Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill (Twenty Sixth sitting)

Afzal Khan Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd January 2019 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

I give the usual reminder about electronic devices: switch them to silent. As the Committee cannot consider the clauses of the Bill until the House has agreed a money resolution, I call Afzal Khan to move that the Committee do now adjourn.

[Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the Committee do now adjourn.

Another week and another statement by the Prime Minister on Brexit. Following the crushing defeat last week, the highly anticipated statement made by the Prime Minister on Monday revealed that plan B is just sticking to plan A. Disappointingly, the Government are now experts in delaying and running down the clock. Evidently, nothing has changed.

In contrast, we could make some meaningful change by progressing with this Bill. As my hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester highlighted last week, the Minister now has an opportunity to restore some order by presenting the current boundary proposal orders for the House to decide on. I wonder whether the Minister can enlighten us any further.

[Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship again, Ms Dorries. My hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton makes an interesting point: he says that the Government are now experts in running down the clock. We have long feared that that is the status of this Committee, as well as—obviously—wider events in relation to the Brexit deal or no-deal scenario.

However, my concern this week is about the capacity of Departments to deal with matters such as the one before the Committee. The Minister has told us that we are waiting for the orders to be drafted on the current proposals in relation to the boundary review—those that were published in, I think, September or October, which are based on 600 constituencies—and until they have gone through and been decided on by the House, it would not be appropriate further to consider my hon. Friend’s Bill.

My concern is that Brexit, the preparations for Brexit and, indeed, the preparations for a no-deal Brexit are sucking the life out of Departments. Right across Government, we see Departments in this position. I believe that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has 70 statutory instruments to be considered; the Treasury has 200 to 300. The Minister’s own Department, the Cabinet Office, which I shadow, is starting to see statutory instruments rack up. My concern is that much as the Minister was certain before Christmas that the drafting of the orders was on time, it is no longer on time, because resources are being diverted to other affairs to deal with the possibility of a no-deal Brexit. I press it upon the Minister that the matters before the Committee need to be considered.

We are hearing now that the February recess might be cancelled. That would have one benefit: the Committee would meet for one extra week in February, which I look forward to. I would miss the time to be with my constituents and family in Chester, but the benefit would be that I got to spend the time with hon. Members on the Committee. Can the Minister give an assurance that work is continuing to progress on the orders for the current boundary proposals, so that the House may dispose of them one way or the other, and that the life is not being sucked out of the regular work of the Department as it appears to be being sucked out of every other Department of State by Brexit?

Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill (Twenty Fifth sitting)

Afzal Khan Excerpts

Committee Debate: 25th sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 16th January 2019 Public Bill Committees

[Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the Committee do now adjourn.

What a week this has been! The meaningful vote has resulted in a crushing defeat. The Government have failed to deliver an effective Brexit. In a similar fashion, they have failed to make any progress with this Bill. Sadly, the chaos surrounding Brexit has overshadowed my Bill since its inception. Following the events of yesterday, it is clear that the Government lack serious authority. During this uncertain period, it seems more and more likely that a general election could be called at any moment.

My Bill aims to strengthen democracy in these uncertain times, and I seriously suggest that we make some development with it and push for a money resolution. This week will go down in the history books—I would very much like my Bill to be part of that. Can the Minister enlighten us on any further developments?

Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill (Twenty Fourth sitting)

Afzal Khan Excerpts

Committee Debate: 24th sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 9th January 2019 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

A happy new year to everybody, and for the first time this year, I will say that the Committee cannot consider the clauses of the Bill until the House has agreed a money resolution. I call Afzal Khan to move that the Committee do now adjourn.

[Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the Committee do now adjourn.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship in this new year, Mr Owen. I welcome back all Members; I hope they had a good Christmas, and I wish them all also a happy new year. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] I hope that with the new year, the Minister has had an opportunity to reflect, and perhaps has a new attitude towards this Committee. In 2018, we had a full year in which no progress was made on this Bill—what a disappointment that is. We are fast running out of time for these changes to come in before the end of this Parliament, and I hope the Minister will feel that we should get on with it.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

I will speak briefly this morning, to say to Members that as I have not been to the Committee for a while, I thought that as the new year approached it would be good to re-acquaint myself with old friends. I also wanted to say, having read the Hansard report of the last Committee meeting, that I am grateful that our good friend the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton got his Christmas present just before Christmas, as the Government did publish the immigration White Paper. I know that he was hoping for that at the last Committee meeting, so I am pleased that that Christmas present was delivered. I do not know whether the hon. Member for Glasgow East got the little note in his stocking from the Minister that he was hoping for; I suspect not.

I am looking forward to hearing what the Minister has to say about whether any progress has been made on drafting the statutory instrument. Obviously, the House’s agenda is very full at the moment with debates on European Union matters, and I know that lots of pieces of legislation that are critical to our exit from the European Union need to be dealt with, so I am not hopeful that the House will find the opportunity to consider this matter at an early stage. However, I look forward to hearing whether progress will be made at the earliest opportunity, and I join you, Mr Owen, in wishing everyone a happy new year.

Oral Answers to Questions

Afzal Khan Excerpts

Wednesday 19th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Oliver Dowden]

I think the hon. Gentleman is a little dismissive of the national living wage, which, since it was introduced, has led to a pay rise for people on the lowest incomes of almost £3,000 a year. It is rising faster than his proposal, and it will reach 60% of median income by 2020. Post that, we will look again at further increases.

[Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

4. What recent assessment he has made of the capacity of the civil service to manage additional responsibilities arising from the UK leaving the EU.

[Rosie Duffield (Canterbury) (Lab)]

14. What recent assessment he has made of the capacity of the civil service to manage additional responsibilities arising from the UK leaving the EU.

[The Minister without Portfolio (Brandon Lewis)]

The Government are equipping themselves with the right people and the right skills for the UK to exit the European Union successfully. Almost 11,000 people are now working on EU exit-related policy and programmes across the Government, and the workforce plans will continue to be reviewed to ensure that our civil service can respond to emerging capacity and capability requirements.

[Afzal Khan]

The National Audit Office reports that the additional staff needed to work at UK borders after Brexit may not be in place by March 2019. Will the Minister explain why, almost 29 months since the EU referendum, the Government have not got their act together?

[Brandon Lewis]

All reports of the National Audit Office are obviously interesting, but I have absolute confidence in the words of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, who is very confident that the Border Force will be ready—as am I, from my previous experience in that Department—for any eventuality of Brexit.

Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill (Twenty First sitting)

Afzal Khan Excerpts

Committee Debate: 21st sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 5th December 2018 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

I remind the Committee that electronic devices should be switched to silent mode. As we know —by now, I can say this without reading the notes—the Committee cannot consider the clauses of the Bill until the House has agreed to the money resolution.

[Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the Committee do now adjourn.

Once again, Ms Dorries, it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. This week has seen some unprecedented debates about parliamentary procedure, setting a collision course towards a constitutional crisis. At best, it is a dispute over the rights of Parliament versus the rights of the Government. These are the same issues that are at the heart of my private Member’s Bill and the same issues of the Government stalling progress.

My Bill would protect the balance between paid-up Government Ministers and Back-Bench MPs by retaining 650 as the total number of MPs. That is what makes it so ironic that the Government are overreaching their Executive powers: by refusing to grant a money resolution, they are exactly proving my point. Perhaps the Minister will consider granting us all an early Christmas present by allowing the Bill to progress.

[David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)]

As ever, it is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Dorries. I follow the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton in saying that in a week when the House has passed a motion saying that Ministers in this Government have held Parliament in contempt, it sends a message about the sorry state we are in when Opposition day votes are not being adhered to and money resolutions are not coming forward for Bills that have been given a Second Reading in the House.

My only observation for the Committee this morning is about the feeling in this place. There is clearly a very volatile atmosphere, and it feels like the last days of a dying Government. The irony is that we will probably be going back to the electorate fairly soon for a general election, and it will be based on the old boundaries. There is a consensus in this House to look at the boundaries again, but not to reduce the seats from 650. We are in a very sorry state of affairs just now.

European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Afzal Khan Excerpts

Tuesday 4th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Corbyn]

The state aid rules of the European Union are something that this Government have been very happy to sign up to and, indeed, use as a means of not defending the steelworks at Redcar, when they could have done something about it and defended those jobs. This Government should be condemned for their failure to do anything to protect those steelworks and those jobs. I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention and the work he did to try to protect those jobs.

Let us take, for example, the Galileo programme, to which the UK has so far contributed £1.2 billion, but from which we now seem set to walk away. Then there is the lack of clarity about whether we will continue to participate in the European arrest warrant, Europol or Eurojust. The Chequers proposal argued for the UK maintaining membership of the European Aviation Safety Agency and the European Medicines Agency, but the future partnership merely allows for co-operation.

[Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that, while the Prime Minister seems proud to claim that freedom of movement has ended, she cannot tell us what it will be replaced with? Is it not right that we see the Government’s immigration White Paper before the meaningful vote?

[Jeremy Corbyn]

I am coming on to that in just one second.

We lack similar clarity about many other areas, including Horizon 2020 and Erasmus—it was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant)—which have been so brilliant in providing students with opportunities to study in other countries. That is why so many young people are so concerned at this present time about what is happening.

There is no clarity about any future immigration system between the UK and the European Union, and it now seems that the immigration White Paper we were promised in December 2017 will not even appear in December 2018. Following the disgraceful Windrush scandal, many prospective migrants will have no confidence in the ability of this Government to deliver a fair and efficient system.

Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill (Twentieth sitting)

Afzal Khan Excerpts

Committee Debate: 20th sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 28th November 2018 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

Please ensure that all electronic devices are now switched to silent. I remind the Committee that we cannot consider the clauses of the Bill until the House has agreed to the money resolution.

[Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the Committee do now adjourn.

I congratulate the Minister on the good news of her pregnancy. A shadow Minister who received the same good news went on leave. Before the Minister takes leave, I hope we will be able to make some progress on the Bill.

I understand that the Refugees (Family Reunion) Bill is also waiting for a money resolution. It seems as though it will start its Committee stage without one and so will join us in meeting every week only to adjourn. It is truly a sorry state of affairs that the Government are so afraid of challenge on such a broad range of issues, including boundaries and refugees, that they use procedure to block the Bills they cannot defeat. This is Executive overreach in its clearest and most damaging form. It is also an enormous waste of taxpayers’ money and of our time as elected representatives.

[The Chair]

I add my congratulations to the Minister. I call David Linden.

Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill (Eighteenth sitting)

Afzal Khan Excerpts

Committee Debate: 18th sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 14th November 2018 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

The usual rules apply to hot drinks and electronic devices. I remind the Committee that it cannot consider the clauses of the Bill until the House has agreed a money resolution. I therefore call Afzal Khan to move that the Committee do now adjourn.

[Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the Committee do now adjourn.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Owen. Last week saw the United States mid-term elections and what I believe should serve as a dark warning about the path on which the UK Government are currently embarking. I was shocked to watch the campaign and the results unfold as the extent of political meddling and voter suppression came to light. That was clearest in Georgia, where the Republican candidate, Brian Kemp, was also the Secretary of State, overseeing the election. He pulled out all the stops to suppress the votes for his opponent, including purging the voter rolls, putting 53,000 voters—

[The Chair]

Order. I have to tell the hon. Gentleman to come to the subject of the adjournment of this Bill Committee and not give a history lesson about the US mid-term elections. I appreciate that there is interest in that subject, but it is not one for this Bill Committee.

[Afzal Khan]

Thank you, Mr Owen. I am trying to make a link to the adjournment of this Committee. The sort of behaviour that I have described also went on in a number of other states in America. Why is that important? Because I believe that the actions of the UK Government are taking place in the shadow of the abhorrent moves to suppress the vote in the USA. It is widely accepted that the UK is influenced by the rhetoric and policy shifts in America. The UK Government are rolling out voter ID laws and, now, a boundary review that disfranchises 2 million voters. Our democracy has a proud tradition of fairness and independence, which must be protected. We could make real progress in these sittings with a cross-party approach to a fundamental part of our democracy.

[Karen Lee (Lincoln) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that, given the amount of talk about how short of money and resources this country is and everything being cut, the fact that hon. Members’ time, which is a valuable resource, is being wasted in this way is absolutely scandalous?

[Afzal Khan]

I could not agree more. This is a waste of our time and the public’s money. We could make real progress by taking a cross-party approach to a fundamental part of our democracy, but instead we are left debating procedure.

[David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)]

As ever, it is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Owen. I found myself coming here on a morning when, although this place is obviously very volatile at the best of times, in the past 24 hours, it has been even more volatile. The hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton is right, and his point was backed up by the hon. Member for Lincoln: this whole exercise is entirely futile. When considering the amount of pressure that will exist in this place over the next 24 hours, few people would conclude that having another general election on the current boundaries before Parliament prorogues in April was unlikely; I think that it is probably very likely. We therefore come back to the central question about the boundaries that we want and what they should reflect. The boundaries of my constituency were put in place when I was 11 years old. I do not think that anyone here believes that constituency boundaries do not need to be looked at again. However, the fundamental question is whether to reduce the number of constituencies from 650 to 600, and I rather suspect that very soon we will be going to the country on the basis of 650.

Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill (Sixteenth sitting)

Afzal Khan Excerpts

Committee Debate: 16th sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 24th October 2018 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

With all electronic devices now switched to silent, we move to the motion to adjourn. I remind the Committee that we cannot consider the clauses of the Bill until the House has agreed the money resolution.

[Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the Committee do now adjourn.

The way that we draw our boundaries in this country has until recently inhabited a sacred space in our politics. We have four independent boundary commissions that independently consider the population and community ties across the UK and produce proposals for how many MPs there should be and where the boundaries of those constituencies should lie.

It is essential that that process remains independent. We need only look to the United States to see the danger of their approach. Extreme gerrymandering has eroded public faith in the political system. Debate around boundaries has been poisoned by party-political fighting, and lengthy lawsuits have recently reached the Supreme Court.

I believe strongly that we must keep our process independent. The current proposed boundaries have been expressly designed to benefit the Conservative party, and 2 million people have been disfranchised from the process. The Government have cut the number of MPs to an arbitrary 600 and equalising electorate size has been given priority over community ties.

My Bill has cross-party support. It is nonsense that we are in these endless Committee sittings, wasting time instead of pressing ahead with my Bill to produce the new boundaries our democracy needs.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

I will speak briefly. I did not intend to speak—I know everyone says that—but the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton said a number of things that cannot land on the record without correction.

First, I agree with him completely that the process covered in his Bill and the process under way absolutely have to be independent. I agree that the way other countries draw their boundaries, for example, the United States, is not one that I wish to follow. There, elected politicians sit with a map drawing boundaries.

My challenge to the hon. Gentleman is that that is exactly not what happens in this country. The boundaries that are now with Parliament, and with the Government for converting into orders, have not been drawn by party politicians. They have been carefully drawn by independent judicial office holders. They have obviously listened to evidence from the political parties, as one would expect, but all political parties have been able to give evidence. They have heard evidence from other people and produced independent proposals.

Of course, those proposals are shaped by the rules set by Parliament. Those rules are about equalising the size of constituencies, and I think there is general agreement that constituencies should be of equal size, not for our interest, but so that votes across the country are of equal weight wherever voters live.

I do not know whether it is still true, or whether someone has polled it, but I think it would be the case that reducing the number of Members of Parliament remains the most popular policy of the coalition Government. With 600, we would still have more politicians in the country at that level than many other comparable democracies.

[Afzal Khan]

Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman could enlighten us as to where the number of 600 comes from.

[Mr Harper]

It is not scientific. I think I set it out when I took through the original legislation. We made a decision to reduce the size of the House. There is nothing magic about 600. The current number is 650 and we decided to reduce that by about 10%, because that was about the amount we were shrinking of the rest of the public sector, and 600 is a round number. Rather than saying it was 587.5 or 592, it is 600. There was a conspiracy theory at the time about this special number that was specially designed to have some specific effect, but it is just a round number—600 seems a more sensible number than 604. There is nothing magic about it, but there was a general sense that it would be better to have slightly fewer Members. By comparison with similar western democracies, we actually have quite a lot of Members of Parliament at our level of government, and it seems sensible to make a modest reduction.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chloe Smith]

I beg your pardon, Mr Owen. I spoke too strongly, and of course I respect your decision.

In any case, let me deal with the question about the number of civil servants working on the orders, which, as I confirmed last week, are being brought to Parliament, quite correctly and in line with the expected process. I am not able to give a number, because my civil servants, whom I have the greatest respect for and gratitude to, work on a number of things at any one time. There is simply no way to say how many are working on one thing and how many on another. However, I confirm again to the Committee that that work is being done to a speed I am satisfied with, and that the orders will come back to Parliament as soon as can be.

[Afzal Khan]

If the Minister is not able to give us those numbers, will she give us an idea of the timescale for the work and when it is likely to make progress?

[Chloe Smith]

Forgive me, Mr Owen, I am a little confused. Am I continuing my remarks now?

Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill (Fifteenth sitting)

Afzal Khan Excerpts

Committee Debate: 15th sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 17th October 2018 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

Order. I welcome you all back and remind you that electronic devices should be switched to silent. We now move to the motion to adjourn, as the Committee cannot consider the clauses of the Bill until the House has agreed the money resolution.

[Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the Committee do now adjourn.

Last week, my hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester presented the Committee with a draft order that the Government could easily use to lay the boundary reports before the House. I do not believe it is necessary to copy the offer. The Minister had claimed that preparing the order would take many months, but it is quite clear that it could be done much quicker than that. I would like to ask the Minister how many civil servants are currently working on drafting the order. Is anybody actually doing that?

Whitehall might sometimes seem an obscure place but it is accountable to Parliament and, ultimately, to the public. Has the Minister instructed any parliamentary draftsmen to draw up the order? If so, how far have they got? I would be grateful if we could get an update, seeing as the boundary review was released a month ago.

Even quicker than an order for the boundary review would be a money resolution for my Bill. The Government had no trouble tabling multiple money resolutions for Bills behind mine in the private Member’s Bill ballot. In fact, just yesterday the Minister tabled and spoke to the money resolution for the Overseas Electors Bill, making it crystal clear that money resolutions are being used for party political reasons, to further private Members’ Bills that the Government support and block those they oppose. We can continue to meet every Wednesday morning and I am glad that colleagues continue to attend, but it would be better if we could actually discuss something.

[Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)]

I am grateful that you have called me, Mr Owen. I want to put a few remarks on the record that are pertinent to those raised by the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton. First, I should apologise that I was not here last week; I was unavoidably elsewhere. I notice, having assiduously read the fantastic Hansard report, which we are so blessed with in these Committees, that I was mentioned in dispatches, as it were, so I thank the hon. Member for City of Chester who speaks for the Opposition for noticing that I was not here. It is always good when people actually notice that one is not at Committee and that it does not just pass people by.

I want to say a couple of things about the drafting points. First, I am slightly disappointed that the hon. Member for City of Chester appears to be so despondent in his role as a Member of Parliament that he has decided to audition for the job of parliamentary counsel. Having acquainted myself with that, I can tell him that being a parliamentary draftsman is rather better paid than being a Member of Parliament. They are very senior lawyers and it is a very specialist job. If the hon. Gentleman looks at the pay scales, he will see they are rather better remunerated than even Cabinet Ministers. I should say that he would be very sadly missed, so I hope his application to be a parliamentary draftsman is declined.

I notice he offered his services to the Minister, but I think she probably has the services of parliamentary counsel to hand. As she said, it is a complicated process. I know the hon. Gentleman has not had the chance, but I have been able, in a number of roles, to ask civil servants to instruct parliamentary draftsmen. It is actually more complicated than the hon. Gentleman thinks and it needs to be right. What the Minister said last time about the complexity of the task is very necessary.

Given that we can discuss only the adjournment, I will repeat what I said on the final point made by the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton about a money resolution. As I have said, the House now has the chance to take a decision on the boundary commission reports that have been laid before it. If we were to actually consider this Bill, it should not be considered in Committee. All the previous legislation on boundaries, because they are constitutional in nature, were considered in a Committee of the whole House. If the Bill were to make progress, the Government ought to find time for it so that all Members—because this issue affects all Members—could discuss it on the Floor of the House.

I think that the right approach is to allow the House to take a decision on the boundary commission orders. Obviously, in my current life as a Back-Bench Member of Parliament, I have no influence over that; it is a matter for the usual channels to discuss. However, if we were to discuss it in detail, it should be done in the House.

[Afzal Khan]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his conclusion and for his efforts in the Committee. The question is ultimately whether he believes that we should resolve this issue. After all, we have used the current figures for 20 years. Do we want to end up using them for 25 years? If we do not get on with this, there is a real risk that that will happen.

[Mr Harper]

One generally welcomes sinners who repent, and I am pleased that the hon. Gentleman is seized of the urgency of dealing with the boundaries. I reflect on how disappointing it is that his party and the Liberal Democrats did not think so when they combined to block the boundary review that was supposed to take place off the back of the legislation passed in the House in 2011. Had they not conspired to block that review, new boundaries would already have been put before the House and we would already have fought a general election on them. I am pleased—I will be grateful if the hon. Member for City of Chester will confirm this—that the Labour party’s position is that we need new boundaries, because that was not its position when they were blocked last time. That is welcome. We obviously want this process to continue.

I have one final point. As I have said previously, consideration of the Bill is slightly putting the cart before the horse because, first, we would be considering it without knowing the House’s decision on the new boundaries laid before it. If the House accepts those, the decision has been taken. Secondly, even if the House were to reject the boundary commission proposals, as in the scenario set out by the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton, we should want to understand why the proposals brought forward under the existing legislation were rejected before we were to amend the Bill. Those reasons would obviously come up in the full debate that would take place in the House, and we should want that knowledge to inform the debate on the Bill.

That is why the sequence of this process that the Minister has set out in previous sittings is right, and I recommend that the Committee accepts it when it considers the motion to adjourn shortly.