"I understand that the data leaves the Government with no choice but to enter a national lockdown, but given the huge consequences that that entails, can my right hon. Friend give assurances that the new tools at his disposal, particularly the 15-minute tests, will be sufficiently ubiquitous and effective in …..." Laura Farris - View Speech
"The hon. Gentleman picks up where I was cut off by the time limit in my Second Reading speech, and I could not agree with him more. When I was preparing my Second Reading speech I looked at the Hansard report of the debate from the late 1990s on reform …..." Laura Farris - View Speech
One of the things we heard this morning was that US congressional districts had close to zero margin of deviation around population size, and one of the points that you made was that when people buy a house, or look …..." Laura Farris - View Speech
"Q We heard evidence from Professor Iain McLean this morning, who said that one of the risks of the local ties argument is that, depending on whose hands that argument is in, it can be politicised in a different way, and what the Conservatives, Labour party or Liberal Democrats …..." Laura Farris - View Speech
"Q I want to pick up on the point about wards and to explore your answer. Is there any particular reason why you do not think that wards should be split? An ordinary member of the public in a city often does not know what ward they live in. …..." Laura Farris - View Speech
"Q To pick up on that, thinking particularly of cities, would that not vary from city to city? There is no real reason why one ward would have a distinct identity compared with the ward next door necessarily.
"Q Are you aware of the extent of the dispute between, for example, the Labour and Conservative parties over the last boundary change exercise? Do you know what proportion of constituencies were broadly agreed or not agreed?
"In the 2018 exercise—sorry, I am not familiar with it myself—do you know what proportion there was broad agreement over and what proportion there was not?
Tom Adams: Not off the top of my head. I do not know exactly; I have not studied that in detail recently. As I …..." Laura Farris - View Speech
"Q I will ask a follow-up question and if you cannot answer, that is fine. Do you know how the Boundary Commission resolves a dispute of fact between the Labour party and the Conservative party? I mention those parties because I am talking about the seats in England, but …..." Laura Farris - View Speech
"Q But in the event that there was a dispute between them in a seat that the two parties contested—it is a process question—do you know how the Boundary Commission would approach that?