1 Primary Elections for Britain Dean Mcsweeney University of the West
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Primary Elections for Britain Dean McSweeney University of the West of England The coalition’s programme for government promises to fund 200 postal primaries during the current Parliament. Targeted at seats which have not changed hands for many years, funding will be allocated to all parties which take up their seats in Parliament in proportion to their share of the vote in the 2010 general election. Speaking at the press conference launching the government’s programme, Prime Minister David Cameron and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg commended postal primaries as a way of increasing public engagement, accountability and choice. 1 The leaders’ enthusiasm for postal primaries notwithstanding, they were in neither of the parties’ manifestos. The idea originated with the Conservative party which had used a variety of primary formats after 2001 to select candidates for parliament and mayor of London. In 2009, the constituency associations in Totnes and Gosport, prompted by central office, used postal primaries to replace retiring MPs disgraced by the expenses scandal. During the general election campaign David Cameron championed postal and open meeting primaries in a speech in Thurrock. Entitled Big ideas to give Britain real change, the speech bore the same name as a party policy document which proposed nine political reforms, including postal primaries.2 The document added detail to the plan for primaries, reproducing the guidelines which had framed the contests in Totnes and Gosport. The local party produces a shortlist of a maximum of four. Voting takes place 20 days after candidates have been shortlisted. Every voter on the constituency’s electoral roll receives a ballot paper through the post with a prepaid envelope for its return. Candidates are asked to observe a £200 limit for their campaign costs. Funding for the 200 primaries, estimated at £8 million (£40, 000 per constituency), comes from cuts in the budget of the Electoral Commission.3 1 Though restricted to the dominant party in a third of constituencies, the introduction of postal primaries will mark a significant departure in how parliamentary candidates are chosen in Britain. The lessons from the two postal primaries used in 2009 are that it will change the numbers and characteristics of those involved in choosing candidates, the criteria for selection and the type of candidates chosen. Much will remain unchanged. Primaries are unlikely to affect the controlling influence of party in the House. The limits to their number and duration will leave most safe seats unaffected and prevent the development of any new form of accountability. Primaries will provide some voters with intra-party competition but inter-party uncompetitiveness will remain the norm. Primaries in Totnes and Gosport In 2009 constituency associations in Totnes and Gosport organised postal primaries open to all registered voters to replace MPs pressed into retirement after two of the most notorious expenses scandals. Totnes MP Sir Anthony Steen claimed £87, 000 for the upkeep of his country house. Criticised for such excesses by constituents, Steen accused them of jealousy. Following a public warning from Cameron that further misconduct would result in expulsion from the party, and two before an appearance before local members, Steen decided to stand down. Approximately hundred aspirants applied to succeed him. Under pressure from Conservative Central Office, the local association decided to hold an open postal primary. The constituency executive drew up a long list of eleven candidates to interview. Three were shortlisted to enter the primary: Nick Bye, the elected mayor of the Torbay local authority in which the constituency is located; Sara Randall Johnson, chair of East Devon Council; and Sarah Wollaston, a GP from central Devon with no experience of public or party office. Wollaston won with 47.9 per cent of the vote, followed by Randall Johnson (33.3 per cent) and Bye (18.7 per cent). Wollaston went on to hold the seat for the Tories at the general election with a majority increased by more than 2, 000, registering a 2.3 per cent swing from the Liberal Democrats. 2 The Gosport the vacancy arose from the retirement of Sir Peter Viggars whose expenses claim of £32, 000 for gardening included £1645 for a floating duck house. Viggars announced his retirement under threat from Cameron of loss of the party whip. There were 190 applications to succeed him. From a long list of six, four were shortlisted to contest the primary: James Bethell, head of communications agency in London, candidate for Tooting in 2005; Caroline Dinenage, a sales director from East Hampshire, who contested Portsmouth South in 2005; Sam Gyimah, head of a training and development business in London and former chair of the Bow Group; and Julia Manning, head of a London health think tank, who had been the candidate for Bristol East in 2005. Dinenage won with 38.6 per cent of the vote, followed by Bethell (23.4 per cent), Gyimah (22.6 per cent) and Manning (15.3 per cent). At the general election the Conservative majority increased by more than 8,000 votes, aided by a 1.3 per cent swing from the Liberal Democrats. New rules, new game Thirty years ago parliamentary candidates in Britain were chosen by the small fraction of party members who served on the constituency selection committees. Writing in 1988, the political scientist Michael Gallagher estimated that the participants constituted approximately 1 per cent of all party members and a negligible proportion of the electorate.4 From the 1980s participation widened to include all members. Selection by all members still confined participation to a tiny fraction of the electorate. By 2005 membership of the three major British parties was estimated to total 571,000.5 Had every member participated in selecting a candidate this would have involved less than 1.5 per cent of the electorate. In practice, a much smaller fraction participates. An MP seeking re-selection normally has an uncontested readoption. Where a new candidate is being chosen, participation is depressed by the substantial numbers of inactive party members, unlikely to join in selecting a candidate even though they are eligible. Surveys by political scientists Paul Whiteley and Patrick Seyd et al found that 40 per cent of Labour members, 48 per cent of Conservatives and 29 per cent of Liberal Democrats confessed to being completely inactive. Majorities in each party had not attended a 3 party meeting in the previous five years.6 Given these filters on the numbers able and wanting to participate in candidate selection, it is likely that only a minority do so. For the 2005 election, participation by 0.5 per cent of the electorate is a generous estimate. Postal primaries vastly increases the numbers involved in candidate selection. Compared to selection by party members, the turnout in the two primaries represented a 35-50 times increase in participation. In Totnes 24.5 per cent of the total electorate cast valid votes (16, 497), 82.4 per cent of the party’s vote at the 2005 general election. In Gosport valid votes totalled 12,659, 17.8 of the electorate and 65.7 per cent of the 2005 Conservative vote. Reproduced in 200 average size constituencies (an electorate close to 70, 000 in 2010), turnout rates similar to Totnes and Gosport would yield a total primary vote of 2.5-3.5 million. Voting in primaries would become as widespread as forms of participation such as taking part in demonstrations, being active in a political campaigns and giving money to political parties. Involving voters is likely to increase the social representativeness of selectorates. None of the parties’ members are a microcosm of their supporters let alone the electorate. Like most forms of political activism, party membership is skewed towards the more educated and those in middle class occupations. In contrast, the working class voters make up from two to four times more of each party’s share of the vote as they do members. Women are a majority of Labour’s voters but only 39 per cent of its members. Conservatives and Liberal Democrats members diverge markedly by age from their parties’ voters. Even though Tory electoral support is greatest amongst those aged 55 and above, they are only half the share of its vote compared to its membership. Most members of the Liberal Democrats are aged over 55 whereas the party’s electoral strength is greatest amongst the under 35s. Primaries also change the behaviour of candidates. When selection was an internal party affair canvassing for support was discouraged or forbidden though not always absent. Most selectors first encountered the candidates at selection meetings. The candidates sought to win support through their formal presentations, responses to questions and their curricula vitae. It was these sources, available at 4 the selection meeting, which were solely relied upon by most of the participants to make their choices.7 These meetings excluded the public even as spectators. Under a primary system of selection, campaigning becomes permissible and public. Voters are the targeted for persuasion, employing activities typical of election campaigns. Candidates in Totnes and Gosport communicated with voters, using leaflets, websites, blogs, e-mails, sites on Facebook and Twitter. Most candidates went looking for votes in public places. Candidates in Gosport appeared at the local market where one established a stall. Other methods of encountering voters included standing at the ferry terminal, holding placards at the roadside on one of the principal commuter routes, attending the local half marathon and conducting a constituent surgery in a pub. Both constituency parties held a public meeting where the candidates spoke and answered questions. Attendance was around 400 in each constituency and there were facilities for casting a vote at the end of the meeting.