Parliamentary Constituencies Bill — House of Lords, 2020-10-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
Donald Thomas (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I must declare an interest, in that my grandfather was from Llanfihangel-yng-Ngwynfa in the deepest rural part of Montgomeryshire. The boundary commissioners proposed in 2016 to link north Montgomeryshire with South Clwyd. I suspect that that proposal may be once more on the table following this Bill—it looks all right on a map Earlier this year, when I was recuperating from illness, I persuaded my wife, the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, to drive me over the Berwyn mountains from the valley of the River Dee. We took the mountain road from Glyndyfrdwy, in Denbighshire and in the South Clwyd constituency. Unfortunately, I had forgotten that the tarmac runs out at the bwlch—the top—and that the track thereafter was unfit for motor vehicles. Naturally, I insisted on going on. It was a hair-raising experience for the noble Baroness. We bottomed out on the fissured and deeply rutted track a few "expletives deleted" times. The only vehicle we met belonged to some Midlander holidaymakers bumping along, who had lost their way blindly following the satnav and were 10 miles adrift When we got down the other side of the mountain and the noble Baroness had calmed a little, we were in the Ceiriog Valley in a different county, the county of Wrexham. However, we were still in the Clwyd South constituency. The River Ceiriog runs along a high-sided valley into the River Dee some 20 miles to the east at the English border. We had to go west over another mountain on a single track road, fortunately this time tarmacked, to reach Llanrhaeadr-ym-Mochnant, once in the Denbigh constituency, but now in Montgomeryshire. There, we were in the Tanat Valley. The River Tanat runs into the Severn, again far to the east over the English border There was another range to surmount to arrive in the valley of the River Vyrnwy and yet another range between us and the Severn valley around Newtown. To get from where we started in Clwyd South to the nearest point of Montgomeryshire by an ordinary double track road, would have been a 30-mile trip through Oswestry in England and a 60-mile trip to Newtown. The geography of Wales is such that the main rivers run from west to east. The Severn traverses Montgomeryshire to Shrewsbury and the Wye crosses Brecon and Radnor to Hereford. Between these two major river valleys there are mountains, through which there is a single winding road, the A483. This was termed the deadliest in Wales two years ago, with 4.3 fatalities per 10,000 inhabitants. To the west, over the waterfront, the rivers run the opposite direction, east to west, into Cardigan Bay in the constituency of Ceredigion. It is a long way to Aberystwyth, and I hope the Boundary Commission does not start adding or subtracting populations over there One cannot alter geography by Act of Parliament. Each valley contains individual communities where even the language changes and the accents vary. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, and the noble Lord, Lord Morris, made the same point in the debate on the fifth group today. This is where the concept of strict quotas falls down. The Government suggested and will no doubt cling to the 5% variant either way. Fortunately, we have now voted to extend it, and I trust Government will not seek to reverse our decision. The Minister said he wanted Wales to be fairly represented and that really does not depend upon meeting quotas of voters Each of these two constituencies has approximately 55,000 voters, and each has huge and difficult terrain. If the tie between MP and constituent is to mean anything, it is senseless to carve up these communities. Over such a wide and diverse area where the geography separates communities, it is not surprising the problems for an MP are various, diverse, and unique. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, speaking earlier today, that there should be a community link, a common interest, so that an MP can speak for that community, one hopes with a single voice However, I must consider what effect the permanent maintenance of an untouchable pair of constituencies would have on adjoining constituencies to the north, west and south. In the end, I fear an even worse melange may be the result. In the debate on group 5, my noble friend Lord Rennard made a passionate plea for flexibility, and I entirely agree. It is for that reason only that I fear I cannot support either amendment, but I hope that the Boundary Commissioners, when they meet, take into account the special problems of the county of Powys, act flexibly and come up with something more sensible than the proposals of 2016.