Wales Bill

Stephen Crabb Excerpts

Wednesday 30th April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jonathan Edwards]

And the Rhyl Journal, although I am not an avid reader, I must admit.

Most people get their political news from London papers. If we have a Westminster election and an Assembly election in close proximity, there is a great danger that the issues for which the national Assembly is responsible will be dropped completely. The Minister has indicated that there is no intention to bring the elections closer and that there are protections in the Bill to ensure that there will be a gap of at least a year between them, so I am happy not to press my two amendments.

On the Labour amendments, the Electoral Reform Society has lobbied extensively against amendment 9, arguing that

“good governance and greater stability is achieved through fixed terms and this should not be a power that is given to the Executive to decide.”

It points out that, as the electoral system for the Assembly makes coalitions more likely, fixed terms also provide stability and security for parties of government. Two of the four terms in the Assembly have seen coalition Governments, so I agree with that point.

Amendment 10 appears to have been drafted with the aim of ensuring that Assembly and Westminster elections are not held on the same day. I would have been happy to support that if it had been pressed to a vote.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Stephen Crabb)]

I, too, would like to start by welcoming you to the Chair, Dr McCrea. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I thank hon. Members on both sides of the Committee for their contributions to this early part of the first day of our deliberations.

Amendment 9 would give the Assembly the power to decide, by resolution, when Assembly elections are held, and would remove the Secretary of State’s powers in relation to varying the date of Assembly elections and proposing a date for extraordinary Assembly elections. Amendment 10 would prevent the Assembly from setting a date for an election on a day on which it knows, or reasonably expects, a parliamentary general election to be held. The amendments would permit the Assembly to determine the date of Assembly elections and consequently the length of its own terms. That reflects a recommendation made by the Welsh Affairs Committee arising from its pre-legislative scrutiny of the draft Wales Bill.

It is worth pointing out that the Silk commission considered the matter of legislative competence for Assembly elections to be outside its terms of reference and made no recommendations in this regard in its second report. Nevertheless, the Government believe that the devolution of further powers to the Assembly should not be undertaken in a piecemeal fashion, and that the issue would best be considered in the wider context of possible changes to the Welsh devolution settlement arising from the recommendations made by the commission in its second report. The Government made clear, on publication of the report, that recommendations requiring primary legislative change should be a matter for the next Parliament and the next Government, and consequently that they should be for political parties to consider in preparing their election manifestos. We believe the same principle should apply when considering whether legislative competence for Assembly elections should be devolved to the Assembly. It is important that electors are clear on how long they are electing Assembly Members for when they vote in the 2016 Assembly election, and that five-year Assembly terms are in place by then to ensure that Westminster and Assembly elections do not coincide in 2020.

The Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 moved this House to a fixed five-year cycle and consequentially provided that the next ordinary general election to the National Assembly for Wales would be moved on a one-off basis by one year from 7 May 2015 to 5 May 2016. This responded to concerns raised by the Assembly that holding general elections to this House and to the Assembly on the same day could lead to the Assembly elections being overshadowed. I am encouraged that Members of all parties seem to be in agreement on the position that we do not want the two elections coinciding. I particularly welcome the Labour party’s support in seeking to minimise the risk of that, which is evident in amendment 10.

Similarly, amendments 30 and 31, tabled by right hon. and hon. Members from Plaid Cymru, are intended to ensure that an ordinary Assembly general election does not take place within six months of a UK general election. I am encouraged that the hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards) has been reassured by the debate so far and by our previous discussions, and that he is not going to press his amendments on that basis.

There is cross-party support for the principle that, as far as possible, we should seek to ensure that ordinary general elections to the Assembly and to this House should not coincide. With the next Assembly election scheduled for 2016, if the Assembly remains on a four-year cycle, the two sets of elections would coincide every 20 years, starting in 2020—something that all parties are clearly keen to avoid. Clause 1 makes it far less likely that Assembly elections and parliamentary elections will coincide in future. I therefore ask Opposition Members to support the clause, to consider the further devolution of powers to the Assembly in the context of preparing their own parties’ manifestos and consequently to withdraw or not press the amendments.

[Owen Smith]

I am grateful to the Minister for acknowledging that our amendments reflect the views of the Welsh Affairs Committee and, indeed, as I said earlier, those of the Welsh Government, and that they were tabled in good faith. I am equally pleased to hear that when it comes to looking at the Silk commission part I report or any legislation that might arise from it or be reflected in the manifestos before the next election, the Government will be open to considering whether the Assembly should be responsible for—or at least have the ability to consent to—when the elections should take place. In the light of the Minister’s remarks, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 1 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 2

Removal of restriction on standing for election for both constituency and electoral region

--- Later in debate ---

The Welsh Government

[Stephen Crabb]

I beg to move, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

[The Temporary Chairman (Mr Christopher Chope)]

With this we may take new clause 5—The National Assembly for Wales—

‘The Government of Wales Act 2006 is amended by adding at the end of section 1 (The Assembly)—

(a) The Assembly may change its name by means of a resolution agreed to by a simple majority;

(b) on the first occasion a resolution under subsection (6)(a) is passed, the expression “National Assembly for Wales” shall be replaced wherever it occurs in the GOWA 2006 by the name contained in that resolution;

(c) on any subsequent occasion, the name contained in a resolution under the terms of subsection (6)(a) shall replace the previous name in the same manner;

(d) unless the context requires otherwise, in any enactment, instrument of other document passed or made before this subsection comes into force any reference to the National Assembly for Wales is to be read as, or as including, a reference to the Assembly as renamed.”.’.

[Stephen Crabb]

Let me begin, Mr Chope, by welcoming you to the Chair. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship.

Following the 2011 Assembly election, the First Minister of Wales announced that the Welsh Assembly Government wished to be known instead as the Welsh Government. That change was made in order to make clearer the respective roles of the Welsh Government and the National Assembly for Wales following the devolution of full law-making powers. Since then, the term “Welsh Government” has increasingly been used by people throughout Wales, and it is now the commonly used term for the Executive. However, “Welsh Government” remains an informal moniker, and “Welsh Assembly Government” is still the formal legal name in statute.

In recognition of the widespread use of “Welsh Government” as the generally accepted term, and following the request from the First Minister, clause 4 provides for the name of the Executive to be changed formally. That will mean that, for the first time, the new title can be used in formal legal documents, in keeping with common parlance. The clause provides that any reference to “Welsh Assembly Government” in existing legislation should be read as a reference to the “Welsh Government”, unless the specific context requires the former name to be used.

As usual, Plaid Cymru Members wish to go even further and have tabled new clause 5, which seeks to devolve to the National Assembly for Wales the power to change its name through a resolution passed by a simple majority. In renaming the Welsh Assembly Government we are simply reflecting what the Executive are now commonly known as. The same is not the case in respect of the National Assembly; people within and outside Wales know the legislature as the “National Assembly” or the “Welsh Assembly”, and I detect no popular clamour in my constituency or any other part of Wales I visit for a change in the name of Wales’s legislature.

[Jonathan Edwards]

Is the Minister aware that the leader of the Conservative party in the National Assembly has made a manifesto pledge to change the name of the Assembly and make it a Parliament?

[Stephen Crabb]

I am aware of all kinds of views from individuals across Wales on what the name of the legislature should or could be. I also recognise that the Silk commission recommended that if the Assembly wishes to change its name to the Welsh Parliament, that should be respected. However in tabling new clause 5 and other amendments Plaid Cymru seems to be doing exactly what it has wrongly accused this Government of doing: cherry-picking the Silk recommendations for implementation through this Bill.

The Secretary of State’s written statement on 3 March made the Government’s view clear: we do not regard this Bill as an appropriate vehicle for implementing Silk II recommendations, that those recommendations requiring primary legislation should be matters for the “next Government and Parliament” and, as such, they are for political parties to consider in preparing their election manifestos. That remains this Government’s approach, so I urge Plaid Cymru Members not to press their new clause to a vote.

[Jonathan Edwards]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Chope.

I rise to speak in favour of new clause 5, which stands in my name and those of my right hon. and hon. Friends. We will not be pushing it to a vote, because we want to save time and to have a discussion on income tax powers, which is what we really want to discuss in detail. However, I say to the Minister that, regardless of his opening remarks, our new clause is in the spirit of clause 4, which he has just presented. I hope the Government will see sense in due course, either in the later stages of the Bill’s progress in this House or in the other place.

New clause 5 would give powers to the National Assembly to change its name to the “National Parliament” or to any other name should it so decide. I stress that the new clause does not call for the institution’s name to be changed in this Bill, but rather that the power to take this decision should be granted to the National Assembly, as proposed in the Silk II recommendations. The Minister was being somewhat mischievous in saying that we were cherry-picking from the Silk recommendations, because our new clause is in line with the Silk II recommendations, in that it is a matter for the National Assembly if it wishes to change the name of the legislature. The new clause would empower it to make that decision rather than having to make a request to the UK Government of the day, as it has done for the name of the Executive.

The new clause would mean that the National Assembly would be able to change its name by means of a resolution agreed by a simple majority. It is gratifying that clause 4 officially changes the name of the Executive to the “Welsh Government”, a title that has been used widely for practical purposes since the 2011 election. There was a Scottish precedent for this change of title in 2007, when the “Scottish Executive” were renamed the “Scottish Government”. There has been broad agreement that the term “Welsh Assembly Government”, which had been in use since 2002, had been confusing and anachronistic after the separation of the Executive and legislative functions of the Assembly in 2007. It also gave rise to the unfortunate acronym WAG—being given the same label as a premiership footballer’s better half has done little for the democracy of our country. I have never used the term since I was elected, instead always using “Welsh Government”, so I was delighted that following the 2011 election the First Minister made the case that the Executive would be known as the “Welsh Government” thereafter. So I fully support clause 4, which makes that name official in legislation.

Now that the National Assembly is able to pass its own laws, it should be called a Parliament. However, I appreciate that others hold a different view, and that in the European tradition, the meeting place of a legislature is generally termed an Assembly. In France, for instance, the national legislature is called the Assemblée Nationale—if my memory of international rugby trips to Paris serves me correctly. Surely it should be a matter for the democratically elected Members of the national legislature of Wales to determine the name of the legislature in which they serve. That is what we are trying to achieve in new clause 5, but I will not press the matter to a vote. I expect there to be greater deliberations on this topic when the Bill reaches the other place.

--- Later in debate ---

[Owen Smith]

I, too, welcome you to the Chair, Mr Chope. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship.

We support clause 4, which renames the Welsh Assembly Government. That is what the Welsh Assembly has long said that it would like to happen and it reflects normal custom and practice across Wales, so we are pleased that the Government have decided to change things and use the term Welsh Government in future.

On new clause 5, we accept that there is a debate to be had about the name. Silk part II refers to the prospect of a Welsh Parliament and it is ironic that the leader of the Conservative party in Wales holds that view. I admire the chutzpah with which the Under-Secretary glossed over that, as it is an irony that the Opposition see clearly. However, this is an area of debate that ought properly to be dealt with in any legislation that reflects Silk part II rather than under this Bill, which properly reflects the preponderance of Silk part I. For that reason, even if the new clause were pressed to a vote, we probably would not support it.

[Stephen Crabb]

I agree very much with the comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper). There are two elements to the debate. The first is about what we call the legislature and the second is about where the decision is taken. As for the first, there is an emerging debate in Wales about what we should call the National Assembly and whether it should have its name changed. The leader of my party’s group in the Assembly has a view that I fully respect. He is an excellent colleague and I am sorry if I gave the impression that I was glossing over his views, but I still maintain the position that the debate is emerging and has not yet engaged with the public consciousness. Until we get to that point, it is probably a debate that will not be resolved.

As for the second part of the debate, the Silk commission referred to the decision on where the decision should be made in part II of its recommendations. We have been clear and consistent all along that decisions about the Silk part II recommendations are not for this Bill but for a future Parliament and a future Government and for the parties to consider in their manifestos. I stand by my earlier remarks and ask the hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards) not to press his new clause to a vote.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 4 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 5 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

New Clause 4

National Assembly to set number of AMs

‘Her Majesty may by Order in Council provide for the transfer of responsibility for setting the number of Assembly Members to the National Assembly for Wales.’.—(Jonathan Edwards.)

Brought up, and read the First time.

Question put, That the clause be read a Second time.