Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

Nigel Evans Excerpts

Tuesday 16th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (PC)]

I beg to move amendment 11, page 1, line 5, leave out ‘7 May 2015’ and insert ‘1 May 2014’.

[The First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Nigel Evans)]

With this, it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Amendment 7, page 1, line 5, leave out ‘2015’ and insert ‘2013’.

Amendment 8, page 1, line 7, leave out ‘fifth’ and insert ‘third’.

Amendment 12, page 1, line 7, leave out ‘fifth’ and insert ‘fourth’.

Amendment 32, page 1, line 9, leave out subsection (4) and insert—

‘(4) In determining the polling day for a parliamentary general election under subsection (3) above, no account shall be taken of any early parliamentary general election the polling day for which was appointed under section 2.’.

Amendment 13, page 1, line 13, leave out ‘“fifth” there were substituted “fourth”’ and insert ‘“fourth” there were substituted “third”’.

Amendment 9, page 1, line 13, leave out ‘fifth’ and insert ‘third’.

Amendment 10, page 1, line 13, leave out ‘“fourth”’ and insert ‘“second”’.

New clause 4—Devolved legislature elections—

‘(1) A devolved legislature election may not take place on the same day as a United Kingdom parliamentary general election.

(2) If a devolved legislature election is scheduled to take place on the same day as a United Kingdom parliamentary general election, then the date of the poll for the devolved legislature general election must vary by—

(a) not less than two months, and

(b) not more than twelve months and one week before or after the United Kingdom parliamentary general election date.

(3) The appropriate authority shall make provision by order to vary the date of the devolved legislature general election, subject to agreement by the relevant devolved legislature.

(4) The following election to that devolved legislature will take place on the first Thursday in May in the fourth calendar year following the polling day for the previous election.

(5) A devolved legislature election is an election to the Scottish Parliament, the National Assembly for Wales or the Northern Ireland Assembly.’.

New clause 5—Varying of elections by the National Assembly for Wales—

‘(1) Section 4 of the Government of Wales Act 2006 (“Power to vary date of ordinary general election”) is amended as follows.

(2) In subsection (1) after “May”, insert “, subject to subsections (1A) and (1B)”.

(4) After subsection (1) insert—

“(1A) If the scheduled date for a National Assembly for Wales ordinary general election is the same date as for a United Kingdom parliamentary general election, the National Assembly of Wales general election must be held—

(a) not less than two months, and

(b) not more than twelve months and one week before or after the United Kingdom parliamentary general election.

(1B) The Secretary of State for Wales shall by order provide for the date of the poll of the National Assembly for Wales ordinary general election, with the agreement of the National Assembly for Wales, subject to subsection (1A).”.’.

Clause stand part.

[Jonathan Edwards]

I wish to speak also to amendments 12 and 13 in my name and those of my hon. Friend the Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil), the Leader of the Opposition and his hon. Friends, as well as new clauses 4 and 5. The amendments go to the crux of the Bill—the establishment of a specific period between elections and the date on which we hold the next UK parliamentary elections.

My party is in favour of fixed-term Parliaments, for many of the reasons outlined on Second Reading. A fixed-term Parliament removes a Prime Minister’s ability to seek the dissolution of Parliament for pure political gain, taking away that significant incumbency advantage—more of which later in my speech. It would end speculation about the timing of the next election and a near-obsession with opinion polls and psephologists about when an election might be called. It provides stability for the political programme, as we have found with the One Wales agreement in Wales, a four-year term, where parties understand what can and cannot be achieved within the required legislative time frame—even in our case where the byzantine workings of legislative competence orders have held up the progress of our law-making, denying us prompt action to solve our problems. By providing a settled timetable, fixed-term Parliaments provide a firm basis for electoral administration, taking away the shock of a snap election and giving a more generous timetable to ensure participation in the voting process.

However, I cannot understand the Government’s reasoning behind the insistence on a five-year legislative term, either in this parliamentary term or in the future. To be perfectly honest, there does not seem to be any reason. The Conservative-Liberal Democrat Government have consistently failed to provide a good reason why the next election should be held in May 2015, not in May 2014. On Second Reading, the Deputy Prime Minister, with bizarre Liberal Democrat logic, presumably taken from a “Focus” leaflet bar graph, claimed that a five-year Parliament would probably amount in practice to a legislative working term of four years. As many hon. Members will already know, the five-year maximum term was implemented in 1911, but even that was introduced with the expectation that the working parliamentary period would probably be four years—a period in which, as Lord Asquith said at the time, a Government had either the political mandate from the previous election or the unwillingness to commit to unpopular decisions ahead of the next election.

Four years—the length of time between elections for the National Assembly for Wales, the Scottish Parliament, the Northern Ireland Assembly, the London Assembly, the London mayoral elections and local authority, community and even parish council elections in all four parts of the UK—is quite clearly and obviously the norm for the electoral cycle in the nation states.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jonathan Edwards]

The right hon. Lady knows that I am in full agreement with her. It was very important that those issues were discussed. It was a disgrace that the Secretary of State refused that request.

[The First Deputy Chairman]

Order. We are moving on to Bills that have already passed through the House. Please can we focus on the amendments before us?

[Jonathan Edwards]

These changes will have a clear impact as electors find themselves not merely with the added burden of an extra piece of paper to complete, as they will in the clashing elections next May and the alternative vote referendum, but voting for different constituency locations. I am proud to serve on the Welsh Affairs Committee in my first term in Parliament. The Committee received evidence from a number of organisations on these potential problems, and reported on them in our first publication of this Session, entitled “'The implications for Wales of the Government’s proposals on constitutional reform”. We heard, for example, testimony from Lewis Baston, senior research fellow with Democratic Audit. He said that

“the elections for Westminster and the Assembly would be taking place on different systems on the same day, and more complicatedly on two sets of boundaries which will hardly ever correlate with each other.”

Philip Johnson told our Committee that the coincidence of elections could have “horrendous” consequences in 2015.