New Labour, Constitutional Change and Representative Democracy

Abstract

THE PURPOSE of this article is to review and assess the constitutional reforms that were made by the Labour Government between 1997 and 2010. Most commentators agree that this was a momentous period of constitutional change—indeed, arguably the most important period of constitutional change in Britain since the introduction of universal suffrage. While it is too soon to assess the full impact of the reforms of the past 13 years, it is already clear that they have altered British democracy for good. The big constitutional question now is: what next? This article attempts to provide answers. In order to do so it is necessary to review what happened since 1997 but also why it happened. For a frequent criticism of Labour's constitutional reform agenda has been that it was all rather haphazard; that there was no blueprint or guiding set of principles behind it.1 So this article is also intended as a response to that charge, by outlining the constitutional changes of the past 13 years and the principles that underpinned them as well as looking ahead to possible future reforms. And finally, in looking to the future, this article engages with the fundamental issue that is emerging in contemporary constitutional debates about the future of British politics, which is the argument between those who advocate a shift from representative to direct democracy. My intention is to argue on the side of those who wish to preserve the essential qualities of our representative system, and in making that argument I hope to inject some realism into the debate about how far constitutional reform can stimulate public engagement in politics—which can at times become a little far fetched.