Wales Bill

Debate between Jonathan Edwards and Mark Tami

Tuesday 24th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mark Tami]

Will the hon. Gentleman please explain or elaborate on the imperialist nature of the M4, because I am slightly at a loss?

[Jonathan Edwards]

The point I am making is that all the investment seems to be on an east-west basis, rather than on a north-south basis.

Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

Debate between Jonathan Edwards and Mark Tami

Tuesday 16th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Jonathan Edwards]

Obviously, my fears might come to nothing, but I see no reason why democracy should be held hostage to fortune in that way. The complication, of course, is how the media report different elections. That is the big difference between London elections and those for the devolved Administrations.

We are aware of the potential pitfalls, and I see no suitable way of dealing with them except by holding the different elections apart from each other. Of course, those are the known unknowns. As yet, we have no way of knowing the unknown unknowns between now and the next set of elections.

[Mark Tami (Alyn and Deeside) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman has not mentioned one problem with holding different elections on the same day. Many who apply for a postal vote for the Westminster election will assume that they will automatically receive a postal vote for every election, but in fact, they will not, because they need to apply separately for a postal vote for the other elections.

[Jonathan Edwards]

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point about the potential for organisational chaos in 2015 and about participation in those elections.

From the perspective of candidates, another argument against the five-year fixed-term UK Parliament and the clash with devolved Administration elections is that political parties in those countries will need to find suitably more candidates to contest those elections—probably about 90 in Wales, if the Con-Dem Government have their way with the boundary changes enacted in the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill, and about 180 in Scotland.