Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

My Lords, I visited Cornwall for many years. More recently, I became a resident there. Unsurprisingly, I get involved quite a lot in transport issues there. I agree with all noble Lords who said how important it is to keep Cornwall separate. I look on Cornwall as an island. Only six miles of land separate Devon and Cornwall on the north side. The river Tamar is the frontier. Crossing the Tamar on a bridge has always been difficult. There are not many road bridges, and many were fearsome in the past. There is one railway bridge. The roads are so bad that about the only railway in the area apart from the main line that was preserved by Dr Beeching was the interesting line that goes up to Gunnislake—which involved reversing in the middle of nowhere—because the local residents rightly argued that that was the only way in which they could get out in the winter when it was snowy. The line is still running very well. I therefore compare Cornwall, as a semi-island, with some of the Scottish islands, which, as we have heard, have already been granted what you might call their own constituency status. I see how the Scottish ferries operate extremely effectively and efficiently, subsidised and supported by the Scottish Government, and I compare that with what happens in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly. We have two very good ports in Cornwall in the shape of Foy and Falmouth. I am pleased to be a harbour commissioner in the port of Foy. Penzance, at the end of the railway, is where the ferry goes to the Scillies. As we have heard, about 2,000 people live on the Scillies who maintain a very nice existence—I go there often—but it is very dependent on tourism. The dear old ““Scillonian””, which is a passenger and freight ferry, is about 40 years old. It has basically been condemned by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency. The service has been given a stay of execution for another year or two, provided that a new ferry is procured. It operates daily in the season with passengers and freight. It needs upgrading because the facilities in the quays are not good. The fear is that one of these days there will be an accident and a piece of cargo will hit a passenger. That could happen at either end, so rightly it has been insisted that the service be improved. The partnership that is trying, with the aid of European, county council and Department for Transport money, to develop and finance extensions to the quays at both ends—at St Mary's and Penzance—and a new passenger and freight combined ferry, has had the most appalling trouble getting a project together. Alternatives have been produced and everyone is agreed on the best alternative. It has had planning problems because it had to extend the quay slightly at Penzance. Someone objected at the public inquiry that the quay could not be extended because it would go on to sacred ground. When the inspector asked where was the evidence that the ground was sacred, he was told, ““Come and look at the footprints of Jesus at low tide””.