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Mr. Ancram: The right hon. Gentleman will remember that at about that time of night, when he thought that he was going to lose the referendum by a small number of votes, he said--he was recorded on television--to me, "I hope that we can have a replay next week."
Mr. Wigley: I did indeed say that we would fight, fight and fight again to secure what we wanted. We acknowledged the validity, as did many of the right hon. Gentleman's colleagues who appeared on television on the evening of the referendum, that, if the no campaigners won by a handful of votes, that would be enough to kill the Bill.
What is sauce for the backward-looking, scaremongering, no-voting neanderthals is also sauce for the forward-looking, yes-voting alliance, which believes in democracy and in Wales. Let us recall that the turnout in Wales, at 51 per cent., was not all that much lower than the 59 per cent. achieved in Scotland. The swing in Wales from 1979 was greater than that in Scotland.
It is worth reminding the House of the post-referendum mood in Wales. Even among those who voted no there was some satisfaction at the outcome. Some of the no voters told me that, when they saw the joy on the faces of the young people of Wales at the yes vote, they were glad that the referendum had gone that way. That was a fact and that has been said. It has been said on television by a former Conservative Member in a face-to-face interview. No doubt we shall hear more about that when the debate moves to the other place in due course.
There are former Conservative Members as well as Labour doubters who now say that we must not be drawn into re-fighting the referendum. What is needed is a coming together to get the best national assembly that we can possibly secure for Wales. I appeal to Tories in England to take such a positive and constructive approach. Wrecking the Bill and giving Wales an inadequate assembly would be a great disservice to my country.
Dr. Julian Lewis:
Does the right hon. Gentleman not understand that there is great concern, that when dealing with an issue of such fundamental constitutional importance as the Bill that is before us, any mandate from the people should be large and healthy? The fact that the referendum did not get a large and healthy mandate concerned the Prime Minister when he said the day after the referendum that the Government would address the concerns that had been shown by the smallness of the mandate. However, the Bill does not address those concerns. Will the right hon. Gentleman comment on that?
Mr. Wigley:
If in other circumstances it had been determined that a mandate must be above a certain threshold proportion of the electorate, Bill Clinton would not have become President of the United States, Margaret
As for misgivings in Wales, I accept that they existed. When the Bill is considered in Committee, such concerns will have to be addressed in some detail. There will have to be exploration of the role of regional committees and other similar provisions in the Bill, but that is not an argument against giving the Bill a Second Reading and building an assembly that can bring the people of Wales together, which I believe is possible.
Mr. Denzil Davies:
Is there not greater concern about the vote going in such a way that Offa's dyke could have been said to have moved westward than about the narrowness of the vote? The boundaries of Wales seem to have changed. East Wales, with exceptions, voted against and west Wales, with exceptions, voted for.
Mr. Wigley:
That is an interesting point, given the fact that arguments in Wales are often presented as being polarised as between north and south. Recently, there has been an east-west divide--and not only terms of the way in which people voted in the referendum. We have seen the divide manifest itself in income per head, unemployment and many other factors. There may well have been a correlation. The highest yes votes were in the areas of greatest deprivation in Wales, both down the western side and in the old coalfield valleys, running through as far as parts of Gwent.
I shall now consider the historic context in which the debate takes place. Wales as a nation was united, incorporated and annexed into England by the Act of Union of 1536. However, Wales as a nation refused to disappear. Through our language and culture, our literature in both languages, our religious institutions and social and political values, Wales retained its national identity.
Over the past 100 years, many attempts have been made to give Wales at least some form of national democracy to ensure that our political values, manifested in the last century through the Liberal party and for a large part of the 20th century through the Labour party--I believe that Plaid Cymru is also an inheritor--are converted into practical reality in Wales.
From the 1880s onwards, there have been numerous movements to give Wales some form of national elected democracy. The Cymru Fydd movement spearheaded the campaign a century ago. I remind the Tories that in 1886 Joseph Chamberlain advocated home rule--home rule all round, including Wales.
In 1891, there was D. A. Thomas's National Institution Bill, which proposed an elected assembly for Wales. It is worth quoting the words of Tom Ellis, the former Member for Meirionnydd, and later a Liberal Chief Whip. At Newtown, in 1888, he said:
Many Bills to establish Parliaments or assemblies for Wales have been presented to the House this century. There was the E. T. John home rule Bill of 1914, and the
S. O. Davies Bill of 1954. There was the new focus on the issue following Gwynfor Evans's historic by-election victory at Carmarthen in 1966, which led to the Kilbrandon report of 1973, advocating Parliaments for Wales and Scotland.
The Labour Government of 1974 to 1979 brought forward, first, a Scotland and Wales Bill. In 1977, there was the Wales Bill that became the Wales Act 1978. The 1979 referendum shot that down. That failure left Wales vulnerable to the ravages of the Thatcher era. What a price we had to pay for that 1979 debacle. Now is the time to ensure that never again is Wales left defenceless to have imposed upon it, against its political will, a right-wing fundamentalist programme that is diametrically opposite to our social values, undermines our communities and drives Wales to the very bottom of the prosperity league in Britain.
At the very least, our own national assembly will articulate the values that we hold as a people: it will be a bulwark against imposed dogma of the Thatcherite kind. When I say "as a people", I mean all the people of Wales. We regard all the people who live in Wales as citizens of Wales and all are equal irrespective of race, creed, colour or language. Plaid Cymru is a national party, but our nationalism is a civic nationalism. It is an inclusive philosophy, and we welcome the inclusive nature of the Bill.
We want a national assembly in which all aspects of Welsh life are properly represented, including the ethnic minorities and disabled people, all the regions of Wales, both rural and industrial, and all parties including the Conservative party. In particular, we want a proper gender balance at the assembly.
Mr. Dalyell:
I have always understood the right hon. Gentleman's argument for independence, but will he confirm that, had the Wales Act 1978 come into force, it would in no way have defended Wales against Mrs. Thatcher?
Mr. Wigley:
We would, of course, have preferred the assembly envisaged in 1978 to have had the full law-making powers that Scotland would have got, and which it is now getting in its Parliament. However, I believe that the will of the people of Wales, articulated through the vehicle of an assembly, would have had considerable force with the way in which policies were implemented in Wales. It could not have been ignored. It would have been worth having, although it would not have given a guarantee. To that extent, the hon. Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell) is right. I shall deal with that point in the context of our proposals later.
Plaid Cymru recently adopted a formula to try to achieve a gender balance in the assembly. I hope that other parties will do likewise. I am concerned that the 40 plus 20 formula will not provide adequately balanced representation, but we can no doubt tackle that in Committee.
There are four reasons for a national assembly: first, to secure better answerability for the Welsh Office, which has grown to cover most domestic portfolios; secondly, to provide better answerability for the quangos and, preferably, better democratic control or integration into a direct democracy system--they have grown out of all recognition in the past 20 years in Wales; thirdly, to
provide Wales with a stronger profile in Europe; fourthly, to provide a stronger strategic approach, on an all-Wales level, in line with Welsh political values.
I spoke earlier of the need to protect Wales and to advance our social policies to fulfil Wales's aspirations for a fair, egalitarian community. We do not believe that that can be achieved without law-making powers. That was the point made by the hon. Member for Linlithgow. Scotland is to have those powers; Wales is not.
"Without a national assembly--at once the symbol of unity and the instrument of self government--Wales's position as a nation cannot be assured, and her work as a nation cannot be done."
One hundred years later, it is in the context of that work, which still needs to be done, that we welcome the Bill.
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