Constitutional Law

Owen Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 30th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the Minister. As he said, the order is largely uncontroversial. The principal amendments are to article 39 of the National Assembly for Wales (Representation of the People) Order 2007, which stipulates that the office for an election agent for a regional election should be within that region; articles 114 and 133, which relate to the Legal Services Act 2007; and schedule 10, which relates to the format of the ballot papers for the constituency and regional lists. We are content that the amendments in articles 6 and 7 of the draft order, which expand the description of bodies regulating the legal profession that must be considered by election courts and describe the duties of the Director of Public Prosecutions therein, are entirely reasonable and appropriate, and we will be supporting them. We are also satisfied that the changes to schedule 10 described in article 10 of the amending order, which relate to the nature of the ballot papers, are also rational and evidence-based changes, based on consultation with all parties and the Electoral Commission. We will be supporting those, too.

We welcome, too, the change proposed in article 5 of the draft order, which amends article 39(2)(b) of the 2007 order and which, in keeping with suggestions made by the parties, the National Assembly and the Electoral Commission, allows election agents for the regional elections to have their offices anywhere in Wales, not solely within that region. That, too, is a sensible and practical change that reflects the realities of how political parties organise themselves for elections, with both regional and constituency bases. In fact, the changes to the constitutional law described in the draft order are all reasonable and sensible amendments. They have all been drafted after respectful consultation with the devolved Administration and are free of party political taint. As such, they stand in sharp contrast to all the other constitutional legislation that we have been debating in this House in recent weeks.

[Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend talks about consultation. Does he know whether any research has been undertaken on the propensity of voters to go for the top name on the list? If so, does he know whether any thought been given to the fact that, with party names rather than individuals’ names appearing on the list, there will perhaps always be a tendency for a certain party to be at the top?

[Owen Smith]

I do not know whether there has been any research on that. I confess that I suspect that there has been none, and I doubt whether many of the provisions in either this order or, more importantly, the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill have been adequately tested, as it has been rammed through with such unseemly haste.

As the Minister said, several of the reasonable amendments in the draft order are predicated on recommendations made by the Electoral Commission for Wales in its report on the conduct of the elections to the National Assembly in 2007—an election that was described in the commission’s document as having been

“alright on the night, but…by the skin of our teeth”.

The commission continued:

“The management of elections in Wales, with significant levels of postal voting, is a substantial exercise requiring strategic investment…project planning and risk management”.

There are lessons that we need to learn, and we need to ensure that the authorities in Wales—the Welsh Assembly Government and, I would suggest, Ministers—have learned those lessons.

[Chris Ruane (Vale of Clwyd) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend referred to how costly things could be. The funding given to local authorities for electoral registration officers is not ring-fenced, so what guarantee can he give—or, indeed, the Government of the day give—that this money will not only be ring-fenced, but be spent by local authorities on what it is supposed to be spent on?

[Owen Smith]

I am afraid that I cannot give those guarantees, but I hope that when the Minister responds, he will be able to give us further reassurances about that; I shall cover that point further in a moment. We are deeply worried that, with the combination poll and all the complications that will attend on that, this election has the prospect of being a very difficult one. I fear that we have probably not tested the possibilities or made provision for all the complications that could ensue.

[Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the Minister would be wise to listen to the professional election administrators in Wales, who have warned of the potential for huge voter confusion next year when we hold different types of elections on different franchises using different voting systems?

[Owen Smith]

Absolutely. That is an extremely important point, very well made. We have a significant problem ahead of us next May, with the combined poll. It is going to be complicated, and I fear that due consideration has not been given to our concerns.

I would therefore like to ask the Minister what dialogue he or the Secretary of State have had with the First Minister and other Welsh Assembly Ministers to satisfy themselves that the necessary planning and resources are now in place. The omission of any measures to address these concerns in the order, or in any related legislation, suggests that the Minister is wholly confident that, once again, it will be all right on the night. That is despite the fact that, as many Labour Members have pointed out, this time around, thanks to the disrespectful placing of the complicating referendum on AV on the same day, along with the cuts to the Assembly budget and consequently to local government budgets in Wales, there will be far more to handle at this poll and far fewer resources with which to do that.

We remember the chaos in many polling stations earlier this year, with people being ignominiously turned away from the polls. We also remember the chaos in Scotland in 2007, when more than 100,000 ballots were spoiled. Thankfully, Wales was exempt from both those instances, but is the Minister certain that there is no possibility of this happening in 2011 in Wales? He will know that it is much easier to destroy trust in the democratic process than it is to build it up. These ballots must go through without a hint of the problems that we have seen elsewhere. I can only assume that, in his response, he will be able to give us an absolute assurance that he is confident that the ballots will go off without a hitch

Notwithstanding the fact that we will not oppose the order tonight as its passage was not assumed in the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill, as was the case with the associated orders for Scotland and Northern Ireland, is it not instructive that we are debating it after that Bill, which will fundamentally undermine the Welsh elections, has already been hustled through this House? Is this not also illustrative of the high-handed party political approach that this Government have taken to dealing with all constitutional issues in recent weeks, given that such things are usually treated with far greater respect and given far more even-handed deliberation?