Wales Bill

Lord Crickhowell Excerpts

Tuesday 11th November 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Crickhowell (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Lord spoke with great passion but he is not right that all political parties are committing to going down this particular road. As far as I know, my own party has made no such commitment. I am still quite open-minded about the basic question. I have not made up my mind and am not necessarily hostile to it. I will listen with great care as the merits of the case are debated over the wider field. I may well finish agreeing with him that votes should go to 16 year-olds, although I have not got there yet.

I am brought to a halt, so to speak, for the same reasons that my noble friend Lord Deben referred to in his speech earlier—as did the noble Lord, Lord Empey. They spoke about devolution bit by bit and a series of random decisions. My problem is that, although I understand of course that these particular proposals are to apply only to votes in the Welsh Assembly or Welsh referendums, once you put 16 year-olds on the register and raise their expectation that they will have a vote it is very difficult to see how you can then say to them, “Oh, but you are not going to have a vote in general elections”. It also seems essential in a sensible democracy that if we are to move to a franchise at 16 for elections to the Westminster Parliament, that should be on the basis of all-party agreement and after proper consultation and consideration, not just because we have to keep up with Scotland or Wales.

I find myself contemplating the possibility that it is somehow not possible to take the 16 year-olds off the register when we come to general elections. I, in the Monmouth constituency, would find myself elected by an electorate that includes 16 year-olds, while in Herefordshire, across the border but 500 yards from where I currently live, the Member of Parliament would be elected without 16 year-olds voting. That would be an intolerable situation and totally unacceptable. Once again, we come back to all those who argued for some kind of proper consultation, whether it be a royal commission or whatever form it takes, in which we can reach a consensus and an all-party way forward rather than saying, “Oh, well, the Scots have done it and therefore the Welsh have to do it”. They can do it in their own Assembly, and that is fine by them, but we are not really saying—or are we?—that it is going to happen in general elections in Scotland and Wales, too. We are on a very dangerous path. I am perfectly happy to go down that path on the basis of proper deliberation and consultation, and agreement by the political parties. I am not prepared to go down it on the basis of ad hocery and “Gosh, we must keep up with the other chaps”.

[Lord Howarth of Newport (Lab)]

My Lords, I am a little less worried than the noble Lord, Lord Crickhowell, about the prospect of different rules applying for certain elections between Monmouthshire and Herefordshire. I tend to be of the view that a constitution breathes through its anomalies. Anomalies can give a kind of flexibility and help us cope with day-to-day developments in politics. Of course, I am not at all against the search for a wider coherence but it is very hard to find that ideal coherence. In the mean time, it is right to be responsive to the democratic aspirations of people, differ as they may in different parts of the country.

I am much in sympathy with the purport of this group of amendments. I recall that sixth-formers in my constituency of Newport in south-east Wales were curiously diffident about voting at 16. I used to ask them whether they thought it would be appropriate and there was a good deal of hesitation. However, if all the parties in Wales think that introducing this is the right thing to do, it is not for us to stand in their way. Wales should have the power to set its own electoral arrangements for elections that are strictly Welsh elections. We can look again at the wider issue of arrangements for general elections across the United Kingdom. I take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, that the principle of no taxation without representation implies that the voting age should be reduced to 16 for elections to the Welsh Assembly. After all, we are contemplating in this legislation the possibility of income tax raising powers being devolved to Wales. It seems to me that that should probably follow.

[Lord Crickhowell]

The difficulty about that proposition is that the bulk of the money is still going to come to Wales from grants voted for in the Parliament at Westminster. Indeed, every change in that alters the position of grants going to Scotland. It is very difficult. If you want to start with the argument that you must have votes at 16 for everyone voting for the money, then you have decided that it has to go to the Westminster Parliament as well. Until that happens, you really cannot carry that argument too far.

[Lord Howarth of Newport]

The noble Lord is absolutely right about the significance of grants that I hope would continue to be made from the Government in London—the Government of the United Kingdom. I have some anxieties that the conferral of tax-raising powers on Wales may be the prelude to a rather drastic withdrawal of redistributive taxation and grant giving across the United Kingdom as a whole. The noble Lord is quite right that these are very difficult issues. I acknowledge the force of what he said on that particular point.

Where I have a reservation about this group of amendments is that they seem to envisage perpetual referendums. There is a reference in all of them to referendums. Personally, I very much hope that the people of Wales will not reach a point in their politics when they conduct a referendum on independence for Wales. I do not want to contemplate that. Nor would it be a good idea if the people of Wales developed the habit of conducting a series of referendums on ad hoc issues. To the extent that we resort to referendums to solve tricky issues in our domestic politics, we tend to undermine representative government and the Parliament of Westminster. I will just finish the point and then give way to the noble Lord, Lord Tyler. We would equally undermine the authority of the Welsh Assembly if it became a habit or reflex to have referendums, however populist that might be.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Howarth of Newport]

My Lords, I would be disappointed if the more radical interpretation of Amendment 4 that the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill of Bengarve, has adumbrated were not to be the case. The National Assembly for Wales should have power to determine the electoral arrangements for the people of Wales whom it represents, in exactly the same way as the Parliament of the United Kingdom, subject to experts and objective advice, determines electoral arrangements for the United Kingdom.

I do not understand this paranoid insistence on standardisation in electoral arrangements. It could be that using the Scottish Parliament, the National Assembly for Wales and the electoral body in Northern Ireland as laboratory experiments would enable us to learn how better to conduct our electoral affairs and democracy. After all, this Parliament has foisted, or intends to foist on the people of Wales, the most absurd reorganisation of constituency boundaries. It would be much better for the people of Wales as far as possible to be able to determine their own electoral arrangements.

[Lord Crickhowell]

The noble Lord’s remarks have prompted a question in my mind. What is the role of the Electoral Commission in this connection? When we are dealing with constitutional affairs here, the Electoral Commission has a very important role. If this matter is being handed over in this way, is it going to have a role in relation to the Welsh Assembly?

[Lord Howarth of Newport]

The Electoral Commission has certain duties that are defined under statute and it offers authoritative advice. However, ultimately, these matters remain to be determined by the elective bodies in question, and that is how it should be.

I want to say a word about Amendment 5, proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Elis-Thomas, which seems to ask no more than that the National Assembly of Wales should take responsibility for its own standing orders. How could we possibly deny it that?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Norton of Louth]

My Lords, I recall that, particularly pre-devolution, we had Ministers who were responsible for different parts of the United Kingdom and who had to spend an awful lot of time not being in London. If there are challenges from being in both assemblies, that is a matter for the Members. Certainly, at times Members have managed to achieve that. Let us not forget that when we talk about a dual mandate, we are referring only to the House of Commons. There are Members of this Chamber who have a dual mandate, including one who is present at the moment.

[Lord Crickhowell]

I am grateful to my noble friend for giving way. I was—

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

Perhaps I could remind the House that, after the Minister has spoken, it is only the mover of the amendment who can speak.