My Lords, over the last year Parliament has debated, agreed and decided that the voting system for mayors and police and crime commissioners should be changed to the supplementary voting system, or SV, through the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act 2026, which received Royal Assent in April. I remember fondly the debates noble Lords had on the matter during the passage of that legislation. Therefore, I am sure that some of the points I will go on to set out in relation to SV will be familiar to noble Lords in the Chamber today. The SV system was used when the positions of elected mayors and police and crime commissioners were first established decades ago. The Government believe that it is the most appropriate voting system for single executive offices, where it is essential that the individual has a broad mandate from their electorate.
The English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act contains the main measures required to change the voting system used for these types of elections, and these will be commenced in due course. However, there are also a number of other changes that must be made to the election conduct rules via secondary legislation to fully enable the use of SV: for example, updating the images on ballot papers to allow a voter to select multiple preferences, updating guidance to electors, and updating the procedures used at the count should there be a second round of counting.
My Lords, I thank the Minister for her introductory comments, and I shall return to one or two of the points that she made in a moment. It is worth being honest in relation to election changes. In every party, when they make election law changes, they may hide it in one form or another, but, over their shoulder, they are looking at how they are going to benefit from any particular change, and that is worth acknowledging. In this case, the speed with which this order has been brought forward is striking. One has to ask the question: why on earth is it being brought forward at this stage, particularly because, as the Minister said, the legislation has just been passed, having received Royal Assent in April? She also went on to say that:
“Further legislation will be brought forward”
for other matters
“in due course”.
Every single debate in which I have participated on election law in the last decade has included a request to simplify the whole process of elections law, and to not make it more complicated. There has been persistent reference to the Law Commission, its original report, and further changes thereafter. What do we have here? It is an admission by the Minister that we are debating one thing this evening, but at some unspecified stage, further legislation will be brought forward. Why? The answer is quite simple: it is because the Labour Party has got itself into an almighty mess in the north-west. There is a by-election in Makerfield on Thursday, and there is the possibility of a by-election for the Greater Manchester mayoralty thereafter, at a cost—although the Government refuse to identify the actual figure—probably of around £5 million, to solve their problems. That is the first issue.
My Lords, I concur 100% with the comments from my noble friend Lord Hayward. I am going to take this statutory instrument at face value and discuss the issues that it raises on the alternative vote and first past the post. As noble Lords will know, when proportional representation was tested with the electorate in 2011—in this case, the alternative vote referendum—it was lost by a margin of 68% to 32%.
Noteworthy in the statutory instrument is the paucity of intellectual rationale for why the changes are happening. I agree with my noble friend: it looks like a cynical stitch-up to avoid embarrassment in the combined boroughs of Greater Manchester. But it also potentially looks like a strategy for a progressive alliance being rolled out in the run-up to a general election—for instance, with the Green Party and the Liberal Democrats —with the stated or probably unstated aim of locking out the Conservatives and Reform UK from power.
First past the post is simple and fair, and Conservatives have always supported it. It ensures proper representation and broad campaigning by parties, rather than policies targeted on a subset of voters. It is simple and transparent. Even in a disaggregated, fragmented political landscape, it is still stable and effective at delivering governance. One person secures the plurality of votes and that is transparent. As it happens, almost 100 Labour MPs have been elected in the other place with less than 35% of the votes. So if it is good enough for this Government’s majority in the other place, it is good enough for our elections generally.
My Lords, methinks the previous speakers on the Conservative Benches do protest too much. First, I remind the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, that it was the Conservative Government, I believe, who introduced the supplementary vote in the first place. So that puts that argument to one side. Secondly, his argument was that first past the post gives us good, clear results. Well, it may do, but on very much of a minority of the electorate. We share this wonderful system with just one country in the world: Belarus. Maybe that is not the sort of companion we would really prefer. I certainly would rather have a system that reflects people’s voting preferences than something that is, as the noble Lord said, easy to count.
As the noble Lord, Lord Hayward, pointed out, the timing of this statutory instrument is interesting, and very helpful to the Government. There is a by-election on Thursday, which may result in a vacancy for the Mayor of Greater Manchester. So here we are with an SI. The voting system for the combined authority mayors was, as I said just now, initially by the supplementary vote. That was abandoned by the Conservative Government, in 2022, I think, in favour of the first past the post model.
The noble Lord, Lord Hayward, said that Governments do this cynically: they choose a voting system saying, “This will be better and reflect the needs of the electorate more”, while looking over their shoulders at how the voters are actually going to choose who they vote for. I suggest to him that maybe that is what happened in 2022. The outcome was not what the Conservative Government hoped for, because in the mayoral elections that followed that change last year, the average turnout was 30%. Two of those mayors who were elected got less than 30% of that 30%—in other words, with less than 10% of the electorate supporting them. I do maths; I am right.
That illustrates the degree of voter apathy about whichever system is used. At least with the supplementary vote there is a bit of a better reflection of voter preferences. But the system is by no means perfect in matching what voters want. It is at best a halfway house towards true electoral fairness, because voters are restricted, as we have heard, to two preferences—column A and column B.
My Lords, before I speak—although I am not sure it is a conflict in this issue— I need to declare that I am a councillor in Central Bedfordshire. I thank noble Lords for speaking in this debate. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, who I think at the end of her speech said she is in favour of the single transferrable minute from one speaker to the next to allow her to speak longer. I thank my noble friends Lord Hayward, who raised the very important question of why now—I will come to that later—and Lord Jackson, who gave an excellent exposition of the shortcomings of the transferable vote or supplementary vote system
This is, in essence, a reversal. Within a relatively short period of time, we have moved from supplementary vote to first past the post, and now back to supplementary votes for mayoral elections. Whatever view one takes of the respective systems, that degree of oscillation is not a strength of constitutional design. I ask the very simple question: what problem is this change actually seeking to solve? The Government’s answer appears to be the claim that the supplementary vote system produces a mayor with broader support and therefore greater legitimacy. It is also said to allow voters to express preferences more fully and to ensure that votes are not wasted—although, as my noble friend Lord Jackson pointed out, in the previous London mayoral election there seemed to be an awful lot of wasted supplementary votes.
My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for their considered contributions today. I first pick up the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, about the principle behind this. I think that is the most important thing; I did set it out in my introductory speech. It is that the Government believe that this is the most appropriate voting system for single executive offices where it is essential that an individual has a broad mandate. Having cleared up that point of principle, I will try to answer all noble Lords’ questions.
The noble Lord, Lord Hayward, asked whether the reason for delivering this change at pace was political advantage. The answer to that is, clearly, no. As I have already said, the Government were very clear during the passage of the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act that we intended to make this change for mayoral and PCC elections after May 2026. There is now the potential for such an election; I will come on to more about that in a moment. We are therefore acting to deliver on our commitments made to Parliament.
The noble Lord, Lord Jackson, raised these issues as well—I am sorry that the charm offensive that I experienced yesterday has come to a shuddering halt, but never mind. The noble Lord referred to
I thank the Minister for giving way. I am very pleased indeed by her commitment to write to me. My noble friend Lord Jamieson referred to the associated costs of introducing this process. Could we possibly have both at the same time?
I will have a look at whether it is possible to get that figure; I thank the noble Lord for that question.
The noble Lords, Lord Hayward and Lord Jamieson, asked me why we are changing the voting system only for two types of mayoral elections. First, to reiterate— as I think was referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock—these changes revert to the 2017 voting system, which was brought in by the Conservatives, and it was the Conservatives who changed it back in 2022. We are reverting to the system that the Conservatives had introduced for these single-office posts.
The English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act 2026 received Royal Assent in April this year and the Government’s stated aim has always been that we will work at pace to deliver secondary legislation needed to implement the new law at the earliest appropriate opportunity. Of course, the Government are conscious that there is now a possible scenario in which a mayoral by-election may need to be held in Greater Manchester in the coming months, subject to the outcome of a parliamentary by-election in the Makerfield constituency on Thursday this week.
To fulfil both Parliament’s will and this Government’s stated commitment to reimplement SV, we have drafted this order at pace to ensure that the necessary legislation will be in place for this system to be utilised if that mayoral by-election takes place. To meet this deadline, the order had to be kept concise and could not include measures to amend all other types of mayoral elections. Amending all the relevant mayoral and PCC election conduct rules would also require a range of statutory instruments, as they use different parliamentary procedures. We intend to implement SV for other mayoralties and PCCs in due course through separate instruments.
If the noble Lord will bear with me for a moment, I am going to answer some of his other points. If I do not cover it, he is welcome to step in.
The noble Lord, Lord Jackson, raised issues about the voting system. I am sure he will make his comments on voting in London when we make the instrument for London mayoral elections. To be clear, this particular instrument does not cover London mayoral elections. SV was the voting system implemented on the introduction of both mayoral and police and crime commissioner elections. As I said, we think it is much more appropriate for selecting single-person executive positions such as mayors or police and crime commissioners.
However—and the noble Lord Jamieson asked about this—we believe that the first past the post system is a clear way of electing representatives which is well understood by voters and which, although not perfect, provides for a direct relationship between a member of a legislature and the local constituency. The first past the post voting system is therefore a more suitable system where there are a number of seats to be filled, such as for a council or a Parliament, and the likelihood is that people representing a range of views and parties will be elected. Therefore, the Government have no plans to change the electoral system for UK parliamentary or local council elections in England.
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As stated during passage of the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act, the Government’s intention was to implement the change to SV for any mayoral or PCC election taking place after the scheduled May elections this year. This order has been drafted to be concise, so it will make only the necessary additional amendments to enable SV to be used for both combined authority and combined county authority mayors, including those who exercise police and crime commissioner powers. The order will therefore not make amendments with regards to local authority mayors, the Mayor of London, or police and crime commissioner elections. Further legislation will be brought forward for those in due course.
Turning to the timings for implementation, this order will make the change to SV for any combined authority or combined county authority mayoral election for which notice is given on or after the date this order comes into force. As this is a reversion to the original voting system used for mayoral elections, the SV process will be familiar to both administrators and electors. Implementing these changes will therefore be straight- forward, and we are confident that returning officers will be able to make the necessary changes.
I now turn to the content of the instrument. The conduct rules for elections of combined authority and combined county authority mayors are set out in the Combined Authorities (Mayoral Elections) Order 2017. This order will make a number of amendments to the 2017 order. As we have discussed already, the SV system was that used when combined authority mayors were first established, so these changes are largely reverting the 2017 order back to its original drafting. The Electoral Commission has been formally consulted on these changes and has raised no objections. Articles 3, 4 and 5 of this instrument will amend Schedules 1, 2 and 3 to the 2017 order respectively. They set out the conduct rules for these mayoral elections, both when the poll is a standalone poll and when the poll at a mayoral election is combined with the poll at another type of election or referendum.
The amendments will update the guidance given to voters in polling stations to reflect that they now have the option to select a second preference. They will also update the various processes involved in counting the votes, to reflect that a second round of counting may be required. They also make a number of consequential amendments throughout the conduct rules, to ensure that references to votes refer to first and/or second preference votes, as appropriate.
Schedules 1 and 2 to this instrument contain updated statutory electoral forms. Schedule 1 sets out the forms in respect of a stand-alone mayoral election, and Schedule 2 sets out the forms where a mayoral election is combined with another type of election or referendum.
There are two types of forms that require updating to enable SV. The first is the ballot paper; a new ballot paper image is provided in this instrument to allow voters to select both a first and second preference of candidates. The instrument also contains the ballot paper to be used where there are only two candidates running, as in that scenario, voters are not given the choice to select a second preference, and the poll reverts to a simple majority voting system. The second is the postal voting statement; this contains guidance to postal voters, so this instrument provides a new postal voting statement form that will inform the voter that they may select both a first and second preference where there are three or more candidates running.
To conclude, these are straightforward changes necessary to implement a change set out in the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act. I hope that the House will join me in supporting this instrument, and I look forward to answering any questions that noble Lords might have. I beg to move.
Let us be honest about this order. It is not normal to identify who would be affected by a particular change of law, but this order is an attempt to prevent Reform winning the possible Greater Manchester mayoralty by-election. It would be better titled “Combined Authorities (Mayoral Elections) (Stop Reform Winning the Greater Manchester Mayoralty) Order 2026”, because that is what it comes down to. There is no other justification for the haste with which this order has been introduced, other than that it solves the Labour Party’s problems and prevents Reform winning a mayoralty. It does not do British democracy well when the position is as blatant as that—nothing more, nothing less. Otherwise, the order could have waited until all the different changes necessary could be introduced in one go, at one time, in the near future.
I want to comment on one other element of this order, and that is the impact assessment. All changes in legislation have an impact; some are smaller than others. The Minister is right that we are reverting to a system that operated previously. Therefore, there should be relatively small changes, but they are changes none the less. It has been quite a few years since this system was introduced, and there will be many polling station officers, returning officers and people asked to administer the whole process who are new to this. A necessary set of changes will result in training courses. As the Minister identified, notices will be different and understanding will be different.
I cannot believe that when this is introduced, the Electoral Commission will not expect to provide guidance to the voters of Greater Manchester on how they will now vote, as against how they did last time. Although the costs in the impact assessment are relatively small, it is not correct to say that there will be no or virtually no cost. It is appropriate that we should be told what the cost is and what the total cost of a Greater Manchester by-election would be, as the Labour Party tries to get itself out of a mess of its own making.
In 2016, the Home Affairs Select Committee recommended that first past the post was best to replace the supplementary vote in police and crime commissioner elections. SV causes confusion and leads to a lot of spoiled and rejected ballots. The Electoral Commission, in its September 2021 report on the 2021 elections, noted:
“A quarter of people who had difficulties filling in their ballot paper in areas holding both local government and PCC elections said it was confusing that the elections used different voting systems. A third of people voting in London said that they found the two voting systems confusing”.
In fact, the rejection rate in the London mayoralty election in 2021 was 114,201 ballots, of which 87,000 were because voters cast a vote for more than one candidate in the first-preference column; 265,353 votes were invalidated because the second preference was cast for the same candidate as the first; and 319,978 second preferences were unmarked. These void rates exceeded the votes validly transferred to the two leading candidates: Mr Khan got 192,000 votes, and Mr Shaun Bailey—now the noble Lord, Lord Bailey of Paddington —got 85,000 transfers.
First past the post focuses on clear accountability. Electors know the one individual who is responsible for the failings or the successes of public policy. SV gives a recycled second vote the same democratic credibility as voters’ first choice. Each vote should count equally. One person, one vote. In fact, a supplementary vote is used almost nowhere else across the globe. The late, much-renowned and much-missed elections expert and academic, David Butler, described SV as a silly answer, based on the need to compromise between rival factions.
First past the post is quicker to count and cheaper to administer, as my noble friend Lord Hayward said, and better understood by voters. Some very eminent people in your Lordships’ House agree with this. In fact, one of them said that “SV is one of the worst systems. We had a referendum in 2011 on changing the voting system for elections to the House of Commons. This was wholly rejected, and I have seen nothing following on from that result, or anything that has happened subsequently, which leads me to believe that the country wants to change the voting system for any elections. We have managed to heap on voters a whole plethora of voting systems. That is not a good thing to do. I thought that one of the worst systems was the SV system. I have observed many counts where people have put a cross in the second column, which means that their votes are discounted.” Brilliantly said by the current Labour Government Chief Whip—quite, my Lords. Indeed, in 2021 the UCL Constitution Unit described the supplementary vote as “an anomaly” and out of step with other elections in England.
At least AV, which is an alternative system, allows a more pluralistic preference voting. I ask the Minister directly: will she confirm that these changes will take effect in respect of a putative Greater Manchester mayoral by-election, which may or may not happen later this year? This is about raw politics. It fails to make a coherent fact-based intellectual case for reverting to an SV regime. It is about locking out Reform UK and the Conservatives from power, and therefore it fails on merit and is a retrograde step, which my party and I oppose.
I think it was the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, who said that voters get confused by different voting systems. I am going to ask him to go to Scotland to enjoy its voting system. Local government is elected by single transferable vote. Votes for the Scottish Parliament are by two systems, one for regional and one first past the post—the regional is to make it more proportional. The third, of course, is first past the post for the Westminster election. The people of Scotland have no trouble with that, and the people of Northern Ireland and Ireland have no trouble with STV, so I am not sure why the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, thinks people in England will be confused.
The argument against SV is that you limit voters’ preferences to just two. If you do not like what is on offer, and if your second choice is not of one of the top two candidates, you have no say because your vote is just discarded. In that sense, those voters are left out completely.
I have a question for the Minister. I had assumed that the supplementary vote would be counted and if there was no majority on the first count the top two would be taken forward to second preferences and all other candidates would be eliminated. However, I could not find that in the SI. It refers to
“the candidates remaining in the contest”
without identifying that that will be, as I assume, the top two. Perhaps the Minister can help me understand what is meant and why it is worded rather vaguely.
I know the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, does not like the alternative vote. Actually, neither do I, because although it is more proportional than either first past the post or supplementary vote, it is not the best system to reflect what people want, but it would be a bit better than using either first past the post or SV.
We support the order reluctantly because it moves us a bit further forward and gets rid of first past the post for at least one election. I think it was the noble Lord, Lord Hayward, who suggested that we are now in a multi-party situation. In elections, there are going to be candidates from at least five parties. In the recent local elections where I live, in several wards there were seven candidates. In those instances, people could be elected on 20% or less of the vote. That makes it more of a lottery than it ought to be. It does not reflect what voters really want and is not good for democracy—the Government Whip is giving me the eye just because I have gone 13 seconds over the time.
Democracy depends on the electorate trusting and having faith in the system. If we do not have trust and faith in the system, that is when democracy is in peril. A big change to the electoral system would be good, but I will go with this one.
These arguments are familiar; they have been advanced in favour of preferential systems for many years. But repetition is not justification. The reality is that this draft does not demonstrate a failure in the existing arrangements of first past the post; nor does it set out evidence that voter confidence in mayoral elections has been undermined by the current system. Instead, it simply asserts that the alternative system is preferable. That is not sufficient when what is at issue are the rules by which democratic office is secured. First past the post has one defining virtue, and that is clarity. The candidate with the most votes wins. There is no second count, no transfer of preferences, and no recalculation. The result is immediate and intelligible. As my noble friend Lord Jackson of Peterborough pointed out, the public have previously demonstrated that they have a preference for the first past the post system.
That matters more than Members may realise, because the electoral system does not exist just in theory. It exists in the mind of the voter at the ballot box. If the voter does not really understand how their vote translates into outcome, we risk something important being lost. The supplementary vote system is not incomprehensible, but it is more complex. It does introduce a second stage of allocation, where preferences are redistributed. That may be administratively manageable, but it is not straightforward and it is not intuitive. We must remember that confidence in our elections is essential.
The Government also argue that the system produces a more legitimate mandate, because it takes account of second preferences. That is a fundamentally different conception of legitimacy, and it is not a neutral change. Under first past the post, legitimacy comes from a clear view expressed at the ballot box. Under supplementary vote, it comes from aggregated preferences after elimination and redistribution. Those are different constitutional logics. First past the post is well understood: it is tried, tested and clear. The question for this House is which is more appropriate for mayoral elections in England today. We are not persuaded that the Government have made a strong enough case that change is required.
There is also the wider concern of uncertainty caused by frequent changes. That cannot be ignored. Electoral arrangements should not shift back and forth with such frequency. Voters, candidates and administrators require stability. They need to know that the rules they are voting under today will be same at the next election. At present, that confidence is weakened by repeated changes.
I should therefore be grateful if the Minister could address a straightforward point. What is the Government’s principle here? Is it that electoral systems should be treated as settled constitutional arrangements unless there is clear and compelling evidence of failure, or is it that they may be altered whenever the Government take a different view? Those are very different approaches.
There is also the question of practice. The instrument requires changes to ballot papers, guidance to returning officers, counting procedures, voter information, and administrative systems across combined authorities. All of that is manageable, but it is not without its cost, its friction, and its implications for time. As my noble friend Loyd Hayward has raised, I also ask the question: why now? Why the urgency? Putting this in place will take some time for electoral returning officers, yet there is a risk we shall very shortly have a mayoral by-election. Would it not be better to delay to ensure a smoother implementation and also to include those other potential future changes? My noble friend asked: why now? I also ask: why now?
What assessment has been made of the costs to local authorities of implementing this change? What additional burdens will fall on electoral administrators? What steps will be taken to ensure consistency of understanding across different areas in the run-up to elections? More importantly, what assessment has been made of voter understanding? It is often assumed in this debate that voters are closely engaged with the mechanics of electoral systems, but my personal experience is that they are not. In fact, sometimes they are not that closely engaged in the detailed minutiae of politics, so I think that is a stretch assumption. What matters to voters is that the process is clear at the point of voting and that the outcome is trusted. Trust depends on simplicity and familiarity; both are weakened when this system changes repeatedly.
None of this requires us to resolve, once and for all, the philosophical debate between electoral systems. Reasonable people will differ on that question. But what the House is being asked to approve is not an abstract principle; it is a concrete change to the machinery of elections, justified on the basis of asserted improvements in legitimacy. We on this side of the House are not persuaded that the case has been made. We are not convinced that the benefits outweigh the cost to clarity, stability and confidence. We are concerned about the wider pattern of repeated alterations to electoral arrangements. We are also concerned about “why now?”
For those reasons, while I look forward to the Minister’s response, I must indicate that we remain unconvinced by the necessity or wisdom of this statutory instrument.
They did a very good job of that themselves; I think that is clear.
The noble Lord, Lord Hayward, asked me about the cost of any by-election in Manchester. If he does not mind, I will write to him on that issue. It is paid for by the local authority and not from central taxation. However, in the general course of things, when it is not a by-election, these elections will be held anyway. Ballot papers have to be printed anyway. The count has to be held anyway. Those costs are very similar, whether the election is held under SV or under first past the post.