Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill (Twentieth sitting)

Debate between Christian Matheson and Bambos Charalambous

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

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

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Owen, and an even greater pleasure to echo the words of my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton and the hon. Member for Glasgow East. This is a frustrating process but the Minister is very well thought of, not only in the Committee but in the wider House. I wish her and her family a successful and easy next few months as they prepare for the new addition to their family.

The Prime Minister is currently away selling her Brexit deal. She has talked about the need to unify the House and the country, and I have to say that I think she is right. We need something to bring the House back together. I suggest that making progress with this Bill would be a way of unifying hon. Members from right across the House. The current boundary proposal, which lies on the table awaiting the drafting of the orders, does not, I believe, have the support of the House, but we could put that to the test. Putting those proposals to the test might bring a certain sense of unity across the House when hon. Members are given the chance to vote against them.

Hon. Members could then unify behind the proposal made by my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton and bring the House back together again. Making progress with the Bill might have some advantages for the Government, who obviously have their own problems with disunity at the moment. It would bring them back together and give them focus. I commend to the Minister that that might be a really good way forward.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

I congratulate the Minister and wish her all the very best. I hope that she has a very safe delivery.

I echo colleagues’ comments. There is a great deal of uncertainty at the moment. We want to try to move things forward. We are approaching the birthday of the Bill passing its Second Reading—it is nearly a year since we voted for it. There has been a fair bit of delay. Is there any way in which we can help to progress the drafting of the orders? Is there any way in which we can put pressure on the Government? We need to make a decision. It is unfair to keep meeting every Wednesday; it is not the best use of our time or that of staff. I wonder whether there is anything we can do about that. The Boundary Commission produce proposals in September and we need to get a move on. If there is anything that we as a Committee can do to help, I want to push this forward, if possible. In conclusion, I again congratulate the Minister.

Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill (Eighteenth sitting)

Debate between Christian Matheson and Bambos Charalambous

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

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

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Owen, and it is always a great pleasure to receive historical instruction from you, notwithstanding that you are here today in your capacity as Chair and not as the hon. Member for Ynys Môn, although I am reminded of many happy childhood holidays in your beautiful constituency.

I rise to speak once again in support of my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton. My hon. Friend the Member for Lincoln talked about a waste of time. Of course, it is a waste of time not just for the Committee, but for the Minister and her officials. Obviously, we do not talk directly about officials, but it would be better if the Minister and her team spent their time drafting the orders, which we have been told are particularly complicated, rather than wasting time in this Committee.

Of course, among all the noise, the heat, the clamour and the frenzy of Brexit—it is getting more frenzied by the hour, it would seem—the main development this week was the announcement by the Leader of the House that there would be some extra sitting Fridays. That gives the Back Benchers whose Bills are in the process an extra opportunity to secure their passage through this House—notwithstanding the advice, which I always welcome, from the right hon. Member for Forest of Dean, who is not in his place today, that Bills such as this one might ordinarily be taken on the Floor of the Chamber in a Committee of the whole House.

The interesting thing in relation to the Bill about the Leader of the House’s announcement is that it throws a spotlight on the fact that originally, when the Government decided that this Session would be not one year, but two, and thus extended its length, they did not at the same time double the number of sitting Fridays, when private Members’ Bills are considered. That essentially meant we would have only half the number of sitting Fridays.

I am mindful of the fact that you are keen that we stay on topic, Mr Owen, but I make this point because it shines a light on the Government’s tactics in closing down, using not argument or debate, but procedural chicanery, any opportunities that hon. Members of all parties and particularly my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton might have to progress a private Member’s Bill.

By closing down the number of sitting Fridays, the Government are halving the opportunities for hon. Members to take forward debate. If it was a one-off that the Government had not moved the financial resolution for this particular Bill, that would be bad enough. However, because it is part of a pattern that includes halving the number of sitting Fridays and then realising later that in order to get some of their more favoured Bills through they have to add a couple extra, it puts the Government in an unfortunate light, as one who use procedural chicanery rather than debate, discussion and a democratic vote to close down proposed legislation that they do not like.

It is becoming more apparent by the week that this Government do not have confidence in their ability to see their legislative programme through the House and are using whatever procedural means necessary to prevent legislation they do not like. As I say, this is unfortunately part of a pattern, and that is why it is with regret that we must now move to the adjournment of this Committee yet again; but we shall be here again at the same time next week.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

Once again we find ourselves here, adjourning for what I think is the 17th or 18th time—I cannot remember how many. We will soon reach the one-year anniversary of this Bill’s Second Reading. I know that because it passed on the day before my birthday.

In that time, very little has happened to progress this Bill. We were told initially to wait for the Boundary Commission to report. It has reported. We are now told that we are waiting for the civil servants to draft the orders required for the vote to happen in the House, and again that has not been forthcoming. I have had my private Member’s Bill drafted from scratch in that time, so if Ministers and civil servants need help, I suggest they ask the Public Bill Office or other parts of the House to assist them, if that is what is causing the delay.

My constituents are aware that the Boundary Commission has reported. They are in great uncertainty. They ask me what is going on, and all I can say to them is that once again we are adjourning and we have no idea when the Bill will progress, whether there will be a vote and whether it will progress at all. This morning, I had a conversation with a former Cabinet Minister of this Government; she seemed quite surprised that we were still adjourning and had not resolved the matter.

All I ask is that the Minister does whatever she can to progress this Bill. There is great uncertainty; people are concerned about the fact that it is not making progress. My council is doing a boundary review of its wards now, so all that is changing and pushing it further away. It makes nonsense of our voting—or not voting—on legislation that looked at the electorate in 2015 and at boundaries that may no longer exist. For that reason, great speed is needed to progress this. I urge the Minister to do all she can to make sure that the Bill progresses, otherwise we could vote on what came forward previously from the Boundary Commission.

Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill (Thirteenth sitting)

Debate between Christian Matheson and Bambos Charalambous

Committee Debate: 13th sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 12th September 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Bambos Charalambous]

If nothing has changed since the previous proposals were presented about a year ago, draft instruments should be ready to go now. Certainly, nothing whatsoever has changed in my constituency, and I am not sure what has changed in other areas. The majority of things have remained the same since last year.

This is an attempt to run down the clock on the Bill. There are only two more sitting Fridays this year. We are told there may be more coming next year, but we do not know when they will be announced or on what dates they will be. Even if the Bill got out of Committee, we would need another sitting Friday for it to get its Third Reading, and a number of other Bills would be ahead of it in any event. This is purely an attempt by the Government to run down the clock on the Bill.

If the Government are so confident about the proposals, why will they not put them to a vote? I know why— because they would lose. I heard the hon. Member for Wellingborough say openly in business questions last Thursday that he would vote against the proposals if they were brought to the Floor of the House. I understand that a number of his colleagues share that view. Certainly, Labour would oppose the proposals were they put to the House—that is my opinion—so the Government would lose.

We need clarity. People say a boundary review has not taken place for a substantial period, so we all agree what the issue is and that it needs to be resolved, but we have a log jam with respect to how that should be done. The way to get out of it is to ensure that the Bill gets a money resolution, progresses out of Committee and has its Report stage soon.

[Christian Matheson]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Owen. I know hon. Members find these proceedings rather frustrating, but I do not. I have learned stuff today. My hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate makes an intriguing point about the Government running down the clock given the limited number of sitting Fridays. That had not occurred to me.

One of the problems the Minister faces is that she is running out of time, excuses and patches of long grass into which to kick the Bill. We kicked it into recess, but recess ended. We kicked it again when we were given the excuse that we had to wait for the drafting, which I will return to in a moment. The long grass of the conference recess will put matters off again, but time and room will continue to run out.

I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Forest of Dean, who talked about some of the procedures that might be used. He mentioned that he does not speak for the Government. The Minister does not speak for the Government in Committee, either—she hardly speaks at all. It was nice to hear from her last week. I am hoping, perhaps against hope, that she contributes today. We shall see.

The right hon. Gentleman also suggested that we should wait and see what the House’s response is to the proposals published this week, but my good friend the hon. Member for Glasgow East and my hon. Friends have already pointed out that the House has pretty much made its decision. How do we know? Because the Government are kicking the proposals into the long grass. They know they cannot win a vote—that is the sticking point.

I see from the Order Paper that this is not the only Public Bill Committee meeting today. The Organ Donation (Deemed Consent) Bill will meet just down the corridor this afternoon. I am pleased to see that on the Order Paper, but I cannot help but wonder whether the money resolution has been moved for that—I suspect it has.