Government of Wales Bill

I was momentarily distracted, Madam Deputy Speaker, by the sheep noises from the hon. Member for Vale of Clwyd. Hopefully, his support for rural policies will follow from that. There is a degree of schizophrenia in the way that the Conservatives approach issues of democratic mandate, but perhaps that is a matter for another day. I am frustrated by the apparent about-turn made by the right hon. Member for Torfaen (Mr. Murphy), who has my considerable admiration and respect, but not when he picks and chooses the manifesto commitments that he thinks his Government should see through. He is quite willing to see the utter abandonment—the U-turn—on other manifesto commitments, such as on student top-up fees, when that suits him. Let us remember that the Government could not have been any clearer in 2001 about their opposition to introducing student top-up fees and went on to blatantly break that commitment. When the right hon. Gentleman comes to use his manifesto promises on this occasion, he will understand why some of us are rather cynical about when and where Labour right hon. and hon. Members choose to support their Government. The second point, which I make to the Secretary of State, is that the Government did not win the last general election. They got roughly a third of the vote. [Hon. Members: ““Oh!””] Hon. Members seem surprised by the mathematics of my claim. I think they will understand when I say that 35 per cent. support suggests to me that 65 per cent. of people voted against their proposition. Even in Wales, a majority of voters voted against the Government’s manifesto, so they cannot realistically cite in defence of their proposal—any proposal—the claim that a majority of people in Wales voted for their manifesto commitment. The amendment tabled by the Conservatives and ourselves reversed the Government’s attempt to ban dual candidacy, for the reasons that we have discussed many times, some of which have been repeated by the Conservative spokesperson this afternoon. The amendment maintains the electoral status quo, with Assembly Members able to stand simultaneously for a constituency seat and on the list. The Liberal Democrats have always maintained that the dual candidacy debate, which has attracted the most attention in the media of all the issues relating to the Bill, is not the single most important issue. It is, in a sense, a secondary procedural issue which has attracted a disproportionate amount of attention. The Bill is fundamentally about devolution and the extent and quality of the powers handed down to the Assembly. Nevertheless, since we are debating it and the Secretary of State is inviting us to rehearse the arguments again, let us recall briefly why there has been opposition to what he and the Labour Government seek to do. The Clwyd, West problem is something of a red herring. The Government White Paper stated that the current arrangement for dual candidacy"““devalues the integrity of the electoral system in the eyes of the public and acts as a disincentive to vote in constituency elections””," presumably because candidates who lose constituency elections can become Assembly Members via the list. However, the Electoral Reform Society commented:"““It has been almost universally agreed that there is little evidence””" to back up the Government’s claims. In her submission to the Welsh Affairs Committee, Kay Jenkins, Head of Office at the Electoral Commission, said:"““There is no evidence that the Clwyd West so-called problem has had any impact on voter participation. . . We have got a very extensive body of research on what makes people vote and not vote across Britain and particularly specifically in Wales, and it is on that basis that we say it is not an issue we could say has ever been raised with us.””" In their evidence to the Committee, Dr. Roger Scully and Dr. Richard Wyn Jones from the university of Aberystwyth cited a study that they had done. They said:"““The total number of people who mentioned anything at all as a reason for not voting in 2003 in our sample was 2; that is out of more than 500 who said they did not vote.””" Let us remember that the Welsh Affairs Committee was split strongly along party lines on the matter and voted 5 to 4 to back the Government’s stance. My hon. Friend the Member for Ceredigion (Mark Williams) voted against the Bill’s proposals, as did the three Conservative members. There are no points for guessing the party affiliation of those who voted for it. Faced with all that powerful evidence to suggest that the Government are pursuing their proposal for party interest rather than democratic interest—