Government of Wales Bill

I grateful to the Secretary of State for giving way, because he is having his love-in and his little backroom deal between those on the Liberal Democrat Front Bench—[Interruption.] I am certainly not jealous; I do not want to be catching the Secretary of State’s germs by getting that close to him— [Hon. Members: ““Oh!””] Well, I feel sorry for him. He is not feeling well, you know. Notwithstanding all those silver-tongued words and the ridiculous picture that is being painted of an anti-devolution Conservative Secretary of State for Wales—I am glad that he acknowledges that there is going to be a Conservative Secretary of State for Wales—the issue with the amendment is all about his having pro-consular powers so that he can control the timing of any referendum that is given to the people of Wales. Is that not the fact of the matter? If we do not allow the Lords amendment to go through, it means that he can act as the lord and master of Wales, calling the referendum whenever he wishes. That is the truth of the matter, because, of course, he and the First Minister and the Welsh Labour party are not in the business of calling a referendum that they may lose.