Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Lord Bach Excerpts(13 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Wallace of Tankerness
As one who stood for election on I do not know how many occasions, I shall not tangle with one of the best agents that my party has ever known.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I shall speak also to the other amendments in this group, all of which are related. Indeed, they relate to each of the combination schedules and have been grouped to ensure that there are equivalent combination provisions across the whole of the United Kingdom.
The overall purpose is to ensure the smooth running of the provisions in Schedules 5 to 8, which relate to the provision of, access to and retention of documents at a combined poll. The amendments are technical and will make certain that the right documents are available to the right officers at the right time, and are retained by the right officers after the polls are over.
I do not intend to go into this matter in great detail, unless pressed, but noble Lords may be interested to note that the amendments provide that at the end of a combined poll there is the same obligation on the registration officer or counting officer to provide access to and supply copies of combined election documents that would have existed if the election had been taken alone. In England, Wales and Scotland, the counting officer will be provided with the necessary lists and other election documentation and information needed to carry out his or her functions in relation to the combined elections that are transferred to him or her. For example, we have specifically provided that as soon as practicable after 5 pm on the sixth day before the poll—that is, after the date for applying for a proxy vote has passed—the registration officer must provide the counting officer with the absent voting lists for any elections which are combined with the referendum in his or her voting area.
An equivalent provision is not needed for Northern Ireland because of the chief electoral officer’s role as both a returning officer for the election and counting officer for the referendum. Other provisions specifically relate to documentation in Northern Ireland, including a court order for the production of a combined corresponding number list retained by the chief electoral officer for Northern Ireland, which can be obtained where necessary in relation to a local election offence or petition, in the same way that such an order could have been obtained if the document had been retained by an officer of the relevant council.
I should also advise the Committee that the Electoral Commission, the Association of Electoral Administrators, the Northern Ireland Office, the Scotland Office and the Wales Office have confirmed that they are content with these amendments. I beg to move.
Lord Bach
My Lords, I thank the Minister for introducing his amendments. I have a simple question. Why are they being added now when I think a number of amendments were added at the latter stage in the Commons proceedings on the Bill? Was this something that was omitted or has it just been thought up? I am talking about Amendments 122F, 122H and 122K, which all refer to the same thing. I can see its importance and we do not oppose it, but why does it appear now when everything else in Schedule 5 was there at the time of the proceedings in another place?
If the noble and learned Lord does not have the answer by the time I sit down, he can write to me. This seems quite important so I am interested to know why it was not added before.
Lord Howarth of Newport
Let me provide a little more time for officials to advise the noble and learned Lord. I should be grateful if he would advise the House on the means of communication whereby these minor, technical but none the less significant changes will be communicated to those whose duty it is to carry out the relevant functions. How much complexity is there in that and will training be needed? How will the system ensure that all those who need to know about these changes being made at a late stage actually know, given the short-ish interval between enactment and the date of the referendum?
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, this is a new but small point. The amendment seeks to ensure that instruction 9 of form 2—
“Form of Declaration of Identity (to be used where proceedings on issue and receipt of postal ballot papers combined)”—
in Part 3 of Schedule 8 requires voters to return all the postal ballot papers in their pack in the event that any ballot paper is spoilt and a replacement is required. The voter will then be issued with a complete new set provided that the originals are returned by 5 pm on the day before the day of the poll. I beg to move.
““Equality of votesIf there is equality of votes at any stage of the counting process, the count shall be abandoned and the poll re-run within one month between the two candidates with most first preferences.””
Lord Bach
My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendment 124 and Schedule 10 stand part on behalf of my noble friend Lord Rooker.
Amendment 123 relates to rule 7 of Schedule 10 on page 295. The heading to the schedule concerns the rules on how alternative vote elections will take place, if we should ever come to that.
Those of us who have been lucky enough to attend local government election results nights will know that there is nothing as exciting as a tied vote. They will remember for the rest of their lives the thrill of someone winning by random as opposed to the will of the electorate—particularly the winner; the loser perhaps not so much. The question my noble friend poses in the amendment is whether that thrill is justified—in other words, whether it is justifiable and inevitable for such decisions to be made by lot or by the toss of a coin—or whether there is a better way of doing it. That is what the amendment is about.
My noble friend’s view—it may be the view of other noble Lords—is that we should not decide elections by lot in any circumstances; that the voters should decide. Under the alternative vote system—if, as I say, it comes into force—the possibilities of a tied vote are extensive at each round of counting in a highly marginal seat. Even in a safe seat it is possible—although not as likely—for, say, candidates five and six to tie. My noble friend is against tossing a coin and he offers a simple solution, as his amendment makes clear. His solution is that if there is a tie at any stage in the proceedings under the alternative vote system, there should be a run-off between the two top candidates within a period of one month.
Lord Rennard
Why does the noble Lord think that this should apply at any point in the counting process? I have demanded recounts and seen how results have gone one way and then the other; as an election agent, in the past I have settled for a result when exactly the same result has been produced twice. Those with experience of recounts may wonder why it would be logical to abandon the count and have a re-run if the count at one point produces a dead heat but then, when you have checked more carefully and have found a few more ballot papers for one candidate, the result has gone another way. There may later be another count and again a clear result with a majority for one candidate. Surely it does not make sense to say that you should have a rerun at any stage if there is an equality of votes. There may be a case for a re-run if there is a dead heat after several recounts, but surely not at any stage in the counting process. That is simply not logical.
Lord Bach
I take on board what the noble Lord has said. He is right—there should be recounts for those who finish equal sixth, for example, to ascertain who finished sixth and who finished seventh. Of course that should take place. However, if at the end of it there is an equality of votes between the top two candidates, the amendment suggests that there should be a run off within a month. If there is a tie at any stage between the top two candidates—not the fifth and the sixth but those with the most votes—there should then be a run off. Of course, there would be recounts galore to ensure that the numbers are equal, but that sometimes happens.
Lord Tyler
I do not think that is what the amendment says. It states:
“If there is equality of votes at any stage of the counting process”.
There is no reference to recounts.
I have some sympathy with what the noble Lord, Lord Bach, is saying. On one occasion I stood for the county council and, after all the recounts, there was a dead heat and we tossed a coin. I luckily lost and did not have to serve on the county council—I ended up in the other place instead.
In such circumstances, surely you go through the whole process before you reach this stage. The noble Lord, Lord Rooker—very uncharacteristically—has produced a defective amendment.
Lord Bach
My Lords, that is very doubtful indeed. The expression “at any stage” could well apply to the position after there had been recounts. When you reach that stage the count should be abandoned, to use my noble friend’s words in the amendment.
I would never accuse the two noble Lords but there is a kind of nitpicking in relation to this amendment. It is certainly not my intention—unless they persuade me otherwise—eventually to ask for the opinion of the House on the amendment; I want to know what the Government feel about this issue. My noble friend is making a serious proposal. He does not like lots being used at any stage in a democratic election and many may feel that he has a point. He says let the voters decide, not the toss of a coin or the drawing of short and long sticks. It cannot be right for administrative convenience to take over from elections.
My noble friend’s second amendment also relates to alternative vote elections. Noble Lords who are still following me will see on page 297 rule 12(2)(b), which reads,
“the numbers on the left-hand side are omitted, together with the vertical rule separating them from the particulars of the candidates”.
In other words, under an alternative vote election, because it will be open to a voter to put “1”, “2”, “3” and so on on the right-hand side of the ballot paper, the number by each candidate that we are used to seeing on the left-hand side will go in alternative vote elections.
My noble friend is concerned about that, although he sees the sense of why that should be, because there may well be confusion if the numbers on the left-hand side link “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6” and the job of the poor voter is to put in “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6” on the right-hand side. There is a serious point here that we should not run away from. This is an issue because in a number of constituencies—maybe many around the country, not just inner-city ones but also ones in other areas—English is the second language for many people, and they currently vote by numbers. Supporters of all parties have been known—and there is nothing wrong with it at all—to stand outside the polling station, asking for support for a particular number on the ballot paper. In other words, the voters do not do English for names but can do numbers. This is not a patronising comment, it is what actually happens in the real world and it is the way votes are taken quite legitimately in some other foreign countries.
Supporters of a particular candidate can no longer use numbers because they will not be on the ballot paper under the alternative vote system. This amendment is strictly to probe the issue of names and numbers on ballot papers, were we to have an alternative vote system. My noble friend—I do so on his behalf—asks whether the Government have thought about this issue and whether this will make people a bit more reluctant to go to the polls or to vote if they realise that this change will be made and they will not be able to vote by numbers. I beg to move.
Lord Strathclyde
The noble Lord was kind to speak to these amendments on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, who meant no discourtesy by not being here—he could not have possibly imagined that we would still be in Committee this week when he planned the rest of his diary. I agree with the noble Lord that this is a skilful and interesting amendment. It is also an imaginative amendment, but it raises points that need to be answered, which I shall try to do.
The purpose of the amendment is to insert new provisions into Schedule 10 to make provision where there is equality of votes at any stage in the counting process. The proposed approach differs significantly from that provided for in the Bill, which essentially proposes that a tie between candidates will be settled by reference to the number of votes secured by the relevant candidates in previous counting rounds, starting with the number of first preference votes obtained in the first counting round. If at that stage there is a tie, the next stage will be looked at and so on. If that process fails to decide the tie—that is, there is an equality of votes for the respective candidates at all previous counting stages—the tie will be decided by the drawing of lots. Under the Bill, there is no provision for the poll to be abandoned and a fresh election held in the event of a tie between candidates. The Government recognise that it is possible to take different approaches on this issue. However, in developing the AV provisions in the Bill, we have taken into account the legislation and practice in elections to bodies across the UK and in other countries where preferences are used.
There is a strong case for referring back to the first preference votes received by candidates and taking those into account in the first instance when deciding a tie, as the first preference votes represent voters’ first choice as to which candidate should be elected. The noble Lord wishes to avoid an election being decided by lot. Under the current rules for UK parliamentary elections—under the first-past-the-post system—in the event of a tie, the returning officer decides the winner by lot. In the AV provisions, we are continuing with that principle that a tied vote can be decided by lot.
As my noble friend ably pointed out, the amendment as drafted would result in a fresh election being held in the event of a tie between candidates at any stage of the counting process, regardless of which candidates were involved. We think it would be hard to justify abandoning a poll where, for example, 10 candidates are standing and there is a tie between, say, the ninth and 10th placed candidates in the first round of voting. I know the noble Lord said this was a probing amendment—I understand that—but that is a flaw in the argument.
Lord Bach
To a large extent the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, will be satisfied. The Committee will be grateful to the Leader of the House for his full reply to what I hope the Committee found interesting points about the running of elections.
Regarding the amendment on whether lots should be held, this side is delighted to hear that the losing of a lot by the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, some years ago made his political career.
On the second, more serious issue, the real point behind my noble friend’s amendment—I think he was not allowed to express it in these terms—was about the abolition of numbers on the left-hand side of the ballot paper. That must follow once there is an alternative vote system because, otherwise, there will be confusion as to what the voter has to do with those numbers. I do not think that the Leader of the House answered that fully. The issue will have to be considered by the Electoral Commission and other interested parties if alternative voting comes in.
For the moment, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Lord Bach Excerpts(13 years, 9 months ago)
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The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Lord Strathclyde)
My Lords, it may be helpful if I deal with this issue because I understand that the Electoral Commission has just moved offices. That is why the old phone number does not work. The new phone numbers should be available in the normal way and we can make them available. If anybody wants them, they can call my office and we can get them to them. I am assured that the Electoral Commission takes great care and notice of what happens here.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, I think there is a greater likelihood of the Electoral Commission reading Hansard than members of the general public. Maybe I am wrong about that.
However, I can also say that the Electoral Commission’s website is really excellent and a great deal of the information that we have been discussing this afternoon is on it. I will give a fuller response later on but I think the noble Lord, Lord Low, is trying to get in.
Lord Bach
My Lords, we have quite properly had a very full debate on this important group of amendments. The Committee should be grateful to all those who have spoken. Our view from the Front Bench is generally supportive of the amendments in the group. I do not know whether Messrs Hegel, Heidegger and Marx would be flattered by the reference to them in the context of this Bill in the British House of Lords, but I am certain that they would be astonished to have been referred to at all.
These are important amendments. The noble Lord the Leader of the House will undoubtedly be familiar with the draft leaflet that the Electoral Commission has put out. Does he have any up-to-date information on whether the Electoral Commission feels that this is a satisfactory document? How much does it intend to change it? Maybe this is the nature of the beast, but how does the page—it is just one page—on the first past-the-post system compare to the pages on the alternative vote system? There are four pages on how this branch of the alternative vote system works. Is that deemed to be satisfactory by the Electoral Commission? I think that it only sets up the difficulties that many noble Lords from around the Committee have mentioned in their contributions. What I am really asking the noble Lord the Leader of the House to tell us is, what is the proposal as far as the Electoral Commission is concerned in terms of a final leaflet?
The Electoral Commission published on 30 September last year, Report of Our Views on the Proposed Referendum Question, to which I believe the Government responded in due course. It is worth pointing out a couple of the findings. On page 1, it states:
“Our research found the main difficulty people had in understanding the question was that they did not recognise or understand the voting systems it talks about – ‘First Past the Post’ and ‘Alternative Vote’. Accessibility and plain language specialists also commented that these were not terms that most people would be familiar with”.
Then on page 2, under “Summary of our findings”, it states:
“There were also some particular words and phrases used in the question that some people did not understand or struggled with: not everybody understood the term ‘First Past the Post’, or knew that it is the name of the system used now to elect MPs to the UK Parliament – even people who had voted before in this type of election … The term ‘Alternative Vote’ caused particular problems and was not understood, or was misunderstood, by nearly everybody taking part in our research”.
That may not come as a huge surprise to Members of the Committee, but it is a warning note. Indeed, the Committee’s discussions about the various types of alternative vote—which are the most satisfactory and which are not—pale in comparison to the fact that there is, at the moment, extremely limited understanding of what this type of alternative vote procedure actually means. Whatever view we take about the referendum taking place, there will not be very long to remedy that. So that is a warning and it is why I think that the amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, are so important.
The Electoral Commission is, of course, an independent body created by Act of Parliament and has very strict rules, rightly, about the political activities of its staff. Nevertheless, there is no disguising the political significance and sensitivity of the decision on the electoral system which will be taken in this referendum and the role that the commission will play in it. As the Bill has demonstrated all too well, political interests are, of course, heavily engaged by this referendum. There is therefore a danger, as has been said on many sides, that in the context of this highly politicised environment, the information which the commission is due to circulate and which will impact significantly on the outcome of this referendum could become the subject of severe dispute. I want to remind the Committee, for a minute or two, of what can be described as an Irish cautionary tale.
I remind the House of what happened in Ireland during the referendum not that long ago on the Lisbon treaty in 2008. In advance of that referendum, a referendum commission was appointed under Irish law to promote awareness and understanding of the Lisbon treaty so as to inform the public about the issues at stake in the referendum. Indeed, apparently it is the practice in Ireland—some noble Lords will know this—that a commission is established for every referendum to ensure that the subject matter to be voted on is explained to the electorate.
The commission is also required to encourage the electorate to vote, which is another task that our own Electoral Commission has been asked to discharge in the forthcoming referendum. Like the subject matter involved in our proposed referendum, the Lisbon treaty was felt to raise issues of such complexity and technicality that it was quickly recognised that the information provided to the public by the independent commission could have a highly significant impact on the electorate’s decision. The subject matter that was distributed by the commission was therefore subject to intense scrutiny by the media and became the object of public argument between the two campaigns. This eventually spilt over into a wider spat about the commission’s independence, with claims and counterclaims being made about the connections between commission staff and individuals in the different campaigns, as well as allegations about a conflict of interest involving companies hired by the commission to help with legal work and communications advice which also worked for the Government. Many Members of the Committee will be reminded of that argument by what I have just said.
Of course, I am not suggesting that we would see the same problems repeated here, but we are saying that because of what is undoubtedly at the moment a low level of public knowledge about electoral systems, that inevitably means that the information provided by the Electoral Commission could have a major bearing on the outcome of the referendum, which in turn makes it highly likely that this information will be the focus of considerable attention, to put it mildly. Perhaps I have just set out the problem in other words, but the ways in which my noble friend Lord Lipsey and others who have spoken to amendments in this group have approached this problem need careful consideration by the Government in the little time that remains. We look forward to hearing what the noble Lord the Leader of the House has to say.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, it is good to have an opportunity to join in this debate. I am very grateful to the movers of the amendments. We have certainly started off with a most interesting debate on this group of amendments. The debate became slightly whimsical, but that is not the first time that that has happened in this Committee. I was glad to hear from my old friend the noble Lord, Lord Graham of Edmonton, for whom the House knows I have a great deal of affection. He was the last great Chief Whip in opposition who achieved so much with so little when the Labour Party was a relatively small part of this House. It is now the largest group in the House of Lords. The noble Lord said that there should be time for reflection—I assure him that we have done nothing but reflect for the past three months or so—and that we should consider some of these issues on Report, and we will, of course, do so.
It will come as no surprise to anybody who has been listening to these debates that the Government very much hope that the referendum will take place on 5 May and have planned for that. I have said that many times and the Government announced their intentions in July. I know that some noble Lords opposite would rather that it were not held on that date and that the Labour Party manifesto stated that it wanted a referendum on AV in October, as it considered that that was a better date, but that is not the view that the coalition Government have taken. In order to get the Bill back to another place so that the Electoral Commission can complete its work in time for a referendum on 5 May, the Bill will have to go back to another place on Monday 14 February. I do not suppose that that is a surprise to noble Lords opposite either as they have known about that date for a very long time.
I was very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, who said that we were making heavy weather of the debate—he was right about that—and tried to knock a few heads together. I am also grateful to my noble friend Lord Newton for what he said about some of the common-sense aspects that came out of these amendments. It has been a full debate and I shall try to give it a full answer.
“subject to the approval of the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission”
Lord Bach
Following the previous debate, I can move this amendment from the opposition Front Bench comparatively shortly. We believe that it is absolutely appropriate that the Electoral Commission has the lead role in providing the public with educational materials in regard to the alternative vote referendum. That was the position adopted by the previous Labour Government in the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act, which originally contained clauses to provide for an AV referendum, supported by noble Lords from the Liberal Democrat Party but absolutely torpedoed and killed off by the Conservative Front Bench in the wash-up before the election.
We remain of the view that the Electoral Commission is best placed to provide the public with the neutral, factual background information that they will need to make an informed decision in the referendum. There is also no question that there is, as we have debated, a serious need for such background information. As we discussed a few minutes ago, noble Lords may well have read the report of the Electoral Commission on the intelligibility of the referendum question as then posed, which was published last September, following the original proposition put forward in the Bill. Following extensive public consultation, the commission found that the vast majority of UK citizens had only a slim grasp, if any grasp at all, of the choice which is being put to them in the AV referendum which, as my noble friend Lord Grocott quite rightly said in the previous debate—I hate to embarrass him—changes our constitution and may change it for a long time to come. Who knows? On the previous amendment, I quoted various short passages from that report and I shall not repeat them.
There is clearly a need for public education about the concepts and issues at stake in the referendum on electoral reform. Given the current low level of knowledge, it seems clear that the education people receive will shape the way in which they think and have a very great influence on how they then act. I shall not repeat my Irish cautionary tale about the trouble that a referendum commission, or in this case the Electoral Commission, can find itself in, but many such difficulties were outlined in the contributions made on the previous group of amendments. There is no doubt that it is a very difficult line for the Electoral Commission to follow without finding itself in very serious hot water from one side or the other or perhaps both.
The purpose of the amendment is to provide the Electoral Commission with some sort of cover which would insulate it against unwarranted accusations of showing favouritism, for example, to one argument over another. It would provide for a Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission, a body which already exists, as noble Lords will know, and it would have a role in signing off materials which the commission intends, under its broad provisions, to disseminate about the AV referendum. That Speaker's Committee on the Electoral Commission would include, of course, senior Members of Parliament from all the main parties and would be chaired by the Speaker, who has no party affiliation.
That seems to us a sensible proposal which would strengthen the legitimacy of the referendum process and help to ensure that the Electoral Commission does not become embroiled unnecessarily or inadvertently in a political controversy which would tarnish the poll and tarnish the result of the referendum which, as I say, may or may not change the constitution of our country for good. It is a modest proposal but I hope one that may find some support in the Committee, particularly from the Minister. I beg to move.
Lord Soley
I referred to this matter in my earlier comments and I am encouraged to make a further comment partly by the speech made by my noble friend Lord Davies of Stamford but also by that made by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick. The problem here is paragraph 9(2) of Schedule 1. Paragraph 9(1) is very clear. It does not put the Electoral Commission in the firing line at all. If the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace, who I assume will answer this debate, heard anything of the previous debate he will have heard anxiety expressed in all speeches about the dangers of putting the Electoral Commission in a position where it takes the blame for not getting a balanced view of the two systems. As I have said on a number of occasions, it is very difficult to write a pamphlet describing the two systems without, in some way, being biased. My noble friend Lord Rooker has already touched on this.
There seem to be two ways of dealing with this problem. One is the way put forward by my noble friend on the Front Bench, which is to allow a political committee, the Speaker’s Committee, to be the lightning conductor. That committee would oversee the work that was done and would sign it off and if there were any flak from it, it would not go straight to the Electoral Commission. That is one way of dealing with it.
Perhaps I may suggest another way which came to me when I heard my noble friend Lord Davies speak—I noticed that the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, gave a fairly positive response to it—and that is the idea of the two campaigning groups being able to send out a leaflet, at public charge, so that it would be done rather like an election address. Looking back to paragraph 9, sub-paragraph (2) is problematic because that is where the Electoral Commission is required to make judgments about the wording used to describe the system. If we took out sub-paragraph (2)—I do not expect the Minister to respond to this straightaway but he might want to think about it—and simply left in sub-paragraph (1), then the Government could, in this Bill—I suspect that it would not need to go into the Bill—allow for the two campaigning groups to produce the leaflet as described by my noble friend Lord Davies with some sympathetic support from the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde. That could be sent round, either with the Electoral Commission’s pamphlet or separately—I should have thought it would go with it—and in that way you take the responsibility of describing the two systems other than in a very basic sense which is required in paragraph 9(1), and put the requirement in paragraph 9(2) onto the two campaigning organisations.
I hope I am making myself clear. It is slightly complicated, but I am arguing that the two campaigns will know what they want to say for and against the two systems. If they produce their own leaflets and they are circulated with the pamphlet put out by the Electoral Commission, which they will do under paragraph 9(1), then it leaves the Electoral Commission in the rather tighter position of simply saying that there is a referendum, informing people about it, informing them how to vote, but not getting into the nitty-gritty of the pros and cons or the description of how the two systems might work. That would be left to the two campaigning organisations. That way you would take the Electoral Commission out of the firing line. The alternative way is to do as my noble friend has suggested from the Front Bench and leave the Speaker’s Committee to oversee the leaflet. It seems to me that either of those systems would act as a lightning conductor for the Electoral Commission and not put it in the firing line for what will almost certainly be seen as in some way a biased leaflet. I hope I have made myself clear. Perhaps the Minister would like to think about that.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
Off the top of my head—I think I know the answer but I cannot be certain—I think that the answer is yes. I know that parties cannot use their election broadcasts for the referendum campaign. I think that that was decided in a case prior to the Scottish referendum in 1979. I think that there will be broadcasts, but perhaps I can confirm that in the course of my remarks.
I am mindful that all public bodies need to be held properly accountable for what they do, but we need to strike a sensible balance. It seems to me that there are dangers in introducing a role for a parliamentary committee in approving the operational work of the commission, as is envisaged under the amendment, rather than monitoring and commenting on its performance, as is the case established under the PPERA. It must also be remembered that the Speaker's Committee, however august, comprises politicians. Irrespective of how carefully we might think that the committee would use its power—I have no reason to think that it would do other than that—perception can be important in these matters. There might be concern if the Electoral Commission—which, I think, everyone agrees, has a reputation for its impartiality—had in this crucial area to have its work vetted or approved by a body comprising politicians.
Furthermore, building in an extra procedural hurdle before the commission could issue the clarifying information to help voters could be difficult if confusion about the systems was allowed to take root and hares were allowed to run which could not be corrected promptly because of the need to refer. We must also bear in mind that the commission already issues a lot of useful guidance to voters, parties, candidates and electoral administrators about the working of our system. That has worked well. I am not aware of any significant concerns about it.
I confirm that my instinctive answer was right: there will be referendum broadcasts for the designated campaigns.
It is the commission's responsibility to decide how, and whether, to provide that information. As I said, I think it is widely accepted across the Committee that the commission is well established as a neutral, independent body. I am confident that it does not need the extra provision which the amendment would impose. There is a further opportunity for noble Lords to comment on the draft. I therefore ask the noble Lord to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Bach
I thank the noble and learned Lord for his full answer and my noble friend Lord Soley for his contribution in support of my amendment. I am slightly disappointed by the noble and learned Lord’s response. As I said in opening, this is a modest proposal—and a practical one, I think. Without doubt, the Electoral Commission will come under a lot of pressure, to put it mildly, in the lead-up to and during the campaign for the referendum. No doubt, much of that criticism will be ill judged and unfair, but the Electoral Commission will have to face it.
This modest amendment is an attempt to give some cover, some protection to the Electoral Commission. The Speaker's Committee already exists. For the life of me, I cannot understand what are the dangers of extending its role to this issue. I understand that the Government do not want to adopt the amendment. I should like them to go away to think about it again because, as a practical measure to try to stop the difficulties that will undoubtedly arise in future, it seems to us to be sensible.
Of course I will withdraw the amendment today. We want to consider in more detail what the noble and learned Lord said, but I tell the Committee that we may well return to this issue at Report. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Bach
My Lords, in our view these are two excellent amendments, although it is rather surprising that they have been put together in the same group. What links them is their excellence, and I hope that the Minister will be encouraging to both noble Lords who tabled them. I do not fear for the health of the noble Lord, Lord Phillips, on his way home. We all know him as a brave and independent-minded Peer who has already shown, in the course of the eight or nine months of the coalition’s existence—it seems a long time already—that he can act independently. Looking at him from where I stand now, he seems to be the same man he was before he voted a few months ago against the coalition on an important amendment on a different issue, so good luck to him in his amendment. Of course, if he had been concerned, he need not be any longer because he has the protection and support of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, and there cannot be any better protection and support than that around the House.
The noble Lord, Lord Phillips, pointed out the ambiguity and ambivalence of paragraph 10 and the need for it to be simplified. For those on the Front Bench on this side, that is clear, and I think it is the only point I need to make about his amendment. We hope that his noble and learned friend Lord Wallace of Tankerness will take note.
My noble friend Lord Lipsey’s amendment also seems to hit the mark for us. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, was right to say that what happened at the end of the last general election night—thankfully in a comparatively small number of venues, although even one was one too many—was absolutely disgraceful. Indeed, if it had happened in any other country, whether it was a sophisticated democracy or a new democracy, I venture to think that it would have been reported in the British media as being proof that that country had not really grown up democratically and lacked certain vital factors in elections. We must make sure that it does not happen again, and indeed I think that that is what my noble friend is suggesting in his amendment.
The noble Lord, Lord Rennard, was quite right to say that this would only affect the referendum, but it needs to affect all elections. However, the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, is perhaps best placed of anybody in the House to use his influence to make sure that government views can be changed so that this can become general practice rather than just for the referendum.
I have nothing else to say from the Front Bench except that we hope very much that the Minister will be sympathetic to these two amendments, both of which will add to the virtue of the Bill.
The Advocate-General for Scotland (Lord Wallace of Tankerness)
My Lords, in addressing the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Phillips, I can assure him that he need not be concerned about proposing it.
Amendment 110ZA would impose a duty on the chief counting officer to facilitate co-operation between the officer, the Electoral Commission, the regional counting officers, counting officers and registration officers. In common with other noble Lords who have spoken in the debate, the Government agree with the intention of the amendment, which is to ensure that there is a strong relationship and good communication among those involved in running the referendum. However, we do not believe the amendment is necessary because there is nothing in the Bill which would inhibit this kind of activity from taking place.
Paragraph 10(1) of Schedule 1 states:
“The Chief Counting Officer must take whatever steps the officer thinks appropriate to encourage participation in the referendum”.
That, of course, includes precisely the kind of co-operation suggested in the amendment. Moreover, I can assure my noble friend and the Committee that this kind of co-operation is already happening in practice. The chief counting officer has established a working group, which includes regional counting officers, to co-ordinate activity ahead of the planned polls; and the commission’s plans for public awareness have been shared with this group, as well as with counting officers and electoral registration officers. We are assured that material will be developed by the Electoral Commission for use by electoral administrators to support their public awareness work and to ensure appropriate co-ordination with its own activities.
On a slightly more technical point, the amendment does not sit well with the current wording and spirit of paragraph 10 of Schedule 1, where the onus is on the chief counting officer being responsible for deciding what steps she thinks are appropriate to encourage participation. It should be noted that when undertaking this responsibility the chief counting officer can also use her power of direction under paragraph 5(5) of the schedule to require regional counting officers and counting officers to take a particular course of action to encourage participation. In contrast, the amendment would mandate the chief counting officer to undertake specific steps, which is not the intention of this provision.
In addition, one effect of requiring co-operation among certain named bodies is that such a requirement could raise a question about whether it was also permissible for the chief counting officer to consult other bodies that are not mentioned there. That problem does not arise in the original drafting.
I understand the sentiments and the intention underlying my noble friend’s amendment.
Lord Bach
My Lords, I speak on behalf of my noble friend Lord Rooker. This small amendment refers to the sealing of ballot boxes before the commencement of the poll, as provided for in the rules for conduct of the referendum given in Schedule 2 to the Bill. The schedule currently advises that the presiding officer must show “anyone present” in the polling station immediately before the commencement of the poll that the ballot box is empty. My noble friend's argument—we do not make too much of this or say that it is a major issue—is that this should be changed to require the presiding officer to show “the first elector” who comes to vote in that polling station that the ballot box is empty.
We believe that the amendment would add a degree of precision to the requirement on the presiding officer and add to confidence in the legitimacy and validity of the poll and its result. Being more specific about who is to see and verify that the ballot box is empty is a small but important symbol that the poll is to be carried out properly. It is too vague to say “anyone present”. That could be the cleaner or the person who is with the presiding officer to help with the running of the poll. Why not require that the first elector who comes through the door should see that the ballot box is empty before casting their vote, which would be the first one in the box? As I said, this is not a major amendment, but I think that it deserves an answer. I beg to move.
Lord McAvoy
My Lords, I rise briefly to support the amendment, on which I will enlarge just a bit. We have good traditions and symbolism in British democracy. I have been an election agent and a candidate. I thought that it was the law that either the agent or candidate could see inside each ballot box before it was locked. That happened regularly. Perhaps it was only in council elections—I am not sure, but I used to see it quite often. I agree very strongly with entrenching the symbolism so that it is not just anyone who sees that part of the procedure. Perhaps we could embellish our democracy a bit by making a bit of a tradition and a bit of a show, to get people there and show that the box is indeed empty. While folk may scorn that type of thing, nevertheless it would show clearly the symbolism that our democracy is vibrant and seen to be so.
Lord Bach
My Lords, I am not sure that it does not arise. The current wording of the Bill is:
“Immediately before the commencement of the poll, the presiding officer must show anyone present in the polling station that the ballot box is empty”.
I should perhaps have made this point in moving the amendment, but what happens—and I do not suppose that this is normal—if the presiding officer is the only person? The poll commences at a certain time. It must begin at the time set by statute or by statutory instrument. If he happens to be the only one who has turned up, the presiding officer would presumably have to show anyone present and the only person present is himself. I am sure that is not what is intended. The current language is not satisfactory.
I think my noble friend Lord Maxton is wrong on this occasion. In almost every case that I know of, those who work on elections do a great job as polling clerks and have postal votes. As my noble friend Lady Golding told the committee, they are obliged to have postal votes because they do not know where they are going to go or which polling station they are going to be at until quite a late stage. It seems a very sensible rule.
Because of the extraordinary support I had for this amendment, I am very tempted indeed to seek the opinion of the Committee, but in spite of pleas from behind me, what has held me back is that I think the clinching point was made by my noble friend Lord Foulkes. If we were to do it for the referendum only, it would leave a difference between practices in other elections and practices in the referendum. As my noble friend said, the answer is that there should be government legislation to amend electoral rules, but I cannot see that legislation coming through in a great hurry, so with enormous reluctance I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Lord Bach Excerpts(13 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Bach
My noble and learned friend Lord Falconer of Thoroton and my noble friends Lady McDonagh and Lord Kennedy of Southwark and I have given notice of our intention to oppose the Question that Clause 13 stand part of the Bill. We have done so not because we oppose Clause 13 standing part but just in order that we might hear the Minister respond to some questions.
Last week we heard from noble Lords concerning Cornwall and the Isle of Wight, as my noble friend Lord Howarth of Newport reminded us. However, we also had a long and interesting—and, I think, worthwhile—debate on Wales, to which Clause 13 relates. The clause amends Section 2 of the Government of Wales Act 2006 so that the Assembly constituencies are those specified in the Parliamentary Constituencies and Assembly Electoral Regions (Wales) Order 2006, as amended. The effect of this change is that any future alterations to parliamentary constituencies made under the new rules introduced by the Bill will not affect Assembly constituencies.
We appreciate that without the first part of Clause 13 the reduction in the number of Westminster seats in Wales made necessary by Clause 11 of this Bill would see a comparative reduction in the number of Welsh Assembly seats. It is not this part of Clause 13 that we object to; we do not wish to see the representation provided for the people of Wales by its devolved institutions affected by legislation which will cut that representation at Westminster. However, the remaining parts of Clause 13 are included to deal with interim reviews of constituencies in Wales which might happen to be undertaken under the terms of the Government of Wales Act 2006 which are ongoing or have not been implemented when Part 2 of the Bill comes into force.
We want to raise again the particular impact that the Bill’s proposals will have on Wales. We wish to ask the Minister whether there might be a phased reduction in the number of Westminster constituencies due to be lost in Wales under the terms of the Bill. If there is not to be a phased reduction, perhaps there is a case to be made that the amount of the reduction be delayed until after the result of the March referendum on powers to the Welsh Assembly and any attendant transfer of power.
The Minister will recall—he is, after all, an expert on this point—that last week he made the comparison with the cut in Scottish Westminster representation following devolution. We would argue that that cut in seats happened only after law-making powers had been transferred to Holyrood. In holding a referendum to extend primary law-making powers in the light of the Government of Wales Act 2006 and the Calman Commission, Wales will, in a way, be catching up with Scotland in this respect. Perhaps it is appropriate that, once this has happened, its Westminster representation be reduced and a better judgment can be made as to how much it should be reduced by. I look forward to hearing the noble and learned Lord’s response in due course.
Lord Howarth of Newport
My Lords, if the number of parliamentary constituencies in Wales is to be reduced, it must inevitably follow that the boundaries of constituencies for the Welsh Assembly and the boundaries of constituencies in Wales for this Parliament will no longer be aligned. I do not think that it would be right for us to seek to reduce the number of constituencies that return Members to the Welsh Assembly, but I think we should appreciate that, if we are going to legislate to cause these boundaries to cease to be coterminous and to diverge, problems will arise and damage will be done politically.
My noble friend reminded us that last week we considered two amendments on this issue. One proposed a phased reduction in the number of parliamentary constituencies in Wales and the other proposed that the reduction should be delayed until such time as the people of Wales had voted to have primary law-making powers transferred to the Welsh Assembly. Both would be helpful mitigating amendments, but let us recall, in the mean time, that the Welsh Assembly, unlike the Scottish Parliament, does not have primary law-making powers and that policy for Wales is made, on a very large scale, in the Westminster Parliament. There is a block grant which transfers resources from London to Cardiff. Home affairs, criminal justice, social security, pensions and, of course, defence, foreign policy and very major areas of policy are determined still for Wales by the Parliament of the United Kingdom.
It follows from that that it is a responsibility of Members of Parliament representing Welsh constituencies at Westminster to work in close relationship with their colleagues who are Assembly Members in Cardiff. They need to be able to talk to each other about the interests of the constituents that they jointly serve. The needs of Wales need to be represented by Welsh Members of Parliament at Westminster and as things are, they are well represented by Members of Parliament of all parties at Westminster. It is easier for them to do that job because the constituencies of Welsh MPs are the same as the constituencies of Welsh Assembly Members. When that ceases to be the case, it will be far more difficult for Welsh MPs and Welsh Assembly Members to work closely and effectively together in the interests of their shared constituents. There will overlapping of boundaries. There will be cases in which Welsh Members of Parliament will have to try to represent, at one and the same time, the interests of two Welsh Assembly constituencies which may not be in agreement about what it is that they would like their champion in the House of Commons to be arguing for. There will be a muddying and a blurring of responsibility. It will be more difficult for people to do their job.
Of course, the noble and learned Lord, like others in the Chamber, is very well aware of the experience in Scotland. I see that my noble friend Lord Foulkes is not here, but my noble friends Lord McAvoy and Lady Liddell are well able to testify that, whatever the merits may have been of the redrawing of constituency boundaries in Scotland, it cannot have been made easier for an appropriate collaboration to take place between Members of the Scottish Parliament and Members of the Westminster Parliament. This is one reason—there are other powerful reasons—why I believe that it is undesirable to reduce the number of constituencies in Wales, or, if the number of constituencies in Wales is to be reduced, we should do it at a gradual pace. The service that their elected representatives are able to give to their constituents will be impaired if we lose the existing alignment of boundaries.
Lord Bach
102: Clause 18, page 15, line 12, at end insert—
“( ) Part 1 of this Act shall not come into force until the Electoral Commission has certified that every local authority has taken all reasonable steps to ensure that the electoral register is as complete and accurate as possible.”
Lord Bach
My Lords, the Deputy Prime Minister has frequently tried to place the Bill in the proud lineage of great reforms that led to the introduction of universal suffrage in Britain. I quote from his “new politics” speech, delivered in May last year:
“I’m talking about the most significant programme of empowerment by a British government since the great reforms of the 19th Century. The biggest shake up of our democracy since 1832”.
In the same speech, recalling the “anger and disappointment” felt by thousands of people who were turned away from the polling stations on general election night, he declared:
“You must be confident that, come polling day, your voice will be heard … Under this government’s plans, you will”
However, we know, as the Committee has heard before, that as a result of gaps in our electoral register, many millions of people are going to be denied a voice—indeed, any acknowledgement of their existence—in the two central proposals contained in the Bill.
The Government are fond of saying that this Bill is underpinned by the principle of equality, but you cannot get equality on the electoral playing field on the basis of a grossly unfair or unequal register. This is particularly so in respect of the proposed boundary changes, which are to be drawn on the basis of the December 2010 register, from which it is agreed that upwards of 3.5 million eligible voters are missing.
Putting that problem on one side, I think that the problem of underregistration also has a significant bearing on the referendum on the alternative vote, which is the subject of Part 1 of the Bill. As we are well aware, the Government intend that the referendum will be held on 5 May next, which, in our view, would be an unsuitable date. Even if the referendum goes ahead on that day, the referendum will at least be contested on a marginally more up-to-date electoral roll than that to be used for the boundary changes, if for no other reason than that there is still time to put missing people on the register. If the referendum was not going to be held so soon, this would allow even more time.
Happily, the Bill provides for that eventuality. Following the Committee’s acceptance of the amendment moved by my noble friend Lord Rooker, the Bill will not actually require a referendum to take place until October of this year. We believe that that extended deadline provides an important opportunity for the registration problem to be properly addressed and sufficient leeway for the acceptance of Amendment 102.
Amendment 102 is concerned with the commencement of Part 1 of the Bill. If accepted, the amendment would require the Electoral Commission to certify,
“that every local authority has taken all reasonable steps to ensure that the electoral register is as complete and accurate as possible”,
before the AV referendum is held. The amendment would not require a certain percentage of eligible voters or resident adults to be registered. In previous debates, that was felt to be an unreasonable target. Indeed, there was some disagreement about what the right percentage target would be. The amendment would simply impose on the Electoral Commission a requirement to judge whether local authorities are doing all that they reasonably should to ensure that as many people as possible are registered to vote.
Lord Lawson of Blaby
I have noted what the noble Lord has said. Does he consider that there may be some people—perhaps a lot of people—who do not register simply because they are not interested in voting at all? That may be deplorable, but that may be the case. Therefore, many of those who are not on the register may not be so due to any failure on the part of the responsible authorities in getting them on the register.
Lord Bach
Of course the noble Lord is right. There are some people who decide, as a matter of choice, not to vote in any election of any kind or may, in the past, have had some reason for not putting their names on the register. However, my amendment seeks to ensure only that local authorities have taken all reasonable steps to ensure that the electoral register is as complete and accurate as possible.
Baroness McDonagh
Is my noble friend aware that there is a legal duty to register? It is the choice of the citizen whether to vote, but it is a legal responsibility and requirement to register.
Lord Bach
I am extremely grateful to my noble friend for reminding the Committee of that. During the course of this Committee, I asked the Government Front Bench whether it is a legal requirement to register—of course it is not a legal requirement to vote, although I must say that I was brought up to believe, and still believe, that it is a duty. As my noble friend has reminded me—I cannot remember which Minister replied—the noble Lord, Lord McNally, in an Oral Question some months ago maintained that it is not a legal requirement to register. That is a very important matter that needs to be determined. It may be that registration is a legal requirement that is observed more in the breach than in fact. That would still make it a requirement, albeit one that is somehow put on one side.
Baroness Golding
I think that what was said was that it was a legal requirement but that, as far as the Minister knew, nobody had ever been prosecuted.
Lord Tyler
Will the noble Lord revert to the question of timing? I expect that the noble Lord and I both recall a very powerful speech by one of his noble friends earlier in the Committee's proceedings, in which it was pointed out that, because of the general election last year, quite a lot of people registered even in the last few days when they were permitted to do so. Therefore, the register of December 2010 is probably more comprehensive than one that we might imagine in future. Delaying the referendum, perhaps until October, might mean that people would drop off the register rather than be fully and comprehensively covered by the one that will currently be the basis of the referendum. The noble Lord's point about timing could be taken either way.
Lord Tyler
My Lords, it was not I. The point was presented much more powerfully on his side of the House, and I simply endorsed it.
Lord Bach
In that case, congratulations are in order all round. The point is interesting, but we could improve the register if the referendum was delayed by a number of months, as seems to be the will expressed by the Committee.
As far as voter registration is concerned, noble Lords will recall an Electoral Commission study published this year—it has been quoted before, but I make no apology for repeating it—which states that,
“under-registration is concentrated among specific social groups, with registration rates being especially low among young people, private renters and those who have recently moved home ... The highest concentrations of under-registration are most likely to be found in metropolitan areas, smaller towns and cities with large student populations, and coastal areas with significant population turnover and high levels of social deprivation”.
I do not need to go through the figures again. We have heard before about the percentages of certain groups of our population who are unregistered. It is a sad story that should not be allowed to continue. The point has been made many times that we did not do enough about that issue until late on in our Government; we are asking this Government to do something about it now, particularly as we are moving towards a plebiscite in the form of a referendum, which is very rare in our country, and we want as many people as possible who are entitled to vote to be on the register. In the context of a potentially low turnout, which the House will perhaps want to debate again on Report, the differences likely to result from the unequal participation of social groups such as young people and others could have a major bearing on the outcome of the referendum.
It is very rare that we resort to a referendum in Britain. When we do, we should ensure that it takes place on an even basis. In the interest of fairness, I urge the Minister to consider our amendment with some care. I beg to move.
Lord Soley
My Lords, I support the amendment. It touches on two things. The first is the general principle that we need to improve registration. I have argued before that we have something of a postcode lottery in how good registration is from one local authority to another. That general point relates to this debate because the amendment would require that we deal with that before the referendum. I suspect that the Government are concerned only about whether they could do so in time. However, we must start the process.
As an adviser to the Electoral Commission, I have felt for a long time that we need to improve the registration process. I do not think that anybody on either side of the House disagrees with that. My experience is that until we get an agreement on a body that will raise the standard by saying what that standard should be across the country, some local authorities will carry out registration extremely well, others will do so very poorly and others will be in between. We know which local authorities perform well and we know which perform very badly. The in-between group is more difficult to identify. The Electoral Commission must have a duty placed on it to come up with a standard in electoral registration that local authorities must achieve.
Having just filled in my registration form again, I know that the form suggests very heavily that not to fill it in accurately is illegal and that one would risk prosecution. It implies that registration is a legal requirement in exactly the way that was described in the earlier intervention. I would like the Electoral Commission to have a duty to say that all local authorities have to make every effort to get people on to the register. I recognise that there is a time problem in relation to this amendment and the referendum, but I do not see why we should not make a start. We could do that now. It would be possible to say that, given the variable standards at the moment, the small number of local authorities that we know do not make the effort have got to do so. Perhaps we could then build on that for future occasions, when we would expect the Electoral Commission to say that all local authorities have reached a minimum standard.
The issue of underrepresentation in key areas is crucial. We all know that some areas have much greater underrepresentation than others, and we all know that some local authorities in those areas do not make anywhere near enough effort to get people registered. Those are the authorities that we should focus on. It would be very good news if the Government said to the Electoral Commission, “We expect you to send out to those local authorities a note warning them that if they do not raise the standards in their area and do more to make sure that people are on the electoral register—and do that at least as well as the best local authorities—you will continue to breathe heavily down their neck until they deliver the standards that you expect”.
Underrepresentation is a major problem. It has distorted so many issues that we have debated in the Bill that we should not allow it to continue. What troubles me is that the Minister and the Government have made no effort to find a way of addressing the problem. I ask that in due course they take up this amendment and extend it beyond the referendum to a general expectation of local authorities and the Electoral Commission that they apply that standard.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I indicated that the commission's report on performance standards for electoral registration officers in Great Britain showed that just under 96 per cent of electoral registration officers met the completeness and accuracy of the electoral registration records standard this year. So they are already measuring and, against that, they found that just under 96 per cent had made it. I do not think there is any dispute in this Committee about the importance of electoral registration. We wish to pursue pilot studies to compare the electoral register against other public databases so that we can identify people who are not currently on the register. If the trials are successful, we will roll this out nationally to ensure that registration officers are aware of what has been shown up by the trials so that they can better target people to get them on the register. There is a commitment to improve the rate of electoral registration but we cannot accept that the referendum should be postponed, possibly indefinitely, awaiting the kind of certification which this amendment proposes. Therefore, I beg the noble Lord to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Bach
I am very grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken in this short debate and particularly to the Minister for what he has said. I am not so sure about the noble Lord, Lord Newton, who made me sound like a kind of modern Herod who wants to lock up 16 to 18 year-olds who do not register. Both sides recognise that this is a serious issue and it has to be dealt with. Of course, I shall withdraw the amendment tonight but we may well bring this up again in some form on Report. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
I would love to think that I am part of a conspiracy to undermine the so-called fair voting systems that some people want. It is a genuine slur on the returning officers—I know my noble friend Lord Rooker does not mean it—to suggest that they are part of any kind of scam. They are raising genuine concerns as non-political civil servants who work for local authorities. However, I draw the attention of my noble friend to Belgium, which has this PR system. It is seven months since the Belgian election and the country still does not have a Government. That is probably a better example. In Scotland, we can manage it rather more quickly than that.
Aside from that diversion, I ask the Minister—who has been very helpful, as has the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace—to look into this and, if there is a problem, to see whether there is any way to resolve it.
Lord Bach
My Lords, my noble friend’s amendment is entirely sensible. Indeed, following on from the previous amendment, I suspect that the Leader of the House may secretly or quietly agree with it. He may not be able to say so, because, as he reminded us, he is now in government. However, the amendment is sensible and I ask the noble Lord at least to take it back and consider it carefully. Also, the point of my noble friend Lord Foulkes about what appeared in the Scottish press yesterday is well worth the Government considering, if not responding to tonight.
This amendment is not contrary to the will of this Committee, due to the second Rooker amendment that is now well known in political history—the one that this Committee passed on 30 November stating that the voting system referendum must be held at some point before 31 October next year, which is clearly within the three months that this amendment mentions. The amendment of my noble friend Lord Rooker was subtle but important. It was hastily dismissed by the Government at the time of its passing, but perhaps they now regret that. It would have eased the pressure under which the Government find themselves.
By recommending a gap of three months between Royal Assent and the holding of the referendum, this amendment facilitates a period of proper preparation, including, most importantly, a proper information and education campaign on the difficult issues that the public are being asked to vote on, which are not that simple. We were reminded about New Zealand, which, when it changed its voting system in the early 1990s, provided a year-long information campaign.
I remind the Committee that Amendment 6 to this Bill, moved a long time ago, advised that a gap of between six and 18 months be inserted into the timetable for the referendum to allow for preparation and an information campaign. This amendment falls far short of that, but is moved with the same motivation. It seeks to facilitate a state of affairs that is an improvement on the 10 weeks or less that the Government’s timetabling will provide the Electoral Commission with to disseminate information about the poll. It is less than 10 weeks in which to inform the public about an issue which Electoral Commission research informs us there is perilously little information or knowledge about.
This is not the proper context in which to be asking the public to make such an important decision, whether you are for this form of AV or for first past the post. Officials and interested participants should be given adequate time to provide this information.
Lord Tyler
As I recall, the noble Lord and his colleagues supported the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, which the Committee then passed, on the basis that we could still hold the referendum on 5 May, but it was left open for the referendum to be held at any time thereafter, before October. Is the noble Lord, Lord Bach, now saying that he is precluding the referendum being held on 5 May? That is a change of position, is it not?
Lord Bach
My Lords, we now know that the Bill certainly cannot be passed three months before the referendum due on 5 May. Therefore, we think that my noble friend, in moving this amendment, is being realistic. That does not take away from the effect of the amendment of my noble friend Lord Rooker, which we were glad to support and still do in principle. However, if the Government wanted a kind of middle way, they might be very sensible to pick up what my noble friend Lord Lipsey has suggested. We hope that the Government treat the amendment with some sympathy.
Lord Strathclyde
One of the most interesting facts that I have learnt today is just how many noble Lords opposite read the blog of my noble friend Lord Rennard. He should be immensely pleased and impressed that he has elicited such a reaction from noble Lords. I hope that at some stage he will commercialise it in an appropriate manner.
The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, asked questions about the Scottish association of returning officers. I will certainly look into the questions that he has raised. Earlier in Committee we discussed this and the information we had at that time was that there would be no problem in Scotland. It will be interesting to see whether that has changed.
The view of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, was that people are not prepared. Interestingly, he said a number of things in support of the amendment. The amendment provides a three-month delay, as though they would not be prepared now but they would be prepared if there were a three-month delay. I am not sure that is right. I think people have a perception about AV and I am not sure that there will be an enormous difference between the 10-week limit that we have at the moment and three months. The Government see no compelling reason to fix the length of the period for this referendum to a minimum of three months.
It is worth reminding noble Lords opposite that the previous Government worked to swift timetables in organising the 1998 devolution referendums. This referendum was announced as far back as June or July. The Bill was introduced in July in the House of Commons. Of course, as has been recognised, I do not know when the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, tabled the amendment but it would mean that a target date of 5 February would have to be set, and that is later this week. If that target were not met, the provision would need to be given retrospective effect so that the referendum period could still begin three months from the date of the poll; for example, on a date before the Bill receives Royal Assent, and neither is desirable or necessary.
Practical arrangements by the Electoral Commission have been well under way for months, ensuring that the referendum can take place on 5 May under the current referendum period timeframe. The Electoral Commission expanded on that in its briefing on 7 December and said:
“We have been working with local Counting Officers and Returning Officers to prepare plans on the basis of a referendum on 5 May 2011, alongside the other polls planned for that day, and in our most recent assessment we said that sufficient progress has been made for us to be confident they will be well run. Similarly, those intending to campaign at the referendum will have been developing their plans for the date specified in the Bill as introduced”.
So a good deal of work has already been done by the registration officers and those who wish to run the campaigns have been working on their material. For those reasons we do not think that there is a need to extend the referendum period, as everything points to those involved being well prepared.
Lord Howarth of Newport
I pay tribute to the part played by the noble Lord, Lord Low of Dalston, on the Disability Rights Task Force and to his resourceful, imaginative and courageous campaigning in the interests of disabled people over a great many years. We are proud to have him as a Member of this House and greatly welcome his contribution not only to debates on the status and position of disabled people in our society but much more widely.
The situation that the noble Lord has described to us is a disgrace. It may be that, as the Electoral Commission has suggested, legislation is more or less sufficient, or ought to be, to ensure that the proper requirements of disabled people within our electoral system are accommodated, but evidently it is not working in practice. Whether that is a matter of lack of financial resources or, more likely, that it is a matter of attitudes and culture I do not know. But in all events, we need to take energetic and determined steps to greatly improve the state of affairs to which the noble Lord has alerted us.
It may be that the amendments he has proposed are the kind of practical amendments needed to rectify some of the deficiencies in existing legislation and regulations. Again, I do not know for sure, but it seems to me that the measures that the noble Lord has proposed are modest, practical and reasonable, and it is hard to imagine what objection could be made to them. But whether or not legislative change is the key to improving the state of affairs that he has described, ensuring that disabled people are included as they should be within our electoral and broader political systems, it is evident that there needs to be leadership and drive to ensure that the attitudes and the performance of professional staff in this field, and I daresay also of the political parties, are greatly improved.
I therefore look forward to the response from the Minister. We should all be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Low of Dalston, for calling our attention to a matter of serious concern and on a purely bipartisan basis. There is no party politics in this. I am sure it is universally agreed around the House that the arrangements that govern elections and certainly the holding of this particular referendum will in practice ensure that disabled people are in no way inhibited or debarred from participating.
Lord Bach
My Lords, the Committee should be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Low of Dalston, for moving his amendment and speaking to the other amendments in this group, and for informing the House about the results of the Polls Apart survey. The noble Lord said that this was a reasonable set of amendments and we on the opposition Front Bench agree. We think they are all sensible as well as reasonable and that they should be supported around the House in due course.
Our advice to the Government is that they should go away with these amendments and think very carefully indeed about how they can implement them. If they do not, I suspect the noble Lord will come back on Report and will have very wide support around the House from all sides so that these practical suggestions can be put into effect. As I say, the opposition Front Bench support these amendments.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, from these Benches we, too, are immensely grateful for the way the noble Lord, Lord Low, moved his amendments and I am sorry he had to spend so long waiting and listening to the rest of us before he got to them. Perhaps I may say at the outset that the Government enormously welcome the principles behind these amendments. I shall give him a very full reply and I hope that he will consider it before Report.
Similar amendments were debated in the other place and the Government stated their commitment to ensuring that everybody has an equal opportunity to cast their votes in this referendum. It is right and important that every effort is made to ensure that all individuals, with or without disabilities, are able to exercise their democratic rights. The Bill already contains significant provisions to ensure that voting is fair for all. This includes those voters with disabilities. Existing anti-discrimination legislation also already imposes duties on public authorities which are directly targeted at involvement in public life. Specifically, the Disability Discrimination Act 2005 was amended to include a duty on public authorities to promote the equality of individuals with disabilities.
Ensuring that ballot papers and polling stations are accessible to all is already a duty that counting officers will need to take forward. For the purposes of the referendum, the chief counting officer will also be able to give directions to counting officers on how they discharge these functions.
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
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Lord Campbell-Savours
My Lords, I strongly support my noble friend Lord Touhig on his amendment. I do not want to repeat much of the discussion that has taken place in the Chamber during this debate. I have studiously avoided, during my repeated interventions on this Bill, accusing the Government of gerrymandering, because I do not believe that that is the motivation behind this legislation. However, in Wales the accusation of gerrymandering will stick because removing 25 per cent of Wales’s Members of Parliament will create—indeed, it is at this moment creating—great suspicion in the minds of the Welsh people.
I claim a right to speak in this debate by way of my birthright in Swansea. My family is almost entirely Welsh. Due to the somewhat rare nature of the Savours name, which is easily traceable to 1602—a task carried out by a great relative of mine at the beginning of the previous century, before the age of the internet—we have quite a lot of information about my family’s activities over several hundred years. In preparing for this debate, I particularly researched the role that my family may have played in setting boundaries in Wales. I had been informed —incorrectly, as it turned out—that sheriffs and high sheriffs had historically had the responsibility of setting boundaries. There are two high sheriffs in my family: Edward Savours in 1747 and Robert Savours in 1845. Both were in south Wales, so I obviously had an interest. It seems that the only influence that they may have had was on parish or county boundaries. Since 1832, sheriffs probably had very little influence, as boundaries appear to have been set by a boundary commission after that.
However, during the research, I turned up some interesting background material on the boundaries in Wales. It seems that in 1944, as has already been alluded to, a Speaker’s Conference was established. From a pamphlet written in 1995 by Mr Iain McLean, a notable academic in this area, entitled Are Scotland and Wales Over-represented in the House of Commons?, we learn the lessons of history on the use of mathematical formulae and seat reductions in Wales—and how interesting these lessons are. Mr McLean explains what actually happened during the 1944 Speaker’s Conference, which was established to resolve arguments over representation. The conference, he says,
“was appointed and run on very similar lines to its predecessor of 1916-17 … Like its predecessor, the conference published only its conclusions”.
However, the minutes of the Speaker’s Conference committee are very illuminating. They say:
“It was pointed out that a strict application of the quota for the whole of Great Britain would result in a considerable decrease in the existing number of Scottish and Welsh seats, but that in practice, in view of the proposal that the Boundary Commissioners should be permitted to pay special consideration to geographical considerations … it was … unlikely that there would be any substantial reduction. It was strongly urged that … it would be very desirable, on political grounds, to state from the outset quite clearly that the number of Scottish and Welsh seats should not be diminished. The absence of any such assurance might give rise to a good deal of political feeling and would lend support to the separatist movement in both countries”.
The noble Lord, Lord Rowe-Beddoe, referred obliquely to that matter. I think that he was suggesting that that was a likelihood arising out of this legislation as it stands. Mr McLean goes on:
“Accordingly, the conference resolved not to cut the number of seats in … Wales and to establish a separate boundary commission … The 1944 recommendations have provided a template for all subsequent legislation … There should be no reduction in seat numbers for Scotland, or for Wales … There should be a Great Britain-wide quota, or target electorate, for each seat … The maximum deviation of any seat from this target should be 25 per cent … Boundary Commissions might ‘depart from the strict application of these rules’ if necessitated by ‘special geographical considerations, including the area, shape, and accessibility of a constituency’”.
Those are exactly the same arguments as we are having today. He continues:
“The Redistribution Act 1944 implemented these rules … During 1946 and 1947 the Labour Government announced that the 25 per cent rule was too restrictive and was leading the commissioners to break up historic communities. This conservative argument was accepted by the Conservatives; an Act of 1947 removed the explicit 25 per cent rule, and placed equal constituency size below respect for local boundaries in the Commissions’ rules”.
In other words, no cuts in the number of seats and respect for local boundaries put above a 25 per cent deviation from targets—a lot more than the 5 per cent that is being proposed in this legislation.
As far as I am concerned, this legislation’s effect on Wales is utterly absurd. It is unjust. It treats Members of Parliament miserably. It will interfere in family life for many Members of Parliament because the Bill is not even staged—and I heard the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Crickhowell, on the question of staging. It also provides for a great level of disruption in the public service careers of Members of Parliament. Many Members go into Parliament because they believe in public service and the need to contribute to their communities. It is quite unreasonable suddenly to remove 25 per cent of them in the way that is being suggested.
Wales is being punished on the back of a populist response by the coalition Government. The expenses scandal has provoked a backlash against Members of Parliament. The Government’s response has been to cut expenses, promise September sittings and cut the number of MPs. It is a kneejerk response and Wales is being appallingly treated. It is absurd that this Parliament should treat the Welsh people and the Welsh nation in this way.
Lord Bach
We have had an extraordinary debate with many outstanding speeches from all sides of the Committee. I say more in sorrow than in anger that I am disappointed that no one from the Liberal Democrat Benches has spoken, particularly with their great tradition as a party in Wales. I cannot believe that they had nothing to say on this issue.
The Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill will have a greater impact on Wales than on any other nation of the United Kingdom. Wales is projected to lose 10 seats of the 40 that it currently has. This represents, as we have heard, a 25 per cent reduction in its Westminster parliamentary representation. It is clearly a very significant proposal. What is so astonishing is that there was no debate in the other place on this matter. The guillotine came down. Does the Minister agree that it is outrageous and hard to understand how the elected House of Parliament could not debate this matter?
But it is worse than that. Many noble Lords who have spoken come from Wales and know how Wales is represented in another place. They will know that the Welsh Grand Committee, comprising all Members of Parliament from Wales, provides a forum for debate relating to Wales. The Grand Committee can meet only when the House directs it to do so. In effect, the Government decide when there is a need for such a meeting. A request was made from a distinguished ex-Secretary of State on 15 September 2010 to the current Secretary of State, the right honourable Mrs Gillan, to convene the Welsh Grand Committee. Unusually, the request was refused. In its report, the Welsh Affairs Select Committee made this comment about that refusal:
“We consider the Secretary of State for Wales’ decision not to convene a meeting of the Welsh Grand Committee in this instance to be very disappointing”.
Perhaps the Minister will tell us whether he thinks that that decision can be justified.
As many noble Lords have said, the prospect of this drastic reduction in the number of Members of Parliament has caused great concern in Wales and among those who are interested in Welsh matters. The all-party Welsh Affairs Select Committee of another place, made up of six government supporters and six opposition supporters, produced a report shortly after the Bill began its legislative stages in another place which was highly critical of the proposed changes. It said:
“A decision to cut the representation in Parliament of one of the nations of the UK, Wales, by a quarter at a stroke should be one that can be shown to have been subject to the most careful and measured consideration, and should be taken in the light of proper examination of alternative approaches, including a slower pace of change”.
The Select Committee concluded, as we have been arguing during our discussion on the Bill:
“There is no need to rush into reorganising the electoral system without careful and measured consideration of the differential effects on the different parts of the UK”.
As the debate in the Committee today has shown, this drastic reduction in the number of MPs has provoked more than considerable concern. For a start, it is a complete departure from the current legal minimum of 35 seats for Wales, enshrined, as we have heard, in the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986, which was passed by a Conservative Government, who should take great credit for that piece of legislation. It is also a significant reduction from the level of Welsh constituencies that was in place at the time when the Welsh people voted for the devolution settlement in 1998. That settlement, as the former Welsh Secretary, my right honourable friend Paul Murphy, noted in debates in the other place, was a package. It was, he explained,
“not simply the establishment of the Assembly, but the continuance of Members of Parliament, at that level, here in the House of Commons to protect the interests of the people of Wales and their nation. If we have a referendum, and there are greater powers, that might change, but at least people would have voted on it. However, in 1998, they voted for the opposite—the retention of Members of Parliament”.—[Official Report, Commons, 6/9/10; col. 72.]
Importantly, that point was echoed by Mr Simon Hart, the Conservative Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire, who warned the Government that a reduction of 25 per cent in the number of Welsh constituencies ahead of the referendum on new powers for the Welsh Assembly was being decided,
“without any reference to the Welsh nation”.—[Official Report, Commons, 6/9/10; col. 119.]
Will the Minister please explain why the forthcoming referendum on powers has no bearing in the Bill on the level of Welsh parliamentary representation?
Leaving aside the issue of the referendum, a number of factors suggest that this sudden and deep reduction in Welsh representation goes too far, too fast. The imposition of a UK-wide electoral quota of the kind imposed by the Bill is bound to create one or two enormous Welsh constituencies that will be overwhelmingly rural in nature and will cover wide and in places inaccessible territories. It will force the construction of new constituencies in the Welsh valleys, which will be impractical and injurious to local community ties, as many noble Lords have said.
Previously, these were the sort of concerns that could have been soothed to a degree through the application of common sense and through the forum of public inquiries, which the Bill proposes to abolish. Will the noble and learned Lord clarify whether there will still be a right to hold public inquiries in boundary reviews concerning the constituencies of the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly and the Northern Ireland Assembly, but not of the mother of Parliaments in Westminster?
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
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Lord Campbell-Savours
I intervene only following the intervention of the noble Lord, Lord Rennard. I am interested in the common ground to which the noble Lord, Lord Williamson of Horton, the noble Baronesses, Lady Williams of Crosby and Lady D’Souza, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, referred last week. They all sought that middle ground that we expect to arise out of the negotiations that will inevitably have to be held. Much of our debate on these amendments could be avoided if the Government were to concede on the principle of the 5 per cent—if they were to accept the 10 per cent for which my noble friend asked or some flexibility above 5 per cent whereby some areas would apply a 5 per cent arrangement as against others that would apply a 10 per cent arrangement. Only by that kind of flexibility do we move away from the arguments that are being deployed during this debate. It is a straitjacket. My noble friend Lord Grocott referred to rough justice. It is rough justice that arises only out of a straitjacket that the Government have sought to introduce.
I would like to know—some work must have been done in government—how many county boundaries would be breached with a 5 per cent flexibility as against a 10 per cent one. If that margin is substantial, surely that is an argument in favour of a 10 per cent flexibility. That question applies to how many London and metropolitan district council boundaries are to be breached. The difference between a 5 per cent straitjacket and a 10 per cent one applies equally to the question of whether wards would be split within individual constituencies. Surely Ministers must be beginning to accept this following the intervention from the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, today. She was absolutely blunt and said basically that we should move from the 5 per cent. Let us hope that in his winding-up speech to this debate, the Minister will signal to us that the Government are prepared to look at that particular issue, because I am sure it would help to move this Bill along.
Lord Bach
My Lords, we have had an interesting debate on interesting subjects, and we look forward to hearing the Minister respond. The principle behind this group of amendments matches that which motivates the next amendment, Amendment 71A, in my name and that of my noble and learned friend Lord Falconer. The stringency of the Government’s proposals as we see it—the inflexibility of the rules set out in the Bill, the strict adherence to a tight mathematical formula and the lack of discretion given to the boundary commissioners in carrying out their work—will have damaging effects on our system.
The Constitution Committee of your Lordships’ House reported on the proposed equalisation of constituencies in this Bill, and wrote:
“Applying the new rules as to equalisation will necessitate the creation of constituencies crossing regional and county boundaries; in addition, many more constituencies than at present will cross local authority boundaries. This has significant administrative and political consequences, in terms of such matters as electoral administration and party political organisation. The pace of change is unlikely to lessen such administrative and political challenges and, indeed, seems likely to make them more difficult to manage”.
It went on:
“The Political and Constitutional Reform Committee heard evidence from Democratic Audit that the new rules as to equalisation were being imposed ‘without any attempt to form a consensus’ and without the Government having first investigated what people actually want from representation. There did not appear to be any evidence that the electorate considers equalisation to be significantly more important than, say, geographical, customary or traditional boundaries”.
The committee concluded:
“Pre-legislative scrutiny and public consultation would have enabled a better assessment of whether the new rules as to equalisation are overly rigid”.
It has come to be expected that those of your Lordships’ colleagues who sit on that committee—and I remind this Committee that they come from all parts of the House—are always entirely wise and sensible in their assessment. We certainly think so.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I am grateful for that clarification. As I indicated, under the existing rules, 19 out of 32 London borough boundaries are crossed by a constituency boundary. My noble friend Lord Eccles also reflected on the fact that boundaries are crossed under the existing rules. My information is that 16 out of 35 shire counties are crossed by a constituency boundary and 31 out of 40 unitary boundaries. In its fifth report the Boundary Commission noted that in the fourth review, 13 constituencies crossed metropolitan district boundaries whereas in the review which took effect in 2010, 22 constituencies did so. And whereas in the previous review 170 constituencies had crossed non-metropolitan district boundaries, the recommendations for the fifth review included 165 which did so.
In Scotland, where I accept there are other issues with regard to wards because of the multi-Member nature of the local authority wards, there is one constituency—that of my honourable friend Mr Mundell, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Scotland Office—which covers parts of three council areas. His constituency of Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale covers the council areas of Dumfries and Galloway, Scottish Borders and South Lanarkshire. This is an important point. My noble friend Lord Naseby mentioned the fact that he had at one stage represented three local authority areas.
Lord Bach
I am sorry the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, is not in his place. I should have asked him at the time. The three he mentioned would have been two district councils and Northampton county council, which overrode both the two district councils. So it would not be three separate district councils—it would be a county council and district councils within the same county, as far as I know Northampton.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I defer to the noble Lord’s superior knowledge of the English local government system. In the case of Mr Mundell, it is three unitary council areas. The constituency which I used to have the privilege to represent in Shetland is one of those preserved by this Bill and it had two local authority areas within it.
I recognise the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Snape, about the relationship which individual Members of Parliament have with their local authorities. There are numerous cases where Members of Parliament represent more than one local authority area. No one is suggesting that any of those who fall into that category do not do their job on behalf of their constituents as well as those MPs who only have only one local authority within their constituency. I note in passing that Mr Mundell increased his majority at the 2010 election by 1.9 per cent. Without causing any difficulties with my coalition partners, that, for a Scottish Conservative in the 2010 election, was quite an achievement.
It is important, too, to look at this from the perspective of the elector. With regard to “one vote, one value”, the electors are only in one local government area with one Member of Parliament. We should not necessarily be looking to the administrative convenience of Members of Parliament at the expense of the value of votes for the individual elector.
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Lord Bach Excerpts(13 years, 10 months ago)
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Lord Bach
My Lords, Part 2 of the Bill is aimed, on the one hand, at reducing the size of the House of Commons by 50 and, on the other, at making the 600 remaining seats or, at any rate, the vast majority of them, more equal in size. As noble Lords are aware, we on this side are opposed to the arbitrary and somewhat dubious proposal to cut the other place by 50 seats. What we see as the failure of the Government so far to provide any coherent, considered reason as to why 600 is the better number, let alone the ideal number, for membership of the House of Commons has fuelled concern that the governing parties reached that judgment either on the basis of private, partisan calculation or that, as the some of the rather flip answers that have been given as to why 600 suggest, they did not really care terribly what the figure was. It is for the House and perhaps eventually the country to judge which of those two alternatives is worse.
We on this side of course support the principle of more equal-sized seats. However, we have considerable concern about the practical way in which the Bill sets out to achieve that objective. As we have previously heard, the rigidity of the proposed new rules, with their overriding emphasis on numerical equality to the practical exclusion of all other factors, is likely to unravel long-established patterns of representation in ways that will disrupt political organisation and even break up community identities.
However, even if those flaws were ironed out and a more balanced approach applied to the rules for drawing constituency boundaries, the Bill would still be undermined by a fundamental defect in its design; namely, that you cannot produce equal seats from an unequal register. It is to that effect that I move Amendment 65B, which is grouped with Amendment 67B.
The Deputy Prime Minister told the other place that the December 2010 electoral register will form the basis for the boundary review that this Bill stipulates must be completed by October 2013. But the Government accept the view of the Electoral Commission that in excess of 3.5 million eligible voters, our fellow citizens, are missing from that register. The Government’s solution to underregistration is to expedite the rollout of individual voters’ registration. That marks a departure from the previously agreed timetable which we feel will harm rather than help voter registration, particularly if the Northern Ireland experience is anything to go by. However, in any event, the Government’s own timetable does not begin the move to individual registration until after December 2010. We fear that this amounts to an admission that millions of eligible voters will be ignored when the boundaries are redrawn. That would be bad in any event, but it is made worse when one considers that the missing voters are not randomly spread.
An Electoral Commission study published in March last year found that,
“underregistration is concentrated among specific social groups, with registration rates being especially low among young people, private renters and those who have recently moved home … The highest concentrations of under-registration are most likely to be found in metropolitan areas, smaller towns and cities with large student populations, and coastal areas with significant population turnover and high levels of social deprivation”.
The Electoral Commission’s study was underpinned by Ipsos MORI research which found—these are pretty shocking figures—that only 69 per cent of black and minority ethnic voters are registered and only 44 per cent of 20 to 24 year-olds, as opposed to 97 per cent of 60 to 64 year-olds.
In light of these facts, what are we to make of the Government’s determination to press ahead with a timetable for boundary changes which ignores specific social groups based in particular locations? There are a number of explanations. At one extreme is the possible explanation that the Government want somehow deliberately to exclude these people from the boundary calculations for whatever reason; that is, they actively want to leave certain people and places underrepresented in Parliament. Of course, we do not accuse the Government of that, but it would be serious if there were people outside who thought that it was their motivation. An alternative explanation is that they regard those excluded voters somehow as collateral damage—a regrettable but inevitable by-product of the need to rush to pass the Bill and secure the two political reforms which it contains. It is important to remember in this context that the Bill contains a commencement clause so that the alternative vote, even if it were passed in a referendum, may not be introduced unless and until the boundary reforms are implemented. That is why there is a rush.
Our amendment is an attempt to mitigate the damaging effects of the Government’s decision to press ahead on this undemocratic basis by placing an upper limit on the extent of electoral inequality that may result from the Bill. As noble Lords will have gleaned, Amendment 65B is a paving amendment. The substance of the changes that we suggest is contained in Amendment 67B, which states:
“No constituency shall have a total population of those aged 18 and over which is more than 130% of the electoral quota”.
I am of course aware that criticisms can be levelled at the amendment, Most obviously, it may be pointed out that not everyone above 18 will be eligible to vote, but the only source that would enable us to work out the eligible electorate is the census. As it happens, the Electoral Commission has said that it is working alongside the Office for National Statistics on a project to use the data from this year’s census for that very purpose; but, unfortunately, the Government have already announced that they are unwilling to wait for the fruits of that study because it will not be ready until 2014, which does not suit the political timetable. So we have no alternative but to propose this alternative method. It is intended to provide a backstop on the level of distortion that will be allowed to occur under the new boundary rules.
Lord Campbell-Savours
I am sorry to take my noble friend back to the debates that we had some time ago, and I am not sure whether he was the Minister dealing with the electoral registration legislation. However, does not this amendment have implications for individual registration, and could not the position be aggravated if the amendment were to proceed on the basis that one has to knock on the door and have a document signed in the case of every elector? Surely this amendment has implications for that and the gathering of signatures.
Lord Bach
We believe that it certainly does have implications for that, and I have already mentioned individual registration. One of the Government’s responses to this line of criticism is that bringing forward individual registration will somehow mitigate it. Our concern is that it will make it worse, certainly in the short term. What disturbs me more is that my noble friend does not remember that I was the Minister responsible for the legislation to which he referred.
Lord Mawhinney
I am extremely grateful to the noble Lord. He was talking about mitigating the effects of underrepresentation. As a former Minister, is it his contention that underrepresentation started in June of last year? If not, what steps did the previous Government take to mitigate underrepresentation when the boundaries for the 2010 general election were being culled together?
Lord Bach
If the noble Lord is gently trying to say that this is not a problem that has just arisen and that just happens to coincide with the formation of the coalition Government, I am absolutely with him—of course the problem has been with us and with our system for quite some time now, for probably more than 20 years. However, what brings it into stark relief is the fact that if the Bill goes through in its present form, we will build the size of constituencies on the basis of much stricter numbers than we used in the past. Those numbers will be very important indeed; more important than they were under the rules set by previous Governments over the past 40 or 50 years. In the instance where numbers will be even more important, it seems more important to us to get the numbers as correct as we can.
Lord Wills
I am just wondering if my noble friend is as surprised as I am that the noble Lord who previously intervened on him seems to be completely unaware of the legislative measures that the previous Government took to tackle this profound problem of underrepresentation. For example, we gave the Electoral Commission significant new powers—data-matching powers and so on—precisely to help it to tackle this problem of underrepresentation and to ensure that by 2015 the register was comprehensive and accurate. I should have hoped that before intervening the noble Lord would have apprised himself of all the measures—not only the measures that I have just mentioned but all the measures—that the previous Government took to tackle this problem.
Lord Tyler
I wonder if the noble Lord can confirm to your Lordships’ House that the Electoral Commission recommended that the only way to make the register more effective and more accurate was to move to individual registration—and that it did so in 2003. How long did it take the previous Government to get round to activating that recommendation?
Lord Bach
If the noble Lord has kept to the rule that you should know the answer to a question before asking it, he will know when the previous Government got round to it, to use his own phrase. All sorts of other methods of trying to improve underregistration were tried before. A great debt is owed to my noble friend Lord Wills, who—I think this can be said openly—had a large part in persuading the previous Government that individual registration was the proper way to proceed.
Lord Bach
Yes, eventually. I am afraid that it may be a lesson that the current Government will also learn—that you do not always get everything absolutely right to start with, and that sometimes it takes a few years to do. It is perhaps best to acknowledge that, particularly when you are rushing through legislation that you may live to regret later.
Lord Campbell-Savours
Does my noble friend accept that one of the reasons why there was a delay—in the case of some of us, we wanted the delay to go on for ever—is the experience in Northern Ireland, where electoral registration rates dropped dramatically? Even to this day we are suffering from the legacy of the introduction of individual registration in Northern Ireland. I apologise to my noble friend, but he knows that I repeatedly argued against this system.
Lord Wills
I am sorry to keep interrupting my noble friend, but having spent years on this issue, until my brain hurt, I fear that the noble Lord, Lord Tyler—who has a proud history of espousing constitutional reform for many years, and I pay tribute to it—is under a real misapprehension about the nature of reform of the registration processes. Of course individual registration is important. That is why, as my noble friend has said, I espoused it. That is why the previous Government brought it forward. However, it is primarily important for the accuracy of the register; it does not help the comprehensive nature of the register. In fact, as my noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours has just pointed out, it has the real potential to damage the comprehensive nature of the register. That has, for years and years, been the problem with dealing with individual registration. The previous Government, I am pleased to say, found a way forward, and I will, if the House permits me later, speak at greater length about it. It is true that individual registration is important for the accuracy of the register; it is not true—with all respect to the noble Lord, Lord Tyler—that it is important for the comprehensive nature of the register. That is the core of the issue here.
Lord Bach
My Lords, illustrating the point that I was seeking to make before I was interrupted, perhaps I may refer to a study undertaken by CACI for the Electoral Reform Society late last year. It found:
“After equalisation, the average constituency will contain about 76,000 registered voters. It will have a total voting age population … of about 83,000. But in areas of the country where registration is low, the VAP could be as high as 110,000—a third bigger than the average constituency”.
Typically, as we have heard, the areas of low voter registration tend to be poorer, urban constituencies where the MPs face a bigger and more difficult caseload than their colleagues in more affluent parts of the country. The people who make up much of that caseload often do not appear on the voter registers but they turn up in numbers in constituency surgeries—and they will continue to turn up even after this boundary review has failed to count them. They will be the invisible electorate which will inflate inner urban seats and will grow in size in line with the requirement to meet the official electoral quota, increasing still further the constituency burden that bears on the MPs who represent them.
So the Bill may be aiming at creating more equal-size seats, but it is going to shoot well wide of that mark. Our amendment will provide a small correction. Using the proposed new electoral quota of 75,800 as the starting point, our amendment would prevent the creation of seats within excess of approximately 98,500 adult residents. It will therefore provide a little more parity between constituencies and, in doing so, prevent the complete overload of MPs representing inner urban populations. I beg to move.
The Advocate-General for Scotland (Lord Wallace of Tankerness)
My Lords, the noble Lord has explained the basis of his amendment. It sets out the requirement that Boundary Commission recommendations should comply with both an electorate and a population range. Under the amendments, the total population aged 18 or over in a constituency could not exceed a number that is 130 per cent of the electoral quota. As a preliminary point, the noble Lord, Lord Bach, has again raised the question of people missing from the electoral roll, as indicated in the report last year by the Electoral Commission. These are matters that we have already debated at some length in the course of this Committee, and I have indicated in replies to previous amendments the steps that the Government are taking to address them. However, it is worth making the point yet again that even if we were to go with what the noble Lord, Lord Bach, wishes to see, and even if we were to be hugely successful in getting people who are eligible on to the electoral roll, under what he is proposing the election for 2015, certainly as far as the English constituencies are concerned, would nevertheless be fought on constituencies that were determined by an electoral quota based on the year 2000; in other words, it would be some 15 years out of date.
In spite of the noble Lord’s sweet words of concern about the underrepresentation of certain groups, and I have no doubt whatever that he, along with all sides of the Committee, is genuinely concerned about this, so far as the 2015 election is concerned, the amendment will do absolutely nothing to reflect these people in the electorate, which will determine the boundaries. Indeed, I have already indicated that under this Bill and the Fixed-term Parliaments Bill, the election due for May 2020 would be based on the electoral register and the base date would be December 2015: in other words, after there has been some opportunity for the various initiatives that have been proposed to have effect, including individual registration.
Here I pay tribute to the work of the noble Lord, Lord Wills, and what he set in motion for individual registration, along with the rolling register, which I think was a product of the last Administration. Those were positive moves and we are planning for more. However, let us not get it into our heads that through this amendment, people who are currently missing from the electoral roll will somehow be taken into account for the constituency boundaries as far as England is concerned for elections in 2015. As I have said, we would still use constituencies where the relevant base date was as long ago as 2000.
It is accepted that the intention behind these amendments is to ensure not only that constituencies have electorates of more equal size and therefore that the weight of votes is fairer and more equal but, as the noble Lord has explained, but that the populations they contain are also fairer and more equal. I would be among the first to recognise that the responsibility of a Member of Parliament is to represent not only those who are registered in the constituency, but the entire population. Some might be eligible to register for a vote but for one reason or another have not done so, and some people might not be eligible because they are under 18 or for reasons of nationality.
There are issues of both principle and practice in dealing with these amendments. I agree with the principle that Members of Parliament must represent all their constituents, whether or not they are eligible to vote, but it does not follow that the boundaries should be designed around that principle. Constituencies are by their nature diverse, and indeed we have had numerous debates in which former Members of the other place have described their different experiences, workloads and issues that arise. We have talked about the difference between inner city and rural areas. It is inevitable that there will be these differences, but I think it would be utterly impossible to design a system that takes account of every conceivable difference. It is also worth restating the simple principle that underlines our reforms as set out in this part of the Bill. They are focused on fairness and equality for electors. What ought to be borne in mind is that we want to ensure that one elector means one vote.
The real point I want to make in relation to these amendments is that of the practical difficulties. I fear that they would be unworkable in practice. Population statistics are derived from the census, which as we know is taken once a decade. Annual estimates of change are then made from the original census data, but at present these are produced by the Office for National Statistics only at local authority level. On the other hand, the electoral register is updated annually, and whatever debate, discussion and controversy we have had over registration rates, the number of people on the register is an absolute figure and beyond dispute. It is not an estimate.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
If I have got it wrong I shall say so, but it was not speculative, which is what the Boundary Commission is invited to do. It has indicated that if it comes up at the stage of the representations in the consultation, it might be able to talk about some hard, factual and practical changes. I shall confirm, I hope sooner rather than later, that that is possible.
Lord Bach
I continue on from what my noble friend asked. As I understand it, in the past Boundary Commissions have worked on the number registered at a particular date—that is certainly right. However, under the 1986 rules, or the way in which they have been applied, the Boundary Commission has been able to look carefully at what is proposed to be built in a certain area, such as a new town, to use an extreme example, in the relevant period. I might be wrong about that, and I look to the Minister and his advisers about that. The Boundary Commission can take that as another consideration. Of course, the commission cannot add a population as such, but it can take into account what is likely to happen in that area in a broad way.
Perhaps the noble and learned Lord will answer this when he replies to other comments that have been made, but we are concerned that if the Boundary Commission's role is so numerically based, it will really have the opportunity to look at these wider matters. At the moment, under what we consider to be rather good rules, will the commission be able to consider them in the same way as it has in the past? I do not expect an immediate answer because this is an important point about the new rules that will be created under the Bill.
Lord Howarth of Newport
My Lords, the noble and learned Lord spoke of his desire to achieve fairness and equality between electors in the processes that this Bill provides for by introducing constituencies that reflect that. We might also want to see fairness and equality between citizens. I know that it is not our tradition and practice in this country to draw constituency boundaries on the basis of population. Instead, we take account of those who are registered electors. However, it is highly desirable that the real population figures should effectively be taken into account. The way to square that circle is to do everything possible to improve the state of the electoral registers to make sure that the registers, constituency by constituency throughout the country, are as accurate and complete as they possibly can be.
The noble and learned Lord said that the Government are intent that that should happen. But it is not realistic to talk, as the Government do, about equal votes in equally drawn constituencies if the registers are so patchy. They are more incomplete in some constituencies than others. Therefore reform of registration, or at least a serious and effective drive to update and improve registration, must be intrinsic to the project that the Government have embarked on in their quest to achieve equal votes in equally drawn constituencies.
Yesterday, the Deputy Prime Minister, answering Questions in the other place said:
“It is the choice of the coalition Government to say that we want to reform politics not in a piecemeal fashion”.—[Official Report, Commons, 18/1/11; col. 682.]
If that is indeed the intention of the coalition Government, as stated by the Deputy Prime Minister only yesterday, then surely the Bill should be amended in some way to incorporate provisions that give impetus and drive to ensuring that registration is greatly improved.
There is a political problem for the Government in that there is a perception that the Government are happy to see significant proportions of the electorate unregistered. A greater number of those who are unregistered may not be disposed to vote for the coalition. Why are we not getting registration built into this legislation? Is it simply because the Government are in such a rush to get the Bill on the statute book? They do not need to be in such a rush to get the whole Bill on to the statute book. As we have been saying, we are happy to accept that Part 1 of the Bill has been scrutinised in this House with some thoroughness. If Part 1 of the Bill were separated from Part 2, we would be content for that to go ahead. For some reason to do with mistrust between the coalition partners, they are still unwilling to do that, but let us hope that it can be done. Then we would have more time to ensure that these important reforms proposed in Part 2 of the Bill are not only properly scrutinised but made more complete by the incorporation of measures in relation to registration.
Lord Elton
There is a great difference between the traditional arrangements of the Chief Whips of both parties in ensuring that they have a sufficient number of people here to keep the House or if necessary win a Division, and a formal arrangement to get a series of people to speak to make sure that the debate goes on longer than it otherwise would. I confess that I am myself speaking away from the amendment.
Lord Elton
May I just finish? I am happy to give way when I have finished. I confess that I am myself departing from good order by not addressing the amendment, which is what I hope the noble Lord, Lord Bach, is about to do.
Lord Bach
I want to address the point that the noble Lord felt obliged to make. The rules of the game changed slightly, did they not, when the Government announced that they would have an all-night sitting on this Bill? They said that would do everything they could to ram the Bill through as quickly as they could. Once they had decided to do that, the rules changed. Why was it not good sense to have a document that would help this side, with our limited power, to set out some sort of rota for matters that need to be debated? The rules have changed and they have changed only because of the way that the Government have behaved.
Lord Elton
With respect, the previous Government had all-night sittings as well and we did not change the rules.
Lord Bach
My Lords, I make this application more in sorrow than in anger, but actually in both. The reason that I beg to move that the House do now resume is that it is the Committee’s only way of showing our distaste and anger at the use of the procedure of closure that has been moved this afternoon by the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford. This precious procedure of the House has strength because it is extremely rarely employed. Indeed, apart from the other night, as I understand it, the closure procedure had not been employed for 20 years, but it has now been used twice in less than 48 hours.
Closure may sometimes be justified—although it is hard to think when—but how it could be justified in a debate on an important amendment on the question of the underregistration of 3.5 million of our fellow citizens in the voting registers is hard to understand. The debate had lasted for 93 minutes and was coming to a conclusion. It is true that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness, of whom I make no criticism at all, had spoken quite early in the debate. However, this is Committee stage, not Report. In Committee, even if the Minister speaks early, other Members of your Lordships’ House are entitled to be heard and to make their speeches in due course. The noble and learned Lord made his speech and then there were speeches from other noble Lords around the Committee. However, for a debate of this seriousness to be effectively guillotined—because that is what it was—after that period of time and when, as I said, it was coming to a close is, in our view, an abuse of the House. For that reason, I beg to move.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal
My Lords, as your Lordships will know, I have not spoken so far in this debate so I rise now with a great deal of sadness. When the closure Motion was first moved by the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, towards the early hours of Tuesday morning, the noble Baroness, our Lord Speaker, refreshed the Committee’s memory about the circumstances in which such Motions can be moved. I am going to trespass upon your Lordships’ time a little by doing so again because it is important that we remind ourselves when such Motions are proper. The paragraph reads as follows:
“I am instructed by order of the House to say that the motion ‘That the Question be now put’ is considered to be a most exceptional procedure and the House will not accept it save in circumstances where it is felt to be the only means of ensuring the proper conduct of the business of the House; further, if a member who seeks to move it persists in his intention, the practice of the House is that the Question on the motion is put without debate”.
I repeat that closure is “an exceptional procedure”. I ask the House: what is exceptional about a 90-minute debate about anything in your Lordships' House? If there is nothing exceptional, we tread on very dangerous ground. This House—not the other place—demands good conduct from us all.
Lord Bach
My Lords, I am most grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken in this important debate, not least to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, for his wise comments, which included criticism of the Opposition as well of his own side. The point that I seek to make in moving this Motion is that you cannot begin to have a system of regular guillotines and at the same time hope to retain a scrutinising House that holds the Government properly to account. We cannot go down the route of regularly using guillotines as a tactic in Bills. The noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, put that point so much better than I can, and it came from those on the Cross Benches, who sometimes look at us, I think, from on high and make judgments about us that we do not make about ourselves.
I was minded to put this Motion to the vote, but, having heard the spirit of this debate and speaking in a spirit of desire for negotiations, it seems unnecessary to do so. I hope I get the feeling of the Committee right in deciding not to put the Motion to a vote. I think we want to continue, particularly with the debate that is about to take place on the next amendment on the Marshalled List. With the Committee’s leave, I will withdraw the Motion, but I hope it is on the understanding that neither the government Front Bench nor their Back-Benchers will indulge in closure Motions of this kind. It is just not acceptable.
Lord Touhig
If the Government concede on this amendment, of course it could be said that they are setting a precedent. That does not bother me. I rather think that, when the first human being stood up on his hind legs instead of crawling around on all fours, people tut-tutted and said that that was setting a precedent. The argument put by the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, is important because it goes to the heart of the Bill. As we discussed to some extent at Second Reading, our representation in Parliament should be community based. If ever there were a case for that, it is that of the Isle of Wight.
The fact that the Isle of Wight is an island is down to the handiwork of the creator and we cannot do much about it, but we can inject some common sense into the Bill and say to the Government that this makes sense. Parts of the Isle of Wight should not be joined to a constituency on the mainland. We could argue the same case, I am sure, for Ynys Môn—there will be other examples I have no doubt—but this makes sense and I hope that the Committee will support it.
Lord Bach
I say from the Front Bench that my party's view is clear that the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, should be supported. The Isle of Wight seems evident to us to be a prime candidate for exemption. It meets the island criteria of the other two preserved constituencies. It has a historic basis to its case for being looked at somewhat differently.
Many noble Lords will have received a letter from the Isle of Wight Council, to which I pay tribute for the way in which it has run its campaign. The letter informs us that there has not been a cross-Solent seat, as the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, said in moving his amendment, since 1832—a date that regularly appears in our debates on this Bill—and successive boundary reviews have very strongly rejected any such consideration. We are in favour of his amendment.
The debate has been of interest beyond the Isle of Wight, because of the two different strands of opinion on whether the Bill is too rigid. The Forsyth/Pannick strand—I do not mean “panic”, but that shows what happens when you break the rules and do not say the “noble Lord, Lord Forsyth”, and “the noble Lord, Lord Pannick”—argues that the Bill is much too rigid in terms of constituencies and begins to lose common sense as a result. Then there is the purist view—although I did not think I would ever say that about the noble Lord, Lord Hamilton—that says that, if the Government mean what they say about numbers being everything, they had better keep to their word. I know which side of that argument I am on.
As the noble Lord, Lord Selsdon, said, I encourage the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, to press his amendment to a vote. Whether he does so is entirely a matter for him. I never thought that I would be in a position to advise the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, with his vast experience, but he should beware of being offered something in the next few minutes by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness, who I am sure will make such an offer with huge skill. The Minister will mean every word that he says, but the noble Lord should beware. If he decides to pay a visit to the ministry in order to hear what the Government have to say in the way of compromise, he should know that he has us at his back, as it were. He has our word that if he does not get what he wants we will support him in the Lobbies.
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Lord Snape
Again, your Lordships will draw their own conclusions from that intervention. In fact, local knowledge makes a big difference when these boundaries, having been drawn up, are finally agreed. I hope that the Minister who replies to the amendment will accept that to lose that opportunity for a local inquiry, where anomalies such as these can be pointed out, would be a serious and retrograde step. As I have indicated, I intervene at this stage to save time and to pre-empt my later amendment. I hope that the Minister will accept that these are relevant points and will address them in his reply.
Lord Bach
My Lords, all three amendments that we have been discussing—the amendment that has been moved and the other two, Amendments 56 and 56A, which have been spoken to—are important. A great deal of important information has emerged as a consequence of the speeches made. I certainly do not intend to repeat those arguments, but I want to make a few short points.
First, all three amendments propose a delay to the submission of the reports of the first boundary review to be held under the new rules. From the Front Bench, we agree with that principle. I remind the Committee that on Monday we debated Amendment 54A, which also called for a delay—it was an important debate—but more implicitly than explicitly, as these amendments clearly do. We called for a delay in the boundary review process, first, until the electoral register is accurate and up to date. If I may say so, the compliment that my noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours paid to my noble friend Lord Wills for his work over many years in this field is well merited. It is important that the Government listen carefully to what my noble friend Lord Wills and others say about the nature of the register and how important it is to get the data right before embarking on some sort of brave new world.
It is also key that the Boundary Commission should be given sufficient time to complete the very large task that it will undoubtedly face. This argument has been made by a number of noble Lords. In evidence to the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee of the other place, the secretaries of the Boundary Commissions for England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland confirmed that the timetable was achievable, but tight, and that extra resources would certainly be needed—I believe that this point, too, was spoken to on Monday. Who knows whether they are being optimistic or realistic? Obviously it is their best guess. However, by any standards, the changes envisaged in Part 2 of the Bill are substantial. Surely it must and will take time for the various Boundary Commissions to propose a new set of constituencies. Our view, which I think is common sense, is that 1 October 2013 is too tight a timetable. That is the case, simply put, and it deserves an answer from the Minister. Why does the Boundary Commission have to report by 1 October 2013? Why not make sure that it has plenty of time to produce reports that will stand the test of time?
We have heard today about public inquiries and no doubt we will have debates on the matter. From my own experience, and more importantly from that of noble Lords who have spoken today about public inquiries, I say that their value is absolutely undoubted. They may be frustrating in terms of time, but their value in making sure that parliamentary boundaries are sensible and can last has been shown time and again. We have heard this from various ex-Members of Parliament who have spoken. I speak as a non-ex-Member of Parliament who has appeared at many boundary inquiries in different parts of the country, sometimes with success and sometimes, I confess, with a substantial lack of it. However, nearly always, following the public inquiry, the decision made by the Boundary Commission, in whoever’s interest, is better than it was before the public inquiry. This issue is of fundamental importance to the Bill and we will return to it at the proper time. It is one of the most powerful parts of the argument that has been made in favour of these three amendments.
The Advocate-General for Scotland (Lord Wallace of Tankerness)
My Lords, the Bill would require the Boundary Commission to report by October 2013. The amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, would change this to October 2015. The amendment in the names of the noble Baroness, Lady McDonagh, and the noble Lord, Lord Snape, would make it October 2016, and Amendment 56A, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, would make it October 2017. As I indicated on more than one occasion on Monday, the Government’s approach has been simple: to ensure that constituency boundaries are as up to date as possible. That point is worth repeating. The boundaries in effect in England at the general election fought last May were drawn up based on data that were 10 years old. If the House were to accept any of the amendments, the election in May 2015 would be fought on data that were 15 years old.
I mentioned on Monday, in answer to the noble Lord, Lord Wills, the 3.5 million people who are eligible to vote but who are not on the register. What I cannot fathom—and I have thought about this time and again in case I was missing something—is the point that somehow one does a service to these 3.5 million people by using electoral data from 2000. What service does that do to those who have come on to the electoral register between 2000 and December 2010?
Lord Gilbert
I am obliged. My second point is that we all come here with different experiences. I have heard many glowing references to the work of the Boundary Commission and the inquiries and hearings that it had. As far as I am concerned, it is a damned waste of time. It never took a blind bit of notice of anything that was said. Even when, as was always the case in Dudley, the Conservative MP for Dudley West and I as the Labour MP for Dudley East made identical recommendations, these people again took no notice of them whatever. Unsurprisingly, the extremely distinguished Conservative Member for Dudley West wanted all the Conservative voters and I wanted the Labour voters; it seemed to be an extraordinarily simple arrangement that could easily have been accommodated, but the commission never paid any attention to what we had to say.
Thirdly, on a slightly more serious point, I make no imputation—if I have the Minister’s attention; how kind of him—that the Government are trying to derive party advantage from these proposals. I have disagreed with some of the proposals before in the Bill, but these are the only ones that I find profoundly dangerous. I really hope that the Minister will go away and look at them. The idea that you pick everything up by the roots and look at it every five years, and the consequences—I forget which of my noble friends said this—for both parties, where people would be squabbling for selection at the next election and the election after that, would be very serious. I hope very much that the Government will think again.
Lord Bach
My Lords, I feel more than usually inadequate to speak in this particular debate, as I think I am the only speaker—it does not matter whether it is the noble Lord, Lord McNally, or the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace, who responds—who, much to my regret, has never been a Member of the other place. Much of this interesting and helpful debate has been about the role of Members of the other place. Still, let me do my best.
In our amendment the other day—I cannot blame noble Lords if they have not exactly remembered every single phrase of it—we suggested from the Front Bench that the periodic boundary review should occur no later than every six years. We recognise the concerns that the current rules under which the Boundary Commission carries out its work—namely, eight to 12 years—is perhaps too long. Many argue that the extent to which boundaries have become out of date in the intervening time between the commission reporting and new boundaries applying following a general election is unsatisfactory, and we are tempted to support action to address that. The British Academy report on the Bill has concluded that,
“population movements are considerable over relatively short periods of time”.
We acknowledge that that may even happen within a five-year period. However, there has to be a balance, at the very least, between that consideration and the workability of the task that this Bill in particular is asking of the Boundary Commission. That is how we came up with the figure of not more than six years.
The arguments employed during this debate give us some cause for reflection about whether “not more than six years” is necessarily the right length of time. The powerful arguments made by the noble Lord, Lord Martin of Springburn, and others about the role of Members of Parliament raise significant and real points. I was intrigued by the answer of the noble Lord, Lord Maclennan, to the points that were made. I particularly enjoyed—I say this with the greatest affection—how he talked about boundary changes in his old constituency where, on the borders, there were Liberal, Labour and Conservative seats. I could not help thinking that he had managed to be a member of more than half of those parties, although I would never accuse him of being a Conservative.
More seriously, to have a review every seven years leaves it just a bit too long. The same applies to the other amendment in this group, which suggests eight years rather than seven. We would like—if this is possible for the Opposition—to go back and consider whether our point about six years strikes the right balance. On the Front Bench we have been rather attracted by the arguments that have been employed about how, unless the electorate decide differently, it is important that there is a certain stability for Members of Parliament, if only to encourage people from all walks of life to go for that honour.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
My Lords, these amendments would increase the frequency of reports by the Boundary Commission from the Bill’s proposed every five years to, in the case of the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, every seven years and, in the amendment spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Martin of Springburn, every eight years. I hear what the noble Lord, Lord Bach, had to say. He was in distinguished company, because the amendment was moved by the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, who was not a Member of Parliament either. I am sure that that was the loss of the House of Commons.
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“( ) For the avoidance of doubt, the financial provision in section 16 includes any additional resources which a Boundary Commission deems necessary to complete its duties under subsection (2).”
Lord Bach
My Lords, we change topic now and come to a short amendment, which deals with the question of resources for the Boundary Commission. The purpose of this amendment, which is in my name and that of my noble and learned friend, is to gain a degree of reassurance from the Minister that the Government are committed to doing all they can to ensure that what can only be described as the dramatic boundary review proposed is carried out smoothly and effectively, and has the necessary resources.
It has always been a huge task to redraw constituency boundaries. It was the responsibility for many years of the Boundary Commission. However, there is a huge difference in the review planned by the Bill. In usual periods, boundary commissions will indeed look at all constituencies, but in many cases no significant change—or no change at all—would be recommended for a large majority of those constituencies. However, reviewing the boundaries, as is the intention, on very tight mathematical rules, and the crucial factoring in of a large reduction in the number of Members of Parliament, make the Boundary Commission’s task significantly harder. There will be much more work.
In giving evidence on the Bill to the other place’s Political and Constitutional Reform Committee, the boundary commissions said that the task was achievable but difficult. I think that is a fair summary of their evidence. The point is that every single constituency will change as a consequence of this boundary review, as set out in the Bill. There are numerous potential manifestations of redrawn constituency boundaries; that is just a statement of the obvious. What is also obvious is that the task itself is immense. I hope the Committee agrees that the timescale of the task makes this boundary review very different from those that have occurred in the past.
As the Bill stands, the task facing the boundary commissions must be completed by 1 October 2013. The Government recommend that after that a review should occur every five years, but the first major change has to be completed in considerably less than three years’ time. We argue that it follows that the resources required will be greater than what the boundary commissions are used to having at their disposal. Will the Minister reassure the Committee that the boundary commissions will be granted all the necessary resources that the commissioners, who after all are the experts in this area, deem necessary for delivering the task that the Government are asking them to do? It would be helpful if he could remind us out of what budget the resources that are necessary for this inquiry come. If extra resources are found to be necessary in due course, out of what budget will they come? In other words, we are asking him to fill in the details for the Committee. I beg to move.
Lord Soley
I support my noble friend on the Front Bench. The Government could give important reassurance on this. The amendment does not ask directly for more funds now but recognises that what the Government are imposing constitutes a complex and continuing problem for the Boundary Commission, which already struggles at times to deliver what it needs to deliver on time. We all know that at present, when the Government are looking for savings in all these areas, there is a danger that the Boundary Commission will be expected to carry out a task that is beyond it. It seems to me that the wording of the amendment is so reasonable that it would be unreasonable for the Government not to give an assurance that if the Boundary Commission needs more money, it will be given it. It is important in that respect.
The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord McNally)
My Lords, the weakness in this amendment is the first five words:
“For the avoidance of doubt”.
There is no doubt. The 1986 Act and this Bill already make provisions for the payment of the commission’s expenses, including any additional resources necessary to complete the review referred to in this clause. In evidence to the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee, the secretary of the English commission, which of course will have the most sizeable task to complete, told the committee that the commission has been working closely on the question of funding, in discussion with its sponsoring departments. Those departments are the Cabinet Office for England and Wales, the Scotland Office for Scotland, and Northern Ireland Office for Northern Ireland.
In addition, the secretary of the commission confirmed that he was confident that sufficient resources would be available to complete the review. It is the Government’s view that this is the best approach—a dialogue between each of the commissions and their sponsoring departments to ensure that their funding is appropriate. We have no doubt that the review will be conducted with a careful regard—I repeat, a careful regard—to public money. That matter, of course, can be examined at a later stage. However, there is no doubt that the commissions will have the resources that they need to complete the review, and the 1986 Act and this Bill already make provisions for that. I therefore urge the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Bach
I thank the Minister for his reply. I thank my noble friends Lord Soley and Lord Grocott for their contributions and support for the amendment. My noble friend Lord Grocott pressed the Minister, and I should like to press him a little further about whether this whole enterprise will make democracy more expensive or cheaper.
A great deal was made some time ago of the £12 million being saved by reducing the number of elected Members of Parliament by 50. However, as my noble friend demonstrated clearly, there are additional costs in the new proposals, not just with the referendum itself but also with the Boundary Commission. Will the price of democracy go up or down as a consequence of these reforms? The Committee and the country are entitled to know. As I said, this is a probing amendment. I am grateful to the Minister, and beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Campbell-Savours
I want to raise the issue of these reports. I have done two inquiries, but I have never seen the Boundary Commission documentation, which I presume must be made available to inspectors during the course of their inquiries. What happens here? When the commission issues its review and sends it first—if I remember correctly—to individual Members of Parliament in political parties, it provides a report, but I have never seen that document. This is important, because in constituencies in places such as Cumbria—the noble Lord, Lord Henley, who lives near Carlisle, knows exactly what I am talking about—the boundaries of the mountain ranges that separate parts of Cumbria are critically important during the course of consideration of boundary reviews. I wondered in what circumstances individual Members of Parliament are entitled to have access to the documentation produced by the survey officers for Land and Property Services in Northern Ireland, and for the Ordnance Survey within the United Kingdom.
Lord McNally
I am relying now on my responsibilities, which I think the noble Lord once shared, as the Minister for the Land Registry.
Lord McNally
I am misleading myself. I mean the director-general of the Ordnance Survey, who is an assessor. I suppose, using common sense, that if you are drawing lines on maps, it is worth having somebody who knows about maps to give advice.
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Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I thank the noble Lord for that question, because he has illustrated that if he had not intervened I might have reached that point by now. I hope noble Lords will allow me to answer that important point, which was made by a number of noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Howarth. I hope to respond to these points as we proceed.
The noble Lord, Lord Wills, has made an ambitious attempt to balance the effect of almost every electoral procedure against every other one. His amendment asks us to wait longer to turn the Bill from a Bill that is workable and achievable into a deeply analysed but almost impossible one that would then have to be taken forward. As I have said, our objectives are clear and we believe that they are attainable. We want one elector to have one vote throughout the United Kingdom. By contrast, the amendment promises a comprehensive overhaul of the whole system that we are considering, including the maintenance of the union and the relationship between the two Houses of Parliament that might produce a magic number of electors and the optimum constituency size.
The current rules by which the Boundary Commission carries out its work have not been considered by a committee since the 1940s. They have been changed on a number of occasions since then by the decision of Parliament through legislation. There is a clear precedent for adjusting boundary rules in the light of experience. The changes have included important elements, such as a longer period of reviews of 10 to 15 years rather than three to seven years. It was right for a Speaker’s Conference to determine the basis for boundary reviews when that happened for the first time back in the 1940s. When the Boundary Commission has asked in its reports for the rules to be made more coherent, Parliament has not asked a conference, a committee or an inquiry to consider what an independent—I stress independent—Boundary Commission has asked for. It is right for the debate to take place in Parliament. Even the 1944 Speaker’s Conference recommended that electoral equality across the constituencies of the United Kingdom should be an overriding principle. We should allow the Boundary Commission to commence that work without delay.
On Second Reading my noble friend noted the dangers of a perfectionist approach, which perhaps is the approach summed up in the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Wills, when he said:
“The Bill is not a panacea. It is not some holy grail in the scripture of political re-engagement, but it is a good start”.—[Official Report, 15/11/10; col. 594.].
Again I say to noble Lords opposite that it is a great pity they did not start the process when they were given such a long opportunity to do so. The point was made by the noble Lord, Lord Gilbert, that there is no perfection of fairness; one person’s fairness may be seen as another’s unfairness. I believe that the Bill, by establishing one vote of equal value across the country, goes a long way to getting a better perception and reality of fairness. I would add that the British Academy report found that the new rules set out in the Bill,
“are a very substantial improvement on those currently implemented”,
and that,
“they have a clear hierarchy and are not contradictory”.
A number of noble Lords, including the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, and the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, asked how the figure of 600 was reached. We have never suggested that there was anything magical or ideal about a House of Commons of 600 any more than the current size of 650 is ideal. It is flawed legislation that has allowed the size of the House of Commons to creep up over time.
Lord Bach
The noble and learned Lord says that in the past Parliament has directed certain matters regarding the redistribution of boundaries, and he is right about that, but does he agree that no Parliament has ever set an exact number, such as the 600 in this Bill? No Government have ever done that. In the 1986 legislation and other previous legislation, Governments have left the Boundary Commission to set the exact number as a result of its inquiry. This Government in this Bill are trying to set a number of 600. That is unique, is it not?
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
Indeed, but the point I was about to make about the present size of the House of Commons is that it is the largest directly elected national chamber in the European Union, and at 600 it would still be relatively big. It would have fewer than the chambers of some comparable countries. The Bundestag, for example, has 622 members and the Italian Chamber of Deputies has a similar number. As indicated in an exchange between the noble Lords, Lord Foulkes and Lord Wills, each country has its own internal arrangements, be it some federal situation as in Germany or the United States, or devolution in our own country.
Lord Bach
The noble and learned Lord said that the numbers have gone up. I am sure that he knows that the number of Members of Parliament who were elected in 1945 was 640, with a population, as my noble friend just said, of 33 million. The number elected in 2010 was 650, with a population that is much higher than that. Will the noble and learned Lord admit that those figures are correct?
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I have no reason to doubt the noble Lord, Lord Bach, but will he accept that, with the exception of the reduction of Scottish Members post the 1945 election, the numbers have gone up on every occasion?
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Lord Bach Excerpts(13 years, 11 months ago)
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Lord Lipsey
When we table amendments from this side of the House we do not consider their partisan impact; we merely consider their impact on the constitution of this country. I am sure that if my noble friend’s amendment meets that test, it will be given proper and due consideration by the House.
In moving this amendment I give the Government and the House an opportunity to say that each of the two propositions—the AV proposition and the number of MPs/seats proposition—should have separate consideration. They should be taken on their constitutional merits as a whole and treated in that way. I deeply regret, and what is more I believe that the Government will have reason deeply to regret, that the reality of the way in which they have chosen to proceed will make consideration of the issues on their merits more difficult for the House.
Lord Bach
I will speak to both amendments. The first is in the name of my noble friend Lord Lipsey, who has moved it so ably, and the second is in my name and that of my noble and learned friend Lord Falconer of Thoroton. Clause 8(1)(b) is an astonishing paragraph of this Bill. It is very remarkable. It was overlooked in debates in the other place, which perhaps makes it all the more important that we debate it properly in this House and in this Committee.
Clause 8 informs the Minister what to do following the result of the referendum being announced. If more votes in the referendum are cast in favour of the answer yes than in favour of the answer no, the Minister must make an order that brings into force provisions to change our voting system for elections to the House of Commons from first past the post to this type of alternative vote system. However, that is not the end of it. An affirmative result in the referendum is not sufficient according to the Bill. The changes in the boundaries detailed in Part 2 of the Bill, particularly in Clause 10, must also have taken place before the alternative vote system can take effect.
In Committee last Monday the Committee was delighted to hear the noble Lord, Lord McNally, tell the House that he and the Leader of the House, the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, were joined at the hip on this Bill. I wondered what it is that joins them at the hip on this Bill. I now believe it sincerely to be Clause 8(1)(b) that joins them thus. It has been clear from the introduction of this Bill that this clause is the glue that holds the Government together. Part 1 of the Bill, as was said at Second Reading, is clearly and plainly the Liberal Democrat part of the deal. However AV may have been described by their leader in the past, the Liberal Democrats have decided that it is worth the candle and that it is best not to go searching for some sort of proportional representation, or certainly not at the moment.
Lord Deben
My Lords, I wonder whether it is possible for us to imagine the state of mind of those on the other side who, having suggested AV, now consider this to be evidence of a plot. They themselves recognised that we should have a system whereby constituencies should be at least more or less the same size, which was why they stopped—it was they who did it—keeping a special factor to enable people in dispersed constituencies to have fewer Members of Parliament. It was a Labour decision to stop that. They now come to the House and argue that both things are unacceptable. Surely being fair is a Conservative concept. Should we not have constituencies of the same size? That seems to be a very Conservative principle.
Is it not also a Conservative principle to suggest that the public might make their own choices in these circumstances? It happens to be a Conservative principle with which I disagree. I do not believe in referenda and I never have believed in them. However, it is very curious that noble Lords opposite suggest there is something intrinsically un-Conservative in having a referendum. I do not understand that at all. There is something deeply wrong in referenda, but that does not mean that people who believe in them could not be Conservative.
Why are Labour Members making such a fuss about this matter? Could it possibly be that they are seeking with some real difficulty to find reasons why they should spend as much time as possible discussing these matters? I do not want to help them in that, so I will finish by saying one simple thing. I came to this House expecting and finding that there was, in many cases, a degree of quality in debate unfound in my 35 years in the House of Commons. I am very sad to find that during these recent Bills, those who have experience of the House of Commons and those who have been press-ganged into the little battle have used all the techniques which brought and bring the other House into such disrepute. I am very sorry that yet again on this Bill we have lowered ourselves to doing the kinds of things which are done elsewhere. It is a pity that we cannot look back on our traditions, even for someone as newly hatched as myself, and raise the standards again.
Lord Bach
Perhaps the noble Lord can help me. It is really just information that I seek. He says that it was the Labour Government who changed the rules to make it not possible for more rural seats to have a smaller electorate. I should be grateful if he could give us chapter and verse on that. As I understand them, the rules we work under now were passed under a Conservative Government in 1986 of which I think he was almost certainly a distinguished and leading member. We actually believe that those rules are well worth preserving.
Lord Deben
Perhaps I may reply to that. The change to the sparsity rules, continued in the 1986 arrangements, was brought in by the Labour Government, who argued that it was unfair that some constituents, because there was a smaller number of them in a constituency, would have a bigger vote than other constituents. All that is happening in this Bill is that we are repeating to the Labour Party something which it has long forgotten.
Lord Rooker
I shall make a brief response to the noble Lord, Lord Deben. I was not intending to speak in this debate but I have three points to make, one of which he will not know. Until two years ago, I had served as a Minister for eight years on the Front Bench here, having come from the other place. I am on record in several places as saying—and I repeat it, although I know that it annoys people down the other end when I say it—that I was under greater scrutiny in my eight years here as a Minister than I ever was in the other place. I am quite happy to say that. It was because of the nature of the way this place works, whether Question Time, Select Committees, or the Floor of the House. There is no doubt about it. I speak only from my own experience. It takes a while to get used to this place, and it can be irritating.
My other two brief points are these. I have been here on this Bill virtually every day, missing only a couple of hours one day, because I just happen to be interested. I do not agree with everything that is happening, as I will make clear in a moment. I have taken several Bills through this House, and in no Committee stage in which I was involved was I aware of ever being forced to say, or of agreeing to say, to the House, “I will take it away and think about it”; or of saying, “I will take that part of this argument away, think about it, and then promise to come back on Report”. If you cannot make a change of rule, you come back openly, having looked at it in the department. Not once, as far as I know, in these debates in six days has any Minister ever said, “A good idea, or maybe a good idea, and we will take that away. There might be something we can do. It does not wreck the Bill, and it may add to things”.
Not once has that happened, and that is fairly unique, in my experience, I say in all humility.
Lord Rooker
I stand corrected then. I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord McNally, for that. As I say, I was here for all but two hours.
The other point is that there was talk about the previous elections and, to be honest, on this issue concerning equality of constituencies I agree 100 per cent with the noble Lord, Lord Deben. There is nothing between us. If you are going to have one person one vote in a constituency-based system, you have to have the constituencies as near as damn it the same size. This was argued out years ago in the 1970s. I can remember there was an argument at a boundary inquiry. I even remember the late Denis Howell lecturing us and saying, “Look, we might argue for smaller seats in the inner areas because our workload is greater, there is deprivation and there are all the other issues. On the other hand, you have to balance that against the massive distances that country members have to travel. It is different”. What is important is the number people who are voting for one parliament.
Frankly, if you look at the history and take the trouble to read or listen to John Curtice, you will see that Labour lost the 2005 election. I know the arithmetic says we came back with a majority of 66 but, if you look at all the facts and stats that came out, the writing was on the wall then simply because of the way the electoral system worked, the shape of the constituencies, and the slowness of the boundary inquiries. For that reason—it is also why I have no amendments to table to the second half of the Bill—I do not think there should be more than 500 Members of the other place. However, as I do not want to upset anybody by tabling such an amendment, this is my only opportunity to say so.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I am sure that they are very similar to the criteria which the previous Labour Government adopted when they gave Orkney and Shetland separate seats in the Scottish Parliament, and did so for similar reasons. His having been a member of that Government, I am sure that the noble Lord will be well aware of those criteria. However, I have no doubt that we will come back to this.
I shall conclude where we came in by indicating that Amendments 45 and 46A would separate the two issues. The first amendment moved by the noble Lord would do this by removing the stipulation that the alternative vote provisions are brought in only after the draft Order in Council is laid, and the second amendment would do this by removing the provision that requires the alternative vote provisions to be brought into force on the same day. It does not actually break the linkage as it would leave the requirement that the order bringing the boundaries provisions into force must have been laid first, although that would not necessarily be on the same day. It may be the intention of the noble Lord, Lord Bach, to put the amendments together.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I have indicated that the coalition programme for government makes a clear commitment to both issues, and it is the Government’s view that the issues are linked, particularly in terms of how the House of Commons will be shaped when it is reconstituted after the election in 2015. As my noble friend Lord McNally has said on many occasions, the linkage is fair votes and fair boundaries. The Government are committed to both provisions if a yes vote is carried in the referendum. The Government therefore wish to see both provisions, if the yes vote is carried, to come into effect in time for the next general election. On that basis, I invite the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
My Lords, I hesitate to say because, although I am only seven or eight months into office, one of the cardinal rules for a law officer is not to expose what your advice to the Government is. Indeed, you do not even disclose whether advice has been given. However, I will reflect on what the noble Lord, Lord Soley, has said and not necessarily answer his question about advice but perhaps revisit the advice that was given to the House by the Clerks when the particular issue of hybridity was looked at.
Lord Bach
On another subject, which I asked the noble Lord about in my contribution, does he agree that even if, by way of exaggeration as an example, 99 per cent of the population were to vote in favour of changing the Westminster voting system to this type of AV, that change would not come about if the boundary changes were not made? How can he seek to justify that?
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I will not justify that particular point, but I will draw the noble Lord’s attention to the fact that the Boundary Commission report is due, as I have already said on two or three occasions during these exchanges, on 1 October 2013. There will be time to debate the fixed-term Parliament Bill, but the assumption is that the next general election will be held on the first Thursday in May 2015. Therefore there will be ample time for both orders to be laid and implemented together, assuming of course that there is a yes vote. If it is a no vote, no time is attached to bringing forward an order to repeal the relevant sections of the Bill, or the Act as it will be by then.
I reiterate that if the Boundary Commission report is brought forward by 1 October 2013, there will be ample time. Obviously this is also important for electoral administrators and the political parties, and it would ensure that the next general election would be fought both within the boundaries that would then be implemented by order and under the alternative vote system.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
Ninety-nine per cent of the people voting for AV, much as I would like to see that, is hypothetical. It is also purely hypothetical that the boundary changes will not go ahead either.