Parliamentary Constituencies Bill (Eighth sitting)

Maria Miller Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee Debate: 8th sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 30th June 2020 Public Bill Committees

[Alec Shelbrooke]

I thank the hon. Lady for her remarks on her new clause.

Let me start by being controversial: I believe that the plus or minus 5% should be seen as a matter of last resort, and that the boundary commission should try to do everything in its power to be bang on the money in the middle. Let me develop that argument, and I am willing to take interventions on it.

These figures are not correct, because I have not messed around with the numbers. I am using them just as illustrations. If we take that figure to be 72,165—that is not the exact figure, but I am using it for illustrative purposes—in less than 600 seats, that figure would have been 78,198, of which another 5% would be 3,909 electors. Five per cent. of 72,165 is 3,609, whereas another 7.5% of 72,165 is 5,413. I make those illustrative points because the difference between the 5% on 600 seats and the 7.5% on 650 seats is 1,500 electors more. The difference between 5% and 7.5% on the 650 seats is roughly 1,800 voters. I wanted to lay that out at the start; please do not talk about the inaccuracy of the figures because I know that they are inaccurate, but they are in the ball park.

The Bill provides for the boundaries to be reviewed and set every eight years. We know that there are several cycles going on, with local government reviews, polling district reviews and ward reviews. As my right hon. Friend the Member for—I have already forgotten her constituency.

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

Basingstoke.

[Alec Shelbrooke]

I was going to say Billericay, but I think that is your constituency, Sir David, or was at some point—I am losing my thread. My right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke has on several occasions drawn our attention to the planned housebuilding population changes that we all know are going to happen in constituencies. The plus 5% and plus 7.5% variances are open to interpretation about what they actually mean. Are we using them as a starting point, with constituencies at the absolute minimum or maximum to start with, knowing that within a certain time, they are going to be out of the equation?

In Wetherby, which is one part of my constituency, 800 houses are being built, and more are being built further down—a considerable number of houses. Some 5,000 are due to be built in the Leeds East constituency, which neighbours mine. The hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood mentioned North Yorkshire as a council that would not have to cross county boundaries if we went to a 7.5% tolerance. Some 10,000 houses are due to go in just on the boundary with my constituency—that is in just one small part of North Yorkshire—so we know that there will be a large shift in populations in a relatively short period, and certainly in that eight-year window.

Mr Bellringer said in his oral evidence—I think to a certain extent the Committee accepted his argument—that we have to draw the line at some point, so we cannot use in the figures new housing and so on. He was talking about potential ward boundaries; the point being that you have to draw the line with ward boundaries that have already been drawn, and not those that might be drawn.

Over the eight years, we will see considerable change in population in constituencies. Indeed, the driving force behind a lot of the Committee’s conversation has been that the data will be almost a quarter of a century out of date by the next election. That was always going to mean a significant movement in constituency boundaries because of the amount of time that has passed. Should the boundary commission be trying to construct seats within the plus 5% or minus 5% tolerance when, maybe with a year, that seat could be bigger than plus 5% or smaller than minus 5%?

I am not saying that we should change the Bill, but in my view, the boundary commission should try to be bang on the money at around 72,000 or 73,000, depending on the final figures. Surely, if we want a balanced electorate, we should look at how we can make that work over the cycle, so that when large housing developments are built, we tinker and make minor changes in an area every eight years, rather than the huge changes that we are making now.

My constituency has 82,000 electors and Leeds East has 66,000. Those are roundabout figures that vary quite a lot, and 10,000 houses will be built during the next five years. By definition, there will have to be a major change in eight years’ time. If we have already bumped right up to the 5% window when forming the initial boundary for the 2024 election, we are talking about elections after 2032. I cannot remember the exact phrase in the Bill regarding when the next review would come into effect. It could be 15 years from now before the next set of figures come in. There would be a lot of time in which there could be huge variation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Christian Matheson]

I briefly seek the opinion of the Committee in discussion of the new clause. I hope that its aim is self-evident.

Most of us in Committee—my friends, the hon. Members for Glasgow East and for Ceredigion excluded—would consider themselves to be Unionists and proud to be British. I certainly would. My concern is that, as the Bill stands, the Union will be placed under unnecessary and increased strain, because the three smaller nations will take the larger hit to representation here at Westminster, in the House of Commons.

Historically, we heard in evidence that Wales and Scotland were over-represented in terms of population, but that there were historical reasons why that was the case. As devolution has progressed, we have had a Scottish Parliament and a Welsh Assembly, which on the passage of recent legislation became the Senedd—I look to the hon. Member for Ceredigion for approval of the pronunciation. Powers have passed to the Parliament and the Senedd so that more decisions are taken in Holyrood and on Cardiff Bay. Plenty of decisions, including large national decisions, however, still need to be taken at Westminster, on behalf not just of England but of the United Kingdom.

The important thing now—perhaps more than ever in the 20 or so years since we have had that level of devolution —is to maintain the strength of the Union and of the voices within that Union, in number as well as volume. The hon. Gentleman needs no support in terms of volume, but with number that importance is greater than ever.

I ask Members in the Conservative party—which, I think, is back to calling itself the Conservative and Unionist party—to share my concerns about all the hit being taken by the three non-English nations. We do not know the numbers yet, but we have a good idea and could make an assessment. Potentially, by transferring Welsh voices and Scottish voices to England—theoretically, Northern Irish voices too, although under the current numbers that does not look likely—we could destabilise not just the level of representation but the level of life experience from the nations.

What about areas that are more remote from Westminster? For example, and I have said this to the hon. Member for Ceredigion before, some areas of north Wales feel a little disconnected even from the Senedd on Cardiff Bay, and some areas of northern England and perhaps some in the far west, because of geographical distance, feel a little disconnected from Westminster. The more we disconnect from the national Parliament, the less legitimacy it has, and the less legitimacy it has, the less legitimacy the Union has, I fear. The unintended consequence—I genuinely believe that it is unintended—of the proposal in the Bill to transfer strength and numbers in this place from Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland to England is that it will damage the Union, and damage the voices within the Union, and damage the experience that all the nations bring to this Parliament.

[Mrs Miller]

I follow the hon. Member’s argument, but surely he should reflect on the fact that Wales did not undergo the changes that it was due to undergo at the time of the creation of the Assembly, which has since become a Parliament. Those changes now have to take place, so that we can deliver the fairness that I know he and I want.

[Christian Matheson]

I absolutely agree, which is why, to develop my argument and to answer the right hon. Lady directly, the new clause in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood does not seek to maintain the current number of constituencies in Wales. We accept—as we accepted, incidentally, with regard to the previous new clause that we talked about—that there has to be some level of equalisation of constituencies.

That means that Wales and Scotland will lose seats, but in order to manage the different pressures between getting equalisation and maintaining the integrity and strength of the Union and the diverse voices within it, the new clause seeks to maintain a balance by specifying a number of constituencies that is fewer, for example, than Wales has now, but more than it would have if absolute equalisation took place. We are therefore addressing some of the points that the right hon. Lady mentioned, and trying to strike a balance that puts the interests of the Union at the heart of the Bill.

Parliamentary Constituencies Bill (Sixth sitting)

Maria Miller Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee Debate: 6th sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 25th June 2020 Public Bill Committees

[Chloe Smith]

That is very important indeed. I am confident that all four of the boundary commissions have been listening closely to the proceedings of the Committee since our evidence sessions, which they joined, and since then in our proceedings clause by clause. I know they will want to take into account comments made by hon. Members across the Committee, including how we can keep communities together and ensure that the public has that strong voice, which was the point I was making with regard to clause 1.

Clause 1 sets out that in future the boundary commissions will submit their final reports to the Speaker of the House of Commons. Mr Speaker is the ex officio chair of the boundary commissions. The reports will go to him rather than to the Secretary of State, as the commissions do now. The Speaker, not the Secretary of State, will lay the reports before Parliament.

We think that is the right change. It underlines the independence of the boundary commissions—a theme we will return to many times. It is right that the chair of those commissions—in other words, Mr Speaker—should receive and lay the reports just as they also currently receive the progress reports made by the boundary commissions. It is also right that the Government’s only role is to implement the recommendations without needing to have any hand in the process by which they are submitted.

In summary, clause 1 makes technical but important changes to the conduct of boundary reviews. It sets the cycle of eight years, establishes the Speaker as the appropriate recipient of the final report and shortens the boundary review timetable in the way that I have explained, to give us and citizens the best chance of knowing that what they have asked for—the general election being conducted on the basis of updated and equal constituencies—will happen. For those reasons, I think the clause should stand part of the Bill.

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

There was some discussion right at the beginning about whether the Bill gives the Executive more power, but is the Minister saying that it removes the Executive from the process once the boundary commission has started to undertake its work?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Miller]

I absolutely understand and accept the Minister’s argument, although other democratic institutions regularly review the number of their elected representatives. My local authority, Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council, has just implemented new boundaries to reduce the number of councillors from 60 to 54, not only to save the council tax payer money, but to recognise that things change. The Government are right to keep such questions under review.

[Chloe Smith]

I am grateful for that example. My right hon. Friend is correct, particularly about the principle that ought to underpin what we do here. After all, we are looking at public money, in terms of what we might call the cost of politics—the number of salaries multiplied by 600 or 650—and how we ask the boundary commissions to do their work. Those things are underpinned by public money and public time, so we should consider them in Committee . There is nothing more extensive to say about clause 5, so I commend it to the Committee.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Linden]

I shall speak to amendment 9. During Second Reading, I was struck by the thoughtful approach of the right hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell, who made a plea—often repeated during the evidence sessions—for commissioners to move away from using wards as the building blocks for drawing up constituencies, and instead to break it down and use more manageable and flexible building blocks. That point was also pressed many times by the right hon. Member for Basingstoke.

In evidence from Ms Drummond-Murray during the evidence session of June 18—referring specifically to Question 8 of that session—the Committee will have noted that Scotland can break it down by postcode, if necessary, rather than using the more clunky ward building blocks. Furthermore, evidence given by Mr Scott Martin, solicitor at the SNP, drew the attention of Members to spatialhub.scot and the technology that is in play north of the border, in response to Question 102 at the Bill’s evidence session of June 18.

Polling districts are usually natural communities on their own, and are good building blocks for constituencies when wards cannot be used. Drawing constituencies using polling districts also makes the constituencies much easier to implement for the electoral administrators. They just need to reallocate the constituency that applies to each polling district, rather than allocating each individual elector. It also means that voters will not need to be allocated to different polling places when boundaries are redrawn. The parties referred to by Sir David should also be borne in mind here. Political parties that select their candidates on the basis of their members’ vote are the first users of constituency boundary data. Reallocating polling districts rather than drawing new boundaries makes it easier for political parties to ballot their members, which they may wish to do before the new boundaries are effective on the electoral registers. I remind the Committee that amendment 9 seeks to add to the tool box for the boundary commission. Rule 5(1) lists factors that a boundary commission “may take into account” to such an extent as it sees “fit”. Amendment 9 also recognises that a polling district’s data may not always be usable, clearly ensuring that it stays as set out and that the data is only used by the relevant boundary commission satisfied that a particular area and data are properly usable. Amendment 9 merely supplements clause 6 and allows boundary commissioners to draw upon technology as set out in the Bill’s explanatory notes.

I am keen to hear the Government’s thoughts on the amendment, and if they plan to object I would like to hear the reason; I will make a judgement on that before I decide whether to press the matter to a vote. I have outlined the rationale behind the amendment, and I look forward to the Minister’s feedback.

[Mrs Miller]

I wanted to make a couple of short comments on amendments 8 and 9, and commend the hon. Member for Glasgow East—he confesses to being a “cheeky chappie”—for tabling them. The amendments may be probing amendments, as I do not necessarily think they would apply in his neck of the woods, but they would certainly apply in England and Wales. I can see why he has tabled them, following our discussions, because they would put on the face of the Bill a requirement that polling district mapping be available for use. It became clear in our evidence that that was not the case; that is why evidence sessions are so useful. I am sure that hon. Members will, like me, be paying quite particular attention to their constituency information, and indeed their polling district information, not least because we are often asked to comment on where polling stations are, and our in-depth knowledge of our constituencies is an important part of our job. We know where the polling stations are and where the polling district boundaries are.

I was quite blown away by some of the responses to the questions I put to Mr Bellringer from the English boundary commission. Returning to amendment 9 before I go into exactly what he said, I understand why the hon. Member for Glasgow East tabled it. If we are going to really do what the Bill requires, which is to create equal-sized constituencies, going to a sub-ward level, whether that is, as he suggested, through polling districts, or—as in my line of questioning to the boundary commission—through postcodes, as in the part of the United Kingdom from which the hon. Member for Glasgow East comes, we need to be able to manipulate the data and the constituency information we have on a very refined level. It seemed odd that that has not been explored in the detail that hon. Members might have expected.

Sir Iain McLean, when he gave evidence, talked about the tension between getting equal-sized constituencies and the issues around local ties, which we discussed in earlier strings of amendments. The importance of equal size is clearly pre-eminent in the Bill and the amendment we are talking about now is important to deliver that important strategic focus of the legislation.

I was perplexed first by the inconsistent approach to the use of sub-ward level data in England, Scotland and Wales, and the fact that postcode data is used in Scotland and Wales but not in England. When I pressed that with Mr Bellringer, he very clearly said on the record that that information was very difficult for the boundary commission to come by; it would take a long time to access the data in the detail required. I was then perplexed by my further lines of questioning to Mr Bellringer, which made me think that, frankly, sub-ward level data had been put into the box marked “too difficult” and it was not necessarily going to be revisited. I would like to send a clear message from the Committee: that that must be revisited.

Although I am not sure I would necessarily support the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Glasgow East at this point, not least because we are still waiting for a note from the boundary commission on how it might handle this, I hope it is listening to the debate to hear the strength of feeling on the matter. For postcodes, Mr Bellringer said,

“we do not have the postcode areas in England. We would have to create them; they could be created, but it would take an awfully long time to do.”—[Official Report, Parliamentary Constituencies Public Bill Committee, 18 June 2020; c. 12, Q14.]

We can wait until that data is ready, if it takes six months or 12 months. The boundary commission needs to start setting the bar a little higher than it has to date on the sort of information it has to hand. Sir Iain McLean suggested that the boundary commission should invest in geographical information systems. I do not profess to be an expert in that and I do not know whether that is what is needed. However, if it is, it should be forthcoming because it is important that we deliver the heart of the Bill, which is about equal constituencies. At the moment, I am unclear about how the boundary commission in England is going to do that. I hope the paper it sends us will edify me on that point.

[Alec Shelbrooke]

It is, indeed, unfortunate that we have made such quick progress that we have come to this clause before we have had the note from the Boundary Commission for England. The discussion we are having links into every single part of the Bill. This is an important moment. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Glasgow East for bringing this amendment—even as a probing amendment, if that is what it is—because it allows us to open up some very important arguments.

We had conversations this morning about whether we should hold the final vote on the Floor of the House. Opposition Members have made some powerful arguments about what would result if the boundary commission got it wrong. We should endeavour—especially with this clause today—to use the knowledge and expertise on the Committee and the evidence that we have taken to steer the boundary commission to get this right first time around. Some of the examples that were given in the past, which were then overturned when communities—not politicians—were able to make the points as to why particular suggestions were wrong, show that these things are not difficult to do, if time and attention is given to them.

I do not like to tie the hands of a body that we have asked to do a job. Being as prescriptive as the amendment would probably go too far, but it sends an important message. One of the problems with past boundary reviews has been that in order to get the numbers right, they have kept wards whole and created some very odd-looking constituencies that do not have anything in common with the areas they represent and their history.

I return to this point about communities all the time. One piece of evidence said that politicians very cleverly argue the “communities” point to get what they want in their seat, but it is an important point; it is not a political argument, and it is not about us. We represent areas: they are our communities. When the original proposal for 600 seats came out—I think it was in 2012—it was proposed that my constituency would run from my solid rural areas right into the centre of Leeds, in the Leeds East constituency. The previous MP there was George Mudie, a man who a lot of people know—certainly in Leeds and in this House—and for whom I have immense respect. He had been in public office for over four decades, I think; he was a leader of Leeds City Council, and a very distinguished one. I do not say that lightly.

He said, “This is appalling. I am an inner-city Member of Parliament. I represent the inner city; my whole professional career has been spent representing these communities.” He was wholly opposed to the Conservative areas of my seat coming into his constituency. Believe me, he would have won; more interestingly, he was more vociferously opposed to the proposals than I was. What it came down to, George Mudie was saying, was that these communities were not like communities, and the proposals broke the bond he had. I cannot remember exactly how long he served for, but I think he had been in some form of public office in those areas of that seat for over 40 years. As I said, he was a very well-respected man, who is missed in this House and in his communities.

When the boundary commission is constructing these seats, it needs to be very careful that it has regard to rule 5 of the 1968 Act, and the five sub-parts of that. That rule is very important when it comes to geography and trying to keep constituencies roughly as they are. I know that is not possible 20 years down the line—there have to be big changes—but one way in which the commission can try to achieve these objectives is to go below ward level. I do not believe we need to prescribe that—to say, “You must start with polling districts”—but in response to the questions that we asked in the evidence sessions, the evidence that we received was legitimately, “I think you need to go below ward level to get this right.” That is not the same as “You must start below ward level”—that is probably not the best approach, anyway. We would want to start with the easiest building blocks we have, and a lot of constituencies will already have those building blocks and communities within them. However, if we go below ward level, when we need to do things with the numbers, there are ways to do so.

There is a very strange little piece of my constituency, in a ward called Kippax and Methley. It is a stand-alone ward of Leeds City Council, where there are a couple of villages called Methley and Mickletown. The odd thing is that until 2010, a person would have to leave the constituency to get to those villages. They still would have to leave the ward to get to them, because the River Aire runs right through that ward and cuts it off, so they would have to go through the Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford constituency or through a different ward. Before I had Rothwell in the constituency, they would either have to go through the Morley and Rothwell constituency or through Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford. The communities are very similar: they were mining communities and the River Aire runs through them, so it is never a straightforward argument. There are some tweaks and twists around it, but the point I am making is that polling districts can be used to solve some of these slight problems.

I appreciate the amendment that the hon. Member for Glasgow East has tabled. It is an important probing amendment to get on the record why we in this Committee think it appropriate for the boundary commission to use polling districts to split wards. One of the reasons why I was persuaded that we should not prescribe polling districts as the starting point was the strength of the evidence about how those polling districts were themselves put together. I doubt it would happen, but it could create a gerrymandering situation later if those were the building blocks. That came out in the evidence. I am not saying that is what would happen, but it gives the potential for that to happen. It is therefore not right to bind the hands and to give temptation in that area, but it is important that the boundary commissions listen to the evidence. We shall explore this further when we come to the plus and minus 5% amendments later. This will be an important facet of that argument.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chloe Smith]

And new clause 9, as you said at the outset. I will be very happy to do so. Thank you, Sir David, for that clarification, which was very helpful. I thank the hon. Members who tabled the amendments, and who have made very considered comments on them. I agree with colleagues that we have come to one of the interesting seams of detail that run through what we have to do in the Bill.

The amendments make specific and additional provision for the boundary commissions to take into account the boundaries of polling districts within their consideration of new constituencies where useable data is available. It might help the Committee if I make it clear in what way the amendment is additional to the provisions in the Bill. This is what Professor Iain McLean ended up looking for in his papers during our evidence session.

As colleagues will know, the 1986 Act is where this framework of rules is found, and within that framework of what are called “rules” are what are called the “factors” that are to be taken into account. That is where some of the debate is taking place; there will be others during the course of the Committee. The provision is additional because it would add to those factors, whereas the Bill does not. The Bill proposes to leave those factors as they are.

[Mrs Miller]

My hon. Friend started to talk about the factors within the 1986 Act. I hope she might have noticed that I tabled an amendment to ask the Government whether they should be rethinking their approach to those factors, particularly their approach to Ynys Môn being a standalone constituency, to join the other four standalone constituencies, which include two very near neighbouring constituencies in my neck of the woods—the two Isle of Wight seats.

[Chloe Smith]

I thank my right hon. Friend for presaging something that it is very important that we shall come on to. I do not wish to dance on the head of a pin, as it were. She is absolutely right that those points are made in the rules, and the factors are a subset of the rules that govern a microscopic element of the conduct.

--- Later in debate ---

[Cat Smith]

To speak to new clause 9—

[Mrs Miller]

On a point of order, Sir David. I apologise for interrupting the shadow Minister. Can you clarify whether you are taking clause 6 stand part as part of this group? I am a little confused. I thought that we were discussing amendments 8 and 9. Are we doing the stand part debate as well?

--- Later in debate ---

[Alec Shelbrooke]

That is well on the record in my constituency.

[Mrs Miller]

Hon. Members are making important points about their parts of the country, which is underlining the fact that it is different in different areas. For example, the original boundaries of my own constituency of Basingstoke went very near the Berkshire border—not a million miles away from the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury—and parts of that part of Hampshire used to be in Berkshire and have Berkshire postcodes. People who live in that part of Hampshire think they live in Berkshire, but they do not; they live in Hampshire. There might be a little less rivalry between Hampshire and Berkshire than between Lancashire and Yorkshire, which is why sensitivity on the ground is so important.

[Alec Shelbrooke]

I am not a historian, but there was no war between Berkshire and Hampshire—no wars of the roses.

Parliamentary Constituencies bill (Third sitting)

Maria Miller Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee Debate: 3rd sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 23rd June 2020 Public Bill Committees

—(Chloe Smith.)

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

On a point of order, Sir David. Can I perhaps ask that Members be given priority to sit, so we can hear the evidence?

[The Chair]

That is what I thought would have been done. Surely the Members should be in the main body.

[Mrs Miller]

Further to that point of order, Sir David. Actually, perhaps the Whip can make room. Thank you, Sir David.

Examination of Witnesses

Professor Robert Hazell and Dr Alan Renwick gave evidence.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Miller]

Q I thank both individuals who are giving evidence this morning for doing so. It is incredibly helpful for our deliberations. I want to press them on the key point of their evidence, which is the importance of the automaticity element of the Bill, to understand why that is central to their evidence, particularly the impact on the democratic process of the three previous reviews being blocked. What has been the impact of that, and why is this matter so important to get right?

Dr Renwick: One impact is simply the delay that is introduced into the process. As I said, at present we have boundaries that were first used in 2010, and in 2005 in the case of in Scotland, which are based on electoral registers that in England’s case date from 2000. Those registers are now 20 years old, and clearly that delay is undesirable.

Secondly, as I suggested, there is at least a danger of the perception that the process is not as impartial as it should be, and it seems to me clearly undesirable to create that perception.

Thirdly, there is the danger of the reality that the process is not as impartial as it should be. I do not think it is helpful for me to speculate on what the motivations might or might not have been for the decisions that have been taken on those reviews. Perhaps it is safer to go back to the 1969 case, given that no one involved in that decision is present any longer. I think it is fairly universally accepted that that review was blocked because the Labour Government at the time thought that they would lose seats as a result of the implementation of the review and therefore they did not want that to go ahead.

There are similar perceptions in the case of the 2013 decision not to proceed with the review and the decision in 2018 not to go ahead with the review, but I do not want to speculate on whether those perceptions are correct.

[Mrs Miller]

Can I ask a supplementary?

[The Chair]

We have at least six colleagues wishing to ask questions and only 14 minutes left.

[Mrs Miller]

Q I was not particularly pressing on the motivations, although I note Dr Renwick’s response on that. I wanted to ask about the impact. Dr Renwick, you have talked about it being undesirable to have a delay and to appear partial, but were there any further impacts on democracy in this country that you wanted to put on the record?

Dr Renwick: Some people have expressed a concern that, because the boundaries are old, they have had a marked biasing effect on election results. The evidence shows that, in fact, the effect is quite small. There are a number of factors that can mean that a vote cast for one party has more weight in the overall results than a vote cast for another party. The main factors that shape that are turnout. Turnout in Labour seats tends to be lower than turnout in Conservative seats, and therefore Labour MPs tend to be elected with fewer votes than Conservative MPs.

The second big factor is the efficiency of the distribution of votes across the country. Between 1997 and 2005, the Labour vote was much more efficiently distributed than the Conservative vote. Labour had tended to win more marginal seats and did not waste, as it were, lots of votes in constituencies that it lost, whereas in the last several elections the Conservatives have had the more efficient distribution of votes across the country. Those are the main factors that lead to biases in terms of the overall election result.

There is also some effect from the distribution of constituencies—both the distribution between the countries within the United Kingdom and the distribution within those countries. At recent elections those effects have produced small biases in favour of Labour, but those are fairly small biases. I am sure you will hear much more on this when you hear evidence from Charles Pattie and David Rossiter, who are the real experts on this, but the consensus in the literature on this is that that effect is fairly small. The effect that really matters is the effect on the democratic principles, not the outcome of elections.

[The Chair]

I thank our witnesses for their full answers, but I am afraid we will have to have very brief questions and responses.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

Just before I turn to Mrs Miller, I want colleagues who are sitting in the Public Gallery to realise that I am aware that they are part of the Committee. If they want to ask a question, they should indicate to me and then speak from the microphone, as Mrs Miller has done.

[Mrs Miller]

Q Thank you very much, Sir David. I thank Mr Williams for coming to give evidence today; it is incredibly helpful to hear from a wide range of political parties. I note that in your introduction, you said you would cover issues in England and Wales, and I thought I detected a slight accent—I do not know whether you come from Wales. I wanted to press you a little further on that, because there are four protected constituencies in the Bill: two constituencies that will be the Isle of Wight, a single constituency in Orkney and the Shetland Islands, and the constituency formerly known as the Western Isles. Do you feel there is an argument to be made for protected constituencies in Wales? Other than Northern Ireland, which I think has its own set of issues, it is the only part of the United Kingdom that does not have protected constituencies.

Chris Williams: There is an argument to be made, particularly around Ynys Môn. I am worried about how all this is going to be perceived in Wales, with a drop of about 20% in the number of MPs, and I think it would be a softener if they see they have been treated equally with England and Scotland, with Ynys Môn seen as a protected constituency. There is an argument about taking into account other geographical features when protecting constituencies, but if you start to look at mountains or rivers, you then start to look at the height or width of mountain ranges, and you get in a complete mess. Certainly, there is a sea in the way between Ynys Môn and the mainland, which is exactly the same criterion that is being used for the Isle of Wight, the Western Isles and Orkney and Shetland. I think it should be applied in Wales as well; otherwise there would be a rightful feeling of wrongdoing to Wales.

[David Linden]

Q Can I ask you specifically what the Green party’s view is on the distribution of seats that will result from this Bill? It is my understanding—the Committee has been told this previously—that Scotland stands to lose seats, and you have spoken about the 20% drop in Wales. Does the Green party of England and Wales have a view on whether or not that is appropriate, and what that does for the integrity of the Union?

Chris Williams: Our Scottish Green colleagues will have a similar position to you on the Union. I guess we come from a perspective of wanting every vote to have the same weight and potentially the same impact on an election, in terms of determining the future Government. The difficulty we have is that whatever we do with the process and with first past the post, there is always going to be some inequity between the constituencies, even if we have no tolerance or variance limit at all. By the time they come in, the numbers will still be different, because the data is always historical and never accurate enough. If we are going to go down the line of every vote being pretty much equal, and trying to make that as equal as possible within the system, it is very hard to argue for a great deal of difference between England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. I would say that a vote in Hartlepool is as equal as one in Ogmore but, at the same time, I can see that this might well bring greater arguments for further devolution.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

The ones that were on the table at the side of the room were wrong, but Bills from elsewhere are accurate. I am very sorry about that.

[Mrs Miller]

On a point of order, Sir David. Could I ask for clarification on the difference between the Bills? Is it material to our discussion? Does it affect the answer we might get from witnesses?

[The Chair]

My view is that it does not really affect that materially, but I felt that I should place on record the fact that the Bill that we had was not the right one.

--- Later in debate ---

On resuming—

[Mrs Miller]

Q We have had some powerful evidence that parliamentary boundaries are to a greater or lesser extent an artificial construct, although rules are put in place to try to acknowledge issues, which should be taken into account. I want to probe further something that Sir John talked about earlier. Because we are dealing with boundaries that are 20 years out of date, this will be a disruptive redistribution.

What comments can be made about trying to future-proof any proposals, to take into account any proposed developments and house building, while noting that those cannot be taken into any analysis of the quota? Do our experts have any views on whether that should be taken into account with regards to the geographical boundaries, so as to avoid unnecessary disruption in the future?

Professor Sir John Curtice: There is a difference between the rules of the Local Government Boundary Commission for England and the parliamentary boundary commissions. The local government boundary commissions are permitted to take into account anticipated housing developments. I have had the occasional private conversation with people about this. You may want to quiz the Local Government Boundary Commission for England. The question that arises is how accurate the forecasts of house building and demolition activity are and the extent to which that ensure that the local government ward boundaries do not get out of date.

The answer to you is that it is certainly possible—see the rules of the Local Government Boundary Commission for England—but regarding the extent to which it is effective, you should ask the Local Government Boundary Commission for England, because I am not certain. There is a difference and you could anticipate doing a degree of that.

Professor McLean: May I add to that? It is rather unfortunate that there are two sets of boundary commissions with different operating rules. Although it is not in the Bill, I do not understand why there needs to be a separate local government boundary commission, in particular one that operates under different rules, as John has just highlighted, from those used by the parliamentary boundary commission.

If one had to choose between these sets of rules—the Local Government Boundary Commission for England permitting evidence about future housing developments and the rules currently before you not permitting them —I would go with the rules that are in front of you, for the same reason that I gave in an earlier answer. One person’s likely housing development, which may just happen to favour that political party could be countered by another person’s likely future housing development, which may favour another party. I feel for the poor inspector, who is, by construction, not a specialist in the area, and is faced with claims that are very hard to adjudicate. You can adjudicate numbers, but future housing development is much more difficult.

[David Linden]

Q Thank you to our witnesses for their evidence thus far. Professor Curtice was probably right to say that we should focus on things in the Bill. The two major things are going from 600 seats to 650, and parliamentary approval. To take the first issue in a question to both witnesses, why do you think that the Government changed their position, going from 600 seats to 650?

Professor Sir John Curtice: That is not difficult. Turkeys were persuaded to put Christmas in the calendar in 2011 but, when Christmas eve came along, they decided to abandon it. There was always going to be a question mark about the willingness of MPs to vote for their own demise.

The reason why we were to have the cuts in the first place is that in 2010 both parties in the coalition proposed reductions in the size of the House of Commons. That was a populist response to the MPs’ expenses scandal. In the end, the cut to 600 that they introduced was less than those in the two parties’ manifestos. Then, of course, implementing it became a victim in 2013 of the spat within the coalition over the failure to reform the House of Lords, and in 2018 of the anticipated inability of the then Conservative Administration to get the provisions through—because they were asking turkeys to vote for Christmas. I am indicating that that is a classic case of how, at the end of the day, it is difficult to persuade Members of the House of Commons to engage in a radical reform that will make their lives difficult.

By the way, given that you have asked this question, let me expand its scope slightly. This is an aspect of the Bill that matters, and this is the question of the attempt at automaticity. To make it clear, there is an issue about automaticity—that is, the ability of Parliament to intervene. Parliament intervened in 2013 and stopped the boundary commissioners working—that was the work of Labour and the Liberal Democrats together—and in 2018 the Conservative Government failed to push the provisions through. Back in the late 1960s, the then Labour Government got their MPs to vote down the provisions. To that extent, there is clearly an issue. Although we have a process of neutral boundary proposals operating under rules set by the House of Commons, in effect the Commons has on three occasions, under different Administrations, ended up not implementing the rule, so there is an automaticity question.

My concern, however, is that although the Bill might make it more difficult for that to happen again, it will not stop it happening again. Given that in clause 8 the Bill stops implementation of the 2018 review, going on to have provisions that supposedly make it impossible for Parliament to overturn things in future, the truth is that the same is perfectly possible for a future House of Commons—a boundary review comes along, the current Administration does not like it, saying, “Actually, we should delay it”, and all they need to do is to introduce a quick piece of primary legislation to overturn it.

As we saw with the Fixed-term Parliaments Act, it is very difficult to introduce provisions that discipline the House of Commons to keep to a set of constitutional rules, given that we do not have an entrenched constitution. Although all of us would laud the fact that the provisions of the Bill are an improvement, reducing the ability of Parliament to stop things, we should not fool ourselves into thinking that it will necessarily stop Parliament, not least because even within the terms of the Bill an order has to be laid—instead of

“as soon as is reasonably practicable”

at the moment—under the new provisions,

“as soon as may be reasonably practicable”.

I am not a lawyer, but the distinction between those two things still strikes me as rather fine on whether or not we could still be left in the situation that we had in the last Parliament, when the provisions were simply were not put before the House of Commons in a timely fashion. That could be repeated.

Professor McLean: I have very little to add. The automaticity may look worrying to some, because it removes the rule from Parliament, but parliamentary supremacy is mentioned in the explanatory notes and of course the Bill could be enacted and then repealed by a future Parliament. That is the nature of parliamentary supremacy. It would be very embarrassing—the mother of Parliaments, one of the oldest parliamentary democracies and so on: it is already very embarrassing that it is operating on the basis of 20-year-old boundaries and therefore we did not have equal suffrage in the 2019 general election, to put it at its most blunt. I would concur with John that Parliament could do it again. It would be embarrassing, and I rather hope it does not.

Parliamentary Constituencies bill (Fourth sitting)

Maria Miller Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee Debate: 4th sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 23rd June 2020 Public Bill Committees

[Clive Efford]

Q Is the simple answer to the question that yes, there are sources that you would like access to?

Peter Stanyon: There are potential sources. We need to see the quality of those data sources before we can jump that way.

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

Q Thank you for your evidence, Peter. If you mentioned this earlier I did not catch it, but we have been talking a lot about polling districts. Could you confirm how often, on average, polling districts actually change? I have been an MP for 15 years and I could probably count two or three times we have had changes in polling districts, which should always be as a result of boundary changes for wards. Is that typical, or are they usually more regular than that?

Peter Stanyon: It will vary across the UK. A statutory review must be undertaken every five years. One has just finished, and the next one is due to report between October 2023 and January 2025. In some local authorities, polling district reviews are undertaken after each major poll, just to make sure that the scheme is suitable. It depends on the fluidity of local authority areas.

[Mrs Miller]

Q I raise this because the boundary commission talked about how difficult it would be to look at polling districts as a unit of currency, as it were, because they change so often. How could those changes be better monitored? Iain McLean mentioned the need for more investment in geographic information systems. Is that a problem, or are the two issues separate?

Peter Stanyon: They are separate, as some local authorities will have access to far better mapping tools than others. The simple answer to the question is that basically the polling districts are left to each individual local authority. How they are reported to a national sub-dataset may be inconsistent across the UK, unlike ward boundaries and constituency boundaries, which are on the public record. Because it concerns local authorities, they do report these things but there is no up-to-date central database of every single polling district sub-division, as far as I am aware.

[Mrs Miller]

Q Would more investment in GIS help?

Peter Stanyon: I am not sure that I am qualified to say that GIS would be the answer to that sort of situation. Better and more complete reporting of where changes have occurred would be beneficial to all those involved in the delineation of boundaries, whether that involves GIS or something else.

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

Q Thank you for your contribution so far, Peter. I will also ask you about polling districts, and will declare an interest at this stage: in addition to being a Member of Parliament I am also a borough councillor at Charnwood Borough Council, Quorn and Mountsorrel Castle. I will talk about Quorn. In Quorn, there are two polling districts. The reason there are two—and the reason they are where they are—is that we have a football club at one end of the village and a village hall at the other end, and they are the polling stations. Is that the kind of thing that happens across the country? What is your advice on that? Do the locations of the polling stations denote polling districts as opposed to something else?

Peter Stanyon: That is a fair summation. The legislation is currently worded to say that you start at the top and work down; the reality is that most polling district reviews are based on working upwards, based on the availability of premises. The key point for any review of polling districts is that the locations—the polling places—must be accessible to the majority of electors. In the case you have described, the decision, which was presumably made by the local authority, is that there are two good venues with good accessibility, so it would make sense to use both venues in that situation. In other cases, there will be a surfeit of venues, making it far more difficult. It really depends in many respects on what premises or locations are available. In some locations you see temporary buildings, such as portakabins and caravans, because there is physically nothing else for returning officers to use.

--- Later in debate ---

[Christian Matheson]

Q Secondly, Wales has some centres of population but it also has areas of sparsity, and some serious geographical issues that a boundary commission review would need to take into account. I made that point to Professor Wyn Jones as well, but I would be grateful for your take.

We have already heard about the south Wales valleys and there are parts of Snowdonia that are very mountainous. I suspect that Wales is more badly affected by losing so many seats because we are focusing solely on the numbers, and that the areas of sparsity and the geographical barriers would lead to much larger constituencies in area. How would you strike a balance between geography, sparsity, rurality and numbers?

Dr Larner: There is an understanding that Wales is the most rural nation in terms of population in the UK. As you say, there are very large constituencies. The issue with the plus or minus 5% rule is that these areas are badly affected. I do not necessarily have a problem with the idea of levelling up constituencies in terms of population size, but I think there are certain geographic limits to what is a manageable constituency. There could be the inclusion of an upper band for the number of square miles in a constituency, or something as simple as that. I know that is a down-the-middle answer.

[Mrs Miller]

Q Thank you, Dr Larner, for your evidence today. It is incredibly helpful in the Committee’s deliberations.

Under these provisions there are four protected constituencies, as you know: two are on the Isle of Wight, near my own constituency of Basingstoke, and two are in Scotland, but there are none in Wales. When the proposal was to reduce to 600 constituencies, it was difficult to give protection to Ynys Môn, yet under this proposal it is easier to do so and stay closer to the potential threshold for constituency sizes. I have tabled an amendment to that affect, which I do not know whether you have had a chance to look at. Can you see any problems with introducing such an amendment into this legislation? I declare an interest as I was brought up in south Wales.

Dr Larner: On the face of it, I certainly do not see any problems. I have also seen some people discussing the idea of some of the constituencies on the west coast of Wales, where there are far more Welsh speakers and very rural constituencies, being considered for something like that. Obviously, Ynys Môn is not as isolated geographically as some of the Scottish constituencies, but, when you consider that the Isle of Wight is involved in these protections, it is reasonable to suggest that Ynys Môn should be too.

[Bim Afolami (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)]

Q Dr Larner, you mentioned at the beginning that you studied electoral and voting behaviour. In the evidence sessions we have heard a lot about the impact on people when they feel that local ties are not respected or that their community is being broken up by a constituency boundary.

Have you come across any evidence from the last few boundary reviews on what a more disruptive boundary review does to voting behaviour, as regards the parties or candidates people vote for, or whether they vote at all?

Dr Larner: Not necessarily in the way you put it, but there is interesting evidence if you compare strategic voting in Scotland and Wales, especially at devolved elections. In Wales, constituency boundaries for devolved and UK general election elections are coterminous, which is a silly word meaning the same, and in Scotland, they are different; they do not overlap. There is a lot of very interesting evidence on those elections. When people are faced with different boundaries, how do they calculate who they will vote for? There is some evidence from Scotland that there is more confusion when faced with different boundaries and boundary changes. For example, people are not always sure which is the strongest candidate, or which is the favourite or second favourite candidate. There is evidence that those boundary changes, which are consistent and repeated—they are not one-off events—cause some confusion among voters.

Parliamentary Constituencies bill (First sitting)

Maria Miller Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee Debate: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 18th June 2020 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

Isabel, did you want to add something?

Isabel Drummond-Murray: No, I was just agreeing. That would be the approach we would take, too.

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

Q It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley, on what I am sure will be a really interesting Committee. I thank the witnesses for the responses they have already given, and the inevitable hard work they are facing in this area.

Can I follow up on one of the responses to David Linden’s questions, about splitting wards to do what this Bill is trying to do, which is to create equal and updated boundaries across the whole of the United Kingdom? I speak as one who represents a constituency of 83,000 people—well in excess of what I am sure will be the eventual quota. Isabel was talking about the importance in Scotland of using postcodes to try to get some sense of equalisation. Could Mr Bellringer outline for the Committee what the approach is to splitting wards in England, and whether any experts have looked at this to give us advice on what is a good process to follow, particularly when it comes to polling districts?

Tony Bellringer: As I mentioned earlier, we have traditionally had a general policy of using wards as our building blocks. However, as you will know from the previous couple of reviews, there have been instances in which we have been prepared to split a ward to solve a problem in that area.

As Isabel alluded to, the difficulty in England is that we do not have access to a comprehensive dataset below ward level that contains the parliamentary electorates and associates them with the boundaries of whatever that unit is—a dataset that we can then manipulate in the software and quickly move those units around to recalculate the figures, because that is how it works. When we split a ward in England at the moment, we have to go back to the local authority and get the detailed breakdown, usually on a polling district basis, and manually calculate those figures, which really slows the process. If we were to move to a much more open process of using sub-ward-level units as our building blocks, we would have to source that data from somewhere.

[Mrs Miller]

Q If you can do it in Scotland, why can you not do it in England?

Tony Bellringer: At the moment, we do not have the postcode areas in England. We would have to create them; they could be created, but it would take an awfully long time to do.

Between the 2013 and 2018 reviews, one of the things with which we kept ourselves occupied was constructing a polling district-level dataset with the help of Ordnance Survey, in order to map those figures against the actual polling district boundaries. That is almost the most difficult part of the process. We sort of have the figures already because we have access to the actual registers, which are usually subdivided by polling district. However, the polling districts are not mapped in a consistent way and we have to be able to associate the electorate figure with the actual boundary of the unit you are working with, so that when you move the unit, the numbers change accordingly. You need to have mapped those polling district boundaries electronically. We did that process, and it took us and Ordnance Survey about two years to map every polling district in England.

[Mrs Miller]

Q May I probe a little further? We are talking about democracy here, so it is pretty important that we get it right, and a bit of extra hard work and extra IT is what the electorate would expect to get a democratic process. I still do not really understand why you are not doing this, particularly given that I know exactly what the boundaries of my polling districts are, so I do not understand why you do not.

Tony Bellringer: As I say, we went through the process between 2013 and 2018, so at one point in time we had a polling district dataset that we could use. However, as you know, polling district reviews happen all the time across the entirety of England, so that single, comprehensive polling district dataset goes out of date almost instantly. There has to be a way of keeping it up to date. At the moment, that requires us to know who is doing the polling district review and when, so we can go and find out what they have changed it to. Do they have it mapped? No—then we need to get somebody to map it into the system. At the moment, there is no process by which the results of a polling district review are notified either to us or to Ordnance Survey so that it can be incorporated and the dataset can be kept up to date.

[Mrs Miller]

Q Mr Paisley, I do not know if this will help, but it might be useful if the commission provided the Committee with a note on the issue and how it could be overcome. Just because it has not been done before does not mean that it cannot be done in the future, and I think this piece of legislation demands that it be done now. Could I suggest that we ask the commission to provide a more detailed note on how this could be done, with any costings that might be appropriate?

[The Chair]

You are being asked to write a wish list on this issue. Could you do that for us?

Tony Bellringer: Yes. We did actually approach the Government at the time. We have kind of done the work to build that and issue one. There is a requirement for a local authority that does a polling district review to publish the findings, but they just do that by publishing it on a website, and it is also not necessarily in a mapped format. All it actually requires is a bit of something tacked on to that legal requirement to publish, which says, “You also need to send it to Ordnance Survey and the Boundary Commission.”

[The Chair]

Could you give that to us within two weeks?

[Mrs Miller]

Q And any suggestions of changes in the law to do that would be really helpful.

Can I ask one other question—will you indulge me, Mr Paisley? I noticed that the commissions try to minimise the disruption to existing boundaries in its proposals, which is obviously a sensible thing to do. I also noted that it has said in the past that the commissions are not obliged to shut their eyes to likely future growth. That is particularly noted in section 40 of the guidance that was produced at the last review. Will both commissions outline their approach to the next review and whether it will be the same sort of approach? I declare an interest in that I represent a part of the country that is building a lot of houses. To propose boundaries that will inevitably be changed radically in the future would seem to be a waste of the commission’s time.

Tony Bellringer: Immediately before we start a review, the commission meets representatives of political parties to talk about how it plans to operate its internal policies within the framework of the statutory requirements, and that is an example of the kind of thing that we would be talking about with them.

It is unlikely that it would change significantly. The fundamental principle in doing this work is that you have to at some point draw a line and say, “That is the data that we are working with.” You cannot build a house on constantly shifting foundations and so you have to say, “That is the data and we are going to work with that data.”

At the same time, where we are looking at competing options in an area, if one is obviously more suited to an area that is clearly growing in population—maybe we know that from strategic planning approvals that have gone through in the area—that will veer us towards that option as the preferred option. That is really what it means.

What we cannot do is say, “Well, okay, the electorate that we are supposed to be working with is this and the electorate is now this, so let’s use that instead.” We still have to stick to the original electorate figure, but be alive to the fact that it is clearly growing and can be demonstrated to be growing. That is quite key as well—we draw a distinction between proven growth in an area and projected or speculative growth in an area.

[Mrs Miller]

Q Presumably, it would affect your geographical boundaries, which may not have live bodies in yet, but will in the future.

Tony Bellringer: Yes and no. The distinction I am trying to draw here is that if you have had a strategic planning development approved and it has been built and people have started to move in, you can say that those figures have changed—it is clearly growing. Even though those figures have derived from a point in time after the electorate data that we are supposed to be using, there is a clear indication that the area is growing. If you have had a strategic planning development approved, but it has not been built yet at the time we are doing our review, we might go, “Well, it is not as convincing.”

[Mrs Miller]

Q And in Scotland?

Isabel Drummond-Murray: I do not think there is much to add to that. We have to work with the electorate as set out in the legislation. On the local government side—I am also secretary to the Local Government Boundary Commission for Scotland—the legislation sets out that we take account of the forecast for five years.

That all points to the need for regular review. We draw a line when we know there is going to be growth and there is capacity to absorb it through the existing 5% tolerance. I guess we could take account of it, but it is not something that has featured particularly on the parliamentary side, simply because of the way in which the legislation is drafted. We use the electorate at the start of the review; we do not guess what the electorate will be at a point in the future.

[The Chair]

We have four more questions and about 11 minutes on the clock, though I will push it on to get all the questions asked, because the evidence we are getting is very good for the inquiry.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jane Hunt]

Q Ward splitting was referred to previously. How would that work in Wales? There was some reference to some wards being too large, which gives me the idea that single-seat wards would be a good idea for the future. How would that work in Wales? Are there areas where local government wards are too large?

Shereen Williams: Like our colleagues in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, we use electoral wards as our building blocks. However, if there was great difficulty, we would use community wards within the electoral ward. In the past, we have put forward proposals where one or two parliamentary constituencies had a split ward in them. It is a route that we would rather not take because it creates confusion for voters when you have a different local authority and a different parliamentary constituency compared with somebody who is in the same electoral ward as you.

[Mrs Miller]

Q I start by thanking Shereen for her evidence today. In your evidence, you have highlighted the specific challenges in Wales because of the beautiful geography you have. Can you and the Welsh commission learn from the experience in Scotland, when they undertook a very significant review of boundaries in the ’80s—I am sure Scottish members of the Committee can remind me exactly when that was—when there was major reorganisation? It is a challenge, but it is one that has been successfully undertaken in Scotland and perhaps now the challenge falls to Wales. Is there any learning you can get from that?

Shereen Williams: The four Boundary Commissions are in regular contact. We rely on each other and we share good practice on a regular basis. In terms of those changes that have taken place in Scotland, I cannot imagine why we would not be able to invite Scottish colleagues to present to commissioners and to inform our thinking on how we deliver this report for Wales.

[Mrs Miller]

Q Sorry—that major change happened prior to 2005, actually. It is really reassuring to hear your comments.

Going back to the question that my hon. Friend the Member for Loughborough raised about splitting wards, it is interesting that that seems to be something that can happen in Wales and Scotland, although the procedures are not as easy as they might be. We heard that from the commission in England. Would you be able to advise the Committee about working with Mr Bellringer on what would need to be put in place to ensure that, if it was helpful, sub-ward-level splits could take place? Would you be able to provide some more information for the Committee on that?

Shereen Williams: Scotland and Wales’s challenge is significantly different from England’s because of the number of electorates. Tony has to co-ordinate in terms of trying to get all the parliamentary constituencies set up for England. In Wales, we are used to splitting wards because we tend to do that for our local government boundary reviews, so we are quite comfortable with the practice of breaking up electoral wards and splitting up communities into sub-wards in order to create electoral wards—this is going back to community wards. In terms of sharing that practice with Mr Bellringer, that would not be an issue, but I have to acknowledge that he has a far more difficult job in hand compared with us in Wales and Scotland.

[Mrs Miller]

Q Very finally, in Wales you have the wonderful Ynys Môn constituency, which is the second-largest island in the United Kingdom—I am nervously looking at the Chair here—or maybe the third, depending on how you view Northern Ireland.

[The Chair]

Rathlin Island. I think you are right.

[Mrs Miller]

I wondered whether, as somebody who was brought up in Wales and understands the importance of cultural identity within the Welsh nation and the psyche, you have thought further about how that constituency should be treated. I am a Hampshire MP, and the Isle of Wight gets particular protection because of that.

Shereen Williams: That would be something for Parliament to decide as to whether Ynys Môn becomes a protected constituency, as they have in Scotland and the Isle of Wight. It would not be for the commission to comment on that.

[Mrs Miller]

Understood. Sorry, I have probably pressed you too far on that.

[The Chair]

Shereen, thank you very much for your wonderful evidence and, more importantly, for getting us back on time. You have made my chairmanship so much easier. Thank you for giving us your time this morning.

Shereen Williams: Thank you for having me.

Examination of Witness

Eamonn McConville gave evidence.

Parliamentary Constituencies bill (Second sitting)

Maria Miller Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee Debate: 2nd sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 18th June 2020 Public Bill Committees

[David Linden]

Okay, thank you.

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

Q Thank you so much for giving evidence. I want to probe further on the issue of automaticity in the Bill. We are currently working on boundaries that are decades out of date. Much of the reason for that and for problems in the past has been the way in which political parties in Parliament have blocked changes to boundaries. As a party, do you support automaticity, because of the ability to have automatic changes?

Dave McCobb: We support the principle that the proposals that come from the Boundary Commission should be subject to minimal potential political interference, or a majority party could use its majority to impose boundaries on other people. The critical issue is how far the whole process is as divorced from partisan political control as possible.

[Mrs Miller]

Q Surely the final recommendations not coming before Parliament would fulfil your criteria of not having political involvement at that crucial stage, which in the past has proved to be such a barrier.

Dave McCobb: I think that depends on the criteria that are set for the Boundary Commission’s review. Provided that the criteria are set for the Boundary Commission’s work in as non-partisan a way as possible, then not having a political vote at the end of it might be acceptable. Again, it comes back to the provisions that the Boundary Commission is required to work to also being free of party political influence to the largest degree possible.

[Mrs Miller]

Q Can you give an example of what might constitute influence on the Commission?

Dave McCobb: I would like to come back to the 5% variation threshold. The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe specifically recommends a variation of up to 10% when doing [Inaudible] necessary. Having that greater degree of flexibility around the way the Commission is able to be flexible, to recognise natural communities where they exist, would enable it to be more free of political direction than as the Bill is currently set out.

[The Chair]

And the issue of what constitutes pressure on a commissioner.

Dave McCobb: I am afraid I could not hear that.

[The Chair]

I think the question was, what do you think constituted pressure on a commissioner? You were going to come back to that point.

Dave McCobb: Sorry, I think I have said what I wanted to on that point.

[Mrs Miller]

Q Following up on one of the previous lines of questioning on the premise of the Bill, which is about equal-sized constituencies and the fairness of that, I was reflecting on what Nick Clegg, when he was leader of the Liberal Democrats, said about that—very much supporting that as a principle. I was reflecting on the comments that you made earlier about the need to balance the issues of community over those of fairness. If it were possible to break down the units of work to, say, a polling-district level, to get that sensitivity on communities and on fairness, which the Liberal party has put prominently in the past, do you think that you could get a better balance, if you were dealing with polling districts, rather than wards, and you could therefore live with a far tighter tolerance of the variances between different constituencies?

Dave McCobb: You make an important point, which is specific to the way in which the commission in England worked on the last review, in that it was very clear that, apart from one or two examples in its final proposals, it was adamantly against ward splitting.

The combination of the English commission’s reluctance to split council wards and the tight 5% threshold contributed to some quite perverse constituencies being proposed in some cases, in particular in some urban areas. In parts of the country, a council ward is 2,000 or 3,000 electors, so a number of them can be added or subtracted around the threshold, but in Leeds, for example, there are 17,000 electors in a council ward and, if you are not willing to split one, in one case a lot of people had to have a random ward that really had no community links with Leeds tacked to the top of a Leeds constituency.

If the commission is given clearer direction on preferring ward splitting if that helps them to retain constituencies that relate to natural communities, that is obviously helpful. We support the principle that each MP should represent a roughly equal number of residents, but we highlight the fact that the Electoral Commission last September estimated that up 9 million potential electors are not on the register and that, while there is evidence that some particular groups might be heavily disadvantaged by under-registration, giving the commission a bit more flexibility to enable it to recognise the parts of the country where there might be major issues with electoral under-registration is the right thing to do.

[Mrs Miller]

It is interesting: in Wales and Scotland, there is an ability to split wards, even to go down to postcode level. It can be done, so I suppose the question is why it is not done more in England.

Dave McCobb: It is that combination of the two factors: the English commission’s reluctance to split wards, which contributed; and the 5% threshold, which, if that were 10%, would allow it the flexibility better to match natural communities and to recognise that there will be parts of the country with much greater problems of under-registration of people resident there than others.

[Ben Lake]

Q I would like to go back a few topics to the allocation of seats across the nations of the United Kingdom. I appreciate, Mr McCobb, that you do not want to pass comment on any numbers, but I was wondering whether the Liberal Democrats have a view of how that allocation should be decided.

Dave McCobb: That is not something that I am in a position to comment on at this time, but I am happy to take that question back to colleagues and to give you a written follow-up, if that would be helpful.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ben Lake]

Q Diolch, Geraint, for joining us this afternoon. This morning, we heard from a witness from the Boundary Commission for Wales, who spoke a bit about the way in which local ties affect how the commission considers boundaries and boundary changes. When it comes to local ties, do you have any particular concerns about the commission’s considerations—its rules—not encompassing all the characteristics we might want to see reflected and respected in Wales?

Geraint Day: The biggest difference in local ties between Wales and England is the Welsh language. A large percentage of Welsh language speakers are down the west coast, but they are also in some of the upland areas in north and south Wales. Local ties do not necessarily go down the same route as that. The Boundary Commission is looking at geographical ties—shopping centres, travel-to-work areas and those types of things—whereas at times the Welsh language communities do not fit into that local-tie element.

In the past, the Boundary Commission has made attempts to address this; where it has originally proposed splitting Welsh language communities, it has made efforts to put them back together. However, I suggest that it would be better to specifically state that in the Bill, rather than just lump it in with “local ties”. If you look at the Welsh Government’s planning process and the advice it gives to local government about local development plans, those plans are required to have a language impact assessment, a requirement that originates from the Welsh Language (Wales) Measure 2011. The way the Boundary Commission operates is perfectly bilingual and it deserves great praise for the way it operates. However, it is not required under the current local ties rule to specifically consider the impact on the Welsh language. I think that should be included as a specific item in the Bill.

[Mrs Miller]

Q Thank you very much for giving evidence to us today and, very importantly, for bringing the Welsh perspective into consideration. One of the provisions in the Bill is automaticity, which means that after about two and a half years of review, the recommendations automatically get brought into being, removing the possibility of political influence from the Government or indeed from Parliament, which has been a problem for us in the past. Do you have a view on that and will you support that measure?

Geraint Day: In one regard, it is a very simple statement to make. However, the removal of parliamentary authority and moving that decision away from Parliament to straight implementation is a big step to make. If that rule had been in place in the last two reviews, we would now have a Parliament of 600 MPs and we would not be having this conversation.

Parliament provides a track to final proposals. If we cannot get a majority in the House of Commons, that raises questions about whether it should be implemented. I understand the trouble that the previous two reviews caused, and as one of the people who contributed and spent a lot of time putting submissions to that, it is quite frustrating. There should be some way of keeping some form of parliamentary overview of the proposals without necessarily enabling it to become a party political football in the House of Commons.

[Mrs Miller]

Q Has that check not become a full stop, which has left us in the position we are in now, with boundaries that are decades out of date and huge variance? Does it not worry you that a vote in a constituency in one part of the country has more or less value than a vote in another part of the country? Does that not cause you concern?

Geraint Day: In terms of how the Boundary Commission operates, it has been doing its job; the issue has been with Members of Parliament in the House of Commons. The way in which that is solved is something that I think Parliament needs to come to an answer about, rather than the non-elected people in society, including myself. It is really a matter for Members of Parliament, but I understand where you are coming from and I have a certain amount of sympathy. I refer back to my previous point—if this rule had been in place in the past, we would already have a Parliament of 600 MPs and not 650. I think that 650 is by far a better fit and that seems to be the general opinion of the majority of the population, so I think the check has worked, to a certain degree, despite how frustrating it has been.

[Mrs Miller]

Q I have one final question. I was brought up in Wales. I understand when you talk about the unique nature of the geography of Wales. There is nowhere more unique than Ynys Môn, where you have a very clear boundary. I am a Hampshire MP, so I have huge sympathy for the need to protect and to support those island communities. Is there anything you would like to add to your comments, in terms of the particular importance of protecting that island community?

Geraint Day: Island communities are unique and you see that not just throughout the UK, but throughout the world, not least in the fact that they even have the Island games, where various islands of the world get together and put on a semi-Olympic games just for the islands. You see it in the identity. That is something that is quite precious and unique and that we as a society need to foster and take care of.

In terms of their numbers, if the Isle of Wight has two MPs, each one will have an electorate the current size of Ynys Môn’s. If it is good enough for the people of the Isle of Wight, why is it not good enough for the people of Ynys Môn?

[Mrs Miller]

Speaking as a Hampshire MP, I am sure that the people who live on the Isle of Wight would understand exactly what you are talking about. Thank you.

Oral Answers to Questions

Maria Miller Excerpts

Wednesday 10th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Yes indeed. I think the scheme provides a fair, balanced and proportionate way of helping all those who have suffered most during the troubles. It is very important that Sinn Féin, along with all other parties, allow the scheme to go forward as soon as possible.

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

Many peaceful protests have been held across the country against racism following the appalling events in the US, including in my own constituency yesterday. Can I commend my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister for recognising the significance of these events? As well as scrutinising the health impact of c-19 on ethnic minority groups, can he look again, using the Race Disparity Audit, for any persistent and systemic racism in all Government Departments—from the treatment of BAME people in the judicial system through to how we teach children about these issues in our education system?

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my right hon. Friend. I completely agree with the need for all political leaders to promote these issues—to recognise how important they are in people’s hearts. I am very proud of what I did as Mayor to encourage the promotion of young BAME officers in our Metropolitan police; we had a system to move them up. I want to see that kind of activity across the government of this country. It is the right way forward for the UK.

Parliamentary Constituencies Bill

Maria Miller Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution & Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion & Programme motion: House of Commons
Tuesday 2nd June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

I commend the Minister for her powerful speech in presenting the Bill to the House. We all come here with equal power vested in us by our communities, but my voice represents a constituency of 83,000 people, while the hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain) represents a constituency of 61,000 people. It is difficult for us to explain to our constituents why that inequity is there. I hope that all of us here would agree that that is not right, and that we should have in our democratic system an inherent equity between Members of Parliament in terms of the number of people who are able to vote for them.

I fully support the Government’s move to automaticity, if that is the right word—to bring in boundary changes without Members of Parliament having to get involved. Indeed, the 5% tolerance ensures that equality will be ingrained in the future and moves us away from having to have these debates on a regular basis. We should all just come clean: this is a difficult issue for Members of Parliament. We have an inherent interest in the outcome of boundary reviews, which makes it difficult. My hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose) made the point incredibly well. We need to put those decisions outside this place to be made.

One thing that has not been discussed is that new Office for National Statistics data estimates that six new constituencies will be generated in the south-east region of this country. This place needs to give some thought to how those new constituencies should be constructed. Constituencies should have a sense of purpose. They should have a sense of history and a sense of community.

When my constituency was first part of a boundary review, back in the 1940s, just 13,000 people were living in Basingstoke. There are now 83,000 people living in my constituency, and Basingstoke sprawls across four constituencies. My challenge to the Boundary Commission is simple, and I think the Minister needs to help it with this. Constituencies should not just be numerical constructs; they should be constructed for communities first and foremost, and we should construct them for the future, not simply salami-slice away what has gone before. That is the right thing for us to think about now, because this boundary review will be seismic in some areas of the country, and we need to ensure that we grasp the opportunity.

At the moment, the provisions in schedule 2 of the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986 are very sparse in terms of the directions they give to the Boundary Commission. They talk notionally about local ties, and those often figure large in the consultations that follow, but is there an opportunity here to give more direction to the Boundary Commission about their importance for constituencies, and about the importance of mid-sized market towns such as Basingstoke, which saw significant boundary changes in 2010? We have done the right thing and built new houses, but we have been rewarded with a fragmentation of our constituency, which is not necessarily healthy for the future.

Why are towns in certain parts of the country split east-west and north-south, and others simply salami-sliced away? We need a better approach to constructing our constituencies for the future.

Public Services

Maria Miller Excerpts

Tuesday 28th April 2020 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Those are very good points, which I will consider and discuss with the Health Secretary.

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

Can my hon. Friend confirm that, as well as treating patients for covid-19, our NHS is very much there for people needing urgent access to healthcare, and will my right hon. Friend confirm that the NHS is open for business for everybody who needs it? Anybody who is suffering a stroke, a heart attack or other life-threatening conditions should not be deterred from seeking that important medical help.

[Michael Gove]

My right hon. Friend makes a very important point. We must do everything we can to encourage people, particularly those with serious conditions such as cancer, to seek support from the NHS. The effective response that the NHS has mounted to the pandemic so far enables us to treat them as well.

Oral Answers to Questions

Maria Miller Excerpts

Wednesday 15th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Gentleman raises an important point. We have doubled the scheme and will ensure that not only the Scottish agriculture sector, but the agriculture sector of the entire country has access to the seasonal workforce it needs. That is why we are introducing a points-based immigration system that will enable this country to get the skills that it requires.

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

Child sexual abuse is not a thing of the past in this country. Over 4,000 offences of online child abuse were recorded by the police last year. Organisations such as Facebook and Instagram find it easy to analyse our online shopping habits but less easy to keep children safe. Can my right hon. Friend say how the Government will continue to make it their priority to protect children from sexual abuse online?

[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. Friend raises a subject of massive interest to the House and to the whole country, and we are indeed very concerned about what is happening online. The Cabinet discussed it yesterday, and the online harms White Paper sets out our plans to make companies more responsible. We will be taking further action in the near future to stamp out this vice.