Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

My Lords, I have in the course of my contributions over recent weeks tried to bring some fairly original material to our debates to help them along. I have often drawn on statistical evidence from various organisations. However, today I do not want to do that. I want to refer to a debate that took place—probably unknown to Members of this House—in the House of Commons on 11 January in Westminster Hall. I should perhaps start by explaining the relevance of Westminster Hall. It is a secondary Chamber in the House of Commons where the debates are of great importance and great interest, but where, for whatever reason, business managers in the House of Commons organise debates which very often attract fewer people. There was a particularly interesting debate that took place there on parliamentary representation. It was called by Mr Andrew George who is the Liberal Democrat Member for St Ives. The relevance of this debate was that it was the first time that many Members of the Liberal Democrat Benches in the House of Commons had had the opportunity to speak on Clause 11 of the Bill. Because of the arrangements in the House of Commons and the use of the guillotine and the truncating of debate, there were many issues which the Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament had been unable to raise. Indeed, he says at the beginning of his contribution: "““I am delighted to have secured the debate, which will explore many of the issues that we did not have an opportunity to explore during the passage of the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill … We failed to get to grips properly with the issues that needed to be debated to improve the Bill before it transferred to another place””. — [Official Report, Commons, 11/1/11; col. 25WH]" Then, in an aside—I have to be straight about this—he blamed Labour Members in reference to the delay in debate. Obviously, there were areas of the Bill that we regarded as particularly important which the Liberal Democrats did not regard as important. I want to quote some of the things he and his colleague said, because they have not been considered by Ministers. The comments that were made in Westminster Hall had not been considered by Ministers when the Bill was taken through its Committee and Report stages in the House of Commons. Andrew George says: "““The Bill proposes that all constituencies have an electoral quota of approximately 76,000 with a margin of only 5% either way. It would carve up the country in a manner that would create bizarre constituencies and ignore important cultural, historic and geographic boundaries””." We have not heard those words mentioned by any Member of the Liberal Democrats here in the House of Lords. He goes on to say: "““We do not want antiseptic constituencies with perpetually mobile boundaries. The five-yearly boundary review that would happen between each Parliament would mean an MP’s attachment to their constituency being perpetually reviewed, so the sense of settlement with the communities they represent would be continually undermined””." That has not been said by a Liberal Democrat Member in the House of Lords; it was not said in the House of Commons by a Liberal Democrat Member because they did not have the opportunity to say it. It was said in the junior chamber in the House of Commons, in Westminster Hall. He then goes on to say: "““The amendments to the Bill which I and other hon. Members tabled were unsuccessful, in that they were not selected or therefore debated””." There are procedural differences in the House of Commons. Whereas here we can debate technically all our amendments, in the House of Commons they have to be selected by Mr Speaker. If they are not selected, they are not debated. Even if they are selected they are not always debated because of the guillotine and timetable. He goes on about his amendments: "““They sought to find circumstances in which the Boundary Commission was given sufficient discretion to work towards the target figure, taking into account reasonable geographic, cultural and electoral issues. We want the Government to allow places to make decisions for themselves collectively, provided that they do not request more favourable treatment, such as over-representation””," which we accept. "““I hope the Minister takes note of that. It is not about more favourable treatment but simply recognising the distinctiveness of places, which the Bill does not take into account””. [Official Report, Commons, 11/1/11; col. 26WH]" Why has no Liberal Democrat Member of the House of Lords got up to their feet and repeated a statement of that nature to this House? Never once in our debate—someone said that we have now been debating for 90 hours—has that point been made by a Liberal Democrat Member of the House of Lords. I can tell you what the answer is. There is a contractual agreement within this Chamber between two elements of a coalition; that agreement is silencing debate. It is completely undermining the very ethos of this Chamber in the House of Lords. A Conservative Member—obviously a very courageous one—a Mr Martin Vickers of Cleethorpes, said in the same debate: "““Continually changing boundaries will impact on the vitality and sustainability of local political parties. The democratic process needs viable local parties and associations, but constant boundary changes inevitably impact on their viability. Taking one ward out of a constituency can render the local party virtually bankrupt if the ward’s financial make-up means that it contributes greatly to the party. We need to think seriously about that””.— [Official Report, Commons, 11/1/11; col. 26WH]" And so we do. Why are not Conservative Members of this House getting up and arguing the case that is being put in Westminster Hall in the House of Commons? And then, later in the debate, Mr Andrew George says that, "““the boundary of my constituency changed at the 2010 election and those constituents who used to live in my old constituency still contact me. Given the arrangements in the Bill, that sort of thing would happen at every election, so there would be confusion””. —[Official Report, Commons, 11/1/11; col. 38WH]" And how right he is. Let us take a town on the margin of a county, on the margin indeed of a constituency, that switches from one election to another between Members of Parliament, where the electorate do not actually know who their MP is, because of this constant change and movement as the Boundary Commission somehow has to find a way of ensuring that constituency boundaries fall within this 5 per cent limit which we would wish to extend to 10 per cent. Take a county like Cumbria, and let us take the town of Kendal. Kendal was not in my former constituency but it was very near the county boundary; a beautiful town on the fringes of the Lake District. Indeed, the people of Kendal would say that they were part of the Lake District. There is a possibility that within the terms of this Bill that town might be split. I know that Members of Parliament with large city seats very often find that their cities are split. It will work in a large city. It will work in a large community, but it will not work in a small community. It will create divisions within that area—divisions inside parties, between officials inside parties, between treasurers, secretaries, chairmen—all kinds of unseen divisions that boundary commissioners when they are taking their decisions about the future of constituency boundaries would never ever at any stage be aware of. Those are the kinds of issues that might well surface during the course of an oral inquiry. But the Bill goes on to take away the opportunity for such a forum to examine the minor detail of what would happen in the small community, a town like Kendal, in the event that it were split in the way that the Bill might provide for in the end. I have a lot more to say on these matters, but I shall save my words for later in the evening—indeed, the night.