Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts

Wednesday 9th February 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville]

My Lords, I last moved this amendment, prior to withdrawal, in Committee last month in the small hours of 19 to 20 January. My noble friend Lord Jenkin of Roding, who eloquently supported the amendment on that occasion, has drawn my attention to the House of Lords newsletter entitled Red Benches, No. 23 dated 7 February 2011, and its column “Procedural Corner”, where we are reminded that the Companion states:

“Arguments fully deployed either in Committee of the whole House or in Grand Committee should not be repeated at length on report”.

My observation of this rule may reassure your Lordships’ House today, but I must explain the more cryptic aspects of the amendment.

The amendment relates to the City of London, where I served for 24 years as Member of Parliament in the other place, making me the City’s third longest-serving Member since 1283. I commented in Committee that the definition of a “special authority”, referred to in paragraph (3) in the amendment, is,

“an authority covering an area with a population of less than 10,000 whose gross rateable value divided by its population is more than £10,000”.—[Official Report, 19/1/11; col. 481.]

In other words, it is an area that is primarily commercial and not residential, and that applies uniquely in the United Kingdom to the City of London. The fact that this anonymous description uniquely applies to the City avoids any suggestion of potential hybridity. I will add to this arid language only the verdict of the Duke of Wellington’s ally at Waterloo, Field-Marshal Prince Blücher, who, on being taken up to the dome of St Paul’s to survey the City from on high, simply opined: “What a splendid city to sack”.

The words,

“so far as is practicable”,

in paragraph (1) in the amendment, while establishing a presumption, avoid adding any rigorous straitjacket to the Bill, and paragraph (2) in the amendment lays down:

“Where the geographical area of a special authority forms part of not more than one constituency, the name by which that constituency is known shall refer to that area”.

This mirrors the present statutory status of the City.

In Committee, I set out the long history of the City of London constituency, which merged with Westminster as recently as 1950, and described how it led up to its precise present status. In Committee, the Minister kindly agreed to a meeting with us between Committee and Report, and I thank him both for that and for his open-mindedness. I thanked in Committee those who universally spoke in favour of the amendment on that occasion, and I single out in particular the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, on the Benches opposite, who moved a similar supportive amendment of her own that evening. I beg to move.

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town]

My Lords, I rise briefly to support this amendment, as I did on the previous occasion. The City of London is the very heart of the community of London and of the country. It is bounded on one side by the Thames and on the other by very different areas. It is worth keeping as a discrete area. It has been laid down in law that it should be a single constituency ever since it lost its own unique representation. I support the amendment because the City has an unusual local electorate, with many businesses voting. I think it is right that the City, which is so important as a financial centre, should have a single Member in the other place to which it can relate and who will speak on its behalf. Therefore, it should be kept whole, rather than risk being moved into two or even three other constituencies.

[Lord Jenkin of Roding]

My Lords, I, too, support my noble friend Lord Brooke and reiterate my thanks to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness, for his kindness in meeting several of us to discuss the amendment.

One has to remember that the City has fewer than 7,000 electors. It is smaller than a great many wards. The arguments for keeping it as a single whole to be attached to one other constituency seem to me to be overwhelming. The idea that one should split the City between two or three different constituencies is very odd indeed. The only question is: does that need to be reflected in the Bill, as under my noble friend's amendment; or is it enough to leave it to the boundary commissioners? I strongly urge that there should be some reflection of this very important case in the Bill. I hope that my noble and learned friend on the Front Bench will be able to give us some comfort.