Wales Bill

Lord Anderson of Swansea Excerpts

Monday 13th October 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Elystan-Morgan (CB)]

My Lords, I wish to speak to Amendment 6 only, which I believe to be a model of draftsmanship, put together in such a way as to bring about as wide and substantial a coalition in favour of a principle as one can imagine.

I believe with retrospect that there are two essential questions facing the House. First, do noble Lords in their heart of hearts believe for a moment that the Welsh Assembly can conduct its important duties, including scrutiny of legislation in particular, on a basis of 60 Members? Secondly, if noble Lords do not—and I suspect that practically every Member of the House can see the force of that point—what are we prepared to do about it? Those are two very simple but, I believe, crushingly relevant questions.

The facts have already been set out very clearly. Scotland has 129 Members; Northern Ireland has 108; Wales has 60. Of course, even more important than that is the fact that only 42 Members in Wales are available to scrutinise legislation. In the case of Scotland there are 113; in the case of Northern Ireland, I am not entirely sure whether it is 90 or 92—I think it may be 92. In the case of the House of Commons, it is 522. However, the issue is not really how many Members you have in relation to the population. There may well be a proper argument in that respect that is deployed later; that is not the issue at the moment. The issue is the minimum critical mass. If you fall below that and fail to constitute a critical mass, you are not a legislature; you are a mock parliament and no legislature at all.

That has to be remembered against this background. It is a single cameral House. I am not for a moment arguing that we should have a second House, which might be very interesting to dissertate on some day. Be that as it may, we have plenty to worry about at the moment in this regard. It is a single cameral House. The scrutiny of legislation in Wales occurs in the Assembly or does not occur at all. That is the point.

This House does its work magnificently as a scrutinising body. Sometimes, we are given more to scrutinise than we should be. I feel that the House of Commons sends huge pieces of undigested legislation through which almost makes a mockery of the constitutional situation, but that is another story altogether.

Again, one has to remember the point already made by one or two Members. When we think of a critical mass, we should think not just of a number but of whether that critical mass is there, in the main, in the Opposition. If it is not—even if you increase the membership to, say, 80 or 100—if you have a strong coalition between party A and party B that is responsible for, let us say, 70% of the membership, you still fail to have a critical mass where it counts.

We are not talking about mathematical representation; nor, with the greatest respect to the noble Baroness, Lady Humphreys—with whose address I wholeheartedly agree in the main—do I honestly believe that it is a matter of trade-off with local government or the House of Commons. If I remember rightly, the noble Baroness was not a Member of the House when this matter was discussed three or four years ago, when the proposal was carried to reduce the number of Welsh Members of Parliament from 40 to 30. I do not want to spoil the splendid feeling of unanimity that we have had up to now, at any rate on this issue, but the Liberal Democrats could have done better than they did on that occasion. We had a vote to give the Isle of Wight two seats. Not one member of the Liberal Democrats spoke on the issue of Wales. The real condemnation came not from the Opposition but from the noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, the grandson of David Lloyd George, who said, “My grandfather would not be turning over in his grave; he would have been in the Dwyfor by now”. That says everything.

The only other thing I have to say about that, which is on the face of it an attractive argument but possibly a dangerous course to take, is that in 1993 a proposal was before the House of Commons to reduce the number of seats in Wales—indeed, I think, over the whole country. The Home Secretary at the time was Mr Kenneth Clarke. He said, “No, as far as Wales is concerned, I am not having it. Wales is a land and nation with characteristics of its own and circumstances which are so special and so unique that I will make it an exception”. I do not believe that Wales is any less of an exception than it was in 1993.

The question then is: what should the number be? The Electoral Reform Society, to which the noble Baroness, Lady Humphreys, has properly referred, has examined 42 countries which are comparable with Wales in various ways. It has come to the conclusion, taking all things into account, that the average number for such sub-parliaments as those countries have—perhaps I do them less than justice in calling them sub-parliaments, but that is the term used by the Electoral Reform Society—is about 100. It also concludes in relation to Wales that the ideal figure would be of the order of 100.

The noble Lord, Lord Richard, who has placed Wales eternally in his debt by his report of 2004, mentioned the fact that the committee animadverted on the question of whether the number should be 80 and said that it should, although it was not asked specifically to deal with the matter, nor did it deal with it scientifically or specifically. Nevertheless, it was a measured judgment. Now then: if it was 80 in 2004, bearing in mind the huge changes that have occurred since then, what would it be worth today? I hope that I do not take unfair advantage of the noble Lord, Lord Richard—I certainly would not wish to nor could I do that; he is well able to make his points for himself. If 80 was the genuine estimate that was appropriate in 2004, surely by today one should be speaking of 100.

I would speak myself of 120. Why? If you regard the curve of the development as a constitutional entity of the Welsh Assembly in the 15 or 16 years of its existence, one does not have to exercise a great deal of imagination to see where it might be in a few years’ time. The idea of aiming for 120 is not chimerical, irresponsible or populist—certainly not populist—in any way. It projects what one hopes and expects for in relation to Wales. I would be very surprised if the powers that have been given to Wales do not over the next few years amply justify that.

If we were holding this debate a month or two ago, I would still be making that point, but where do the promises and undertakings that have been showered on the people of Scotland, and the people of Wales and Northern Ireland, about devolution—those promises were falling like autumn leaves in Vallombrosa, as the quotation goes—bring us? If a quarter of what was promised solemnly will in fact be done, 120 could well be justified as the membership. However, it is not a question of numbers. It is more a question of prejudice: the vast storm of prejudice that anybody who argues for an increased number will have to face. That has to be done with courage and integrity. Edmund Burke famously said that for evil to triumph, it is necessary only for men of good will to do nothing. If you wish the Welsh Assembly to fail in its main purpose of being a legislature, all you have to do about the membership is nothing.

[Lord Anderson of Swansea (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Elystan-Morgan, made his proposal for 120. I thought that one was reaching the point of, “Any advance on 80? Any advance on 100? Any advance on 120?”. Where does one stop?

[Lord Elystan-Morgan]

I am deeply grateful to my friend for giving way. Perhaps I may make a point that I forgot to make. The real case for 120 is that it is very simple. It is exactly double the number now, and you can double both constituencies—the individual constituencies and the regional ones.

[Lord Anderson of Swansea]

That sounds a bit like double the number you first thought of. It is always good to follow the noble Lord. Certainly he cannot be accused of populism—perhaps courage, perhaps recklessness, but not populism.

I was tempted to go down his path of a second Chamber for Wales. There may, ultimately, further down the path, be a case for a second-opinion Chamber composed of some of the notables from the local authorities and elsewhere in Wales, but that is not a debate for today.

The noble Baroness, Lady Humphreys, quoted, I think, the Electoral Reform Society, saying that these matters were too important to be left to politicians. That is a little patronising. The Electoral Reform Society consists no doubt of very worthy people who can help us by doing their analysis, but ultimately these decisions will be made by politicians, who have the experience and do not live in ivory towers. However, I agree with her that the whole matter—the matter of numbers—should be seen in the round and that one should look at the numbers in the Assembly and whether those numbers are capable of doing the job. One cannot exclude the number of those in local authorities. On that subject, I hope to move an amendment in respect of the recommendations of the Williams commission on amalgamations of local authorities in Wales, because I detect among the people of Wales a distaste for the number of people currently in the various authorities. Looking at it in the round, including local authorities and the Assembly, and not excluding the House of Commons, I am not convinced of her case for this House, because on the whole we have far fewer Members of this House than Wales warrants. That is, however, another matter.

The noble Lord, Lord Rowe-Beddoe, spoke simply and put forward a simple proposition. There is a consensus around his suggested figure of 80. The starting point is that, after a somewhat bumpy start, the National Assembly has now bedded down, is accepted as a proper part of the Welsh political landscape and has been a pioneer for the United Kingdom in several aspects of policy, as I find when I go into my local supermarkets and am charged for bags, a matter that will come to England somewhat later.

The amendment that I am speaking to will not, as politicians often boast, kill two birds with one stone; it will kill three birds with one stone. In respect of the equality of men and women, it is clear that although the position in the Assembly in Wales is better than in most other legislatures, certainly better than in the House of Commons, there is still a disparity. Many parties and many parliaments have struggled with this problem. Selectorates, often with a majority of women, are frequently reluctant to select women for various levels of representation. My own party tried women-only shortlists in both the 2005 and 2010 elections; in the 2015 election, my own Swansea East constituency will have a women-only shortlist.

However, that is not without problems, as one sees in Cynon Valley, and it can be a matter of considerable controversy. It can be a problem when men find it difficult to find a place in the areas where they were born, brought up and worked for a long time. They are demotivated when there is no chance, because of women-only shortlists, of standing in their own constituencies. I put forward this proposal as a serious option for solving the problem. It is a far more acceptable device for ensuring equality and would make Wales a world leader, consistent with our normal radical policies and progressive traditions.

The advantages do not stop there. My proposal would also abolish the list system. The list system has not been a success. I am reminded that “hiraeth” in Welsh is not a longing for one’s own region within Wales but a longing for one’s own valley, constituency, city or village. It is difficult to work up loyalty or attachment to a region in Wales. “My region, right or wrong”: I cannot see anyone in Wales going to the barricades to fight for their region. It is more consistent with our Welsh tradition not to have regional lists.

Thirdly and finally, I come to the increase in numbers. It goes logically with what I am saying that as the powers of the Assembly increase—and one does not know how far that will go, and here perhaps the consensus ends, because some will want a great leap forward while others will want a more incremental approach—there should at the same time be an increase in numbers. It is also clear, as the noble Lord, Lord Rowe-Beddoe, said with great clarity and power, that the number in the Assembly, the 60, may have been an appropriate starting point—the 40 and the 20. Indeed, there would have been difficulties had the number of 40 constituencies been reduced to 30—it would have been perhaps 30 and 30 at that point.

However, the numbers are clearly insufficient for the job of scrutiny. At the moment, particularly when there is a coalition, as often happens in the Assembly, everyone appears to have a job. It is rather like the jibes at the old Mexican army—everyone was a general, everyone had a job. We want to get away from that. We want people in the Assembly who are able to do a job of scrutiny and we should agree to have 80 of them.

There are three good reasons for the amendment. We should not be afraid of change. In terms of gender equality, the smaller units in Wales and the increase in the powers of the Assembly, which would be matched with a commensurate increase in numbers, this amendment is proper and consistent with our radical, trailblazing tradition in Wales.

[Lord Thomas of Gresford (LD)]

My Lords, that was an extraordinary speech, if I may say so. We Gogs certainly have an identity, and we have an identity when we know that the south-east of Wales is spending the borrowing powers that it is acquiring on two tunnels on the M4 and putting a great deal of development into south Wales that we do not see in the north, where we have our own communication problems. To talk in terms of everyone being concerned about their little valley may do very well in south Wales, but I can tell you that in north Wales we feel very differently about it and we welcome the fact that we have regional AMs in the Welsh Assembly who can express a wider view than that of the little valley that they come from.

Although I am not overly enthusiastic about the list system, I will not see it dismissed in the way that the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, has done. Nor am I convinced by his idea that we should have proportionality of gender but not of political viewpoint. That would mean that the possibility of a dominant party would swiftly arise. My noble friend said that it would be the Labour Party. I would not go that far, because there are forces at work in some of the Welsh valleys today that are not essentially socialist in their approach. I am against the idea of having first past the post in Wales when it does not exist in Scotland or in Northern Ireland and when we have been fighting hard for it not to exist in England as well.

The noble Lord, Lord Elystan-Morgan, made the important point that the increasing amount of legislation coming to the Welsh Assembly means that we must have more Members to deal with it. I think that the consensus in Wales at the moment is that there are not enough people to scrutinise the legislation that is going through.

The noble Lord talked about scrutiny. The fact is that this is about not just primary legislation going through but primary legislation without the advantage of a second Chamber. Your Lordships will recall that I suggested earlier that we should surely be working towards a federal, single-tier Parliament for the whole of the United Kingdom, with committees for Wales, Scotland, England and Northern Ireland that could scrutinise the legislation that comes through. As I said, if we have English votes for English laws that have to go through the scrutiny of this House, that will be a considerable advantage compared to single parties putting through legislation without adequate scrutiny. On primary legislation in Wales, there is a lot to be done, but what is not to be done is what the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, suggests in his amendment. I wholly support everything that my noble friend Lady Humphreys so ably said.

[Lord Roberts of Llandudno (LD)]

My Lords, I would welcome further explanation from the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, regarding his amendment. When he suggests that two Members should be elected from 40 constituencies, should the elector have one vote or two in that election?

[Lord Anderson of Swansea]

Basically, whether it should be one or two votes is a matter that should be left to the Assembly. My position is that all these arrangements should be left, so far as possible, to the Assembly. It has mature politicians and it is for them to make those decisions.

[Lord Roberts of Llandudno]

My Lords, perhaps I might reply to my great colleague, the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, by saying that if you have only one vote as against two, the whole composition of the Assembly, including the one that is to make the further arrangements, will be totally distorted.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Anderson of Swansea]

That was by chance and by choice of the parties rather than by statute.

[Baroness Randerson]

The noble Lord is seeking to guarantee that gender balance. I am normally very supportive of any initiative that increases the number of female elected Members but, as the noble Baroness, Lady Gale, indicated, there would be an element of controversy. For example, if a female was elected as one of the Members and a male as the other Member, but the second male, shall we say, on the list had more votes than the winning female, or vice versa, there would be local controversy.

However, the main concern with this proposal is that it would reduce the element of proportionality. The offer of proportionality was intrinsic when Welsh people accepted the Assembly in the referendum. It was an integral part of what was offered.

The interlinked issues of the right number of Assembly Members, the optimum balance between constituency and regional Members and the system used to elect them need to be considered as part of the further step forward in devolution in Wales. If there are to be profound changes, there needs to be wider consultation. I know I will disappoint many Members when I say that I do not believe that the thinking behind these amendments is sufficiently mature for me to accept any of them. There needs to be further debate.