UNIVERSITY VOTE IN BRITISH PARLIAMENT BEING ABOLISHED

Grey River Argus, 29 March 1948, Page 2

UNIVERSITY VOTE IN BRITISH PARLIAMENT BEING ABOLISHED

LONDON, March 21.

Conservatives and Independents are doing their .utmost to retain the few remaining special Parliamentary franchises, but the Labour Government are determined to sweep them away. By a large majority in a crowded House, the Commons decided recently to abolish university presentation. This is one of the few controversial parts of the Electoral Reform Bill being now debated m the Committee of the whole House. The importance of the occasion was marked by the participation in the debate of two senior Ministers, Mr Morrison and Mr Ede, Home Secretary, and Mr R. A. Butler for the Conservatives. All the university Members who spoke opposed the abolition.

There are two main points of contention. One is whether retention of university franchies (by which all graduates vote) justifies the departure from normal territorial representation. The other is whether the agreement between the Parties to retain it, which was reached during the wartime Coalition, is valid now that the Coalition has been broken up.

University representation was instituted over 300 years ago by James I to secure the presence in Parliament of Members not bound to landed, or trading, or official interests. It has survived all' the many electoral changes of the past century or so, partly because there seemed no good reason to abolish it and partly because it has been a way of sending to Parliament useful members not specially gifted with the arts of popular appeal. ' -

The Labour Government are now tidying up wherever they can and in dealing comprehensively with the whole electoral system for the first time, they argue that the case for retaining what they term “fancy franchises” in modern Britain is not strong enough. Mr Morrison, who had not a university education, but said ho wished he had, earnestly disclaimed any bias against universities (w-hich are almost entirely recruited by merit alone nowadays) recalling how the present Government had shown special .favour to them. What he objected to was plural voting which used to be common but had been steadily reduced under the democratic system.

Alleged Breach of Faith On the question of the broach of faith over the wartime agreement. Mr Morrison offered to submit to any impartial body that the Opposition had not proved their case and that the Coalition proceedings did not commit to successor Governments. The Conservatives do not say there was a written binding agreement, but that there was gentlemen’s agreement and that such constitutional matters should always, if possible, be settled by arrangement between the Parties. Mr Butler did not mince his words on this subject or on the abolition of the University Vote. The latter he regards as one more blow at tradition, at the professional classes and at higher education and one more step on the road to soulless party bureaucracy. It was, he asserted, being done for Party reasons because elsewhere under the Bill, Labour was likely to lose a few London seats, through redistribution of constituents. They could not win university seats, so they abolished them. Government speakers repudiated this, maintaining that they wore against any outstanding anomalies in the voting system whichever party these might favour and would have redistributed the London seats in any cas*.