Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Lord Lipsey Excerpts

Monday 24th January 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Campbell-Savours]

My Lords—

[Lord Lipsey]

I shall follow directly on from what the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, said, and I shall be extremely brief, so my noble friend will not be kept waiting long. In one way, I shall go further than the noble Lord did and say that many of the principles incorporated in the amendments are already present in the Bill in the rules under Clause 11. For example, it states, more explicitly than the present rules, that

“local government boundaries as they exist”,

on the most recent council elections, should be a special factor that the Boundary Commission can take into account. It states that a special factor that the Boundary Commission can take into account is local ties. County boundaries, as we know, most famously in the case of Cornwall, are exactly the sort of local tie that it can take explicit regard of. So those principles are in the Bill. The trouble is that they do not amount to a row of beans because of the 5 per cent limit. That is the problem. Otherwise we would not face this difficulty.

[Lord Tyler]

The impression seems to be given by Members opposite that somehow the existing situation is that a constituency never crosses a county boundary. That is of course not true. In the historic case of Lancashire and Yorkshire—I can think of no part of the country where counties have a more historic rivalry—the constituency of Oldham East and Saddleworth crosses the county boundary.

[Lord Lipsey]

I cannot think what it was in my remarks—because no doubt the noble Lord intervened on me seeking clarification—which contravened what he just said. When he makes his speech in a minute, no doubt he will be able to develop his point, but I do not think that it arises from my remarks to the House, with great respect.

[Lord Snape]

Before my noble friend moves on, I put to him the point that I sought to put to the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, but he declined it. The House of Commons committee to which I referred states that,

“many more constituencies than at present would cross local authority boundaries”.

It is referring, as my noble friend implies, to the 5 per cent limit.

[Lord Lipsey]

I am not in favour of any absolutes—that is my point—but I am in favour of greater flexibility, which would enable most of the principles in the amendments to be respected. Perhaps I may take an example that came up earlier. Under the Bill, of the 46 counties of England, in only nine cases can the boundaries be respected. How does that reflect reality? However, if we had a different rule—a 10 per cent rule, for example—those boundaries could be respected in all but two cases, and these specific exceptions would not need to be brought into effect. Of course I give way to my noble friend.

[Lord Campbell-Savours]

Perhaps I may take my noble friend back to the very interesting and constructive contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Rennard. I am being very serious when I say that because what he suggested might, in some ways, influence any negotiations that take place. He placed greater emphasis on the numerical calculation than on the area of the amendment with which we are dealing. I ask my noble friend to press the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, perhaps to intervene more, not only on the Floor of the House but with his colleagues, because that is the way forward on the Bill.

[Lord Lipsey]

I have probably known the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, even longer than I have known my noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours, and no one has ever accused him of being as ineffective behind the scenes as he is effective on the public stage. I rose immediately after he spoke in order to agree with him and to show that here we are finding common ground, which is desirable for the conduct of the negotiations that are now to take place and will help the Committee out of the current impasse, so accurately described earlier in our proceedings by the Leader of the House.

[Lord Rooker]

My Lords, once upon a time there was a place known as the Royal Borough of Sutton Coldfield, just to the north of Birmingham. In the local government boundary changes under the 1970-74 Tory Government, it was added to Birmingham in 1974. The external boundaries of Sutton Coldfield have remained exactly the same but it has simply been added to the north of Birmingham. I declare an interest, as part of the northern boundary was part of my old constituency of Perry Barr. Earlier today I bumped into the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, who thanked his noble friends for the support that he got last week, and we had a chat about our joint boundary, which was always a bit of a bone of contention come the Boundary Commission review.

In my 27 years as an MP I think there were two parliamentary boundary changes and probably three local authority ward changes, but this boundary remained exactly the same. I have just looked at a map again because it is a few years since I represented the area. The historical boundary of the Royal Borough of Sutton Coldfield was built almost on the watershed but was gradually developed. When you look at a map of the area, you say to yourself, “What’s that dotted line that goes across the back gardens and up the alleyways and at one point splits a cul de sac in half?”. This is an urban constituency, and this boundary happens to form the line between the B73 and B44 postcodes. There is no question but that in parts of the country postcodes affect property values. It has already been mentioned, including by me, that wards are building blocks, and the average ward throughout England has about 1,400 constituents. Some of them are really tiny but the average ward in London has about 6,000 constituents. However, once you get out into less populated areas, the wards are tiny. As building blocks they are great because you can add in 100 here or 200 there in order to make the boundaries come right. However, when you have a ward of 18,000, 19,000 or, in some cases such as the old Sutton wards, more than 20,000 constituents, what do you do?