Government of Wales Act
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What the Act does
 Our View While we welcome an increase in powers for the Welsh Assembly we do not believe that this Bill goes far enough. The New Politics Network and Charter 88 support the implementation of the Richard Commission proposals. The proposals in this Bill to ban dual candidacy have are particularly controversial. Currently a candidate that is standing in a constituency election for the Welsh Assembly can also be on the partys regional list. This can mean that a candidate that has been defeated in a constituency can still become a member of the Assembly. In Wales it has become known as the 'Clwyd West question' because in that constituency three of the four defeated candidates still became Assembly Members because they were also on the lists. This is not unique to Wales and happens wherever Additional Member system is used. However while the Arbuthnott Commission explicitly rejected banning dual candidacy in Scotland the Government is pressing ahead with the ban in Wales. Glyn Mathias from the Electoral Commission expressed concern at the proposals when he gave evidence to the Welsh Affairs Select Committee. He believed that if dual candidacy is a problem a ban is not the solution. There is a serious danger that an attempt to resolve one particular anomaly or injustice will actually serve to create other anomalies and injustices and that is the basis really of the conclusion we have come to. There are about 30 other countries around the world which have additional Member systems as their electoral system. No other country currently bans dual candidacy on the lines of the proposal in the White Paper. AMS has been used since the 1940s in Germany, and was adopted by several countries in the 1990s most notably New Zealand. Countries where there is clarity about the role and purpose of the list members seem to manage well with AMS and do not find dual candidacy to be a problem. It has become a particular problem in Wales is the partisan split. In other countries (including Scotland) all parties have some list representatives, while in Wales a Labour executive draws its support exclusively from Labour constituency members. This can then lead to the creation different classes of elected representatives and in some cases to attempts to delegitimise the parties that only have members from the lists. |
The Act makes provision for:
- Enhanced legislative powers for the Assembly through a streamlining of procedures so that its legislative priorities are secured more quickly and easily;
- The way forward for a formal separation between the Assembly and the Welsh Assembly Government to avoid confusion and to improve effective scrutiny;
- A change to the provisions in the Government of Wales Act so that losing candidates in Assembly constituency elections are unable to become Assembly Members through the regional list.
Legislation enabling the Welsh Assembly to legislate on devolved policy areas will be passed but will not be enacted unless it is approved by a referendum.
Controversially, this does not go as far as was proposed by the Richard Commission in March 2004. It recommended that in addition to primary legislative powers, the Welsh Assembly should have:
- Tax Varying powers - that if a legislative Assembly is constituted, it is desirable, though not essential, for it to have tax-varying powers.
- Increase in membership - that to exercise primary powers the Assembly would need an increase in membership from 60 to 80 Members.
- Method of election - that the present voting system, 40 constituency members elected by first past the post and 20 list members elected by the additional member system, cannot sustain an increase to 80 the best alternative is the STV system.
July 2006
The Government has banned dual candidacy in Wales but not without a fight with the House of Lords.
Opposition Peers had inflicted a number of defeats on the Government on key proposals in Bill. Details of the votes can be found here Ammendments passed by the House of Lords included
- To remove a subsection allowing the Secretary of State to veto the Assembly's request for a referendum
- To require that Orders in Council can only have retrospective effect where it is "not to the detriment of those who have either benefited from or acted in reliance upon the state of the law before the retrospective Order is made"
- To require that standing orders apportioning members to committees and sub-committees, must have regard to "the balance of political parties represented in the Assembly"
- To require that the 4 Assembly members to sit on the Assembly Commission do not belong to the same political party
- To rename the Audit Committee, the "Accounts Committee"
The Government made some concessions on the composition of committees, the Assembly Commission and the name of the Audit Committee but held firm on the more substantive issues.
The Bill's Progress
Responsible Department
Wales
House of Commons Stages
Introduced: 8 Dec 2005
Second reading: 9 Jan 2006
Committee stage: 23, 24 & 30 Jan 2006
Remaining stages: 27 & 28 Feb 2006
House of Lords Stages
First reading: 1 March 2006
Second reading: 22 March 2006
Committee stage: 19 April, 23 May & 6 June 2006
Report stage: 27 & 28 June 2006
Third reading: 13 July 2006
Consideration of Commons reasons: 24 July 2006
ROYAL ASSENT: 25 July 2006
