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Electoral Administration Bill

The maintenance of an equal number of electors per seat is obviously desirable in principle. It is clearly undesirable to have, as we have had in the past, inner-city constituencies with very small numbers of voters. On the other hand, I cannot go as far as supporting an amendment which says that equality of numbers must be put ““above all other considerations””. It is a factor, but there are others, as the noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville, and my noble friend Lord Tyler have just said. They include geography; the fact that we must have constituencies of relatively small numbers in thinly-populated areas to avoid having gigantic constituencies; and some of the physical characteristics. It is desirable, where it is practical to do so without too greatly distorting the numbers, to ensure that constituencies are within the boundaries of a single county. One of the examples of the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, was the Isle of Wight, the largest constituency—in population terms—in the country. That is a difficult issue. If you were restricted by having numbers as the outstanding consideration, the Isle of Wight would end up having two constituencies, also involving a slice of the New Forest. That would be unsatisfactory, so the existing remit of the Boundary Commission is about right.