My Lords, these amendments are about equity and fairness—or, rather, inequity and unfairness.
I represented the people of Blaby—now South Leicestershire—for 23 years and I can tell those who have never been Members of the House of Commons that representing a constituency is a real privilege. Polling revealed that some 25% of people in each constituency know who their MP is. I was thrilled to be told that local polling said that nearly 50% of the people of Blaby knew who I was. Whether that was true, I cannot say; perhaps it was because they wanted to vote against me. However, I promise noble Lords that most people in this country are not bothered about who their constituency MP is. They are bothered about his or her politics and they want to know who that person is when they want some assistance: that is the truth. When my constituency lost a few wards, people said, “I’m sorry you’re no longer our MP”, and
while they may have been sorry on a personal level, frankly, they could not care very much. I agree with my noble friend Lord Blencathra: every Boundary Commission review is plagued with party-political manoeuvring. I am afraid that I see that slightly in these amendments too, although they do not always work quite as well as they might.
Consistency in politics is a great thing, as it is in life. Of course, one can change one’s mind—circumstances change as a country evolves—but generally we should stick to what we say, say what we believe and believe what we say. We are discussing the electorate per constituency. I had meant to table an amendment to Clause 5, but with great efficiency I did not realise that it had to be done so swiftly, so I did not get it down, but I will speak on the percentages instead.
I stick with the Conservative manifesto upon which I was elected in 2010, which wanted to reduce the size of the House of Commons to 600 MPs. There was no party-political advantage in that, as far as I am aware. It was also in the Conservative manifestos of 2015 and 2017. I would love to know why it changed; perhaps the Minister can tell me. On 6 September 2010, when introducing the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill, the Deputy Prime Minister pointed out that the percentage difference—which we are discussing—between Manchester Central and Glasgow North was 41%. In fact, that has got a lot worse. Glasgow North has remained approximately the same, but I looked it up today and Manchester Central has gone up by about 5,000, so it is probably about 45%. The discrepancy has grown, and that cannot be right. On this occasion, I agree with Nick.
5.30 pm
Mr Clegg said:
“We settled on 600 MPs, a relatively modest cut in House numbers of just less than 8%, because it saves money … and because we think it creates a House that is sufficiently large to hold the Government to account while enabling us all to do our jobs of representing our constituencies. It also creates a sensible average number of constituents—76,000, as I mentioned earlier—that we already know is manageable … That is why we feel 600 is about right.”—[Official Report, Commons, 6/9/10; col. 39.]
We are now talking about 76,000 as an average. I do not quite see why that has change either, because in the 2010 manifesto, of course, the Liberal Democrats, called for 500 MPs elected by PR—and that is why it was called the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill—and on page 88 they said:
“We will … reduce the number of MPs by 150”
to 500. What has changed there? There are too many Peers, I think we all agree with that, and perhaps we will all volunteer to go out the door today. There are too many Members of the House of Commons as well. Perhaps we could look at starting with a bit of a change: reducing the numbers in the House of Commons and the numbers in the House of Lords as well.