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Political Parties and Elections Bill

I do agree that that is necessary, and that the Electoral Commission's credibility in carrying out its task, which covers elections to the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly and the Northern Ireland Assembly, depends on its having a spread of people with intimate knowledge of what is going on in those elections. Not only fairness but effectiveness is needed. The point about electoral systems has been well made. The systems used in Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland are entirely different from those used for this House—more's the pity, in the case of the Northern Ireland system. That shows the variety of problems that the commission faces. More than that, we are dealing with different political cultures. It is not just how people are elected that is different in this House from the Scottish Parliament, Wales or Northern Ireland. The multi-party nature of those assemblies makes politics different. We cannot understand a place's electoral politics unless we understand the culture of its politics. That point is fundamental. We must therefore consider how to deal with the current situation, which I hope is temporary. The principle suggested by the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire is right: the law must recognise the existence of the other parliamentary assemblies. We in this House are not the only relevant people. I am absolutely with him on that, and I am glad that he wishes to press to a Division the amendment that makes precisely that point, but I am afraid that I am with my hon. Friend the Member for Argyll and Bute (Mr. Reid) on the exact mechanism and numbers that the hon. Gentleman has chosen. If we were to require an unweighted number of 15 parliamentarians for a party to be represented, we would end up with nine political commissioners, four of whom would represent Northern Irish parties. One of those would be Sinn Fein, and it would be interesting to see whether it took up its position.