---

Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

My Lords, as someone whose title was taken from Lerwick in Shetland, I was somewhat startled and delighted this afternoon to arrive here to find that Shetland is once again in the cockpit of history. I am sure that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness, was equally delighted as a former MP for Orkney and Shetland. I do not think that Orkney and Shetland have been so near to the pulse of the nation since Charles James Fox was for a short time the Member of Parliament for the rotten borough there. That was after he had contested the Westminster by-election and there was an inquiry into whether the result was fraudulent. However, I do not think that I ought to go into the merits of the special treatment of Orkney and Shetland. I wish to follow the noble Lord, Lord Snape, in one respect, as I shall talk mainly about AV. On Part 2 of the Bill, which seeks to reduce the size of the House of Commons, I agree with the point made by my noble friend Lord Baker that, when we compare the size of our legislature with the size of legislatures in other countries, we should look not at Europe—as the noble Lord, Lord Elystan-Morgan, did—but at countries such as Japan, the United States and India. There is a strong argument for saying that our legislature is too large. Briefly, on the second principle of equalising constituencies, I will listen carefully to what the Opposition say, but I do not think that so far the case has been wholly convincing.