---

Scotland Bill

It is true to say that the devolution settlement achieved at the time of the referendum represented the settled will of the Scottish people, but that does not mean that there can never be any further change of any kind. In our debates on the Bill, we have identified difficulties and we have tried to resolve them and to move things forward by making changes. On the question of the electoral system, we first have to ask whether there are any problems and, if there are, whether there is a solution. I believe that there are some difficulties with the existing system. For example, the public have never entirely understood how losers become winners. They see people standing for election in a constituency and losing, only to pop up as an MSP anyway. The situation is made far worse when some of those who lost pretend to be the MSP for the constituency in which they stood and were defeated. That was certainly the case for a considerable number of years in Glasgow Pollok, where Johann Lamont was elected by first past the post. Kenny Gibson, from the SNP, who came second, then pretended to be the local MSP. Tommy Sheridan, from the horizontal road to socialism party, who is now detained elsewhere, also pretended to be the MSP for that constituency. That was undoubtedly unhelpful, because different people would turn up at local meetings, events, protests and campaigns pretending to be the MSP. This is a genuine issue that needs to be addressed. We have already heard the outrageous story of Alex Neil printing posters saying that he was the MSP for Airdrie and Shotts when patently he was not. That was a deliberate attempt to deceive the electorate. The fact that there is an election coming up in the near future can only be coincidence, but that was none the less a deliberate attempt to deceive. We also had a situation in the Govan constituency, the one beside mine, where Nicola Sturgeon camped out. She has now won that seat, but she did so partly because she had pretended to be the list MSP for that constituency. These are all clear difficulties in the present system and they need to be looked at. Related to that problem is the cherry-picking not just of issues but of individual items of casework, especially in relation to immigration cases but to others as well. As an MP, I have had a string of cases in which MSPs have taken up people's complaints about immigration, told them that they could do something about it, led them down a path that led nowhere at all, then told them to come and see me. By that time, a considerable period had passed and some of the people had consulted lawyers based on what they had been mis-told. The same thing has happened with social security cases. We need a change in the rules that would stop list MSPs, in particular, cherry-picking.