Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill — House of Commons, 2021-09-13
Topic: Government Operations
Chloe Rebecca Smith (Conservative, Centre-right): In that case, Mr Evans, I am going to carry on until you tell me otherwise. There is an amount to get through, but I hope to do so The schedule provides for a number of changes to primary and secondary legislation to ensure the effective operation of the statute book when the 2011 Act is repealed. These amendments primarily reverse or alter legislative amendments made by the 2011 Act. The schedule works with clause 6. As I have explained, we want to make sure that references to the 2011 Act work elsewhere in other legislation. There are some key changes in the schedule to draw to the attention of the House The first is to rule 1 of schedule 1 to the Representation of the People Act 1983, which sets out the election timetable. The Bill amends that rule to ensure that the trigger for the election process in the case of a parliamentary general election is the Dissolution of Parliament, following the recommendation of the FTPA Joint Committee The second change provides additional certainty in relation to the election process. The election writ is deemed to have been received the day after the Dissolution of Parliament. This will allow returning officers to begin arrangements the day after the election writs are issued, enabling all constituencies to begin making the necessary preparations, even in the event that the physical delivery of the writ is delayed. Similar deeming amendments are included for by-elections The third update is to section 20 of the Representation of the People Act 1985. Under the existing legislation, in the event of the demise of the Crown after Dissolution or up to seven days before, polling day is postponed by a fortnight. The 1985 Act provides no discretion or flexibility to further alter the date of the poll. This Bill provides limited discretion for the Prime Minister to move polling day up to seven days either side of this default 14-day postponement, by proclamation on the advice of the Privy Council. This is beneficial because it ensures that enough flexibility is built into the system should such specific and unlikely circumstances ever occur. There is also flexibility to move the date set for the first meeting of Parliament in such circumstances—again, by proclamation on the advice of the Privy Council The last key change that I will highlight in this section is to the Recall of MPs Act 2015, which is amended to ensure that there continues to be provision to prevent or terminate recall petitions close to a general election to avoid redundant by-elections. This means that there is no requirement to trigger a recall petition if the last possible polling day for a general election, based on Parliament running its full term, is less than six months away, and a recall petition is to be terminated when Parliament is dissolved. For the reasons that I have set out, I recommend that the schedule be the schedule to the Bill If it remains convenient to you, Mr Evans, I will now start to work my way through the amendments that have been tabled, but I remain at your disposal to return to the clauses if hon. Members would like me to respond after they have spoken to their amendments New clause 2 has been tabled by the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant). As I understand it, it seeks to provide a role for the House of Commons in approving an early general election by simple majority vote. This would adjust the arrangements that exist under the 2011 Act by removing the two-thirds majority requirement. It would in itself be a departure from the prior constitutional norm, whereby the Prime Minister could request an early Dissolution of Parliament in order to test the view of the electorate. As we have already begun to touch on in this afternoon’s debate, the deadlock and paralysis created by the 2011 Act did rather demonstrate why a prescriptive statutory approach does not work. Instead, what we are doing in the Bill is returning to a set of widely understood constitutional conventions and practices. Those tried and tested arrangements are the right ones, and this new clause would run against the grain of those arrangements It is, after all, a core underlying principle that the authority of the Government and the Prime Minister, as the sovereign’s principal adviser, are derived from the ability to command the confidence of the House of Commons. The 2011 Act attached confidence and the decision of the Prime Minister to call an election to statutory motions, which gave the Commons a direct say in Dissolution, but it is also possible to argue that those arrangements hindered the function of democracy by making it harder to have necessary elections. Instead, the House should indeed be able to express its view on confidence, but in a much freer manner. We do not need the prescriptive statutory approach of either the 2011 Act or, I fear, this new clause New clause 2(5) would require the Prime Minister to advise the sovereign on the date of the election within 30 days of the House approving a motion for an election. I would argue that this is not necessary. Under the Bill, once a general election has been called and Dissolution takes place, the election timetable in schedule 1 to the Representation of the People Act 1983 makes the provision for the timing of an election very clear. Again, rather than introducing prescriptive arrangements, we believe that we should return to tried and tested standards whereby it is a core principle that the Prime Minister must be able to command the confidence of the House of Commons. New measures around that concept are not needed.