Dissent in the British House of Commons: Rejoinder to Franklin, Baxter, Jordan

Dissent in the British House of Commons: Rejoinder to Franklin, Baxter, JordanAuthor(s): Philip NortonSource: Legislative Studies Quarterly, Vol. 12, No. 1 (Feb., 1987), pp. 143-152Published by: Comparative Legislative Research CenterStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/440050 .

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PHILIP NORTON The University of Hull

Dissent in the British House of Commons: Rejoinder to Franklin, Baxter, Jordan

In an article published in this Quarterly in May 1986, "Who Were the Rebels? Dis- sent in the House of Commons, 1970-1974," Mark Franklin, Alison Baxter, and Margaret Jordan presented evidence against three current explanations of declining party discipline in the British Parliament. One of the explanations they challenged, the poor leadership hypothesis, had been advanced by Philip Norton. In this rejoinder, Norton defends his interpretation, finding that the evidence presented by Franklin and his associates leaves it intact. His rejoinder is followed by a response from the authors of the original article.

Since the end of the nineteenth century, party cohesion has been a marked feature of British parliamentary life. It was a distinguished American political scientist, A. Lawrence Lowell, who demonstrated the dramatic rise in the number of party votes in the House of Commons' division lobbies in the 1880s and 1890s (1924, pp. 74-81). It was another distinguished American scholar, Samuel Beer, who chronicled the party stranglehold throughout the first half of the twentieth century. Indeed, writing in 1965, he was to declare that cohesion had increased "until in recent decades it was so close to 100 per cent that there was no longer any point in measuring it" (p. 350). Day after day, he wrote, members of Parliament "with a Prussian discipline ... trooped into the division lobbies at the signals of their Whips and in the service of the authoritarian decisions of their parliamentary parties. We are so familiar with this fact that we are in danger of losing our sense of wonder over them" (pp. 350-351).

Since those words were published, the House of Commons has witnessed an upsurge in intraparty dissension. Regularly, MPs have entered the lobby of their opponents (see Table 1). For the first time in the twentieth century, Government backbenchers-first under the Con- servative Government of Edward Heath (1970-1974) and then under the Labour Governments of Harold Wilson and James Callaghan (1974- 1979)-proved willing to enter whipped Opposition lobbies in order to deny the Government a majority (see Norton, 1981, p. 230). The contrast

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TABLE 1 House of Commons' Divisions

Witnessing Dissenting Votes, 1945-1979

Parliament Number of Divisions (Number of Number of Dissnin os Witnessing Dissenting Votes, Witnessing Dissenting Votes sessions in Expressed as a Percentage parentheses) Total Laboura Conservativea of All Divisions

1945-1950 (4) 87 79 27 7 1950-1951 (2) 6 5 2 2.5 1951-1955 (4) 25 17 11 3 1955-1959(4) 19 10 12 2 1959-1964 (5) 137 26 120 13.5 1964-1966(2) 2 1 1 0.5 1966-1970(4) 124 109 41 9.5 1970-1974 (4) 221 34b 204 20 1974 (1) 25 8 21 23 1974-1979 (5) 423 309 240 28

aAs one division may witness dissenting votes by both Labour and Conservative members, the Labour and Conservative figures do not necessarily add up to the totals on the left.

bExcluding the Labour backbench "ginger group" votes of February-March 1971. See Philip Norton, Dissension in the House of Commons 1945-74, pp. 387-389.

Source: Norton (1980).

between the 1950s and the 1970s is stark. In the 1950s, there were actually two parliamentary sessions in which not one Government backbencher cast a dissenting vote. By the end of the 1974-1979 Parliament, if Prime Minister Callaghan wished to fill a vacant ministerial post with a loyalist backbencher he was not easily able to do so: within the usual pool of backbenchers from which ministers are normally drawn, there was vir- tually no one left who had not at some stage voted against the Govern- ment. Backbenchers have maintained this independence. Despite an overall majority in the House of Commons of almost 140, the present Government of Margaret Thatcher has suffered an embarrassing defeat on the second reading of the Shops bill-68 Conservative MPs voting with the Opposition, producing only the third occasion this century when a Government has lost a second reading-and lost in three divisions on traditional House of Commons matters. Such behaviour would have been regarded, by parliamentarians and observers alike, as inconceivable in pre-1970 Parliaments.

What, then, explains this change in behaviour? Analysis focusses on the 1970s, and at least three separate explanations have been offered in recent years. These form the basis of the evaluation by Franklin,

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Baxter, and Jordan (1986) in a recent issue of Legislative Studies Quarterly.

The first explanation is that a "new breed" of members entered the House and voted with greater independence. This hypothesis has been variously advanced, as Franklin, Baxter, and Jordan chronicle (e.g., Jackson, 1968; Mellors, 1978). For some reason, Franklin and his associates assert, in relation to my own research, "Norton does not him- self confront the socioeconomic explanation associated with the new breed hypothesis" (p. 145). In Conservative Dissidents, I analysed the relationship between dissenting behaviour by Conservative MPs and prior socialisation (education), career aspirations (date of return to the House, age) and career vulnerability (size of winning margin at preceding election) (Norton, 1978a, pp. 217-21). The correlations, generally, were weak-only prior socialisation produced a moderate positive correlation (Yule's Q = +.39)-and not greatly dissimilar to the correlations revealed by Schwarz and Lambert in their analysis of the 1959-1964 Parliament (1972, pp. 65-85; Norton, 1978a, pp. 218-219). Franklin and his associates, employing a broader framework (encompassing Labour MPs and more variables) reinforce that finding. As they conclude, their findings rule out any explanation that is purely generational.

The second explanation is that put forward by John Schwarz (1980), seeking to explain Labour dissension in the succeeding 1974-1979 Parliament. He believes that Labour members were willing to dissent because of a change in what he terms the "parliamentary rule" (that is, that a government will resign if defeated on any issue). As Franklin and his associates comment, and as I have called attention to in my own research, that "rule" (the language is unfortunate; the term is peculiar to Schwarz) was defunct by the end of the 1970-1974 Parliament. During that parliament, the Heath Government suffered six defeats, three of them on three-line whips, and in response to none of them did it even contemplate resigning or requesting a dissolution (Norton, 1976, 1978a). Furthermore, a point not noted by Franklin, Baxter, and Jordan, Schwarz's analysis is based on a misunderstanding of the change that took place, not just on its timing. There was no change in the so-called "rule." Government response to the various defeats of the 1970s (65 in total) was consistent with precedent (Norton, 1978b, pp. 360-378). What changed was not the "rule" but members' perceptions of it. The belief that parliamentary defeat on an important issue necessitated the Govern- ment either resigning or requesting a dissolution was widely held by members. Hence, this belief affected their behaviour significantly, but it had no foundation in any consistent basis of practice or in any authori- tative source. It was, in short, a constitutional myth and was dispelled by the experience of the Heath Government.

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The third explanation is that which I advanced in Conservative Dissidents: that the sudden and dramatic increase in Conservative intraparty dissent in the Commons' division lobbies in the 1970-1974 Parlia- ment was precipitated by Edward Heath's manner of prime ministerial leadership (Norton, 1978a, ch. 9). The policies with which he was associated, his insistence on their expeditious and unamended passage, his unwillingness to explain his actions (especially policy changes) to his supporters and to garner their support through friendship, and his unwillingness to use judiciously his powers of patronage and appoint- ment, all coalesced to produce a parliamentary party that was deeply troubled and members who were prepared to express their disagreement with particular policies in the division lobbies to an extent they had not previously been prepared to contemplate. Mr. Heath's leadership, in short, triggered a dramatic change in the voting behaviour of Conserva- tive members of Parliament.

The conclusion of Franklin, Baxter, and Jordan is that "rebel- liousness cannot readily be accounted for purely by leadership errors on the part of Edward Heath" (1986, p. 155). Their challenge to my hypothesis rests on two assertions. The first, and most important, is that dissenting acts by Labour members in the Parliament were almost as numerous as those by Conservative members (1986, Table 4, pp. 153- 154). The second, which in any event does not challenge my central thesis, is the correlation between backbench committee office and dissent. Both contentions pose little threat to my hypothesis and findings.

Comparability of Intraparty Dissent

Franklin and his associates assert that there were 666 "dissenting acts" by Labour MPs in the 1970-1974 Parliament and 709 such acts by Conservative MPs. Thus, they assert that "rebellious acts on the part of Labour members were almost as numerous as those by Conservatives" (p. 154). There are two problems with this contention. First, my data show no such similarity either in extent or intensity. Second, even if there was such similarity, it would have little bearing on my hypothesis, which rests on an increase in Conservative dissent in the division lobbies. The assertion would have relevance only if it could be shown that there was a comparable increase in Labour dissent in the division lobbies. There wasn't.

Let us consider both points. First, what was the incidence of intraparty dissent in the 1970-1974 Parliament? If "dissenting acts" are defined simply as votes cast against the party whip or official front bench advice, the number of Conservative dissenting acts is 1,513. (This figure

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TABLE 2 Number of Crossvotes Cast

In the House of Commons' Division Lobbies, 1966-1974a

1966-1970 1970-1974 Party Parliament Parliament

Conservative 14 1,115 Labour 162b 92

aA crossvote is defined as one cast against the whips in a division in which Labour and Conservative parties divide against one another with the whips applied on both sides.

bThis figure does not include Labour members voting against the whips during the multiple divisions on the Parliament (No. 2) Bill in 1969. Though most Conservatives voted against the Government, the whips were not applied on the Opposition side.

Source: Calculated from Norton (1975).

is tabulated from my data in Dissension in the House of Commons 1945-74, the source relied upon by Franklin, Baxter, and Jordan.) The equivalent figure for Labour is 553. Allowing for the size of the parliamentary parties and the Conservatives being in office (hence almost one- third of the parliamentary party not being in a position to dissent), a Conservative backbencher cast an average of three times as many dissenting votes as a Labour backbencher. If one considers the willingness of members to crossvote-that is, vote against their own side in a division in which the two parties have divided against one another with the whips applied-the position is even starker. Conservative MPs cast a total of 1,115 crossvotes. Labour members cast a total of 92. Conserva- tive MPs, therefore, cast more dissenting votes than Labour MPs, in more divisions (see Table 1), and with greater intensity.

Second, how does this incidence of intraparty dissent in the division lobbies compare with the preceding Parliament (1966-1970)? Was there a rise in the incidence of Labour dissent from the 1966-1970 to the 1970-1974 Parliament to parallel a rise in Conservative dissent? The reverse, in fact, pertained. There was a decline in the incidence of Labour dissent and a significant increase in Conservative dissent. In the 1966- 1970 Parliament, Labour MPs cast almost four times as many dissenting votes as did Labour members in the succeeding parliament. Conservative MPs, in marked contrast, cast 662, fewer than half the number to be cast in 1970-1974. Again, the position is even starker when one looks only at the number of crossvotes cast (Table 2). Conservative MPs were willing to vote in a whipped lobby of their opponents in the 1970-1974 Parlia- ment in a way they had not previously been willing to and to an extent not shown by Labour members in that or the preceding Parliament.

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TABLE 3 Conservative Dissent

In the Division Lobbies, 1945-1974

Number of Conservative Dissenting Voters

Disenv ing Voe ONumber of Divisions in the Parliament of Involved in Each Occasion of Division Lobby Dissent 1945 1950 1951 1955 1959 1964 1966 1970

1 11 0 6 6 49 0 16 35 2-5 6 1 3 3 52 0 4 55 6-9 3 0 0 1 8 0 1 50 10-19 3 1 0 1 7 0 9 57 20-29 1 0 2 L 1 0 6 5 30-39 1 0 0 0 2 0 1 2 40-49 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 50 or more 2 0 0 0 1 1 3 0

Total 27 2 11 12 120 1 41 204

Source: Norton (1978a).

Hence, the factual basis of my hypothesis remains intact. Con- servative MPs in the 1970-1974 Parliament proved willing to vote against their own side in a way not witnessed before. More members were willing to vote against the whips than in any preceding postwar parliament and to do so in greater numbers than before (Table 3). The figures presented in Tables 2 and 3 are even more impressive when the size of the Govern- ment's overall majority is taken into account. Before 1970, there was a correlation between the incidence of dissent and the Government's overall majority. A large overall majority allowed Government backbenchers to dissent without threatening the Government's majority in the division lobbies. A small overall majority deterred dissension. (Hence, the incidence of dissent in the 1959-1964 and 1966-1970 Parliaments, when the Governments enjoyed majorities of 100 and 98 respectively, was predictable.) That correlation ceased to hold in the parliaments of the 1970s. In the 1970-1974 Parliament, the Heath Government enjoyed an overall majority of 30 (reduced to less than 20 by the end of the Parliament), "a parliamentary majority at just the level of modesty once thought most likely to ensure solidarity and so its policy-making effec- tiveness" (Epstein, 1980, p. 19). Conservative backbenchers proved willing to vote against their own side not only more often than before but in numbers sufficient to deprive the Government of its majority, something Government backbenchers in preceding parliaments had not been willing to contemplate. The Heath Government suffered six defeats and, on my

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calculations, avoided defeat in at least 17 divisions on the European Communities Bill as a result of Liberal votes and some Labour absten- tions. In qualitative terms, there is nothing in preceding parliaments (either on the Conservative or Labour benches) to compare with the crossvoting of 15 Conservative MPs on the second reading of the European Communities Bill, reducing to eight the Government's majority on a declared vote of confidence. Quantitatively and qualitatively, Conservative dissent in the division lobbies in the 1970-1974 Parliament is distinct from intraparty dissent in preceding parliaments-and similarly distinct from Labour dissension in the same Parliament.

Committee Office and Dissent

In their analysis of the relationship between members having "committee roles" and dissent, Franklin, Baxter, and Jordan found that committee officers were more likely to dissent intensively than those members who did not hold office in a backbench committee during the Parliament. This correlation is employed to challenge my finding that there was persistent dissent on a number of issues by an identifiable right-wing grouping. (I was careful to so describe it; Franklin and his associates refer to it as a "right-wing faction," a term I eschewed.) The refutation is based on the assertion that "leading members of backbench committees are not, in either party, likely to represent a factional wing" (p. 154). This, quite simply, is not correct. It is quite common for committees to be led by members representing a particular wing of the party. In the current Parliament, for example, the "wets" and "dries" in the parliamentary party run slates of candidates for particular committees. In the 1970-1974 Parliament, neoliberals within the party led both the finance and the industry committees. Indeed, as was noted at the time by a perceptive political journalist, dissent within the parliamentary party found reflection in "a hankering to make Government critics the voices for the backbenchers" (Wood, 1972). Neoliberal critics thus gravitated to the leadership positions in the backbench committees, the finance committee in particular providing the arena for a powerful battle between neoliberal critics and Government loyalists.

Given that backbench committees on both sides of the House attract members with a particular interest in the subjects covered by the committees, as one would expect, and that dissension is likely to emanate from members who have a particular knowledge of a subject (from the whips point of view, ignorance is bliss), then a correlation between dissent and committee roles is to be expected. Such a correlation does nothing to challenge my hypothesis based on a demonstrable increase in Conservative crossvoting.

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Conclusion

In the Parliament of 1970-1974, Conservative members of Parlia- ment cast dissenting votes more often, in a greater number of divisions, and with much greater effect than in any preceding parliament. The change in behaviour was sudden and significant and finds no parallel on the Labour side of the House.

Why should such a dramatic change in behaviour have taken place? There were clearly extraparliamentary pressures at work. Britain was undergoing growing economic strains; the era of relative prosperity was at an end. New issues were coming on to the political agenda, among them membership of the European Communities. Such pressures partial- ly explain why MPs were more likely than before to disagree with their leaders, but they do not explain the sudden and dramatic way in which Conservative MPs chose to express that dissent. The economic pressures and the new issues were not peculiar to the 1970-1974 Parliament; nor, in general terms, were they peculiar to Britain. Yet the change in behaviour was peculiar to the Conservative party in the House of Commons.

The most plausible explanation lies in the leadership style of Edward Heath. His manner of prime ministerial leadership provided the trigger that impelled Conservative backbenchers-dissatisfied with particular policies and his leadership-to enter the division lobby of their opponents. As one Conservative MP put it, "if the prime minister doesn't listen to you, all you can do is vote against the Government." For Conservative MPs, crossvoting was a weapon of last resort; Prime Minister Heath precipitated their use of that weapon.

Ironically, by exercising prime ministerial power on a scale not witnessed in recent history, Heath provided the basis for that power to be restricted in future years. The reaction it evoked on the backbenches created precedents on which future Government backbenchers-Labour in the 1974-1979 Parliaments, Conservative in the succeeding parliaments-were prepared to build. Labour members, it has already been shown, were previously not unwilling to vote against their own side but usually chose to do so when a Labour Government had a large majority. The experience of the 1970-1974 Parliament dispelled a constitutional myth that had acted as a powerful constraint, deterring members from striking against a vulnerable Government majority: namely, the belief that a Government defeat on an important (or, indeed, on any) issue necessitated a dissolution or the resignation of the Government, the so- called "parliamentary rule" covered by Schwarz. What changed, as I have already argued, was not the "rule" but members' perceptions of it. Recognising that a Government defeat in the division lobbies raised no

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wider constitutional issues and certainly did not jeopardise the continua- tion of the Government in office, backbenchers on both sides of the House could indulge themselves in a way they had never previously con- templated. The result, as one Labour MP put it, was that members came to take a degree of voting independence for granted. The member who made the comment, George Cunningham, quite happily engineered a number of defeats of his own Government, including one on the most important constitutional bill of that parliament, the Scotland and Wales Bill.

Hence, Heath's leadership led to a change in behaviour which sur- vived his period in office and which provided the foundation for a modest change in relations between the executive and the legislature. The behavioural changes led to attitudinal changes on the part of members: they adopted what Beer has aptly characterised as a participant attitude toward government, displacing their previously deferential attitude (Beer, 1982, p. 190). The behavioural changes also led to structural and procedural changes in the House (Norton, 1985). Recognising their new political muscle, backbenchers on both sides of the House forced the creation in 1979 of 14 new investigative select committees and subse- quently approved other changes, a number against the Government's wishes, to extend their institutional capacity to subject the administra- tion to scrutiny. These included the creation of a National Audit Office and an extension of the opportunity to refer bills to special standing committees (Norton, 1986). In short, the House of Commons is no longer the quiescent body that it was in the years before 1970. And the roots of that change are to be found in the prime ministerial leadership of Edward Heath.

Philip Norton is Professor of Government, The University of Hull, Hull HU6 7RX, England.

REFERENCES

Beer, Samuel H. 1965. Modern British Politics. London: Faber and Faber. . 1982. Britain Against Itself. London: Faber and Faber.

Epstein, Leon D. 1980. What Happened to the British Party Model? American Political Science Review, 74:1-22.

Franklin, Mark, Alison Baxter, and Margaret Jordan. 1986. Who Were the Rebels? Dissent in the House of Commons 1970-1974. Legislative Studies Quarterly, 11:143-159.

Jackson, Robert J. 1968. Rebels and Whips. London: Macmillan. Lowell, A. Lawrence. 1924. The Government of England, vol. 2. New York: Macmillan. Mellors, Colin. 1978. The British MP. Farnborough: Saxon House. Norton, Philip. 1975. Dissension in the House of Commons 1945-74. London: Macmillan.

. 1976. The Government Defeat: 10 March 1976. The Parliamentarian, 57:174-175.

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_ . 1978a. Conservative Dissidents. London: Temple Smith. . 1978b. Government Defeats in the House of Commons: Myth and Reality. Public

Law, Winter:360-378. . 1980. Dissension in the House of Commons 1974-1979. Oxford: Oxford University

Press. . 1981. The Commons in Perspective. Oxford: Martin Robertson. , ed. 1985. Parliament in the 1980s. Oxford: Blackwell. . 1986. Independence, Scrutiny and Rationalisation: A Decade of Changes in the

House of Commons. Teaching Politics, 15:69-98. Schwarz, John E. 1980. Exploring a New Role in Policy Making: The British House of

Commons in the 1970s. American Political Science Review, 74:23-37.

Schwarz, John E., and Geoffrey Lambert. 1972. The Voting Behavior of British Conserva- tive Backbenchers. In Samuel C. Patterson and John C. Wahlke, eds., Com-

parative Legislative Behavior: Frontiers of Research. New York: Wiley. Wood, David. November 13, 1972. Times (London).

Response to Norton's Rejoinder

MARK N. FRANKLIN ALISON BAXTER

MARGARET JORDAN University of Strathclyde

In his rejoinder to our article (Franklin, Baxter, and Jordan, 1986), Philip Norton takes issue with four aspects of our work. He com- plains (1) that we ignore his analysis of the socioeconomic basis of dissent, (2) that we misunderstand the influence of a constitutional conven- tion on backbench behaviour after the late 1960s, (3) that our perception that equivalent changes took place in both major parties is wrong, and (4) that the correlation we find between backbench dissent and committee leading role does not contradict his own conclusions. In this response we address each of these four points, though in a different order.

We must start with an apology. The figures we give in our Table 4 for the numbers of Conservative dissenting acts are wrong. These figures were added to the table for documentary purposes at a late stage of draft- ing, and so were not subjected to the same scrutiny as other coefficients in the same table and elsewhere. It is chastening for us to find ourselves

_ . 1978a. Conservative Dissidents. London: Temple Smith. . 1978b. Government Defeats in the House of Commons: Myth and Reality. Public

Law, Winter:360-378. . 1980. Dissension in the House of Commons 1974-1979. Oxford: Oxford University

Press. . 1981. The Commons in Perspective. Oxford: Martin Robertson. , ed. 1985. Parliament in the 1980s. Oxford: Blackwell. . 1986. Independence, Scrutiny and Rationalisation: A Decade of Changes in the

House of Commons. Teaching Politics, 15:69-98. Schwarz, John E. 1980. Exploring a New Role in Policy Making: The British House of

Commons in the 1970s. American Political Science Review, 74:23-37.

Schwarz, John E., and Geoffrey Lambert. 1972. The Voting Behavior of British Conserva- tive Backbenchers. In Samuel C. Patterson and John C. Wahlke, eds., Com-

parative Legislative Behavior: Frontiers of Research. New York: Wiley. Wood, David. November 13, 1972. Times (London).

Response to Norton's Rejoinder

MARK N. FRANKLIN ALISON BAXTER

MARGARET JORDAN University of Strathclyde

In his rejoinder to our article (Franklin, Baxter, and Jordan, 1986), Philip Norton takes issue with four aspects of our work. He com- plains (1) that we ignore his analysis of the socioeconomic basis of dissent, (2) that we misunderstand the influence of a constitutional conven- tion on backbench behaviour after the late 1960s, (3) that our perception that equivalent changes took place in both major parties is wrong, and (4) that the correlation we find between backbench dissent and committee leading role does not contradict his own conclusions. In this response we address each of these four points, though in a different order.

We must start with an apology. The figures we give in our Table 4 for the numbers of Conservative dissenting acts are wrong. These figures were added to the table for documentary purposes at a late stage of draft- ing, and so were not subjected to the same scrutiny as other coefficients in the same table and elsewhere. It is chastening for us to find ourselves

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Dissent in the British House of Commons: Rejoinder to Franklin, Baxter, Jordan