As you’ll probably know by now, in the last few weeks the (at least) second Senedd committee set up to consider electoral reform reported back (pdf).
The headline recommendations were:
- The number of Senedd Members should be increased from 60 to 96.
- All MSs should be elected using closed list proportional representation via the D’Hondt method (at the moment only the 20 regional list members are).
- The Senedd should have 16 constituencies based (initially) on pairing together the proposed 32 new UK Parliament seats. Each new Senedd constituency would elect 6 MSs. The constituency boundaries will be reviewed again by 2031.
- There should be a statutory gender quota, which would likely mean minimum numbers of male and female candidates in each constituency. It’s also recommended that candidate diversity monitoring is improved.
- More work should be undertaken to pave the way for future job-sharing and quotas for defining characteristics other than gender (i.e. race, disability).
On Wednesday, the Senedd backed the principles of the committee’s report by 40 votes to 14 meaning work can start on the necessary law changes.
With Labour and Plaid Cymru having a supermajority (two-thirds of MSs) between them – and a political mandate from the 2021 election to make changes to the Senedd – as long as there are no hitches, reforms ought to be in place by the next scheduled election in 2026.
The issue now is whether some of these recommendations, if enacted, could end up causing more problems than they aim to solve.
“Does the number of politicians make a difference to the collective quality of their work, or is it more down to their personal qualities, work ethic, application and professional experience outside of politics?”
The argument in favour of an increase in members is, in practical terms, open-and-shut.
Whilst doing Senedd Home it was obvious there were too few members to effectively carry out all of the scrutiny work.
This wasn’t helped by the handicap of having a half-dozen or more MSs in the Fifth Senedd that weren’t up to the job, as well as the disproportionate number of members on the government or Senedd Commission payrolls. It seems to be taboo in Wales to even bring that up, though.
96 members would be at the higher end of the recommendations of previous commissions (usually between 80-100, mostly at the 80-end).
There are ways to make an increase more palatable – a big cut in salaries and expenses, employing fewer support staff, local government reform, a smaller cap on the number of ministers (government or otherwise) and term limits.
The Committee believes such an increase is justified “in light of the wide array of changes in the political landscape of Wales” since the McAllister Review in 2017.
Changes? What changes?
Very few substantial extra responsibilities were devolved in the shift to the reserved powers model. The new tax powers aren’t exactly a headache-inducer and are mainly managed by the Welsh Government and civil service. Meanwhile, Brexit is being largely dealt with by the UK Government (or not as the case may be) and haven’t we been consistently told there’s been a power grab from the centre rather than a power release?
I’m yet to be convinced the Senedd’s powers and responsibilities have changed to such a degree since 2017 (2011 even) that they need to increase the number of parliamentarians by 60%.
An increase is justified, certainly – but no more than an extra 10-15 members until there’s a further significant devolution of powers (policing and criminal justice, for example) at which point an increase to 90+ would be easier to justify.
“But what about Scotland and Northern Ireland?” you say. “They’ve got far more representatives-per-head than we do!”
So what? Are they any better off for that?
Does the number of politicians make a difference to the collective quality of their work, or is it more down to their personal qualities, work ethic, application and professional experience outside of politics?
Is it more a case of poor selection processes and candidate vetting that leads to the election of no-marks that can barely think for themselves and results in the remaining MSs having to work twice as hard to make up for it?
“Strengthening the Senedd” is a brilliant slogan for politicians. It sounds like “doing something” that’s going to benefit the rest of us. Yet at the same time, it can’t be proven that it would do so in any meaningful way.
How can you objectively measure whether a parliament is “strengthened” or that “scrutiny has improved”?
