Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

I will be brief, as other Members want to contribute. The speeches this evening and other speeches in Committee and on Report have shown that this is a highly politicised issue and a highly politicised debate. When we debate changes to the voting system, major constitutional change and changes that affect the boundaries of constituencies, an attempt is usually made at least to reach some cross-party consensus. It is sometimes done through the procedure of a Speaker's convention, for example. Given the rhetoric of the Government parties before the election, one would also have hoped for some pre-legislative scrutiny and the proper involvement of the parties representing all regions and areas of the United Kingdom. Instead, a Bill has been cobbled together, and elements of it have received no mandate—and no mandate has even been sought in respect of them. As a result, we are in this divisive situation, in which the Government are ramming the Bill through without agreement and without consensus. That is no way to deliberate and it provides no basis for making decisions on the future composition of this House—or indeed for deciding how people should vote for Members of this House in the future. Despite what the Deputy Prime Minister has said and despite what other Ministers—they have struggled manfully to deal with these issues—have done, it is clear that a lot of the opposition to the Bill has come from Conservative Members behind the Government Front Bench, not just from Opposition Members. From a Northern Ireland perspective, I have to say that the respect agenda that has been much talked about has not been much in evidence on this issue. Eloquent words on Wales and Scotland have already been spoken, but as far as Northern Ireland is concerned, the alteration of the Northern Ireland parliamentary boundaries has a direct impact on the Northern Ireland Assembly boundaries—they are one and the same. Those changes will happen every five years. The Deputy Prime Minister seemed to suggest that they will not happen, but given that there will be a boundary revision every five years, and given the changes in registration and the number of votes allocated to different countries and regions, it is inevitable that there will be changes in the boundaries. That will have a direct impact on the make-up of the Northern Ireland Assembly, which has multi-Member constituencies. We have all gone through an long period during which we tried to reach a political settlement in Northern Ireland. Thankfully, we have made enormous progress. We have a reasonably, or relatively, stable political set-up, although of course challenges and difficulties remain. However, we risk upsetting that political equilibrium—that consensus—with this measure, which, as I have said, will have a direct impact on the Northern Ireland Assembly. Moreover, all this has happened without any prior consultation with the parties or the Executive in Northern Ireland. I believe, and any objective observer would believe, that that consultation should have taken place.