Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Lord Dixon Excerpts

Wednesday 12th January 2011 Lords Chamber

In the House of Commons before the last election, both the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties agreed that 2015 was a reasonable timescale to achieve a comprehensive and accurate register, so why have they changed their minds and decided to rush through this review on the basis of a register which is by all accounts not going to be comprehensive nor accurate? Why have they changed their minds? If they have not changed their minds, why do they believe that the register can be comprehensive and accurate by 2013? If they do not believe that, why are they proceeding with such a radical and comprehensive revision of boundaries on the basis of an inaccurate register? Why are they doing this? Could the Minister answer that? In the absence of an answer, I hope the Government will look at these amendments favourably and support them.

[Lord Dixon]

We are now getting to the main part of the Bill: the constituents. The arguments about alternative vote and first past the post will come with the referendum. I was involved in alternative vote in this House in 2003, when one of the hereditary Peers, a Deputy Chairman, died. There was a ballot to take his place. Some 423 out of 661 Members voted and the candidate who won had 151 votes. There were 81 candidates, 44 first-preference votes and 42 transferred votes—alternative votes. The person who was elected still did not even get 50 per cent of the votes that were cast. Those arguments will come out when we get to alternative vote.

The important part of the Bill is the constituencies. I have personal experience with constituency. The last change in the Jarrow constituency was in 2005. I know a little about the Jarrow constituency; I have lived there for, in a couple of weeks’ time, 82 years. The only time I was out of the constituency was when I was doing my Army service for two years in the Royal Engineers, so I know a little about the constituency. I served as councillor, mayor and MP, and am now in the House of Lords.

The Boundary Commission proposed that the Bede ward—named after the Venerable Bede—in the Jarrow constituency be transferred to the South Shields constituency and that the Pelaw and Heworth ward in Gateshead be transferred to the Jarrow constituency. That proposal looked good on paper because the difference in the size of the two constituencies would have been only 153 voters. Everyone thought that they were doing well to achieve that equalisation between the Jarrow and South Shields constituencies.

The people of Jarrow had no objection to gaining the voters of the Pelaw and Heworth ward, because Pelaw and Heworth used to be part of the Jarrow constituency. In fact, Thomas Hepburn, who was the founder of the Northumberland and Durham miners union, is buried in Pelaw cemetery. For a long time, the members of the Jarrow constituency Labour Party would put a wreath on his grave before they went to the Durham miners’ gala.

The problem that arose was with the proposed transfer of the Bede ward to the South Shields constituency. Now, Jarrow got its name from the Saxon word “Gyrwy”, which means marsh or fen, which it has been suggested refers to the Jarrow Slake that lies along St Paul’s church in Jarrow, where the Venerable Bede had his home as well as at the Wearmouth St Peter’s church. The Venerable Bede was one of early Europe’s most established scholars. I might add that none of that rubbed off on me—I left elementary school when I was 14, I started in the shipyard when I was 14 and three months and the only exam that I passed in my life was my driving exam—so I cannot claim any of St Bede’s knowledge.

On the proposed transfer of the Bede ward to the South Shields constituency, I wrote to the Boundary Commission on 6 January 2005 to make an alternative suggestion. My suggestion was that the Bede ward should remain in the Jarrow constituency, that the Pelaw and Heworth ward in Gateshead should be transferred to Jarrow and that Jarrow’s Whitburn ward, which is on the coast, should be transferred to South Shields. I was pleased to find that my suggestion was accepted by the Boundary Commission, because many in Jarrow would definitely have been upset if the Bede ward had been transferred to South Shields.

The other thing about the Bede ward in Jarrow is that, as some Members may recall, in 1936 some 200 men from Jarrow marched to London for the right to work. The Jarrow march was not for another crust or for more money on the means test—as it was then known—but for the right to work. Most of the men who marched from Jarrow lived in the East ward, which was adjacent to the Jarrow town hall. After the war, the East ward was cleared and most of the Jarrow marchers were transferred to the new estate in the Simonside ward. The Boundary Commission’s proposal would have resulted in the descendants of the Jarrow marchers of 1936 ending up in the South Shields constituency. That would have virtually caused a civil war, as it would have suggested that they were now Sanddancers rather than Jarrow people.

However, the Boundary Commission did not know any of that. The only way that the issue came out was because there was a public inquiry. The Boundary Commission accepted the proposal that Whitburn, which to my knowledge has never had a direct bus service to the centre of Jarrow, be transferred to South Shields and that the Bede ward remain in Jarrow constituency. The difference in the electorate of the two constituencies was 53, as against the difference of 179 in the Boundary Commission’s original recommendation.

I think that it is vital that local residents have some say in how the constituency boundaries are formed. That issue, I believe, is the most important issue in the Bill.

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town]

My Lords, I was going to rise before my noble friend but I am grateful that I did not as I want to make only one brief point. It is partly on what he was saying about the naming as well as the defining of the boundaries, because one of the things I am most concerned about is that so many boundaries will be changed that one of the big issues will be the naming of the new constituencies and therefore the time taken. This part of the Bill will bring in more consultation than is allowed for without boundary hearings but it will also be timed. I therefore support this amendment and I urge the Government to consider, when they look at the timing of this, that one of the most political issues, even after they have defined the boundaries, will be the naming of so many new constituencies. I urge caution on that as that is where, in the words of my noble friend, civil war will break out.