Scottish Parliament (Elections etc.) Order 2010

I thank the noble Lord for giving way. Before he moves too far away from the issue of defective drafting, perhaps I may raise a point with him. As he knows, I lived through part of this process in government because I became Secretary of State after the 2007 election and received the Gould recommendations and the Electoral Commission report. I accept entirely what the Minister says about the errors having little, if any, effect. My concern is that, to others, such errors may appear to show a consistent inaccuracy in the machinery for dealing with these issues. The Minister will not be able to check this now, but I refer him to the observations of his right honourable friend Mr Alistair Carmichael, who was the shadow Secretary of State for Scotland when I reported to Parliament on the report. Mr Carmichael suggested that history revealed that the electoral machinery that was servicing elections in Scotland was not fit for purpose. I am concerned that dismissing these errors in this way does not draw Ministers' attention to what may be a fundamental systemic problem in the machinery that is in danger of repeating the previous problem.