Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

My Lords, I am not at all surprised to be advised that my amendment is defective, as these are indeed knotty matters, and it takes specialists to formulate legislation to get it right. However, if the Government think—and I have much sympathy with that point of view—that it is desirable to align the boundary reviews with the cycle of elections, maybe they would go back and think a little bit further about this and see whether they can find a better means to do it. I do not think that the Minister’s optimism that primary legislation from time to time in Parliament to get the relationship back in to a reasonable synchronicity would be straightforward, because whenever Parliament debates boundary review matters, a lot of Members become intensely interested in that and these proceedings are never very short or straightforward. If the Government wish to hold consistently to the principle they articulated in the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill, I hope they will go back and do some more work on this. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment 49 withdrawn. Amendment 50 Moved by