Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Debate between Lord Graham of Edmonton and Lord Howarth of Newport

Monday 24th January 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Graham of Edmonton]

I am tempted to enter this debate because the premise that the constituency is important has a slight flaw. Every constituency has a number of wards. I first became a councillor 50 years ago this year, and my experience is that the best discussions that I have taken part in have been with 10, 12 or 15 people in someone’s house. We did not masquerade; we were proud to say that we were a ward and we dealt with the issue. Every issue in a locality—a constituency—has a resonance in a part of the constituency, whether it is a road pattern, a development, a school or the closure or opening of something. The ward level is very important.

Having taken part in this debate and listened to colleagues, I congratulate them on bringing their experience here and on not being put off by the shaming fact that, as I detect, that experience is seen in some places as irrelevant. We have the opportunity here to remind the Minister—rub it into him, if you like, without being offensive—that there are people out in the field who will be affected by this.

The Minister and his colleagues have made great play of the big society and localism. However, in this Bill they are not paying attention at all; democracy grows and is stimulated by events and individuals. We could all in this Chamber look back on where we made a big move on to a council, into its leadership, into Parliament and so on, but it all stems back to a handful of people who represented the Labour Party, the Tory Party or the Liberal Democrat party, not in a big way but in a small way—and that is the way they want it. Those of us who have an ambition to serve at a higher level have the opportunity to do so, and everyone is here only because they have given service to their party in one way or another. Thousands of people serve the democratic principle from a very low base.

I say simply to Members opposite—I cannot say that I am replying to what they have said because I have not heard what they have said, except the Minister—that they ought to pay serious attention to the impact of the Bill at the local level if it is carried out, because it will damage our democracy.

We all struggle, not just within the Labour Party but in all parties, to maintain democracy. Issues come up that affect the constituency, and then you get local headlines and so on. So far as I am concerned, though, the Edmonton Labour Party that I served, and still have great connections with, has gone through a series of changes in its organisation. From having eight wards it is now down to four because of the change in the demographic profile of the constituency. It is that level, around someone’s table in someone’s house or in a back room, that I am talking about. Last Saturday I went along to the annual meeting of the Edmonton Co-operative Party, an organisation that is affiliated with the Labour Party. There were 20 people there, serious players in the political game. They might not pull many strings or be able to affect a lot, but there were 20 of them on a Saturday morning, from 11 o’clock to past 1 o’clock, who came along and were moved to discuss the issues that affected them.

I support the amendment. I hope the Minister is able to say something that will be helpful to the mover of the amendment, because unless there is a change to the policy of the parties opposite—in general, but particularly on the Bill—we are going to be worse off in the future than we have been in the past.

[Lord Howarth of Newport]

My Lords, every noble Lord who has so far spoken in this debate, and indeed in the debate on the previous group of amendments, has put forward the view that it is highly desirable that parliamentary constituencies are aligned as far as possible with local authority boundaries.

The only noble Lord who has demurred from that to any extent is the Minister, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace. He did not deny that, all other things being equal, it would be desirable, but unfortunately he makes the factor of numerical equality between constituencies paramount. He therefore spoke of there being a conflict of factors with which the Boundary Commission is obliged to wrestle. I would not put it in those terms; I would say that there is a tension between a variety of legitimate factors—numerical equality, community, history, geography, and of course alignment with local authority boundaries. The Boundary Commission’s task is to do its best to reconcile those factors to arrive at a judgment that holds them in an appropriate balance, as my noble friend Lord Grocott stressed, in consultation with local people. The present system is a good one, and it seems reckless to upset it in this way.

Local authority areas, like constituencies, ought to contribute to defining and expressing people’s sense of their local community. That is a point that we have been arguing and no doubt will continue to argue in proceedings on the Bill. Unfortunately, they are too much discounted in the Bill. If members of the Government consider that questions of identity—people’s sense of who they are and where they belong—are negligible considerations in politics, I respectfully suggest that they are seriously mistaken. Indeed, any system of parliamentary representation that systematically discounts those emotions within our national life will not last. Supposing that the Government are successful in legislating to bring this into effect, the system of frequent boundary reviews, within the straitjacket of numerical equality that the Government are designing, might work once or even a second time, but I fancy that after the 2018 boundary review the people of this country will say, “This won’t do”. I very much doubt that the system will survive, should it be legislated, and we will do our best to persuade the Government that it is not, after all, a very good idea.

The Government ought to understand that themselves. As my noble friend Lord Graham of Edmonton just mentioned, the Government make much play of localism and the big society, but how can you seriously advocate the virtues of those things if at the same time you design your political structures to inhibit and distort localism and disregard people’s own sense of where they take their place within society?

If the Government think that these considerations are too sentimental or imprecise, I appeal to them at least to consider the practicalities of the working relationships between MPs and elected members of local authorities. My noble friend Lady Farrington wisely advised the Government to look at this from the point of view of local authorities. The reality is that local authorities take decisions overwhelmingly within a context of policy made by central government—of legislation and policy emanating from Whitehall and Westminster. Unfortunately, we have a highly centralised system of government in this country. Indeed, until we have radical decentralisation and greater autonomy for local government in this country, we will continue to need more MPs.

That is partly because so much policy-making and legislation comes from the two Houses of this Parliament; therefore you need an adequate number of Members of the other place to do justice to the policy-making and legislation. It is also partly because local authorities, rather than being free, as they ought to be, to get on and do their work on behalf of their local communities, must endlessly look to the centre for authorisation and make representations to the centre to see whether they can persuade officials and Ministers to modify their policies so that they make more sense for their local concerns. Key intermediaries in that process of frequent negotiation between local and central government are local Members of Parliament. It is therefore very important, in practical working terms, that Members of Parliament have a satisfactory operational relationship with their colleagues and counterparts in local authorities.

Equally, it is very important that elected members and officers of local authorities know to which Member of Parliament they should turn. It is better, therefore, if the constituency boundaries can be drawn so that whole local authorities are contained within them. Local authorities then know exactly which individual Member of Parliament they need to work with. The more MPs they have to deal with, the more confusing, expensive and time-wasting it is for people in local government. Equally, the more confusing and difficult it is for Members of Parliament to maintain the kind of working relationship that they need. Neither the local authority nor the Member of Parliament should need to duplicate, triplicate or otherwise multiply representations, meetings or the dialogue that they have with their colleagues at the other level of government.

A Member of Parliament should champion the place he represents. He or she can champion a local authority area if he or she has a clear-cut relationship with that local authority area. How much more difficult it is for a Member of Parliament convincingly to champion a hotchpotch of different local authorities that happen to fall within different parts of his constituency.