Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

The Minister says that not so charmingly himself, so the favour goes back to him. Under the clause, new subsection (5A) would read:"““As soon as may be after the submission of all four reports under subsection (1) above that are required by subsection (2) above to be submitted before a particular date, the Secretary of State shall lay before Parliament the draft of an Order in Council for giving effect, with or without modifications, to the recommendations contained in them.””" So the Boundary Commission will bring forth its report, there will be no public inquiry and the Minister will then bring forward the boundaries with or without modifications. It is the phrase ““with or without modifications”” that I have difficulty with, and clearly the Select Committee does too. The hon. Lady mentioned that her Committee had to do its business very swiftly. Indeed, I think it had only five days in which to undertake a whole inquiry. That is one reason why I believe the Bill is being taken through with undue haste. A substantial number of amendments have been tabled and will be considered on Monday, but we already know that some of them are inaccurate and will be modified when the Government bring forward territorial statutory instruments in relation to Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland. I very much hope that the Minister will enlighten us as to whether those statutory instruments will be subject to the affirmative or negative procedure. [Interruption.] That is not what will happen on Monday because the measures are not going to be debated next Monday at all, contrary to what the Deputy Leader of the House has just said from a sedentary position. The Government believe that we should retain in present legislation the phrase ““with or without modifications””. That is a pretty broad power.