Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve Excerpts

Wednesday 16th February 2011 Lords Chamber

I respectfully suggest that all that is quite extraordinary and highly relevant to whether, on a Bill and an issue of constitutional significance, this House ought respectfully and politely—but insistently—to say to the other place, “You really need to look again, properly and in detail, at the views of this House”. I beg to move.

[Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve]

My Lords, I put my name to the relevant amendment on Report. As I did not have the opportunity to speak then, I shall say why I think that it would be important for the other place to consider it again. The amendment is extremely helpful to the coalition—it has not interpreted it that way—for the simple reason that Boundary Commissions are being asked to take on a complex task. There are some clear rules, but it is difficult and we do not know what position they may find themselves in. Other amendments before your Lordships’ House proposed that the regular band within which constituencies might vary should be widened. I did not support any of those. I agree with the Government that it is important for democratic reasons that, in so far as constituencies can be made equal, they should be made equal. However, in reality, Boundary Commissions may face an intractable task.

There are situations in which sub-division is not as simple as we might think in considering the application of rules. As is said in primary schools, sometimes three into two won’t go. For that reason and to enable the Boundary Commissions to carry out their task well —not for them to make a mass of exceptions; with good luck, they will make no exceptions—we should respectfully ask the other place to consider the amendment again.

[Lord King of Bridgwater]

I begin by saying how much I admire the ability of the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, to make another most interesting and persuasive speech without repeating the speech in any great detail that he made on the previous occasion. I respect that. He said that the amendment that we discussed on Report was carried by a healthy majority; I point out that it was a quarter of the majority carried after the debate that we have just had, so I do not know what we would describe that as.

It is important to remember where we are. I would like to think that the whole of this noble House was agreed on two points: that seats should be as equal as possible, and that a more equal distribution should be in place by 2015. Some people on the opposition Benches—certainly not the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, and his colleagues—may be keen not to see more equal distribution by 2015; they must speak for themselves. However, it is certainly the objective.

I do not think that the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, challenged this point when I made it previously: his amendment allows for less equality than presently proposed by the Government. Maybe some noble Lords, including those on the Benches opposite, were not quite aware of what the Government had proposed. I do not agree with where the Government started from. They proposed 10 per cent; I had some heckling when I mentioned that last time, because people did not realise—they thought that it was 5 per cent, but of course it is 5 per cent either way, a 10 per cent spread. The amendment proposes 15 per cent. I think that 10 per cent is too high. I recognise that the Government realised that there had to be a compromise when they drew up the Bill—that some allowance had to be made for latitude by the Boundary Commission in its work. The amendment is a compromise on a compromise, because moving to a 15 per cent spread means a difference of perhaps 12,000 people between different constituencies. That is too great. That is my first point.

My second is on the other thing done by the amendments on which the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, is inviting the House to insist. He effectively conceded that 15 per cent was a big variation, so he covered himself by inserting the fact that it should be used only in exceptional circumstances. As was recognised by certain noble and learned Lords, exceptional circumstances then allow further consideration and opportunity for challenge and further chance of judicial review. That is why the amendment fails my second test by making it more likely to mean that we do not get a new and fairer electoral arrangement by 2015.

In the light of today’s previous debate, we might have expected what the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, then said when he set this up as a great constitutional issue. I do not want to discuss the previous debate—I did not speak in that—and I understand entirely why the arguments might be made in this case. However, surely the purpose of our electoral system—which we all support—is that there should be equal value in equal votes, so far as possible. I do not consider that a great constitutional change which needs great pre-legislative scrutiny. Of course he talked about pre-legislative scrutiny and further public consultation—perhaps public hearings—in advance of any proposals from the Government. That would certainly scupper any chance of the electorate being able to vote at the next election, if it is in 2015, with a new and more equal distribution of votes.

The noble Lord flattered this House very adeptly—we all enjoy a bit of flattery—by saying that it has a considerable reservoir of knowledge, and that many of us have stood in many different elections and experienced boundary changes and changes in constituencies. That is absolutely right. However, I thought that he was getting perilously close to saying that, on this issue, this House was entitled in some way to be superior to the other place.