Private Members’ Bills: Money Resolutions Debate
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Vicky Ford
Main Page: Vicky Ford (Conservative - Chelmsford)Department Debates - View all Vicky Ford's debates with the Leader of the House
(6 years, 5 months ago)
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Afzal Khan
If the hon. Gentleman will wait, I will cover that point.
That outcome cannot be dictated by party politics, yet from the beginning the Government have sought to use boundary changes to gerrymander the political map in their party’s favour. The Conservatives stand to win a greater proportion of the seats in a smaller Parliament.
Afzal Khan
Let me make some progress; I will give way again later.
The Conservatives stand to benefit from disenfranchising the 2 million people who have registered to vote since 2015, some 700,000 of whom are young people under 30. The power of the Executive will be enhanced by cutting the number of MPs without reducing the number of Ministers.
Political parties are important, but partisanship is fracturing our democracy. We can all agree that a boundary review is long overdue. My Bill is a serious attempt to come to a cross-party consensus to find a way forward that is workable and that has the support of the House. The proposals should be debated and scrutinised in Committee, not decided in the back rooms of Government offices.
Andrea Leadsom
I cannot really understand why the right hon. Gentleman wants to support a Bill if he thinks the money will never be spent to enact it. That would be a ludicrous situation.
Vicky Ford
Does my right hon. Friend agree that this is not only a significant amount of money but that it creates great uncertainty for the current boundary commissions process, so if the Bill were passed, it would be hugely destabilising for the boundary review and, far from making a better situation, would kick the entire issue into the long grass yet again?
Andrea Leadsom
My hon. Friend makes an important point. We need to complete and finalise this boundary review before undertaking any thoughts of a further one such as that proposed by this private Member’s Bill.