Jack Straw - a long standing supporter of FP TP

Home Secretary Jack Straw said the commission, headed by the former Labour cabinet minister and now Liberal Democrat peer Lord Jenkins, would publish its recommendations in October and that a referendum on changing the way MPs are elected to Westminster would be put to the British people before the end of the current Parliament.

He said: "It is right that voters should have the final say over the electoral system they use to elect us to this House.

"Whether there is change or no change, the referendum will provide the popular legitimacy which is essential for our working democracy."

"Skewed"

The Conservative deputy party chairman, Michael Ancram, said the current remit of the commission was "skewed" as it had only been asked to consider change to the current system and had not been asked to examine the merits of the "first past the post" system.

This, Mr Ancram feared, would inevitably lead to the commission recommending reforms along proportional grounds to which the Conservatives are opposed. He said that "tried and tested arrangements should only be changed when they have clearly failed".

Keeping power

Mr Ancram said that the motive behind Labour's setting up of the Jenkin's commission was not to ensure a balanced and academic review of the electoral system, but rather to keep the Tories out of power for ever by governing in a proportional system through a series of left wing coalitions.

John Major: PR is "mad, bad and dangerous"

The former Conservative Prime Minister, John Major, joined the debate on the side of the status quo, saying Proportional Representation was, "mad, bad and dangerous to adopt".

Tory motion defeated

Despite the impassioned plea against PR from Mr Major and the insistence of the new Conservative constitutional affairs spokesman Dr Liam Fox that:

"The first reason to support the first-past-the-post system is that it works. The second reason ... is that it is better than the alternatives." The Tory motion, which sought to widen the terms of reference of the Jenkins Committee was defeated by 339 votes to 137, giving the government a majority 202.

Debate just starting

There are supporters of PR and the "first past the post" system on both sides of the House.

Mr Straw himself is a long standing opponent of Proportional Representation, even arguing against its adoption during Labour's dog days in the early 1980s when it seemed as if the party would never again govern on its own.

So with Labour investigating change, the Tories rejecting it, and the Liberal Democrats desperate for it, far from ending with this Commons debate the battle over electoral reform starts here.