Cameron gets his history wrong on referendum thresholds
“We have not had thresholds in previous referendums.”
David Cameron, Prime Minister’s Questions, 9 February 2011
With the AV Referendum Bill gathering some belated momentum in its passage through Parliament, the House of Lords voted on Monday to make the results non-binding if turnout is below 40 per cent.
When David Cameron was asked by Conservative backbencher Christopher Chope in today’s PMQs if he agreed with this move, the Prime Minister gave a curious response, asserting that it was unprecedented for requirements such as these to be met.
However a leaf through the history books shows that this isn’t true.
When the voters of Scotland and Wales were first offered devolved assemblies in 1979, the Welsh rejected the proposals by a ratio of almost 4:1.
However north of the border, the Scottish electorate voted marginally in favour of devolution. Why then did MSPs only take their seats after the referendum was repeated in 1997?
The answer is that the Scotland Act of 1978 which precipitated the referendum in the subsequent year stipulated that for the proposals to be implemented and a new assembly instituted, at least 40 per cent had to vote in favour. This threshold was not reached, with only 33 per cent of eligible voters backing the measures at the ballot box.
Whilst the Scottish example differs from the present set of proposals in that it required 40 per cent to actively vote 'yes' rather than simply turn up, there very clearly was a threshold imposed by Parliament.
Funnily enough, this exact point is made in a House of Lords memorandum by Professor Vernon Bogdanor, Mr Cameron’s former tutor at Brasenose College, Oxford.
He writes: “The Government and Parliament decided, perhaps rightly, not to allow Scottish devolution to go ahead in 1979 despite the small positive majority for it—33 per cent-31 per cent—far below the 40 per cent threshold which Parliament had set.”
Full Fact wouldn’t like to speculate on Mr Cameron’s attention levels in tutorials during his Oxford days, but it seems on this occasion the Prime Minister would do well to spend a little more time in the Library.
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