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Mr. Rhodri Morgan: On what evidence does the hon. Gentleman say that my electorate rejected the proposals for a Welsh Assembly?
Mr. Shepherd: I base it on the turnout in the city that the hon. Gentleman represents.
Mr. Morgan: There are four constituencies in Cardiff, which means that there are many possibilities as to the
results in Cardiff, West. My belief, based on having seen some of the boxes being unloaded, is that Cardiff, West in no way rejected the proposals.
Mr. Shepherd: I am told that 55.6 per cent. voted no, so it is difficult to reach that conclusion. [Interruption.] I can see that the hon. Gentleman is sensitive: his own city rejected the proposals, and it is likely that his own electorate rejected them. Notwithstanding that, he feels that the result was an endorsement for the march forward of the elected assembly.
Mr. Evans: In Cardiff, where the gravy train was expected to stop, 53 per cent. of the people did not even turn out to vote.
Mr. Rhodri Morgan: You were not there.
Mr. Shepherd: I quite understand that Labour Members are enormously sensitive about this. They have to get over the fact that only 25 per cent. voted for the proposals.
Mr. Morgan: The hon. Gentleman is talking rubbish.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Alan Haselhurst): Order. The hon. Member for Cardiff, West (Mr. Morgan) spoke for 36 minutes yesterday, and has made two long interventions today; sedentary interventions on top of that are not acceptable.
Mr. Shepherd: I merely postulate that perhaps the Welsh electorate are rather wise. We are told that the start-up costs will be considerable, and that the annual running costs might be between £15 million and £20 million. I think that most people can see that, to use a phrase that has already been used by a Labour Member and which stuck in my mind, we are talking about a class that is trying to get its bottom on the Consolidated Fund.
The by-product of the proposals will be the creation or extension of a political class, and I am not sure what that accomplishes for Wales. All I know is that, despite the information provided by the Government in the form of a most massive campaign in favour, the proposals failed by any recognisable democratic process to achieve validation.
My concern is not based only on the particulars of the Bill or of the referendum campaign, however magnificently it failed.
Mr. Hain:
As the hon. Gentleman was elected by only 36 per cent. of his electorate, does he consider that he was validly elected?
Mr. Shepherd:
The Under-Secretary must have heard four or five interventions by my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest, East (Dr. Lewis) who tried to point out--I realise that the distinction might be too fine for the hon. Gentleman--the difference between a constitutional settlement, or a validation of what is attempting to be a constitutional settlement, and the ordinary processes of democracy and the election of Members of Parliament.
Most of us can perceive a distinction, but the Under-Secretary does not. That is not a surprise. I have listened to his abuse of almost all Opposition Members as neanderthal, backward-looking and not pro-democracy--
Mr. Nick Ainger (West Carmarthen and South Pembrokeshire):
The leader of Plaid Cymru said that.
Mr. Shepherd:
The language is common. I pick on Plaid Cymru only because it launched into that attack. I just know that there is nothing consensual.
We need to stand back. Wales might have rejected the proposals because they are not on an equal footing with those for any other part of the United Kingdom. They certainly do not echo the proposals for Scotland. In a sense, they marginalise Wales; or are they a statement to the effect that the Welsh people are incapable of exercising powers and functions deemed appropriate for Scotland? Does the Secretary of State for Wales think that the Welsh population are lesser in their abilities or reasoning, and could not maintain a form of government for themselves?
There is a distinction between the two proposed systems of government which has to be explained more appropriately than Labour Front Benchers have managed so far. I am concerned about the Scots and the Welsh, as they are incorporating an alien system of electing Members of Parliament. I say "alien", because it is unusual. My fear is that these great developments will reduce turnouts at elections until they lack authority and we end up like the United States, where so few people voted for the president--which is extraordinary in such a major democracy. I am worried about the unbalanced nature of the constitutional changes.
Labour Front Benchers talk about regional assemblies for England, but will not deal with how to balance the Union's constitution. It is now unequal. The fact is that neither the Welsh nor the English elector will be on equal terms with the Scottish elector. Let us imagine that the Labour party wins the next general election but that its majority is formed only by Welsh Members of Parliament or, worst of all, by Scottish Members of Parliament. How can it be sustainable in those circumstances, when the inequality of citizenship is so rawly and prominently presented to us?
This is a terribly unbalanced way to go about making constitutions. It does not seek consent and has not achieved consensus, two elements that are usually deemed to be important. It has not reached out and tried to embrace the political structures of our country. There has been no attempt to form a constitutional convention to see whether we can recognise the genuine needs of our island and its form of union. The proposals are nothing but the flaunting of a political class and a Labour party in power, owing its allegiance to whom--to Charter 88? The proposals are so piecemeal that their very lack of stability will do us down. In the end, this will be Labour's undoing.
People will come to realise the inequality and the unstated, and almost unstateable, English element in this. I am Scottish-born, and represent an English constituency. I have always been a Conservative. My fear is that so many of those who now exercise power are only political activists and do not have a broad enough vision of stability and what brings us together as a Union.
None of the proposals before us reflects those things. I am terribly fearful of a brand new Parliament that has had such a change of membership and which has so many
new Members who do not value the House or the system we have, partly, perhaps, because they have been genuinely disillusioned by 18 years of Conservative government. Much is made of that, and there may be some truth in it. However, we should not throw the baby out with the bath water.
As it happens, I have always believed in devolution. I believe that Westminster is a national expression, and that local government should flourish. Are the proposals for Wales a local government measure, or something more important? They have taken a local government route but, in the end, people who wish to spend money must be able to raise it. That is the element of the proposals that will do down Wales.
The Government maintain that they can for ever support the Barnett formula, which is already under attack from hon. Members representing constituencies in the north of England, who are well aware that there are inequalities in the distribution of central finance. No Government can say that, for ever and a day, they will distribute money on the basis of such a formula when circumstances have changed. As Lord Barnett has pointed out, when his rule of thumb formula--which has worked well for nearly 20 years--was devised, Scotland was at an economic disadvantage in the Union in gross domestic product per head. Now the figure is said to be comparable with that for the south-east.
How can the formula be maintained on any rational basis when Wales is at a disadvantage compared with the rest of the Union? Of course it must be up for grabs and a subject of dissection, argument or bidding every so often. The best that the Government can do is guarantee it until the end of the Parliament. The best that the Prime Minister can do is guarantee it for as long as he is Prime Minister. Anyone who looks at the formula knows that even a change of leadership in the party presently in government may result in a rebalancing of the formula to the disadvantage of those who think that they are to be advantaged.
I did not intend to attack the gallant Under-Secretary, whose extraordinary career is an inspiration to many of us. As an aside, I am appalled that a career solely as a political activist can be the basis for haranguing--haranguing--lifelong members of the Labour party who do not support the Bill or do not think that it is necessary.
I do not know whether people in Wales listen to debates in this House any more, but they know that the dissent on the Bill goes beyond the Conservative party. Some 250,000 of those who voted no--25 per cent. of those who voted in the referendum--clearly did not vote for the Conservatives in May. That 25 per cent. includes Labour voters, Liberal Democrats, or even--dare I say it?--Plaid Cymru supporters, who felt that there was not enough separatism in the measure.
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