Parliamentary Constituencies Bill

Debate between David Linden and Alun Cairns

Report stage & 3rd reading & 3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 14th July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Alun Cairns]

I am grateful for the right hon. Member’s intervention. I looked through Hansard to see what the standing of the Labour party on this debate was, and it took a considerable time to find that the predecessor of my hon. Friend the Member for Ynys Môn, Albert Owen—a friend of the right hon Member and a friend of mine—did raise it, but it was quite a long time before that became a debate, so I think the right hon. Member overstates his support of the argument.

We should recognise that not only is Anglesey—Ynys Môn—an island and its own constituency, but it also has its own local authority. When local government boundaries were being considered as part of the Local Government (Wales) Act 1994, the case for Ynys Môn was recognised, creating Ynys Môn as its own authority in its own right, in spite of the challenges of having a smaller population than others. Clearly the responsibility to meet all the obligations of all local authorities would be challenging for such a small community. The 1994 Act recognised the importance of the island’s make-up, which is further recognised in the Bill before us. The amendment that the Minister has accepted recognises that too.

As I mentioned, there is cross-party support for this amendment. I recognise the strong case that my hon. Friend the Member for Ynys Môn has made for its status, and I also recognise that her predecessor, Albert Owen, made a similar case at a late stage of the Bill. The Bill goes to the heart of fairness in representation and will ensure that communities are respected. Accepting and responding to calls from my hon. Friend shows that. I commend the Minister for the way she has responded to the debate and to the case made by my hon. Friend and welcome her acceptance of the amendment.

[David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)]

It is a great pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Alun Cairns). I have to say, I found it quite strange hearing a man whose job in the last Government was to stand up for Wales in the Cabinet give such full-throated support to a Bill that will see Wales lose eight seats. Someone whose job in Cabinet was to be the voice of Wales has just stood up and said that he is quite content to see Wales lose seats, but that is a matter for him.

I rise to speak to new clause 2, which is in my name and those of my hon. and right hon. Friends. I want to start by thanking again all Members with whom I served on the Bill Committee, which I admit I probably took an unhealthy amount of joy and pleasure from. I suspect that I was not the only one—the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Chris Clarkson) had a “Rain Man” effect on some of us quite a few times. It was a meeting of minds for parliamentary geeks and psephologists, and in my view, it did not last long enough. All members of the Committee were thoughtful, engaging and good-natured. In particular, I enjoyed my exchanges with the Minister and the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Cat Smith), who led for the Opposition. Remarkably, this is the first time that all three of us have managed to get out of a boundaries Bill Committee without gaining extra offspring—that said, the Bill has not had Royal Assent yet, so we will not count our chickens.

On Second Reading, I made it clear that the Scottish National party will not oppose the Bill, not because it was in any way perfect—far from it. However, we genuinely welcomed the Government’s U-turn on cutting the number of constituencies from 650 to 600. I was delighted to see clause 5 in the Bill, and I was probably the only Member who spoke to it with such enthusiasm in Committee. I think that some Conservative Members found it quite difficult to speak in support of clause 5, which reversed what they had enshrined in law through the 2011 Act.

I wholeheartedly agree with the Minister that our exit from the European Union means that there will be more legislative work for hon. Members to undertake, and therefore, cutting the number of MPs would be a very silly move, but I will return to that point later.

Before I turn to my concerns about the Bill, I want to welcome the amendment that we passed in Committee in respect of Ynys Môn, which will finally be a protected constituency, joining the Isle of Wight, Orkney and Shetland, and Na h-Eileanan an Iar. Anglesey, on which I have certainly enjoyed a holiday, was first established as a constituency in 1536—probably around the point when the current Leader of the House was colouring in “Erskine May” as an enthusiastic toddler. In all seriousness, there was unanimous support in Committee for the proposal to protect Ynys Môn and I am glad that we achieved at least one change in our deliberations on the Committee Corridor. However, I bitterly regret the fact that the Government did not compromise on more issues because, as I said on Second Reading, the Government might have a majority in this House, but they certainly have no monopoly on wisdom. There are still aspects of this Bill, even as amended, that trouble me deeply, and I will outline them now.

First, there has rightly been much discussion about the controversial issue of automaticity. I was remarking to my friend the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood earlier this week that we do not actually know whether automaticity is a word, but it was certainly coined and used over and over again in Committee. We heard lots of evidence on both sides of the argument concerning Parliament’s role in having oversight of the Boundary Commission’s recommendations. While many of the points made by witnesses and Government members of the Committee were thoughtful and sincere, I am still not persuaded of the merits of this provision. We were repeatedly told during the Brexit process that Parliament is taking back control and that Parliament is sovereign. In my view, this move does exactly the opposite, with Parliament ceding its role of parliamentary oversight. Clause 2 of the Bill would enshrine this blatant power grab in statute, and therefore my party will support amendment 1 if my friend the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood chooses to divide the House.

Secondly, I am in favour of Labour’s new clause 1, which deals with the electoral quota. The Scottish National party supports a wider tolerance and we feel that moving to 7.5% is a reasonable compromise that would give boundary commissioners more flexibility in drawing up more manageable constituencies, which would be welcome. Certainly, the evidence we heard in Committee is that they are looking for as much flexibility as possible, and I think that it is incumbent upon us to respond to that. If my pal from Lancaster and Fleetwood puts new clause 1 to the vote, we will support Labour on that as well.

Thirdly—this is the nub of the matter for me—the Bill is absolutely rotten for the devolved nations, which is why I and my hon. Friend the Member for Ceredigion (Ben Lake) have tabled new clause 2, which we will seek to divide the House on. I want to outline to hon. Members precisely why we have chosen to focus on new clause 2 on Report and why I feel so passionately about this, but, more importantly, why I believe that others should too.

As I made clear on Second Reading and in Committee, bluntly, I do not want to see any Scottish seats in this House. Constitutionally, I do not want Scotland to be a part of the United Kingdom at all, because Scotland is a nation, and nations are best served when they govern themselves. However, I am a democrat and I accept that until the people of Scotland vote by a majority for independence in a referendum, we must continue to participate with diligence in the proceedings of this House and give Scotland a strong voice in accordance with the mandate delivered by our constituents, regardless of which party we represent.

As I have said repeatedly, Scotland’s current representation in this House, and indeed that of Wales, must not be diminished or reduced in any boundary reform. However, the reality of the Bill is that Scotland will lose three seats and Wales will lose eight. That is far from the Westminster respect agenda that people in Scotland were promised in the wake of our 2014 referendum result. Indeed, it is a democratic outrage and it is not one that we will stand for.

It is not just nationalists in this House who should be concerned about diminished representation in the House of Commons for the devolved nations. Surely every Union flag-waving, “Rule Britannia” singing Member in the Scottish Conservatives should be able to see that Scotland’s voice being diminished in Westminster is bad for the harmony and integrity of their precious, precious Union. What we see in the Bill is a blatant power grab of seats from the devolved nations, with them being given directly to England—[Interruption.] The right hon. Member for Vale of Glamorgan seems to suggest that he is unhappy about that. He can challenge it if he wants to, but that is the reality in the Bill. It is a power grab of seats from the devolved nations—the devolved nations that he was meant to stand up for in Cabinet. They are being taken away from countries such as Wales and given to England. That is a fact, and if he cannot stand up and refute that, I am afraid that it is on the record.