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Johnny Ball might be helpful in examining a tricky mathematical and political problem

Over on the Institute of Welsh Affairs blog site, John Osmond has helpfully provided some of the content of the debate. The blog says:

What will the Conservatives’ commitment to downsize the House of Commons by 10 per cent mean for Wales? Yesterday the IWA’s conference Life Under the Tories heard that it could mean the number of Welsh MPs dropping by far more than 10 per cent, in fact by nearly half, to 22. Devolution expert Professor Robert Hazel, Director of the Constitution Unit at University College, London, is undertaking a study of the Conservative’s emerging policies on the constitution and believes this is a serious possibility. He told the conference that the cut would be calculated on the basis of a “devolution discount”.

Because the workload of MPs in Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland is now so much reduced, and because the devolved nations are over-represented in Westminster anyway, serious consideration is being given to reducing their numbers by a greater amount than 10 per cent. Reducing MPs at Westminster by 10 per cent would cut their overall number from the current 650 to 585. If Wales’s 40 MPs were reduced in proportion it would mean they would drop from today’s 40 to 36, back to where we were in 1979 (due to boundary changes the number of Welsh MPs increased to 38 in the 1983 election and 40 in 1997). However, Professor Hazel believes the Conservatives are thinking in terms of the devolved nations having their representation cut by considerably more to reflect the fact that they have their own Assemblies and Parliament. For Scotland he suggested there could be a cut from 57 to 40, for Northern Ireland from 18 to 12, and Wales from 40 to 22.

A Change of Personnel takes up this issue, as does my friend Glyn Davies on his blog. Glyn goes further and sets out a series of principles which he thinks should form the basis of future representation:
- A 10% reduction in Welsh MPs as part of a general reduction across all parts of the UK.
- Equalisation of the ratio of electors to MPs, though allowing some weighting for sparsity and anticipated population growth.
- A reduction in the number of MPs from areas where devolution has occurred as part of a “devolution discount.”

Since the second and third points are diameterically opposed, it is impossible to agree with both of them. Glyn sets out his stall in support of the first two principles but not the third and, in commenting on his post, I signal broad agreement with this. As a naive old democrat I have long believed that constituencies across the UK should be broadly of the same population size. I have always thought it wrong that urban seats generally require fewer voters, which certainly tends to discriminate against the Conservatives. Further, although it might not be popular, I also believe it wrong that Welsh electors are over-represented too, there being an in-built bias to Wales and other smaller parts of the UK in terms of the average number of voters when compared to England. It takes political guts to take this issue on honestly and openly, and I commend the Conservatives for doing so.

But where the logic and respect end is the ridiculous suggestion that a “devolution discount” be implemented. Quite where this latter element arises is beyond me, because other than in the chatter of politicos I can find no reference to it being advocated as a serious possibility. Has Robert Hazell heard it suggested in a more serious way or is this just scare mongering? Either way, Nick Bourne AM and Cheryl Gillan MP need to rule this silly idea out as soon as possible.

And while they’re it, they can put David Davies MP right, too. As the BBC also reports, the vocal tribune of anti-devolution has been on his soap box again and said:

“The more powers Wales develops and the closer to independence it gets the harder it will be justify large amounts of English taxpayers’ money being given to the Welsh assembly. There are obviously going to be public spending cuts throughout every area of the public sector. That’s going to happen whether we have a Labour or Conservative government. There’s no point in shying away from that because we are borrowing at a rate of £200bn a year and we are not going to be able to get the money for much longer. But there’s no reason to fear specific cuts in Wales providing of course we don’t go any further down the route to independence.”

Since the only people talking about independence today, tomorrow or any time soon are Plaid Cymru, the SNP and True Wales, including David Davies himself, it might be sensible to dismiss this as another obfuscation. But on second thoughts there is an issue here which needs tackling. David Cameron has already declared that his party will not block the move to a referendum on Part 4 powers of the Government of Wales Act – and I believe him and his party on that.

But is one of his MPs now suggesting that if Wales has the temerity to vote Yes in that referendum that they would have gone “further down the route to independence” and should therefore be financially penalised? It all sounds a bit like blackmail to me. And hardly helps the Welsh Conservatives position themselves in readiness for an honest debate on this issue.

Sort it out, Nick and Cheryl, because if you don’t then this sort of myth-making will be a real problem for you for the next six months.