My Lords, well done to those who have been involved in setting up this hybrid Grand Committee. It is an innovation and my mind boggles at how it is done. But, despite its wondrous characteristics, the sooner we get back to normal the better. As a very early speaker in this Committee, I want to make one constitutional point. There is one very unusual thing about today’s proceedings, which I accept because of the circumstances we are in. To my knowledge, there has never been a major constitutional Bill—which this is—held in Grand Committee. Such Bills are always held on the Floor of the House. One cannot imagine anything more fundamental to our constitution than the way MPs are elected and the areas that they represent. So I hope that this Committee may be the last of its kind and we can get back to the more usual practice of debating these Bills on the Floor of the House.
I have put my name to the amendments in the name of my noble friend Lady Hayter in the full knowledge that she would explain them lucidly and leave me little to do. I am sure she has been comprehensive enough even for Lord Tyler who, I am sure, will be listening and will have heard what she said. I will add, with some strength of feeling, to a couple of the points that
my noble friend made. The first relates to the huge importance of Parliament having an ultimate say in the Boundary Commission’s recommendations and their implementation. The Government will deal with this later, but it is also relevant to this clause. The Government will argue that they are taking power from Parliament and the Government and giving it to an Order in Council which is absolutely neutral. I am afraid that that is not very accurate language. When the commission’s report is finally sent to the Order in Council is a matter for a government Minister. So, if the Bill goes through unamended, it will, effectively, transfer the final word from Parliament to Government. We can argue about that, but let us at least argue as if we were on a level playing field and understand what is actually being done.
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As my noble friend has said, if there was ever an argument for Parliament having a crucial role in these kinds of decision, it is the fiasco of what happened when the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill was being considered in 2011. The Government were hell-bent on reducing the number of MPs by 50. Anyone who knew anything would know that that would lead to worse parliamentary representation and MPs with bigger constituencies. I speak with some feeling on this. Once upon a time, I had a constituency with an electorate of 100,000; at another, I had one with an electorate of 57,000. Believe me, the level of service you can give to a large constituency is much lower than that which you can give to a smaller one. So it was tremendous that Parliament exerted its authority and stopped the Government in their tracks. If they had only had the sense to see their mistake then, we would have had a new Boundary Commission long ago—probably two since 2011—and we would not be having to catch up now, with such a long gap between Boundary Commission reports. If anyone is an expert on parliamentary constituencies, it is Members of Parliament, and this is a parliamentary constituency Bill.
There is something I would like to know, and it is not just out of idle curiosity. Although we cannot ever bind them, it is important that no future Government ever try again unilaterally to reduce the number of MPs. If that were happening anywhere else in the world, we would say it was shocking. The Government have, fortunately, had a Damascus-road conversion from a position in 2011 when a Conservative-led Government decided to reduce the number of MPs, to now, when they have seen the error of their ways and it is back to 650. Thank heaven for that; I congratulate them. However, I would like to hear from the Minister when he responds some reason why that change of heart took place. How soundly based and rooted is it? How confident can we be that there will be no future attempts to reduce numbers of MPs during this Parliament? Are they convinced by the argument rather than by party advantage, which was the overwhelming reason why they tried to reduce the number in 2011?
With that final, minor, sour note, this is a genuine request for the Minister to give the Committee his version of why it is now important to have 650, rather than 600 MPs. That being said, I am pleased to support these amendments.