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Electoral Administration Bill

My odds are 33:1 with a leadership run, which will not happen. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his kind comments. I will just about forgive him the fatuity of the last vote, which was an exercise in pointlessness as it asked the House to divide on two positions that amounted to the same thing. On the principal objectives, we have striven for consensus whenever possible, even if we have not always achieved it. That is as it should be. We have made the point over the years, including in the previous Parliament when we considered electoral reform, that such issues should not be partisan and that we should agree a common framework for our essential democratic processes. It is important that we listen to each others’ points of view and accommodate them as far as possible. That has happened during the Bill’s passage. Changes have been made through our consideration and as a result of the points that were made not only by the hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Sir Patrick Cormack), but by the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young), who chairs the Standards and Privileges Committee and made the point about reporting donations to hon. Members. A minor consideration on imprints was also taken into account. There has been a retreat on descriptors, thus preventing us from holding a difficult debate on whether ““annibynnwr”” is a better description than ““annibynnol”” for independent candidates on Welsh ballot papers. A minor amendment was made when the Government finally understood my point about arrests within polling stations. I was right and the Minister eventually accepted that the original wording did not convey what the Government intended. Clearly, we need to make more progress on the four-month issue, which we debated. Progress has been made on deposit thresholds. The definition of election material is important and will be introduced probably through secondary legislation. The Government accepted the point that the hon. Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch, East (Rosemary McKenna) made. It is a shame that we did not reach the amendments that the right hon. Member for Walsall, South (Mr. George) tabled. He has been my colleague on many occasions on Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe monitoring expeditions. He well knows the requirements of international organisations that we do not yet fulfil.