Government of Wales Bill

I think my response to the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. David) answers that question as well. The hon. Gentleman will recall from those Committee discussions that I thought that it would be healthy for the Welsh democratic process to allow the significant stream of opinion in the Principality that still has not come round to the idea of devolution, and would rather see it scrapped, to be aired. I do not think we should be afraid of that. I do not believe that it is deeply damaging, or even anti-Welsh, to suggest that a referendum should include such a question, and I remember that two Labour members of the Committee agreed with me. Let us be clear about this. I do not oppose further devolution, if the people of Wales choose it. I have no problem with stage 3 devolution as envisaged in part 4. Full devolution following a strong, positive referendum result is essential, however: it cannot be introduced through the back door without an opportunity for the people of Wales to vote. The problem lies in the constitutional trickery in part 3—the Order-in-Council procedure. The Secretary of State has spoken on a previous occasion of his dislike of referendums and has said that other issues can be bundled into a referendum campaign so that what might have begun as a question about a specific issue becomes a mechanism for disgruntled voters to sound off about their general unhappiness with the Government of the day. That is a fair point. I well understand why he is concerned about how the electorate might behave after nine long years of his cynical Government. I think, though, that he underestimates the sophistication of the Welsh electorate when it comes to thinking about their Assembly. We should have nothing to fear from a referendum. The pace and direction of devolution must be dictated only by the Welsh people. As a member of the Select Committee, I want to record my disappointment at the way in which the Government produced the Bill without even waiting for the Committee to publish its report on the White Paper. That makes a mockery of pre-legislative scrutiny. Perhaps I should not be surprised, however. At no point during his appearance before the Committee for the inquiry did the Secretary of State appear to be in listening mode. That was particularly evident when he and the First Minister were asked about the proposals for altering electoral arrangements for constituency and regional list Members. Committee members will recall their double act when they sought, outrageously, to trash the reasonable and considered concerns put by the Electoral Commission and by Dr. Richard Wyn Jones and Dr. Roger Scully of Aberystwyth university, who said that the new arrangements could be seen as serving partisan interests and could therefore undermine confidence and participation in the electoral process. The First Minister laid into them, saying"““I think this is not their finest hour””," and claiming that their statements were ““poor and unsupported””. The Secretary of State himself then accused the Electoral Commission of being out of touch with political reality. It was all very unsavoury. Those tactics only served to reinforce the impression that deep partisan motivation underlies the changes in the electoral arrangements, and that the Labour party has no desire to achieve any cross-party consensus on the issue.