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Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

That often happens in this life. I was just coming to that. What will happen is that MPs will come back and find that they have got an increasing workload. Their staff are worked to the bone, anyway, and they will suddenly see that they have an opportunity to put in an irresistible bid for yet more of them. It will be impossible for a Government to resist that pressure from their own Members, and so the extra staff will be granted and staff allowances will go up. The probability is that this will swamp, dwarf and completely eliminate any saving made by having 50 fewer MPs. The proof of this particular pudding will lie in the eating. I therefore ask the Leader of the House to put his calculations in the Library so that we can look at the facts when they emerge after the next general election. It would be a nice subject for the independent inquiry into the number of MPs to consider and would give it a good factual basis for saying that this huge error, justified on the grounds of cost, is a statistical howler of the utmost proportions.