ELECTORAL REGIONS IN ENGLAND (Hansard, 26 February 1998)

§ Mr. John Greenway (Ryedale)
Clause 2 sweeps away the existing European constituencies and imposes instead the European electoral regions, which we shall discuss again in the debate on schedule 1. There has been no public consultation on the matter, and no reference to, or consideration by, the boundary commission, in spite of the Prime Minister's expression of such strong support for its doing so.
My reason for rising at this point is to say that the Bill, and certainly clause 2, provides no real mechanism for reviewing the regional electoral boundaries on which constituencies are based. As people were not consulted, it would not be surprising if people in future wanted to change the boundaries. There is in schedule 1 a small reference to local government changes, but we should like to ask the Minister how the electoral regions can be changed. The Bill makes absolutely no provision for it.

§ Mr. Hogg
I support what my hon. Friend has said. Lincolnshire has been grouped with the East Midlands. It has much more affinity with the Eastern region. There has been no recent consultation on the grouping of Lincolnshire with the East Midlands. Lincolnshire is essentially a rural county. Its interests are not likely to be represented by grouping it in the East Midlands, where there are many large urban concentrations and the representatives ultimately elected are likely to have much more to do with those urban areas than with the rural areas of Lincolnshire.
The point that I make is similar to the point that I made in the debate on clause 1 stand part. The specific interests—in this case of rural areas—will be prejudiced. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) that it is important that a system is in place whereby the House and other bodies can reconsider the groupings so that if one grouping is seen to prejudice the position of any county, that matter can be looked at and dealt with. I see no mechanism in the Bill to do that. I ask the Minister to be good enough to tell us what she has in mind.

§ Mr. Beith
There should be a boundary commission or a standing electoral commission to examine those matters after the first elections, but the Bill is so constructed to ensure that the next European elections, relatively soon, can be fought by a fair system. Therefore, we think that the Bill should proceed in its present form and that the clause should stand part of the Bill, but that we should return to the matter after those elections.

§ Ms Quin
The effect of clause 2 is merely technical. It provides for schedule 2 to the European Parliamentary 589 Elections Act 1978 to be replaced with schedule 1, to which the hon. Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) referred. We shall discuss the provisions of schedule 1 later in our proceedings. Some of the matters that were raised by Opposition Members relate to amendments that we have already discussed in our debates on the regions, the regional structure of the Bill and the role of the boundary commission, or to subsequent amendments referring to a referendum and other aspects relating to schedule 1.
I am grateful for the comments of the right hon. Member for Berwick—upon—Tweed (Mr. Beith). He seemed to understand that this was simply a technical amendment to make sure that the elections could take place as foreseen.