Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Lord Kennedy of Southwark Excerpts

Monday 24th January 2011 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

73: Clause 11, page 10, line 7, leave out from “Commission” to end of line 8 and insert “should take into account”

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords, I am asking the Committee to agree to delete the words,

“may take into account if, and to such extent as they think fit”,

and insert “should take into account”. Some noble Lords may think that that is just an emphasis of words; it is much more than that. Changing “may” to “should” shows our intent. We want that to happen; it is important; I think that it must happen. It is vital that the Boundary Commission takes into account special geographical considerations, local government boundaries and local ties that would be broken by changes in constituencies and the inconveniences attendant on such changes. If the Boundary Commission does not do that, frankly, what is the point of the Boundary Commission? Surely all noble Lords would want the Boundary Commission to take these factors into account, not to leave the provision at “may”.

I am hopeful, as are many other noble Lords, that there may be some movement on the Government side to take in the concerns expressed in this House. I hope that we will not be disappointed later this week. This is this House doing its job, because there is no one else left to provide the detailed scrutiny. Is it not right that the Boundary Commission should take it into account that having a constituency on both sides of the Mersey or on both sides of the Thames may not be the best drawn constituency? Is it not right that the Boundary Commission should take into account the realities of rural communities in Lincolnshire and the relationship between those communities? Is it not right that the Boundary Commission should take it into account that Nottingham City is a unitary authority? It has three Members of Parliament representing seats contained wholly within its boundaries, and there are considerable differences between the city and the rest of the county. Is it not right that the Boundary Commission should look at the historic county of Rutland and decide that it is better that it stays with Melton to form one parliamentary seat, rather than being chopped up and thrown to the winds? Is it not right that the Boundary Commission should take account of ward boundaries, as they are the building blocks of our constituencies? Is it not right that the Boundary Commission should take into account the uniqueness of Corby?

As I draw my remarks to a close, I look forward to the debate and the Minister's response.

[Lord Davies of Stamford]

We touched on this matter before, but it seems to me important to make the point quite clearly that there seems to me to be all the difference in the world between “may take into account” and “should take into account”. I ask noble Lords to put themselves in the position of members of the Boundary Commission—or members of any commission charged by Parliament to undertake an important task. If you have a criterion that says that you “may” do something, that is not a positive criterion; that is not guidance that this is a value on which Parliament sets some store; that is not a message from the people via Parliament to respect certain considerations or to take them into account. It is not a positive criterion at all—it is the absence of a negative criterion. The phrase “may take into account” means that, if you are minded to do so, if you really want to do so, we do not prevent you from doing so. We do not deny you the opportunity of doing so. However, there is no positive suggestion whatever that these considerations should be taken into account. Can that seriously be the Government’s intention? Is it seriously the intention of anyone in this Committee that some positive value should not be ascribed to considerations such as local government boundaries, for example, or, going back to our former debates, a sense of local community and so on? Surely the whole tone of our debates has been that these are genuine values, and the question is: what sort of trade-off should we make between these considerations and the desiderata, which are genuine, as I have always admitted, in terms of uniformity of numbers? I give way to my noble friend.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

I certainly agree. I feel almost inadequate in terms of our scrutiny in the light of what my noble friend has said, but I finish—

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

Does my noble friend also agree that having no Green Paper, no White Paper and no draft Bill has caused some of the problems that we are experiencing now?

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

My noble friend is absolutely right. I would have preferred to have had the opportunity of being on a committee to scrutinise the Bill before it came before this House. I would have been happy to deal with some of these points during the pre-legislative scrutiny. However, I know that many of my noble friends will want to come in on one or other of these 12 amendments and I certainly do not want personally to detain the House any longer.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

First, I wish the noble Lord, Lord McNally, well. He has had a very tough day—we all have—and I hope he just needs sleep and a meal and nothing more than that.

I thank all noble Lords for their contributions in this important debate. My noble friend Lord Davies of Stamford agreed with me that the point of “may” or “should” was to give very clear instructions to the Boundary Commission. My noble friend Lord Foulkes of Cumnock made very many important points—on wards, on his time in local government and on electoral systems. His points about the wealth of a constituency were very interesting. We may come back to that on Report and expand those points further.

The noble Lord, Lord Rennard, made some points that I agreed with, although I did not agree with him on the points that he made about scrutiny. We have had no Green Paper, no White Paper and no draft Bill, which is part of the point of the problem we have today. My noble friend Lord Soley made some important points—that parliaments of other countries, not Governments, decide the number of seats. My noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours, made the crucial point that introducing a cap on the number of seats undermines the provisions that the Boundary Commission takes account of elsewhere.

My noble friend Lord Liddle reminded the House that the function of the Boundary Commission is curtailed because of the cap and the 5 per cent tolerance figure. His point about the Speaker’s Conference was well made. My noble friend Lord Bach hit the nail on the head when he said that the cap was, above everything else, the problem. He also pointed out that the failure to engage with the Opposition was a real problem and that the timescale of the review is a problem in itself. My noble friend Lady Liddell of Coatdyke made some excellent points. She explained that she witnessed some of the problems that we have been discussing both as a politician and a journalist. My noble friend Lord Kinnock, in supporting my amendment, made some very pointed and incisive comments about a written constitution and the very difficult situation that we find ourselves in today. He made a very powerful case.

In conclusion, I was going to say to the noble Lord, Lord McNally, who is not here now, that he is not someone I have had the pleasure to talk to yet. We have said hello to each other in the corridor and stuff, and he is always very friendly to me and says hello. It must be a very frustrating time for him, but he really does need to take a leaf out of the book of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness. I do not want to get my head bitten off, but we need to look at these things very carefully.

I hope that the discussions that we have this week will bear fruit. With that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendments 74 to 74B not moved.