Fixed Term

Robert Spain (London): Gordon Brown's fascinating transformation from "Stalin to Mr Bean" has forced him to offer to stand down after the next general election (which, following Glasgow East, may be sooner rather than later). Tony Blair made a similar promise in late 2004 after serving seven years as Prime Minister and with a maximum of 2 years left before he had to call an election (in the event the election was held only 8 months later). Brown has already been forced to make this promise 1 year into his tenure and up to 2 years away from a general election. Blair's offer was intended to strengthen his position and ensure his unpopularity did not count against Labour at the ballot box. While the second aim was successful, the first was not. Soon influence began to seep away from 10 Downing Street - most of it next door. There is every reason to suspect that in Brown's case this seepage will be worse. A lame-duck Prime Minister desperate to win just 1 general election is not an ideal state of governance. An important question, therefore, is how to resolve it.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK):  The new issue of Total Politics is out and well displayed in W H Smiths in Victoria (but not yet on its website). It has an exchange over whether there should be fixed term parliaments which includes a piece Iain Dale asked me to write some time ago - it is a very pleasant surprise to open a magazine and find you have written in it! The exchange is a bit awkward as I argue for the German system when a no-confidence motion can force an election which is otherwise fixed for every four years while my opponent thinks the Germans do not have a fixed term for that very reason. Oh well... Here is my last para:

Iain Dale (London, blogger): In a modern democratic state we ought to believe that power should be transferred from the few to the many. Nowhere is this more important than the system used to decide when elections should be held. In local councils, the Scottish parliament, the Welsh Assembly and the European Parliament we have instituted fixed terms to decide when elections should be held. Only for Westminster elections do we still allow one person – the most powerful politician in the country: the Prime Minister - to determine the date of an election. Should we therefore be surprised when the Prime Minister skews that decision according to when he or she thinks an election can best be won? Of course not. Politicians are only human. Well, kind of. It astonishes me constantly that normally sensible minded people still believe the power to call an election should still be in one person’s hands. It’s as if they want to hark back to the days when a sovereign made all the decisions and the ‘little people’ were expected to implement them.

There are, of course, many variants to the concept of Fixed Terms. The very phrase is in itself a bit of a misnomer in that it must still be possible in a parliamentary (as opposed to a presidential) system for an election to be held within a fixed four or five year term. There are several ways in which this could be achieved. A vote of no confidence is perhaps the most obvious as in Germany. Ah, opponents cry, but a government could engineer its own MPs to vote against it, thereby making the whole concept of a fixed term rather redundant. Factually that may be true, but imagine the electoral consequences if that happened. The opposition would make hay out of it.

David Howarth is to be congratulated for his Bill and for sparking further debate. Ideally, all parties would sit down together and thrash this out, but I don’t expect it to happen. There are too many vested interested in the two main parties for them to want to take this issue seriously in the short term. This is a campaign which will have to be fought over several years if it is to achieve success.

OurKingdom is supporting the Campaign for Fixed Term Parliaments along with Iain Dale, Stephen Tall and Unlock Democracy. Here Iain interviews David Howarth on his Bill:

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): Shane Greer is trying to learn to think and asks

But here's my question to advocates of fixed term parliaments: what is unfair, indeed undemocratic, about millions of voters going to the polls and expressing their desire to see the party in government returned for a further five years?

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): Iain Dale has just put the results of a new poll of MPs up on Fixed Term

44% of all MPs support fixed term parliaments, 49% oppose them

25% of Conservative, 41% of Labour and 88% of LibDem MPs support fixed terms

It also gives you the breakdown on a nationl and gender basis.

Bethan Jenkins (Neath, AM): Last week I introduced a statement of opinion at the National Assembly for Wales calling on all AM's to support the call for fixed term Westminster elections. A statement of opinion, for those of you who are less aware of the goings on at the Assembly, is more or less the equivalent of an Early Day Motion in Parliament. My statement specifically calls on our Welsh Assembly Ministers to make representations to Westminster with regards to introducing fixed term elections for Parliament.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): Iain Dale has asked me and Lib-Dem Sephen Tall to start an all party (and no party) campaign for FIXED TERM parliaments with the aim of getting all parties to sign up for it. My hope is that the next election is the last one ever held under current rules. Or even better, that the snipped election of 2007 was the last. The website is just under construction but go to it and sign up, and tell all your friends and foes to do so too, or link up to it via facebook. Here is the short summary of what its about,

Jon Bright (London, OK): It looks like Gordon Brown disliked deciding whether to have an election or not so much that he might make sure neither himself nor any future PM will ever have to endure such strife again. Brown's Green Paper set out a plan for transferring the power to parliament which, like all parliamentary powers in an age of large majorities, would be a change more cosmetic than actual. But Harriet Harman told David Dimbleby today that the idea of a fixed term is also under consideration. OK is helping Iain Dale get a campaign together for just such a change - the facebook group already exists here, with a website and more news to follow. Do you think a fixed term is the right choice for the UK?