Category: Parliament

Shaun Bailey – 2020 Speech on the Parliamentary Constituencies Bill

Below is the text of the speech made by Shaun Bailey, the Conservative MP for West Bromwich West, in the House of Commons on 2 June 2020.

I start by echoing a point that the hon. Member for Glasgow East (David Linden) made about today’s proceedings and pay tribute to the House and parliamentary staff who ensured that we were able to do what we have done today. Whatever our views, they have done a fantastic job in ensuring that while we are back here, we can participate as we need to.

Equal-sized constituencies with one Member, one vote and all Members being equal has been a core tenet of our democracy for nearly 200 years. I am proud of the fact that the communities I represent were at the heart of that battle 200 years ago to ensure that every individual had their voice heard, no matter where they came from, how much money they had in their wallet or how much property they owned. The likes of the chartist council at Princes End, the chartist council in Wednesbury, John Wilkes from Tipton Green, Richard Cooper from Princes End, George Browning from Wednesbury, and later Black Country suffragettes such as Hilda Burkett and Emma Sproson led the fight to ensure that a working-class lad from a council house, who was told that he would amount to nothing, can stand here today in this Parliament and represent those people’s descendants.

I want to ensure that that chartist and suffragette legacy is carried on. I am proud of the fact that in my constituency, community groups such as the WMA community centre in Tipton Green and Q3 Academy in Tipton ensure that our young people can continue to access democracy. I believe that the Bill honours that tradition. If we look at what it tries to resolve, we need to ask ourselves some fundamental questions.

Is it right that in town A, half as many people can vote for an MP as those in next-door town B? Is it right that the difference between the 20 smallest and the 20 largest constituencies in this country is 675,000, which I believe, looking at my right hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke), is about the size of the city of Leeds. Is it right that 27 million people are reportedly being under-represented because they live in constituencies where they are above the average threshold?

I am slightly confused by the Opposition’s position on this matter. My hon. Friends have touched on the history of the Labour party in trying to block this levelling up of our electoral system. The Minister mentioned the 1969 Labour Government’s attempt to block the independent boundary review, and in 1982 Labour tried to take things to the courts but failed. The hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) is not in his place, but he made the good point that common sense needs to be applied to this at all times. I totally agree on that, but I wish to address some of the comments the Labour party has made. For example, Labour Members say that this Bill is an Executive power grab, but the basis of this is an independent, judicial-led Boundary Commission; this is taken out of the power of the Executive and given to an independent body. In addition, this is primary legislation and Parliament can of course amend or abolish it at any time. It is a basic principle of our parliamentary democracy that we, as Members, can do that if we need to, so I must disagree with the Labour party on that point.

I am conscious of the time and I wish to allow colleagues to speak, so I will just make the point that the last time the boundaries in my constituency were amended I was five years old. A lot has changed since then. Many of us have changed, with some probably changing more than others. It is time that we get this done. I say to right hon. and hon. Members from across this Chamber that if we truly believe that everyone’s vote is equal and we truly believe in ensuring that our democracy continues to grow and thrive, we must pass this legislation.

June 3, 2020
Cat Smith – 2020 Speech on the Parliamentary Constituencies Bill

Below is the text of the speech made by Cat Smith, the Shadow Minister of State for the Cabinet Office, in the House of Commons on 2 June 2020.

I beg to move an amendment, to leave out from “That” to the end of the Question and add:

“this House whilst supporting the retention of 650 parliamentary constituencies declines to give a Second Reading to the Parliamentary Constituencies Bill because the Bill would disproportionately and undemocratically concentrate power over constituency sizes and boundaries in the hands of the executive, because the Bill fails to create a more flexible electoral quota allowing greater consideration to be given to local ties and community connections when drawing constituency boundaries, and because the proposed numeration date for the boundary review of 1 December 2020 risks boundaries being based on an incomplete register owing to the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on the preparation of electoral registers.”

Every single one of us in the House today represents a constituency that has been drawn up based on the electorate data of nearly two decades ago. Twenty years ago, our country and our communities looked very different. Some of our communities have grown and others have seen population decline. Indeed, in that time, 2 million more electors have come on to the electoral roll and it is time we counted them when it comes to the constituencies we represent.

We hope that the review can be completed before the next general election and that there will be no further delay. After two shelved boundary reviews, the public will not want more taxpayers’ money to be wasted on a review that does not see the light of day. We need a boundary review, and the Opposition stand ready to work with the Government on that if it is fair and the rules are not inserted or omitted on the basis of any perceived political advantage for any party.

The Bill must proceed with the aim of delivering a fair and democratic review. We want the new boundaries to reflect the country as it is today and ensure that all communities get fair representation. Those boundaries must also take into consideration local ties and identities.

I welcome the Government’s decision to reverse their previous position of reducing the number of MPs to 600. As we have left the European Union and the work of the UK’s 73 MEPs falls to this House, it would have piled a heavier workload on to fewer shoulders. More importantly, it would have handed further power to the Executive, because reducing the number of MPs while refusing to cut the size of the Government payroll would create a dangerous level of Executive dominance at the expense of Parliament and our democracy.

Welcoming the return to proposing 650 MPs brings me to the last two wasted reviews on the 600 figure. With two abandoned reviews, we are in a farcical situation with boundaries. While Tory Ministers argued with their Back Benchers, public resources flooded down the drain. Millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money has been wasted. The unfinished 2013 review cost British taxpayers £7 million. It wasted the time and expertise of the boundary commissioners in working towards a target that was destined to be scrapped, and the 2018 review was equally wasteful. In a written question, the Government estimated the cost at £8 million. The Government have not provided a recent figure on that, but I have given the Minister the opportunity to do so by tabling a written parliamentary question asking just that.

However, one of the biggest concerns that the Opposition has about the Bill is the Government’s decision to end parliamentary oversight of the process. It is yet another attempt to diminish scrutiny over executive power. Parliamentary oversight is fundamental to the democratic passing of a Bill, and this Bill is no different. The Minister says that it is to stop MPs blocking new boundaries, but in the last Parliament it was her Government who never tabled that review for a vote, so we will never know the outcome of a vote that never took place.

The process of needing MPs to vote for the final report from the commission is an important safety net, because without it we would now have just 600 MPs here today. When the Government wanted to go back to 650, it was that safety net that allowed them to do so and make that happen, but removing parliamentary scrutiny is worrying for the future integrity of our democracy. This loophole allows a power grab, with no parliamentary backstop to limit the dominance of the Executive. The Government have not shown any regard for the primacy of Parliament. Indeed, the unlawful prorogation of Parliament is a case in point.

I note the remarks that the Minister made about the enumeration date in the Bill of December 2020. I am glad that she is looking at this, and I look forward to her update to the House, because after 20 years of delay, the boundaries must reflect the electorate with the best possible accuracy. I urge her to consider ditching the 1 December 2020 register in light of the unprecedented covid-19 crisis that we are currently living through. Our councils are working flat out to support our communities at the present time, and to ask them to undertake an annual canvass at a time of social distancing when they have stretched capacity risks that register being patchy at best. So I welcome the Minister’s remarks and put on record my thanks for the hard work that all our councils are doing in supporting some of our most vulnerable residents at this time.

Lloyd Russell-Moyle

Does my hon. Friend agree that there may be a case to always link the register to the last general election? We know that that is a credible register. Other crises might come up in the future, and the Government will always have to be changing, whereas if the register is always based on the last election we will know that it is based on a mandate that people have exercised.

Cat Smith

I thank my hon. Friend for that very sensible point. What he notes, of course, is that we see a spike in voter registration when we have a general or a local election. Of course, this year there are no elections because of the coronavirus crisis, but just six months ago we had a general election in this country and we know that the December 2019 register is incredibly accurate because we saw a spike in voter registration.

We are also aware that electoral registration officers are already expressing concern about the impacts that coronavirus will have on the December 2020 registers, and the prevailing opinion is that the annual canvass is likely to be impacted in some significant way. I urge the Minister to favour using the very recent general election data of December 2019. The Office for National Statistics released that data just last week, and we saw more than 1 million people register between December 2018 and December 2019, indicating that the December 2019 register is much more accurate than the December 2020 register will potentially be.

The fact that the data was published last week demonstrates the lag in collating that data. So if, for example, the Government were to continue to use the December 2020 register, commissioners would probably be waiting until May 2021 before they had collected that data from EROs and could get on with their work. Let us help the boundary commissioners begin their important work as soon as possible by using the data published last week, which we already have, relating to December 2019 and the general election.

Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)

Does the hon. Member accept that one of the key issues is to ensure that the electoral officers are properly sourced, supplied and located across the various constituencies? One of the problems in the last election was that because there had been a refurbishment and, indeed, a reduction in the number of election officers, there were errors in sending out people’s polling cards and some people did not know who in their household could vote. Does she agree that this is a good opportunity to ensure that electoral officers are properly supplied and in the right locations?

Cat Smith

I thank the hon. Member for giving me the opportunity to put on record my concerns about the overstretched nature of electoral returning officers in our councils right across the country. Cuts to local government have not protected electoral returning officers and the resources that they are working with.

Turning to the issue of the electoral quota, I know that Members across the House will want to highlight their concerns about the impact of this boundary review on communities in their constituencies. Community has never been stronger than during these troubling months. Right across the country, we are seeing communities come together to support vulnerable people, and now more than ever, community connections must be valued and respected. However, the restrictive 5% quota tolerance in the Bill flies in the face of protecting community ties. I know that many of my Welsh colleagues are planning to speak this afternoon, and they will highlight some of the geographical challenges the quota throws up—by which I mean mountains dividing constituencies. In Devon and Cornwall, the Government have repeatedly ignored the historic and proud identities of those counties. Boundaries based on strict numbers that ignore identities do not carry community support, as we have seen with the so-called Devonwall seats in the last review. Will the Minister ensure that there is no Devonwall seat in this Bill? I suspect that Cornish MPs might want to table an amendment to protect Cornish identity. If they were to do so, would the Minister back them?

As the Minister knows, there is consensus among respected experts such as Ron Johnston, David Rosser and Charles Pattie, who agree that the 5% rule causes significant disruption to community boundaries. Indeed, they concluded that the substantial disruption on the map of constituencies in the aborted sixth review was not entirely the result of the reduction of the number of MPs from 650 to 600; their report showed in detail that disruption was caused by the introduction of the uniform national quota and the 5% tolerance. I commend to the Minister the private Member’s Bill introduced by the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone), which suggests a 7.5% quota. Communities across the UK will be more representative if a wider quota is introduced. Why is the Minister refusing to accept the evidence and introduce a quota that would be better for everyone?

John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con)

Is this not an example of the prayer of St Augustine—grant me chastity and continence, but just not yet? If we are going to do this, let us do it right and let us do it now. The hon. Lady is making an argument for perpetuating inequity.

Cat Smith

I completely dispute the hon. Member’s argument; that is absolutely not the case. I am very keen that the Government should be able to get on with this boundary review. I want new boundaries to be in place ahead of the next general election, because at the moment we stand in this House representing constituencies based on data that is two decades old. We should absolutely move on from the status quo, but I am saying that we should ask for a quota of 7.5%, because we could then keep community ties together and represent constituencies that actually look like the communities we stand here and claim to represent.

Alec Shelbrooke

The hon. Lady has come on to the 5%, rather than moving on from that, but the OSCE standard around the world states that there should be a variance of no more than 10% from constituency to constituency if there is to be a fair election. Would the hon. Lady like to develop her argument in relation to that international standard?

Cat Smith

The Opposition recognise the need for constituencies to be broadly as equal as possible, but anyone who stands up in this House and says that they truly believe that all constituencies should be equal should look at the data from December 2019. If we were to take that data on how the electorate looked and say that every constituency had to be exactly equal, every constituency would have to have an electorate of 72,613. Not 72,614 or 72,612—those figures would be outside the quota. There will always need to be a variance, and it is a question of striking a balance between having constituencies that are broadly equal and constituencies that represent their community ties.

Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con)

The amendment does not mention 7.5%. If that is Labour party policy, would it not lead to a situation where there could be two constituencies side by side with a 15% difference in their numbers, thereby totally undermining the argument that every vote should have equal weight?

Cat Smith

The 7.5% I drew attention to is in the private Member’s Bill promoted by the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone), so if the hon. Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson) wants to know where the figure comes from, I suggest he speaks to his hon. Friend.

I am conscious that you want to get all Back Benchers into this debate, Madam Deputy Speaker. There are many aspects of the Bill that make sense and that we welcome—for example, giving the boundary commissioners more flexibility to use local government and ward boundaries that are yet to come into force. We also welcome the move to hold reviews every eight years. The longer cycle will limit the disruption caused to parliamentary constituencies, potentially resulting in savings, but ensuring that MPs remain accountable to their constituents, so that we are not elected to this place and our constituents are never given a chance to hold us to account in a further election.

I look forward to hearing the contributions from all Members to this important debate. It is time for a democratic boundary review, and the Labour party will not stand in the way of that. However, the Bill must not strengthen the power of the Executive at the expense of Parliament. I hope the Minister will consider changing the numeration date, given the extraordinary circumstances of covid-19.

June 2, 2020
Chloe Smith – 2020 Statement on the Parliamentary Constituencies Bill

Below is the text of the statement made by Chloe Smith, the Minister of State at the Cabinet Office, on 2 June 2020.

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

It is a great pleasure to open this debate. The purpose of the Bill is straightforward: to meet the Government’s manifesto pledge of delivering updated and equal parliamentary boundaries, making sure that every vote counts the same. We will do so on the basis of 650 constituencies.

The principal legislative framework set out in the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986 remains in place. The Bill makes a small number of amendments to that in order to move us forward with some aspects of the timing and the process of future boundary reviews and, as I said, returning the number of constituencies to 650.

Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)

There is a fundamental flaw, which the Minister brought out for us in her very first paragraph. I think Ministers think that by trying to rejig the constituencies they will make every vote count equally. That is not true. The only way we can do that is by having a proportional electoral system. We could make every person count equally if we counted our boundaries not by the number of registered voters in a constituency but by the number of people, which is what every other country in the world does.

Chloe Smith

A huge chunk of what the hon. Gentleman proposes is out of the scope of the Bill, but in terms of what is in scope, I hope therefore that he will reject the Labour party’s amendment, which goes against equalising the size of constituencies by arguing against the tolerance quota. I am sure he will consider that as he comes to vote tonight.

Let me pre-empt a question that might legitimately be asked: why are we doing this now, given the other challenges that are presented by the coronavirus? Of course, we absolutely rely on the electors of the UK to cast their vote and choose the Government of the day, and fundamental to that is the idea that each vote carries the same weight. We can achieve those equal votes only through a robust system of boundary reviews. They should be regular, thorough and impartial, and it is those reviews that provide us with updated and equal constituencies.

The last implemented update of Westminster constituencies was based on electoral data from the very early 2000s. That means that our current constituencies take no account of our youngest voters, and nor do they reflect nearly two decades of demographic shift, house building and migration. That cannot be right. The purpose of the Bill is to update those rules. It needs to do that so that the next review, which is due to start in early 2021, can proceed promptly and deliver, with some certainty, the updated and equal constituencies that the electorate deserves.

I will run through the main elements of the Bill. With your permission, Madam Deputy Speaker, let me say at the outset that in doing this I have engaged extensively with interested parties, including representatives of the parliamentary parties and electoral administrators, to ensure that these proposals are as good as they can be.

As I mentioned at the start, the Bill will amend the existing legislation to ensure that we continue to have 650 parliamentary constituencies in the UK, as we do now. In order to achieve that, the Bill brings to a close the 2018 boundary review, without implementation. It removes the Government’s obligation to bring those recommendations of the 2018 review into effect, because those proposals would take us down to 600 constituencies.

This is a change of policy from that adopted under the coalition Government. We have listened to views expressed across the House, including that of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee, and I am pleased that Opposition Members have stated their support for retaining 650 constituencies. We believe that the decision to move to 600 seats is no longer the right choice for the British public because circumstances have changed. In the past decade, the population has grown and we have, of course, left the European Union, which means that significant areas of policy and law making are coming back to all the legislatures of the Union, including the UK Parliament.

David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)

Although I welcome this damascene conversion to having 650 seats, the Minister will recall that it was not that long ago in the Committee of the Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill 2017-19—which was sponsored by the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Afzal Khan)—that she denied that argument about powers coming back from Brussels. What has changed?

Chloe Smith

It is only a shame that we are not spending yet more time in that particular Bill Committee. I have particularly regretted the hours not spent in the company of the hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Afzal Khan), who is sadly not in his place; we could have continued those most enjoyable conversations. In any case, a conversion on the road somewhere near Damascus is better than none, and it is right that we maintain that 650 constituencies. This will ensure effective representation for a growing population in the new era of self-government.

Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)

The Minister will know that there are 1.2 million extra people on the registers across all four nations of the United Kingdom since they were done for the last boundary review; that is really good news. Given that huge increase, will she consider using the December 2019 date for the register, rather than a date in 2020, which would see the number drop because we are not able to run the canvasses across the country?

Chloe Smith

That is a really important point and a good argument. I will come to that shortly because it is, quite rightly, at the forefront of all our minds.

Let me first deal with the other two arguments that are put forward in Labour’s reasoned amendment. It is a little disappointing to see those arguments, because all political parties really ought to be able to get behind the Bill. It is the right thing to do and it is disappointing to see an attempt to block it, because we need to have equal and updated boundaries.

In Labour’s 2019 manifesto, the party pledged to

“respond objectively to future, independent boundary reviews.”

The first two points in the amendment do not live up to that. The first says that the Bill concentrates power in the hands of the Executive. That is not true; the Opposition are wrong and I will go on to explain why. As I said in response to the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), who has left his place, the second point in the amendment argues for less equal seats, and I cannot believe that there is a political party in this House that does not wish to see itself as following in the footsteps of the Chartists, seeking equal representation across the land.

I do not know how the Labour party does want to see itself, but it ought to reflect on what it said when it was last in government, as it agreed with the then Committee on Standards in Public Life that there was inequality of electoral quotas, which would erode equal representation. Labour did not change that, and it came to the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats in government later to put that right, bringing in the quota of plus or minus 5%. It is that which we maintain today in this legislation, and it is that which provides more equal seats and ought to be supported.

Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)

I agree broadly with the hon. Lady that equal representation between seats is really important, but we all know that from time to time different numbers of people register in different constituencies. When the first major boundary review took place in 1911, the boundaries were based on population census data and not on the whims of who had registered that year or not. Is there not a case now to go to that data, and then 5% possibly could be perfectly agreeable?

Chloe Smith

I understand the argument on census data, and I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for putting it, but I do not think it is the right thing to do. I am very happy to explain why, notwithstanding the perhaps obvious point that censuses are only every 10 years—they are on a different frequency to even the amended cycle we have here in front of us—so straightaway they are not suitable because of a different rhythm. There is an important point that we ought to recognise, which is that in a census a different group of people are counted. For example, censuses, naturally, count people who are not citizens and electoral registration must count those who are eligible to vote. That is an important distinction and I think it is right that we use electoral registers as the basis of the data. Another point on which we must all agree—I am confident that he does—is that we all ought to encourage everybody to be registered to vote, because that is the core answer to his point.

Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)

When somebody from my constituency seeks my assistance, I will represent them whether they are a citizen or not and whether they are on the electoral register or not. My hon. Friend the Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle) makes a fair point. We represent everyone in our constituencies and surely the electoral register should be based on that number.

Chloe Smith

And so do I. And so does every single Member of Parliament in this House if they are working hard for their constituents. I wonder whether the hon. Gentleman mangled his words at the end of his sentence or if he is making a different point, which is that the electoral register ought to be based on everybody whom he helps in his constituency. That could not be so, because that would, for example, put people who are not citizens of this country on the electoral register so I do not think that that is a good argument.

Let me turn to the other key changes in the Bill. It will introduce a longer boundary review cycle, with reviews taking place every eight years. We think an eight-year cycle will provide for the regular updating of constituencies, but without the disruption of constant change. The Bill will slightly shorten the timetable of the next boundary review by three months to two years and seven months. That is a one-off change which gives us the best chance of updated boundaries being in place ahead of the next general election, recognising that political parties, electoral administrators, electors and candidates need to know those boundaries in good time.

Alec Shelbrooke (Elmet and Rothwell) (Con)

Can my hon. Friend just clarify the eight-year cycle? My concern is that with five-year Parliaments we will eventually end up with boundaries coming into effect a couple of months before an election and we will be unable to get the legal parts in place.

Chloe Smith

Yes, I am happy to do that. I think there are two points to that clarification. First, we calculate broadly that an eight-year cycle would give us a likelihood of two elections under one set of boundaries and then a third election on a changed set. It is that I to which referred when I said it gives a balance between change and continuity. It is important for constituents to know who their MP is and to do as they wish to do, which is to hold us all to account. Secondly, we operate very carefully to the Gould principle, which states that we should not make changes to electoral matters less than six months before the relevant election. That is a point of practicality. It is a pragmatic thing. It is something I always have in mind when working on elections with those behind the scenes as the Minister with responsibility for election policy. I can give my hon. Friend and the House an assurance that we want the principle to be in place here. There should always be a clear six months between changes to how elections are run and the running of elections.

Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)

Whenever the constituencies are altered, as they could well be, can the Minister give the House an assurance that constituencies will not change without the input of constituency associations, MPs and communities?

Chloe Smith

Yes, I certainly can, very straightforwardly. The public consultation elements of the legislation stay in place. We think that is very, very important, so that everybody the hon. Gentleman lists has that chance. There is ample public consultation where they will be able to put their views and help to get the right results for communities, which I think is very important.

Fay Jones (Brecon and Radnorshire) (Con)

I know this Bill is very much in its infancy and there is a long way ahead, but as I represent the largest geographical constituency in England and Wales, it would be remiss of me not to point out that we need to consider the needs of rural communities. Our needs are stretched and our needs are different, so I urge the Minister to work closely with rural communities as we design this Bill.

Chloe Smith

I thank my hon. Friend for that point. As she rightly says, there are aspects of community that really come out when we are thinking of rural seats, just as they do in respect of urban and suburban seats. I know that all such arguments will be brought out to the Boundary Commissions as they undertake their work after this legislation passes. I can also reassure her that a specific point in the factors the Boundary Commissions have to use deals with particularly large constituencies, and that one remains the same. She may have it mind, although I do not think her neck of the woods gets quite to that size, but she will know the one I am referring to.

Let me return to the things the Bill changes. It will improve the timings of the public hearings that form part of that extensive consultation process I was just referring to. The hearings will be moved to a little later in the boundary review timetable so that they can targeted to areas where interest is greatest. That often becomes clear only as a review gets going. The Bill will also improve the way the Boundary Commissions have to consider local government boundaries. They are one factor the commissions may take account of when they develop their proposals. Currently, they may consider only those local boundaries that have been implemented at a local council election prior to the start of a review. The Bill lets the Boundary Commissions take into account not only the local boundaries that exist at the beginning of the review, but prospective boundaries—ones that have been formalised in legislation but not yet used in an election. That measure will help to keep constituency boundaries better aligned with local government boundaries, for example, by taking into account forthcoming amendments to council wards in London, Wales, Wiltshire and Cornwall, should the orders for those areas be made by the time of the review.

Andrew Rosindell (Romford) (Con)

In London, a lot of boundary changes are taking place in my borough of Havering, but the pandemic has meant that they have been delayed—the decision has been delayed from December until early next year. Will the Minister confirm that that will not preclude us from using the new boundaries when we look at the constituency boundaries under this review?

Chloe Smith

Yes, I can confirm exactly that. My hon. Friend illustrates the point I have just made; the intention of that improvement is indeed to allow prospective local government boundaries to be taken into account.

Lloyd Russell-Moyle

On local boundaries, in Brighton our average ward size is 10,000 whereas in Birmingham some of the ward sizes go up to 20,000. The difficulty of having only a 5% variance is that inevitably in urban areas we will have seats that are cut, confusion for the electorate and MPs often having to cover three council areas. Is there not a case for allowing the Boundary Commission at least to weigh up these things on an equal standing, rather than requiring them always to be subordinate to the numbers and not to the community?

Chloe Smith

I think the hon. Gentleman will find that that remains in the legislation that is already in place. I was going to come on to that in just a moment, giving the list of factors that must be taken into account, but I can assure him he will find what he asks for in that list.

Alec Shelbrooke

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way. I will listen to what she says next, and I will come on to this in my speech, but I just want to get her view on it. What is the reasoning behind trying to keep the boundaries within one local authority? My constituents, for example, have no idea what the boundaries of my constituency are and whether they are within the boundaries of North Yorkshire County Council, West Yorkshire or Leeds City Council. I want to probe her on why she thinks it is important to stay within local authority boundaries.

Chloe Smith

That is not exactly what I have said. What I will make clear in just a second is that there is a list of factors that the boundary commissions must have regard to in the determination. I am not saying that any one of those factors is better than the others, and neither are the boundary commissions. There is a list of factors set out in the existing legislation dating from the 1980s, and we are simply saying that we leave that as it is. He will find the answer to his concern there.

Let me talk about how the proposed constituencies will be brought into effect. It will be done automatically by an Order in Council, without debate or approval by Parliament. I know that this is of some interest to Members. The purpose of this change is to bring certainty to the boundary review process. It is to give confidence that the recommendations of the independent boundary commissions will be brought into effect without interference or delay. There will be no change to the Government’s obligation to give effect to the recommendations of the boundary commissions. In fact, as part of this measure, the Secretary of State’s current ability to amend the Order in Council if rejected by Parliament will be removed. The Executive’s power will, if anything, be reduced.

If this Bill does not proceed today because it is blocked, as Labour Members want to do, they will leave more power in the hands of the Executive. Of course, they used that power—or, should I even say, abused that power—in 1969, when the Labour party intentionally blocked the independent boundary review’s recommendations. We do not think that that is the kind of thing that should happen.

We think that, first and foremost, the boundary commissions are independent organisations. They develop their proposals through a robust and thorough process involving extensive public consultation. It is really important that their impartial recommendations are brought into effect promptly and with certainty. That avoids wasting public time and money, and it ensures the independence of the process. Countries such as Australia, Canada and New Zealand use similar approaches to those proposed in the Bill with no interference.

Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)

The Minister has mentioned several times consultation by the boundary commissions, but if their scope is limited by a plus or minus 5% variation in the size of constituencies, local communities are wasting their time invariably in putting forward those arguments. Is it not more important that people who have common interests and live in a common, identifiable community vote together rather than to meet these tight constraints on the size of constituencies?

Chloe Smith

I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s argument, but I think it is a really bad argument. It argues against having equal sized constituencies, which is fundamental. If we want to be able to say that we have a first-past-the-post system that operates as fairly and respectably as it can—as it does in the other countries that I just named, and as it ought to in this country—we need to have equality of seats. It is incredibly disappointing that the Opposition are arguing against that, and I do not really understand why they are. It goes with the other really poor argument in their reasoned amendment, which I just finished dealing with.

Andrew Rosindell

The Minister’s point is absolutely correct—we do have to have balanced boundaries—but does she agree that that can be achieved by having smaller building blocks, like polling districts, rather than huge wards that change from one constituency to another? If the boundary commissions used smaller building blocks like polling districts, it would avoid communities being broken up.

Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)

Order. We must have short interventions. A lot of people want to speak. I am sure the Minister will be winding up fairly soon, but if everybody wants to get in, Members should bear that in mind.

Chloe Smith

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Perhaps I had better make progress and take no further interventions. I will endeavour to speak as quickly as I can to cover the remainder of the important content.

Let me turn to the permitted tolerance in electoral quota, which relates to the plus or minus 5% point that we have just touched on. The rules on that have been in place since 2011, and they provide that the boundary commission has to develop proposals on the basis that all constituencies are within a 10% range of the average constituency electorate. That is known as the electoral quota.

As I have been saying, that is critical to achieving equal constituencies and to votes carrying the same weight. We have systemic inequality in some of our constituencies—I could give the examples, but I will let them be seen for themselves in some of the almanacs that we normally have around us. We know that there is a problem with unequally sized constituencies.

The existing law allows a few limited exceptions to the rules, including in respect of four protected constituencies which, because of their particular geographical circumstances, may diverge from the quota. In certain circumstances, the Boundary Commission for Northern Ireland may propose constituencies that fall outside the range, and that is because of the fact that Northern Ireland represents the smallest discrete grouping of constituencies, so the Boundary Commission has less capacity in Northern Ireland specifically to meet the standard tolerance. We do not intend to add to those exceptions.

We are all absolutely passionate about representing our communities and our areas, and they all have distinctive natures—we all argue that and we all know that in our hearts in respect of the areas we represent—but I return to the central point that we are trying to achieve parity of representation for all electors across the Union and within its constituent nations. We do not think that additional exceptions are necessary, because the 10% tolerance range gives the boundary commissions the flexibility that they need to do the job, and they do that by taking into account the other factors that are set out in the existing legislation and will remain in place, to which I have referred a couple of times already. Those factors include local ties; geographical features and considerations; existing constituency and local government boundaries; and inconveniences caused by proposed changes to constituency boundaries.

We believe that the 10% tolerance will continue to allow the boundary commissions to consult openly and fully on their proposals and to adjust their recommendations in the light of the responses that they receive. The three separate consultation periods give significant opportunity to communities—as well as others in the process, such as political parties—to comment on proposals. Responses can be made in a number of ways and they really do shape the recommendations. For example, in the most recent boundary review more than 50% of the proposals for constituencies in England were adjusted in the light of feedback, so there is flexibility in the process and it is routinely used successfully.

Stephen Doughty

Will the Minister therefore urge the boundary commissions to use common sense? In the most recent review, for example, they did not take into account many sensible things. In the proposals, the Cardiff bay barrage in my constituency was split between three different constituencies. Previous reviews had listened sensibly to different geographical requirements, and things like the most recent proposals simply do not make sense.

Chloe Smith

I can promise you, Madam Deputy Speaker, that that is the last intervention I will take, but it does give me the chance to say that the boundary commissions will listen to the debates in Parliament and will perhaps hear at a different level of detail the arguments that right hon. and hon. Members put. I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s having said that; I am sure it will be listened to by those who operate the rules that we give them through the legislation.

Let me turn to the data, which is very important. Again, we do not intend to alter the long-established practice of reviews being based on the electoral register as updated by the annual canvass. The canvass is the process by which those who are registered to vote in an area are checked and verified every 12 months. Electoral data drawn from the registers in Scotland, Wales and England is further checked by the relevant agencies—the National Records of Scotland and the Office for National Statistics—and the collated information, including on Northern Ireland, is then published centrally by the ONS, so it is a complete and current picture of the situation in all four nations. From that point on, it is used by the boundary commissions. As a general rule, the data that comes after the annual canvass represents the most up-to-date, robust and transparent information source on which to base a boundary review.

Let me turn to the impact of coronavirus on this year’s annual canvass, because it is very important. This is where the reasoned amendment tabled by Opposition Members contains a good point. To state the obvious, it relates only to the immediate next review, rather than to the principles of the Bill. I assure the House that I have been looking at the issue for some time and am considering carefully the options for the next boundary review to be based, on a one-off basis, on an alternative dataset not affected by the coronavirus pandemic. I will update the House on that in due course. I hope that reassures right hon. and hon. Members that we will be able to return to the issue during the later stages of the Bill, thereby allowing us to take the time to observe the problem and get it right as a one-off this year.

In closing, let me give a further reassurance that I am working extremely closely with what we call the electoral community.

Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)

Will the Minister give way?

Chloe Smith

I am trying to close so that Back-Bench Members can speak, but if the hon. Gentleman wants to cut into that time, he is welcome to do so.

Nick Smith

I thank the Minister for giving way, but her most recent remarks about which register the next boundary review will be based on were a bit ambiguous. Is she saying that it will be based on the 2019 numbers or the 2020 numbers to come?

Chloe Smith

It is a logical question. I have said that I will update the House in due course on that. I am looking at several options to get the most complete and accurate data for us to use in the boundary review this year. I am not seeking to avoid answering the hon. Gentleman’s question, but I will be in a position to bring the information forward during the Bill’s later stages, when I look forward very much to completing the reassurance I am giving the House that we want to use the best data that is unaffected by the pandemic. That stands slightly separately from arguments that perhaps he or other colleagues would like to make about other types of data that should be used. I am talking specifically about how to handle coronavirus. I know that he will understand that that needs to be kept in mind.

I was about to go on to say that I am in contact with the electoral administrators throughout the sector to see, up to the very latest moment, the challenges they face and how they can be dealt with in the publication of canvass data to give the best input to the Bill and for all the other purposes for which canvass data are used—mainly helping people to register to vote.

The Bill is very important. It is technical, but its goal is simple: to ensure 650 equal and updated constituencies. The people of the UK deserve fair votes and effective representation, and to have trust in and certainty about the boundary review process that delivers those things. I commend the Bill to the House.

June 2, 2020
Alistair Carmichael – 2020 Speech on Proceedings in Parliament

Below is the text of the speech made by Alistair Carmichael, the Liberal Democrat MP for Orkney and Shetland, in the House of Commons on 2 June 2020.

The Leader of the House, in introducing the debate, suggested that we should deal in some facts, so for the benefit of the record, I want to state a few facts of my own. In order for me to get here today, it required a journey of 18 hours, starting with an aeroplane, a taxi, a normal train and four hours in Edinburgh waiting for a sleeper train that I picked up at 1 o’clock this morning to arrive at Euston at 8 am. I cannot and will not do that every week. Apart from anything else, the return journey will be 26 hours long and would require me then to go into self-isolation for 14 days—the only responsible way to live in a community such as mine. Having come here, I am here for the duration, because I cannot go back until it is safe to my family and my community for me to do so.

I do not tell the House that because I look for any sort of sympathy. After 19 years as a Member of Parliament, I have learned better than that by now. I am telling the House because I think it is important that this House should be a Parliament for the whole of the United Kingdom, and every part of the United Kingdom should be able to participate here. What the Leader of the House brings to us today is a recipe for us being a Parliament essentially of people who live within driving distance of London, and that is simply as unacceptable as it is dangerous. It is a downright disgrace for the Leader of the House, who sits in the interests of the supposed Conservative and Unionist party, to bring forward a measure of this sort.

I accept that there were real difficulties with the hybrid process and the stilted nature of the debate that we had in the virtual Parliament. But believe me, the difficulties of the virtual Parliament are absolutely nothing compared with the difficulties that will come from the two classes of Member of Parliament that we will have as a consequence of the measures before us. When digital was the default option, it did not matter who was shielding. It did not matter who was able to move. Now it will become very obvious.

We know that it is only a matter of time before somebody who ought to be shielding and should not be here will find that there is some big incident in their constituency, and they will want to be here articulating the case of their constituents, because that is what we do. Inevitably, they will end up coming here when they should not, putting themselves, their family and their community at risk. It is not too late. The amendments tabled by the Chair of the Procedure Committee are good and sensible, and I entreat the House to accept them.

June 2, 2020
Caroline Nokes – 2020 Speech on Proceedings in Parliament

Below is the text of the speech made by Caroline Nokes, the Conservative MP for Romsey and Southampton North, on 2 June 2020.

I have a great deal of support for the view of my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House that debates held in this place without intervention are sterile and that we are failing to scrutinise the Government adequately. However, as Chair of the Women and Equalities Committee, I have to endorse the comments of the shadow Leader of the House: these measures do not just look discriminatory—they are discriminatory.

Instantly, a number of groups with protected characteristics are excluded. Those who are pregnant or new mothers, or older Members, might be advised not to come here via public transport. The underlying health conditions of either Members or their families are, to be frank, none of our business, but they will be excluded, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) has been. I appreciate the lengths to which Mr Speaker has gone to ensure that we have adequate arrangements for queuing, but how suitable are they for people with disabilities, including hidden disabilities?

Covid has too often been described as a great leveller, in that anyone can catch it—we saw that from my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister—but its unequal impact is well documented. Older people, men, those from BAME backgrounds and those with underlying health conditions now have a very stark choice: stay at home and play no part in proceedings, losing your right to cast your vote on legislation, or come here and expose yourself and your family to greater risk.

I absolutely accept that this House is not our employer, but good employers have a duty to make reasonable adjustments to ensure that workers with disabilities and health conditions are not substantially disadvantaged. By taking away the ability to vote remotely, we are substantially disadvantaging those people. I would argue that the amendments tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Karen Bradley) are, in fact, a reasonable adjustment, and for that reason I will be supporting them this afternoon.

June 2, 2020
Graham Stringer – 2020 Speech on Proceedings in Parliament

Below is the text of the speech made by Graham Stringer, the Labour MP for Blackley and Broughton, in the House of Commons on 2 June 2020.

Any right hon. or hon. Member who was in this House during our lengthy debates on our membership of the European Union after the referendum will be in no doubt that minds and votes were changed during those debates. I know that because, once or twice, mine were changed after a debate—sometimes with discussion. A Conservative Member who proposed an amendment actually voted against it after a debate. I suspect that there was a little arm twisting by the Whips. At the present time, we have, in this country, some of the most authoritarian legislation that we have ever had for reasons that are both understandable and credible. That means that, as a House, we have not been having that thorough full-blooded debate where people can change their mind and vote at the end of the debate. That means that the whole House has not been doing its job properly on this matter.

It has been suggested that Members want their constituents to know which way they have voted. If they have not been part of the debate, I do not really see the distinction between pairing and voting via an iPhone. The only distinction at the moment is whether it is recorded in Hansard. I take the point of the Leader of the House that he will discuss this with the Whips. If a pairing is recorded in Hansard, there is really no difference: constituents know where Members stand on the issue, even though it is not the exact equivalent of a vote.

The other matter I wish to raise in the brief time allowed is the number of people in the Chamber. The Government have said that they are following the science and the advice. Science is universal. The World Health Organisation recommends a distance of 1 metre. Other countries recommend 1.5 metres. We, together with a small number of countries, recommend 2 metres. There has been very little study on covid. The studies that lead to those distances, which are not universal, are on previous viruses, not this one. I urge the Government, partly for the sake of democracy and partly for the sake of getting the health issues right, to consider again and look to moving towards the recommendations of the World Health Organisation.

June 2, 2020
Jeremy Wright – 2020 Speech on Proceedings in Parliament

Below is the text of the speech made by Jeremy Wright, the Conservative MP for Kenilworth and Southam, in the House of Commons on 2 June 2020.

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Ogmore (Chris Elmore). I entirely agree with the Government that remote scrutiny is inferior to Members of Parliament being here to do it directly. That is no criticism of those who have worked very hard to make a virtual Parliament work at all, but it is the reality of the ways in which Bills and Ministers are most effectively scrutinised. It is also to the Government’s credit that they are seeking to restore the most effective scrutiny of themselves. In relation to those of us who can do so, I understand their preference that we conduct our scrutiny from here, but this debate and the amendments to the Government’s motion are really about those colleagues who cannot be here, and specifically those who cannot be here because the Government have, for good and sensible reasons, told them that they should not be. For those colleagues, there is a strong case for preserving some means of virtual participation in our proceedings. I am grateful to have heard what the Leader of the House has already said about that, but I look forward to hearing more.

Surely the most fundamental part of our job is casting our votes. In that regard we should be most concerned with the most fundamental principles, and surely the most fundamental principle of all is that our votes in this place count equally, in our roles as representatives of our constituents. It cannot be right to exclude from decision making any Member against their will, unless it is done for reasons of principle or because it is unavoidable. Excluding those who would be here, were it not for the Government’s instruction, cannot be right on principle. This is not the House taking disciplinary action against those who have broken rules—quite the reverse—and neither it seems to me is it unavoidable. Imperfect though of course it is, we do have a system of remote voting that we have tested and used over the past few weeks. Of course, it should be used only for this period of restriction, but while that period continues it remains the only way that those excluded from this place can vote. I do not believe, I am afraid, that the Government’s solution is satisfactory. Pairing and slipping are exclusions from voting for which a Member has volunteered in most cases. The Members we are talking about today are not all volunteering to be excluded and to exclude their constituents from the process of legislative decision making. They are being excluded through no fault or wish of their own.

Karen Bradley

I apologise for intervening again, but my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope) referred to me earlier as letting the genie out of the bottle. My point was that the public expect us to vote. The public expect us to be here. The public are looking at our voting record. We will be judged on our voting record. To say, “I took the decision at that point to allow myself to be paired” or that, “I was not able to do anything else other than be paired because of my medical condition,” will probably not be sufficient for many of our voters.

Jeremy Wright

Yes, I understand my right hon. Friend’s point, and I was going to go on to say that, although I understand the point of my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope), we are not, of course, as has just been said in the debate, dealing only with those who are ill. Some people are not ill but are being required—again I stress—by Government instruction to keep themselves away from this place. For those reasons, and with considerable regret, I cannot support the Government’s approach on voting, and I will support the amendment tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Karen Bradley).

June 2, 2020
Chris Elmore – 2020 Speech on Proceedings in Parliament

Below is the text of the speech made by Chris Elmore, the Labour MP for Ogmore, in the House of Commons on 2 June 2020.

I speak as a traditionalist. I am a Whip. My right hon. Friends the Members for Newcastle upon Tyne East (Mr Brown) and for Tynemouth (Sir Alan Campbell) have constructed my DNA in this institution. I am therefore very much a traditionalist. However, the system does not work. The Mogg conga, as it is now being deemed, through the House into Westminster Hall, is the result of the Government’s not tabling the relevant motion before the recess. It is the responsibility of the Leader of the House, no one else. According to some who have been briefing, even No. 10 did not realise what the Leader of the House was doing on the day before the recess. It would be helpful to know the right hon. Gentleman’s view on that because No. 10 does not seem to know what is going on.

The point is that this is about disenfranchisement. There are Members who have to shield but who are not vulnerable. Most Members I know who are shielding are far from vulnerable; they are honourable, hard-working, decent people, but like many people in this country, they are taking the advice of their clinicians. It is also a fact that some Members are the partners of key workers who no longer have childcare and who therefore have to be at home to look after their children. This is about the Leader of the House introducing a system that is no longer equal, and that is deeply unfair.

I want to use my remaining minute and a half to bust some of the myths mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Karen Bradley). I pay tribute to her as the Chair of the Select Committee, of which I am proudly the minority ranking member—I think that is how some people think of it—as the vice-Chair. [Interruption.] I say to my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) that that was just a joke. He never normally likes my jokes. I want to bust a myth for the Leader of the House: there has been no delay in bringing forward Bills for Public Bill Committees. There are four rooms in the House that could be used, and there is a maximum of four or five Bills currently being debated on the Floor of the House that will go through to Committee. It is the Government who have prevented the Bills from going into Committee, not the Opposition Whips Office.

Karen Bradley

I thank the vice-Chair for giving way; it is very generous of him. May I also make the point not only that Public Bill Committees have been able to meet since 21 April—nothing has stopped that—but that they could meet for more than their normal two days a week? They could meet on every sitting day for very long hours to ensure that business was delivered, and I am sure that Members would support that.

Chris Elmore

I quite agree with the right hon. Lady. One Committee that is going to the Programme Sub-Committee today will be meeting for three days a week with two sessions a day, and it has the option to do four days if it so wishes. That is at the request of the Government. The Government have delayed the start of this process, not the official Opposition or the smaller parties. It is for the Government to put forward a Bill Committee, and they have no one to blame but themselves. The rooms are available, and I would further add that testing was undertaken for hybrid Bill Committees. The Clerk of the House and Officers of the House were asked to undertake the testing of the hybrid version, and I understand that it worked perfectly well, including taking evidence from witnesses. I would never wish to suggest that a Member has misled the House, except maybe inadvertently, but it simply is not correct to say that anyone was blocking Public Bill Committees from sitting. It simply is not true. The Opposition were able to put forward Members to go on to the Committees, and the Government were able to do the same. Those debates could take place. As the Leader of the House knows, some Bills, such as the Finance Bill, do not need to have witness sessions. They just involve line-by-line scrutiny, so they could easily have been done. I ask the Leader of the House to clarify that matter when he comes back to respond. I support the amendments tabled by the right hon. Member for Staffordshire Moorlands—in fact, I have added my name to them—and I will proudly vote for them on the basis that this is about fairness and about true equality for all Members of this House, no matter what their reason for not being able to attend.

June 2, 2020
Christopher Chope – 2020 Speech on Proceedings in Parliament

Below is the text of the speech made by Christopher Chope, the Conservative MP for Christchurch, in the House of Commons on 2 June 2020.

I begin by expressing my embarrassment on your behalf, Madam Deputy Speaker, that all your entreaties to the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford) fell on deaf ears. I think he shows little respect for you in the Chair.

I wish to participate in the debate because I am a member of the Procedure Committee and I have a slight difference with my right hon. Friend the Chair of the Committee. Although I agree with the Committee’s plea for people to be able participate in the proceedings as far as possible, and I am delighted that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House will table a motion tomorrow, I do not believe that remote voting is necessary.

In normal times, my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) would be sitting here. He cannot be here today on medical advice. Ever since I was first elected to this House in 1983, no person who is away from the House on medical advice has been able to do anything other than get a pair. That system worked well in the 1983 and 1987 Parliaments. When I raised that in the Procedure Committee, my right hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Karen Bradley) said that the genie was out of the bottle and it was no longer possible to persuade members of the public that, if we were not physically present to vote and we were paired, we were going about our business. I think we have a big education job to do to explain to our constituents and the public that we can do a really good job as Members of Parliament without physically being here to vote every time. When Ministers go on trips or Select Committee members meet outside this place, they are often paired.

There is something to be said for making that pairing arrangement more transparent, as the hon. Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer) suggested earlier, but let us not demean ourselves by saying that pairing is a second-best arrangement. Pairing is a fair way of ensuring that people who are ill and unable to attend the House can have their votes counted. Under a pairing system, one person’s vote on one side is cancelled out by someone else on the other side. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) has been in the House almost as long as me and he knows that the system works well for those who are ill. It would be wrong to change it now. The Procedure Committee has an inquiry on the matter, but we cannot resolve that today. Let us therefore proceed with the motion in the name of the Leader of the House and allow ourselves to have real voting here. For those who cannot get here to vote, let us encourage pairing, while perhaps making the system more transparent.

June 2, 2020
Ian Blackford – 2020 Speech on Proceedings in Parliament

Below is the text of the speech made by Ian Blackford, the SNP MP for Ross, Skye and Lochaber, in the House of Commons on 2 June 2020.

It is a pleasure to be called in this debate and to follow the right hon. Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Karen Bradley). I implore her to move her amendments this afternoon. They are important amendments. They are about the rights of all Members to participate in the process of Parliament, both in debating, speaking and holding the Government to account and, of course, in voting. The shadow Leader of the House is correct. We must remember that we are living in the middle of a pandemic. It is the responsibility we have as a Parliament, and our responsibility to all the nations we represent, to make sure all our constituents are not disenfranchised.

I rise today in the absence of my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh East (Tommy Sheppard), who, because of the pandemic, cannot be here. I have to say that it is a considerable privilege to do so. The Leader of the House and I have known each other for a long time. I hold him in high esteem as a political opponent, but I have to say to him that on this matter I believe him to be wholly wrong. The decision by the UK Government to return Parliament has put parliamentarians in an impossible situation. A small number of us on the SNP Benches are here today—reluctantly—in order to ensure that the Government are held to account.

I have to ask the question: why were we forced to come here? Why were we forced to come here today? Reference has been made to the journey I have made. I do not wish this to be about me, but I had to drive to Inverness and then get a sleeper train, because there are no flights from the highlands to London. As has been referenced, it is a 16-hour journey. I know the same is true for the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael).

Mr Carmichael

Eighteen.

Ian Blackford

Eighteen hours for the right hon. Gentleman. Is the Leader of the House really suggesting that parliamentarians should spend over 30 hours a week travelling to have the privilege of representing their constituents, when over the course of the past few weeks we have had the opportunity and the ability to do our jobs of challenging the Government remotely and effectively? The shadow Leader of the House is correct. With the post bag we have had, the thousands of emails we have received, and the need and desire to be able to assist our constituents—we have had the time to do that—we are going to lose countless hours simply because the Leader of the House determines that on the basis of tradition we should be here–. Nothing to do with the circumstances we are in and the risks to our constituents in this pandemic.

Mr Carmichael

I am not going to spend 30 hours a week travelling. Not only is it logistically challenging, but it would be downright irresponsible for me to return to my community now. So I am down here now at the behest of the Leader of the House and I will be staying here until it is safe to go home.

Ian Blackford

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his intervention. The issue of safety is of paramount importance. We must go about our duties able to determine that not just all of us but our staff members and our constituents will be safe.

The right hon. Gentleman may be making a personal choice to stay down here, but just think about that. The Leader of the House indicated that we may not go into recess towards the end of July, so it might well be that the right hon. Gentleman and others are committing themselves to being away from home—away from their families—for a prolonged period. Why? Why, when we know that the hybrid facilities, in the main, work?

On this nonsense—and I have to say that it is nonsense—that Bill Committees have not sat, it is in the gift of the Government to bring forward a set of circumstances that will allow Bill Committees to meet. I must say to the Leader of the House that there is a responsibility on us to arrive at a consensus on these matters. This is not about the Government; this is about Parliament.

It is fair to say that the Opposition parties, as well as a considerable number of Government Members, are strongly opposed to what the Government propose. I implore the Leader of the House on reflection to accept the amendments that have been tabled, which would allow us collectively to deal with the situation we are in and get to a set of circumstances in which Parliament can do its job. I am in the situation that very few of my Members are here today, because we did not want to expose more Members than necessary to the kinds of risks that the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland referred to. I pose the question again: why should we be in this situation?

If I may say so, this is not just about Members of Parliament who have health concerns. Even if we arrived at a situation, as has been suggested, in which they could be excused or paired, anyone in that category would have been identified as having particular health circumstances. Is that right? But this is not just about Members of Parliament who have their own health concerns; it is about Members of Parliament who may have family members who are shielding. We are talking about a considerable number of Members of Parliament who risk being disadvantaged.

Of course, in Scotland—it was the case in England as well—the public advice was to stay at home, to protect the NHS and to save lives. The Government’s official line was that if people could work from home, they should. Well, we can work from home. We should work from home, because that is the right thing to do, not just for Parliament but for our families, our colleagues and our constituents. We have asked employers to be flexible; the Commons should be too.

MPs were working effectively. The hybrid system, though not perfect, was more efficient than the system we now have in place. The right hon. Member for Staffordshire Moorlands reflected on that. Look at the number of people who can be in the Chamber, and contrast that with those who could participate in our hybrid proceedings. The whole point about the hybrid proceedings is that Members who, for their own reasons, choose to come here can continue to do so, but those who need to, want to and should participate on a hybrid basis are not disenfranchised. Many colleagues across the House cannot come into work—Members who are shielding; Members who cannot travel—and the UK Government are willingly disenfranchising them and their constituents.

Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)

Does my right hon. Friend agree that if the Government get away with this today, we will be left with a situation where, although all MPs will be nominally equal, some will be more equal than others? Is not that very much a reflection of the pattern we saw last week, when the Government displayed such a cavalier attitude to that core principle of the rule of law, equal treatment before the law?

Ian Blackford

Absolutely. I agree with my hon. and learned Friend. I say to the Government that there are real questions that we as Opposition parties wish to put, but at the same time there is a recognition that we are in a real crisis. We are in a health crisis and we have an economic crisis on the back of that. Where appropriate, we must work together. There must be generosity of spirit from the Government in dealing with these issues.

I have been prompted to speed up, so I will.

Plans to shut down virtual participation in Parliament are a shambles. They are unworkable, unsustainable and are unravelling further by the day. For votes to take place, a queue of more than a kilometre would be needed through the building. Can Members imagine how the public must look upon this? We will be queuing right out of this place and we will be taking a considerable period of time.

The Leader of the House raised the issue of how many times we might be voting, but there are times when we have multiple votes. We will be losing hours a day if we are to determine our right. [Interruption.] It is a bit ridiculous that Members on the Government Benches think that this is funny. Do they really think this is funny? This is serious. We are talking about the lives of our constituents.

Andrew Griffith

If this is serious, would the right hon. Gentleman like to give way?

Ian Blackford

No, I will not. You have lost your right to do that.

The proposal for voting is ludicrous and a waste of our time. I am sure our constituents would wish us to use our time more effectively. The House of Lords will soon have a remote voting system in place where Members can vote via smartphone or tablet. For what reason is that the case for one Chamber but not the other?

We know that asymptomatic carriers of covid-19 are the silent spreaders in the pandemic, and that the virus can spread on contact and lasts for hours, if not days, on hard surfaces. What efforts have been made to ensure that these Benches are cleaned between sittings? That is an important matter, because we know from evidence from Singapore that there was significant—

Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)

Order. I can answer the right hon. Gentleman. Mr Speaker has taken care of that.

Ian Blackford

Well—[Interruption.] I can hear Members saying “Move on.” Really? I have to say that I find the attitude of some Members on the Government Benches quite deplorable. What I was going on to talk about was the situation in Singapore, where there is public evidence of people going into churches the day after other people—

Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)

Order. I implore the right hon. Gentleman to talk about this Chamber, because we have little time left. There is plenty of other time for Singapore. Will he please conclude his remarks quite soon?

Ian Blackford

I am afraid I am going to take my time to ensure that I am putting the case of Members of the Scottish National party. The reason I mention Singapore is because people were going into church and getting covid-19 from people who had been there in the days before. These are serious matters and they deserve to be properly aired.

The UK Parliament’s Select Committee on Procedure has called for remote voting and participation to remain an option for as long as the pandemic continues, and that should be the position we adopt. The Committee has outlined significant deficiencies in the plans and concluded that virtual participation should be allowed to continue while coronavirus restrictions are in place to allow MPs who are not able to come to Westminster, because of the continuing restrictions caused by the pandemic, to contribute to debates and represent their constituents.

The Government’s decision to ignore the cross-party consensus to retain hybrid proceedings and to plough ahead with plans to force hundreds of MPs to physically return to Parliament was widely criticised. The Public and Commercial Services Union, which represents security, catering and support staff in Parliament, said that the part-virtual system had worked well. General secretary Mark Serwotka said that it was

“strange why the government is in a rush to change course when a second covid spike is such a strong possibility”.

The Electoral Reform Society branded moves for MPs to vote in Parliament “beyond a farce”.

The Leader of the House argued that democracy would once again flourish, having been curtailed under the hybrid system. That is simply wrong. [Interruption.] I am getting a bit fed up with remarks from Conservative Members about this being “self-indulgent”. I will tell them what is self-indulgent: MPs being dragged here when we know that the hybrid system works, and MPs being disenfranchised by the Government. That is self-indulgent.

While MPs are shielding and unable to travel to Parliament, we are experiencing a democratic deficit imposed by the UK Government. It is wholly wrong that we are in this position. I hope that we can achieve a resolution that will see us return to a hybrid Parliament that allows all our colleagues to participate in questions, statements, debates and voting from the security of their homes. We should be in a position whereby we can do our jobs and protect everyone else by staying at home and doing the right thing.

June 2, 2020