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Mr. Wigley: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that if the Secretary of State had taken on board all the points that were made at the meeting of the parliamentary party and if he had said, "I have met all the points, so there is no need to go through the Welsh Grand Committee; I am willing to change the proposals to take those points on board," he would have made a comprehensible defence? To close the door, to refuse to back the changes that were asked for at the meeting and to support the business motion is, to all intents and purposes, to tell us that it was a total waste of time to have the meeting of the Welsh parliamentary party.
Mr. Davies: Very much so. It is my personal regret that the Secretary of State did not have the courage or the courtesy to tell us that to our faces at the meeting in Norman Shaw. He must have been set in his mind then, so why on earth did he not have the courtesy or the courage to tell us that that was the case rather than sneaking out and giving a BBC interview half an hour later?
I also oppose the business motion because it institutionalises conflict. I hope that the Leader of the House now understands that if we had been able to deal with the matter in the way that we wished, we could have reached agreement. There is a need to reform the procedures of the Welsh Grand Committee; everyone understands that. As a result of the business motion, there will be unnecessary confrontation with the Opposition. The procedures of the House are rigid and formal.We shall not be able to have the flexibility--the give and take--that we could have had in the Welsh Grand Committee. The business motion denies us that opportunity. Undoubtedly, the motion that will be put to the House at 10 o'clock will not command the broad support of Welsh Members. Indeed, it is a missed opportunity to reform the Welsh Grand Committee.
Those arguments underscore the fundamental divide between Welsh Members who represent Welsh constituencies and the Secretary of State. There is no doubt that Opposition Members have a genuine desire to improve democracy in Wales, but the business motion prevents us from doing so. There is a genuine desire to have better and more accountable government in Wales. The business motion will prevent us from having that
debate. There is a genuine desire to have more efficient government, less corrupt government and a Government who reflect the wishes of the people. The business motion will prevent us from developing that argument. There are four hon. Members on the Conservative Benches who represent Welsh constituencies, but it is quite clear that they do not share our aspirations.
As an Opposition, we have always been constructive in this matter. To my knowledge, as far back as 8 March 1993, when the Welsh Grand Committee met in Cardiff to discuss the governance of Wales, the Opposition suggested to the then Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Wirral, West (Mr. Hunt), how we could restructure the Welsh Grand Committee. We were then debating the reorganisation of local government.We asked the Government why on earth, if they wished to proceed with it, they did not put the matter before the Welsh Grand Committee. Their response some months later was to deny Welsh Members of Parliament by repealing Standing Order No. 86--which is what the motion before us does--and to prevent Welsh Members from sitting on the Committee, which, above all else, was discussing local government in Wales.
Instead of putting Welsh Members on the Committee, the Government included luminaries such as the hon. Members for Bosworth (Mr. Tredinnick), who came to something of a sticky end, for Milton Keynes, South-West (Mr. Legg)--a fine record he has in Westminster--and for Halesowen and Stourbridge (Mr. Hawksley), who had no Welsh interests apart from a property that he owned in Powys.
The debate is not about devolution, which is not on the agenda tonight. The Government know our position on that, which is clear and unequivocal. The debate is about reforming the procedures of the Welsh Grand Committee. We want workable, meaningful changes. We want it to be given proper powers, not only to debate and to question the Government--when we do that, the Government can run away from the arguments, as they have done tonight--but to decide matters. If there is a difference between the Government and the Opposition on the handling of the Welsh Grand Committee, it is down to that.
The Government currently hold all the cards.They decide all the matters and want to keep the cards in their hands. They make the arrangements for the Welsh Grand Committee. They control its agenda and always have the last word in it. They refuse it the power to decide any matters. The business motion will curtail debate to about two hours, but that is not enough time to explore those matters, particularly on the Floor of the House.The motion will deprive Welsh Members of Parliament of any opportunity to seek a consensus on how the procedures of the Committee could be improved. Thanks to the motion, there will be artificial votes. Those of us who sit on the Welsh Grand Committee, who represent Welsh constituencies and have a vested interest in ensuring that we get it right tonight, will be outvotedby Conservative Members, who will be whipped at10 o'clock to deny us our rights.
For those reasons, we oppose the business motion and shall seek to divide the House.
Mr. Newton:
I thought that the debate started rather promisingly, when the hon. Member for Dewsbury(Mrs. Taylor)--I thank her for this--spent a great deal of
I do not accept, however grateful I am for the remarks about me, the contrast that has been drawn with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales. It is certainly not a breach of confidence--I do not think that anybody would mind me saying this--to say that being, as I am, quite keen to see this particular improvement, as I see it, in the procedures of the House advanced as soon as possible, I had a sketch plan of business a week before Christmas. I offered my right hon. Friend the opportunity to proceed with the changes that he had outlined--which, generally, appeared to have been welcomed--to the Standing Orders that govern the Welsh Grand Committee. He declined, saying that he did not want the opportunity to debate the business at that time, precisely because he wished to go through a process of discussion and consultation with other Welsh Members of Parliament.
I understand that my right hon. Friend wrote to the hon. Members for Caerphilly (Mr. Davies) and for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley), and to the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Carlile) on 14 December, explaining exactly what changes he proposed to introduce, offering a meeting to discuss them and asking their agreement. Thereafter, there was a considerable exchange of correspondence, and, as has been acknowledged, something rare happened: there was a meeting of the Welsh parliamentary party--a gathering of all hon. Members who represent constituencies in Wales--which my right hon. Friend attended. I accept that there appears to have been some misunderstanding in the wake of that meeting. My understanding is that my right hon. Friend had always made it clear that changes to the Standing Orders of the House were matters for debate on the Floor of the House. That appears to be the main point of disagreement.
Mr. Ron Davies:
Whatever faults we might have as Welsh Members of Parliament, I can assure the Leader of the House that we never let the Secretary of State leave any of our meetings under any misapprehension of our true feelings. May I clarify one point and ensure that Hansard records what happened? It is quite correct that the Secretary of State wrote to me and other hon. Members on 14 December, but the Leader of the House has just suggested that, in that letter, the Secretary of State offered a meeting. That is not correct.
If the Leader of the House consults the Secretary of State and looks at the correspondence, he will find that the Secretary of State did not write to me, the hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley), who represents Plaid Cymru, and the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery(Mr. Carlile), who represents the Liberal Democrats, until31 January. I now ask the right hon. Gentleman to reconsider his point, because that is very important.
Mr. Newton:
I understand--I gather that it is my right hon. Friend's recollection--that my right hon. Friend offered a meeting at that stage, but if there has been any misunderstanding about that, I am sure that my right hon. Friend will want to clear it up when he speaks in the debate, which I hope that we shall get on to before much longer.
Mr. Llwyd:
On the question of misunderstanding, the Leader of the House is at a disadvantage, because he was not at that meeting. I was, and I think that we all have a similar recollection. We all understand that, for any effective change to be introduced, there has to be a change in the Standing Orders of the House. We need not be experts in "Erskine May" to work that one out. The point is that the Secretary of State left the meeting with the firm impression that he was considering actively all the points that had been raised, none of which now appears on the Order Paper.
Mr. Newton:
We are, are we not, in effect talking about two different things. There seem to be differences of perception about the meeting, which, as the hon. Gentleman says, I did not have the advantage--if that is the correct word--of attending. My right hon. Friend's understanding, if I may speak for him further, is that he had consistently made clear his expectation that the matter would be debated on the Floor of the House.
7.3 pm
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