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Comprehensive Spending Review

No; I am not referring to the fact that I was not a Northern Ireland MP. That is not my point at all. I make no criticism of the Secretary of State whatever—in fact, I exempt her from what I am saying. My point is that there is a lack of knowledge about how the constitutional settlement works and about how we deal with such issues in the House of Commons. Nowhere was that more vividly expressed than in our debates on the constitutional Bill—the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill. There is a relationship with the comprehensive spending review, because my fear is that if, as proposed, we reduce the number of our Welsh MPs by 25%, it will mean a 25% reduction in the pressure on the Government and Parliament over the issues we are talking about. The voice of Wales will be different. I do not expect English Members of Parliament on the Conservative Benches to understand the issue of Wales in a bigger context or a bigger state—that is totally ignored. However, I would have thought that the Liberal Democrats would understand that the idea of the representation of Wales in a bigger unit is an issue. It has a huge impact on what we are dealing with today; in fact, there can be no bigger impact, because the biggest impact that any Government can have on their citizens is in how much money they are allowed to spend on services to improve their quality of life. If our representation is to be reduced, which it will be, we are facing a serious issue. The Secretary of State must continue to fight the cause of Wales in the Cabinet and its Committees, but I am not at all convinced that her colleagues are listening, whether in terms of the constitutional settlement or of the comprehensive spending review. That is a great pity, because our job as Welsh Members of Parliament, in the Welsh Grand Committee and on the Floor of the House of Commons, is quite specific: to defend the interests of our constituents. Everything that has been said today about the cuts—whether capital spending, revenue spending or other issues—and every single decision made by the Government through the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Treasury will have a direct impact on our constituents in Wales. That is why it is so important that we have sufficient representation in this place to fight our cause.