Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Lord Dodds of Duncairn Excerpts

Monday 1st November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Paul Murphy]

Absolutely to the contrary. The Union is protected because it recognises the different parts within it—whether Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland. Devolution has strengthened the Union, but it will be weakened by these proposals, because the Bill fundamentally goes against the concept of the representation of smaller nations within a United Kingdom.

[Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)]

The right hon. Gentleman served with great distinction as Secretary of State for Northern Ireland as well as Secretary of State for Wales. He makes a valid point. At the times of the Belfast and St Andrews agreements, it was clear that part of the settlement was that there should be no question of any change in the representation of Northern Ireland in the House. That was never raised as an issue, because everyone was agreed and settled on it. That was the basis on which devolution took place.

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[Mark Durkan]

Yes, it could have serious ramifications. I do not need to spell out the names of particular townlands and their hinterlands, but the consequences are obvious, especially for multi-seat constituencies.

In the various amendments that I have tabled, I am not saying that we are seeking inequality for Northern Ireland. The principle of equality of constituencies should exist, particularly in constituencies that have to elect six Members, supposedly on a PR basis. They should be broadly equal, but they should be equal in a Northern Ireland sense.

[Mr Dodds]

On this issue, the hon. Gentleman and I agree about the Bill’s impact on the Northern Ireland Assembly. We might not agree on how we see our future, because my party obviously sees Northern Ireland as part of the United Kingdom. He is absolutely right to mention the Assembly constituency boundaries, however. Those boundaries will be about to change when the election is held in 2019, so anyone standing in those elections will have been representing their constituency for four years, but the boundaries will have been changed for the past three years. That is a completely unacceptable situation.

[Mark Durkan]

The right hon. Gentleman is right to backlight exactly the sort of anomalies that will be created by the Bill. We are meant to be legislating for the whole of the United Kingdom and its constituent parts, so let us not legislate to create anomalies.

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[Mr Howarth]

My hon. Friend put that argument very well indeed and I would struggle to find the words to match what she has just said.

Let me conclude. I genuinely believe that what is proposed by taking away public inquiries as part of the process is that the relationship between constituent, Member of Parliament and constituency, which is already fractured, will split completely. I think we will end up in a situation where constituencies are simply ships of convenience. I hope that that day never comes and that the Government will at some point wake up and realise that this is not the right way to do things.

[Mr Dodds]

I want to speak in support of amendment 209, tabled in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea), as well the consequential amendment 210. It would delete proposed new section 5(2) from clause 12 so that the status quo was maintained and a public inquiry could be held by a boundary commission. As that is the purpose of my amendment, I have no difficulty in lending my support and that of my hon. Friends to amendment 15, proposed by the right hon. Member for Tooting (Sadiq Khan). As regards the other amendments in this group, I am happy to support amendment 194, tabled by the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan). As he said, it is a fall-back provision if the House decides to do away with the option of having local public inquiries in general. At the very least, I agree that there should be such a provision that would cover Northern Ireland as a region because of the particular circumstances that he so ably outlined.

I want to make a few general comments very briefly, then a couple that relate specifically to Northern Ireland. First, we have had a very good debate. Everyone who has spoken in this and the previous one spoke against the Bill and its provisions. I have not heard many speeches in support of it, other than from those on the Government Front Bench. [Interruption.] I am sorry: the hon. Member for Epping Forest (Mrs Laing), who has returned to her place, strongly opposed part 1 of the Bill on the alternative vote, so she is in the category of having opposed the Bill on some matters but, as she made clear, she would go much further than the Bill does on other matters. I got the clear impression that she would be happy to do away with constituencies altogether and have one great list system in which everyone voted in relation to the entire country. She might be happier with such a system, but we shall not rehearse that debate as we have already had exchanges on it.

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[Mr MacNeil]

It strikes me that there is cross-community agreement on local public inquiries as the Northern Ireland fall-back position. Does the right hon. Gentleman hope that if the Government do not listen here, they might listen in the other place?

[Mr Dodds]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. Given the experience of recent days, and the Minister’s references to the time that has been allowed for debate—a couple of hours this afternoon and this evening to debate these very important matters concerning the number of seats and the abolition of the age-old right to have local public inquiries—I am confident that the other place will examine these matters in great detail and will, I hope, bring common sense to bear.

[Paul Murphy]

My right hon. Friend is making an important point. Is he aware that, so far as I know, there is an anomaly that in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales the Boundary Commission inquiries for UK parliamentary constituencies are to be abolished, but remain for the two Assemblies and the Parliament?

[Mr Dodds]

In Northern Ireland, the parliamentary constituency boundaries are the Northern Ireland Assembly boundaries. I know the position is different in Scotland and Wales. That is why, at least for Northern Ireland—and for all the reasons that I and others have outlined this evening, it should be the case for the whole country—I appeal to the Government to think very carefully about the implications for our country of the decision to push ahead with abolition.

[Dr Whitehead]

Almost all of us are aware of the purpose of the abolition of inquiries into boundary changes. It is about expediency, getting the process through as rapidly as possible, and airbrushing out a particularly important part of the process in order to do that.

I do not accept the idea that because boundary commissions have not changed an enormous amount in the past, that is likely to be the case in future. Because of the wholesale changes that are being made in the rest of the Bill, boundary commission public local inquiries will probably be more important in future than was the case in the past.

In the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986, the most recent iteration of the rules for the redistribution of seats, we see, as other hon. Members have mentioned, a balancing arrangement between the idea of equality in representation, between various local considerations, and between representation and decision making. As a result of that relatively balanced mechanism, it is fair to say that the boundary commission process has worked pretty well, without enormous public outcry at its past decisions.

Looking ahead, we find that the Government are removing not only most of the checks and balances that were in the boundary commission arrangement, but the very last check and balance whereby, after that whole process has taken place, the public have an opportunity to question, have their say and find out why those changes are taking place in the way that has been suggested. The idea that that should be replaced with a procedure that is simply not transparent is a complete rejection of all those previous checks and balances, and a rejection of the principles put forward—I am sorry if this sounds ad hominem—by a Minister, the Deputy Leader of the House, for whom I have a great deal of respect, but who would have made exactly the same arguments about public representation, the public’s say and the due process of democracy until one day before the election.

I do not know whether a particular event in Greece, and the electoral practices there, caused the hon. Gentleman to change his mind on the matter, but over the years a large number of Liberal Democrat constituency parties have been active participants in those processes, and he will have to go to them and say, “Actually, you can’t do this any more, because I’ve thrown this out of the window as part of a deal to get something else through.” They will be aghast at what has happened to the principles that they previously put forward.