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Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

My Lords, I have not had any hours of sleep during the night, I am sorry to say, but happily the Cross Benches are springing to life. I cannot match the floods of eloquence to which we have been treated through the watches of the night, but when, at after eight in the morning, we are still debating the fifth amendment, after what must be 15 or 16 hours of continuous debate, and with debates on amendments weighing in at two and a half hours each, and sometimes a good deal more, it occurs to me that it may be time for a view from the Cross-Benches. It will not be lost on the Opposition that they have been the subject of criticism for time-wasting and abusing the procedures of the House in a way that tries the patience of the House and brings it into disrepute. But it takes two to make a stand-off. At the end of the day, it is the responsibility of the Government to manage the House so as to carry the House with them and not alienate the Opposition to the point where they withdraw co-operation. In order to while away the time during the watches of the night, I turned up The Coalition: Our Programme for Government. Paragraph 24 is on political reform. It begins mildly enough by saying that, "““The Government believes that our political system is broken.””—" It goes on, "““We urgently need fundamental political reform, including a referendum on electoral reform,—" well, we all know about that, and it goes on, "““much greater co-operation across party lines,—" and then it goes on to "““changes to our political system to make it far more transparent and accountable””" and so on. Much greater co-operation across party lines? Whatever happened to that? It is perfectly clear to me that if the Government would only engage in the usual kind of discussion which takes place through the usual channels, they could get their Bill and we could all go home for a rest. Of course, I am speaking only for myself—