Jo Cox MP

Baroness Nye Excerpts

Monday 20th June 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Nye (Lab)]

My Lords, Jo Cox was proud to be a member of the Labour Party and that Labour family is proud of her. There are some people in families, as well as in political parties, whom you try to dodge, but Jo was someone who improved your day. She was a passionate believer in the power of good and many dark corners of the world have lost a passionate human rights defender. So many people have lost a woman who was a joy and an inspiration to work with—people who worked with her for nearly two decades here in Parliament, in our own Parliamentary Labour Party offices, in party headquarters and in party offices up and down the country. Even before she became an MP, her many friends in former leaders’ offices—in Tony Blair’s and Ed Miliband’s—as well as my friends and former colleagues in Gordon Brown’s office, valued her insight and compassion, not least in the work that she did with Sarah Brown on women’s health. They are all part of this tribute to Jo, who loved life, her country, her world and, most of all, her family. I met Brendan when he was a Labour student. Over this awful time, he has shown himself to be so brave and so strong. We mourn their loss, but he and her family should know that all of us are absolutely and resolutely united and determined to counter the hate that killed Jo and to prove that hope beats hate.

Apprenticeships

Baroness Nye Excerpts

Wednesday 4th May 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Aberdare (CB)]

My Lords—

[Baroness Nye (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Lord Tebbit (Con)]

My Lords—

Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Baroness Nye Excerpts

Tuesday 25th January 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kinnock]

My Lords, I am glad that I gave way, even though I did not give way. The point about manifestos will be in the clear recall of the noble Lord. It was explicitly and forcefully made by the noble Baroness opposite. I was responding for the sake of accuracy and in the interests of this House on that very point. I am well aware of the Cunningham report and of the conventions of the House. I do not think that any convention or any established custom is superior to the truth.

[Baroness Nye]

My Lords, I would like to speak to Amendment 75ZB and move back on to the amendments, which I think some on that side of the House were slightly straying from.

I was born in Brixton—hence my title Baroness Nye, of Lambeth—but I strayed north of the river at one point, where I had a very nice time as I got married and had three rather lovely children. So there are advantages to both sides.

When I looked at Amendment 75ZB, I wondered why the Boundary Commission would ever want to split constituencies on either side of the River Thames. Let me read one section of the British Academy report, which I think proves that the inflexibility of the Bill is such that we could end up in the situation where constituencies could cross the river. The report states:

“Greater London is the part of the UK where borough boundary-crossing has been most common at recent reviews, and where it is likely to be widely necessary under the new rules. With an electoral quota of 76,000 only three of the 32 boroughs would have an entitlement of as many as three constituencies (Bromley, Croydon, and Ealing). No more than eight of the boroughs have an entitlement which means they could be treated separately in the allocation of constituencies, but because of the non-integer entitlements of their neighbours it could well be that virtually all of the boundaries have to be crossed”.

In that case, it is feasible that we could get a situation where constituencies are cross-river.

I know that that point slightly exasperates some people. For example, in regard to the Devon and Cornwall situation, the Prime Minister has said:

“It’s the Tamar, not the Amazon, for heaven’s sake”.

I know that you could just as easily say “It’s the Thames not the Amazon”. However, as has been demonstrated by my noble friend Lord Howarth and others, with a smidgen of flexibility we would not be in a position where constituencies were not within geographical boundaries and communities would have to be split. If the Minister could be a little more flexible, we would not get into a situation where rivers would have to be crossed.

[Baroness Quin]

My Lords, the constituency that I used to represent in the other place has been mentioned so many times during the course of this debate—

Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Baroness Nye Excerpts

Monday 17th January 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howarth of Newport]

My noble friend makes an extremely important point. With the abolition of bodies such as the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, which the Government seem to be contemplating, and a whole series of expert bodies that is adumbrated in the provisions of the Public Bodies Bill, we will face yet greater difficulty in ensuring that there is an informed body of knowledge among Members of Parliament to enable them to debate effectively these immensely important and sensitive issues. My noble friend Lord Winston has tempted me to explore that avenue but, in view of the time and the impatience of so many of my noble friends to make their own contributions to the debate, I ought to sit down.

[Baroness Nye]

I support my noble friend Lady McDonagh. I have worked with my noble friend over many years. On matters of organisation I always follow her lead because she has great expertise in this area. It has not always been the case on, perhaps, politics or personalities over that period, but this is not the place.

When I spoke at Second Reading, I started by saying that I thought there was a consensus among all the parties that we had a duty and responsibility to look at legislation to see whether it restores trust and confidence in our parliamentary democracy. I have listened to most of the debate in Committee and I am afraid that nothing I have heard has managed to change my mind. In the Second Reading debate I had the privilege of following the noble Lord, Lord Maples. Unfortunately, he is not present. I did not agree with him then and I do not agree with him now.

As has been said, there has been no pre-legislative scrutiny or any kind of consultation on this constitutional reform. We heard this afternoon—it was actually yesterday afternoon—from the noble Lord, Lord McNally, that the Government still strongly advocate pre-legislative scrutiny. If this Bill had had that scrutiny or consultation, more progress might have been made and we might not have found ourselves in such problematic areas.

I disagree with my noble friend Lord Kinnock—it does not happen very often and I apologise for it in advance—but I understand the position of the Liberal Democrats as before the election they wanted to introduce STV, and therefore saw no need for the other place to have any more than 500 elected representatives. They also wanted to have a thorough overhaul of the state and to introduce a form of federal government which would involve many decisions being devolved to the institutions. I will not comment on whether or not that was a good policy. I do not agree with it but at least it had the merit of being coherent and understandable. The Conservatives also went into the election seeking a reduction in seats of 10 per cent, which would have brought them down to 585. When they drew up the coalition agreement, because the Liberal Democrats agreed to a referendum on AV and not on STV, their proposal to reduce the number of MPs to 500 was obviously not appropriate and was withdrawn. In my humble opinion the next best thing would have been to go back to the figure of 585, but that did not happen. As we have heard in the debate tonight, yesterday and at other stages, we have not really got to the bottom of where the figure of 600 came from. We have heard that savings to the public purse is a priority. I should have thought that forgoing an extra 15 Members would have added to those savings. To go back to my point about confidence being restored, I do not think that it is restored if, within weeks of campaigning for a reduction to 585, the figure suddenly switches to 600, with no explanation.

I take the point that my noble friend Lord Soley made that, whatever the figure is, if this Government set a figure it establishes a precedent for any future Government to set a different figure. Governments should stay out of deciding the number of seats. The amendments proposed by my noble friends for an independent body to look at this would have been a good way forward. Why am I therefore supporting my noble friend? One of the things that the Government could have done was to look at the House of Commons (Redistribution of Seats) Act 1949 and the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986, which both had targets of 613 seats. It was a target, not a specific number that we should have, but there was a feeling that we all agreed on 613. An independent boundary commission would then put that into place. When the Minister winds up, I hope that he will say whether that figure was considered and whether the Government considered amending that legislation to make the 613 figure not a target but the limit.

I support my noble friend’s amendment because I think that 630 is closer to that 613 figure and therefore would also get rid of some of the problems regarding Cornwall, Ynys Mon and certainly the Isle of Wight, as my noble friend has pointed out. Therefore, it is a way of addressing the issues. I take the point that both parties in the coalition have put forward a reduction in seats and therefore we must take that seriously. I would prefer not to go down this route but, if we are going down it, we need some leeway in what the figure is, and 630 to me would be the best way of achieving that. Therefore, I support my noble friend.

[Baroness Billingham]

My Lords, I should like to speak about something slightly different, but I am pleased to support the amendment of my noble friend Lady McDonagh.

Before I came into this House, I had the great privilege of being a Member of the European Parliament. That gives me an insight into what it is like to represent a constituency because I represented not only one constituency—as most people here will have done or will have associated themselves with—but seven Westminster constituencies. It just so happens that, before I was elected MEP, each of those constituencies in Northamptonshire and part of Leicestershire were held by men, and each of those men were Conservatives. It was a shock to all of us, including me, that I was elected then—I promise noble Lords that I have never asked for a recount—but that gave me an opportunity of working with those constituencies which, although they were side by side, were unique in themselves.

Perhaps I may remind noble Lords of those constituencies: Northampton North, Northampton South, Wellingborough, Kettering, Daventry, Corby and part of Leicestershire known as Blaby. I can assure noble Lords that, when I spoke in Northamptonshire, I always referred to my constituency as Northamptonshire and Blaby, but it will come as no surprise to anyone that, when I was speaking in Blaby, I called it Blaby and Northamptonshire. I learnt so much working with all those constituencies. Those were places that have developed over the years and over generations. They are not areas from which people move away, as people tend to stay in rural and middle-England areas such as Northamptonshire. Generation after generation can be traced back in those villages. I would urge enormous care to be taken on making too many radical changes in such constituencies.

Each of those constituencies had political divisions within them, but they also had things that united them. If there was ever a threat of a hospital closure, you can be assured that people would all be out on the streets together. In other ways, too, traditional industries were represented quite separately in those seven constituencies—one need only think of Northamptonshire’s old boot and shoe industry. Within a decade, we lost 22,000 jobs. One of my roles in those constituencies was to try to get the European Parliament to provide further support, which we achieved very successfully.

Noble Lords will also remember that Corby was a steel town that had more than its share of misfortune. The whole of that industry was wiped out in the 1980s, but you will recall that the people who arrived in the 1930s to work in the steelworks came down from Ravenscraig in Scotland. I could take you tomorrow to primary schools in Corby where you would not believe that you were not still in Ravenscraig, because the accents are still so strong. The constituencies were unique and the boundaries really mattered.