Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

My Lords, this has been a significant debate. Everyone who has sat through the past three and a half hours would agree that everyone who has spoken has made an important contribution to public discourse on these important constitutional issues. However, in many ways the most significant speeches are those that were not made. As has already been pointed out, apart from a handful of brief interventions and one speech which seemed not to have been premeditated but to have been motivated by the rather noble intention to fill the great silence echoing across the Chamber from the other Benches, there was nothing from the Liberal Democrat or Conservative Back Benches. I wonder just how it is that all those distinguished Peers sitting on the government Benches have nothing to say about these crucial constitutional issues. As many noble friends have pointed out, that is revealing. Then there was the speech that the Minister did not make. I would have hoped that he would have shown some recognition of the potential risks of rushing through this legislation in the way that the Government are doing. There are risks. These are very technical issues. They are complex and relate together, and the consequences are potentially profound. They have not been considered. Over and over again we have heard it admitted by Ministers. These issues have not been thoroughly considered. My noble and learned friend Lord Falconer asked for evidence of the deliberations and discussions. It could not have been deliberated upon or researched with any seriousness in the timescale available to the Government. That is what is needed. These signal a profound change in our constitutional arrangements, yet the Minister has avoided any recognition that there are risks involved in proceeding in the way that he has. Nor did he produce any serious argument against this amendment. The only argument that he produced is that there is a need for speed, but what is this need for speed? This amendment does not kick it in to the long grass. I respectfully disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Maclennan. It is not inevitable that a commission of inquiry will mean that it is going to get bogged down and will never happen. It is simply a question of political will. If the Government have the political will to drive this forward now, surely in just three years, within the lifetime of this Parliament, they can muster the same political will again. It is entirely a matter for them. There is nothing inevitable or inexorable about this getting bogged down if this amendment were accepted. The Minister produced no good arguments. I would have hoped that at the very least he might have done what my noble friend Lord Grocott urged him to do, which is what Ministers since time immemorial have done, which is to nod wisely and sagely and say that they will at least consider the issues raised by this amendment and perhaps return to it on Report. But he did not even do that, and I am surprised. I had not expected to push this to a vote because I had thought that I would have a more encouraging response from the Minister. But I did not get it, so I am now in two minds. On the one hand, I think that the frailty of the Government’s position has been so exposed in this debate that it should perhaps be tested in the Lobby. But I am not without hope, so the other part of me still hopes that even now the Government may reconsider their position. I hope that they will recognise that their current position is so bereft of principle and so damaging to their credibility, not just in this Chamber or the other place, but among the people of this country who deserve and demand a say in the arrangements by which they will choose the people to represent them in Parliament. I hope that that will give them pause and that between now and Report they will reconsider and see whether there is a way that they can engage seriously with these issues. Finally, I remind the Minister that I am not seeking to substitute my judgment for that of the Government on all these important issues. I am simply asking for an impartial, fair and independent process to resolve these issues within a timescale that most people would recognise as reasonable. In the end, I have decided that I will withdraw the amendment in the hope that the Government will reconsider. If they do not, I am afraid that we will have to return to all these issues on Report. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment 54ZA withdrawn. House resumed. Moved by