Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Julie Hilling Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Laing]

No. I think the point is incompetent. We debated it at great length last night, and the fact is that public inquiries are not necessary. It is necessary to have a certain amount of time for consultation, and that is provided in the Bill. We do not need long, drawn out public inquiries when political parties spend weeks and months arguing spuriously about old-fashioned boundaries and traditions, and about hills, mountains and rivers, when they are concerned only about the number of Labour voters or Conservative voters who are likely to be in a constituency. Labour Members should have the courage to face up to a fair democratic system, and that is what the Bill will introduce.

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

Is the hon. Lady aware that in 2005, when Greater Manchester reviewed 28 constituencies, the public inquiry took three weeks, not months—no longer than three weeks?

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[Simon Hughes]

Yes it does, compared with the current system. [Interruption.] If the hon. Gentleman will just calm down—he is far too overexcited most of the time.

Secondly, the system allows people to express preferences—it is positive, not negative, voting that allows them to say what they really want politically as opposed to being forced to say what they do not want politically. That is definitely progress.

There is another practical consideration, as the right hon. Member for Knowsley knows. This House does not have a majority in favour of a proportional system at the moment—I accept that. I want a proportional system. Personally, I prefer alternative vote plus, because it has the balance of a single-Member seat plus top-up. But there is not a majority for those things. This measure allows Parliament to come to a view, as put forward by the Labour party in the general election, that the British people should be given the option of moving to a better system. It is not the perfect system—there is no such thing as a perfect system—and not the best system, but it is a better system. I hope that this House and the other place will allow the great British public to decide on this. Then, if the referendum comes up with a yes vote, as I hope it will, we will have a better political system and a better democracy.

I share one of the views of the right hon. Member for Knowsley and the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram). It is a scandal and a shame that in this country, throughout the time of the Labour Government and now, 3 million or more people are not on the electoral register when they should be. I have made it clear to my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister and colleagues that there is a duty on our Government, just as there was a duty on the Labour Government that they did not discharge, to work across parties and outside parties to ensure that we get all those registered who should be registered.

[Julie Hilling]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Simon Hughes]

No, I am trying to be very quick.

I will go on arguing from these Benches that the Government need to do more to increase electoral registration. Yesterday, with my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister, I urged our party members to do more, and I hope that the Labour party and the other parties will do more as well. I hope that the Government will assist in every way—this month, before the December register comes into force—to ensure that the maximum number of people are on the electoral register. There are all sorts of ways of doing that, and the sooner we can start sharing our wisdom, the better.

I want to make one more substantial point. There is an absolutely overwhelming argument for more equally sized constituencies. The disparity between the number of voters per constituency is scandalous. I speak as somebody with Welsh, Scottish and English roots. It is no longer justifiable for Wales or Scotland to be over-represented in this place when England does not have any devolved government at all and is therefore already relatively under-represented.

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[Julie Hilling]

I wanted to make a number of points, but with the shortage of time, I will keep my comments brief. Like many other hon. Members, I have tried to make points before, but because of the conduct and timetabling of the Bill, I have been unable to speak on my deeply held beliefs.

Let me take just one element of the Bill and try to correct some of the errant nonsense on independent inquiries. In 2005, an inquiry was held into the boundaries in Greater Manchester, because it was decided that after the application of the electoral quota, there should be 27.25 MPs rather than 28. However, because nobody could have the spare quarter of an MP, the number went down to 27 MPs, and something similar may happen in the near future. There were 384 written submissions before the decision to hold an independent inquiry. Once the inquiry was called, there were more than 600 written submissions and 190 people spoke to the inquiry. Sixteen alternative proposals were made.

I do not know of 190 political parties in Greater Manchester, so I would conclude that those submissions were from ordinary citizens. As I said, the inquiry took three weeks, not the many months that Conservative and Liberal Democrat Members would like us to believe inquiries take. Constituents individually or collectively put forward their views on how they wanted to be represented.

The Bill is deeply flawed on many levels. Not only does it reduce the number of MPs, potentially ignoring historical links, splitting wards and removing the right of people who are affected by changes to have their say, and not only is it gerrymandering of the worst kind, but it runs counter to all the Government’s grand statements on the big society, local decision making and empowering local people. The Bill shows that those are simply words, and that the Government have no intention of localising power. The Bill may be cost saving, but at what cost? It should not pass.