Orders of the Day — Government of Wales Bill

House of Commons, 2 February 1998.

REGULATION OF PROCEDURE

Bernard Jenkin (Conservative, North Essex)

I beg to move amendment No. 288, in page 25, line 30, at end insert— '(7) Any remaking or revision of standing orders shall not come into effect unless a draft thereof has been approved by resolution of each House of Parliament.'.

Michael Martin (Deputy Speaker, Glasgow Springburn)

With this, it will be convenient to take amendment No. 292, in clause 49, page 26, line 17, leave out from 'shall' to end of line 19 and insert— 'not have effect until a draft thereof has been approved by resolution of each House of Parliament.'.

Bernard Jenkin (Conservative, North Essex)

I shall be extremely brief, as time is short as a result of the private notice question. Clause 45 sets out the conditions for providing and remaking standing orders in the Assembly. Interestingly, clause 45(2) says: But subsection (1) is subject to any other provision of this Act or any other enactment which regulates, or provides for the regulation of, the procedure of the Assembly (or of committees of the Assembly or sub-committees of such committees). The interesting feature of the subsection is that it makes explicit Parliament's continuing power to pass Acts to regulate the standing orders of the Welsh Assembly. My first question to the Minister is why that subsection, which reasserts Parliament's powers so explicitly, is necessary at that point in the Bill, if at all. It seems a little strange. Amendment No. 288 is simply a probing amendment that suggests that, if we are to have the ultimate power, we should have an on-going, neater power to regulate the Assembly's standing orders. Our amendment would add a new subsection, suggesting that any remaking or revision of standing orders shall not come into effect until a resolution of both Houses has been passed. That would balance what is suggested by the Government in clause 49. It states that commissioners will draw up the draft standing orders, which will then be submitted to the Secretary of State who, according to clause 49(3), can make such modifications as he considers appropriate. If the Secretary of State is to have that power over the initial standing orders of the Assembly, we rather think that that power should be regulated by the House of Commons. We have suggested that the initial standing orders should not have effect until a draft thereof has been approved by the resolution of each House of Parliament, and that constitutes amendment No. 292. As things stand, the two clauses seem to be rather unclear in their ultimate intention. I look forward to hearing the Minister's comments on the amendments.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

I consider neither amendment to be appropriate as both would impinge on the power that the assembly will have to determine its standing orders. The hon. Member for North Essex (Mr. Jenkin) is correct to say that the Secretary of State will produce the first standing orders once he has considered advice from the commissioners. Subsection (5) provides that the standing orders can be subject to revision by the assembly. Indeed, they can be remade by it. Given the way in which we have constructed the Bill, we have every confidence that the assembly will be able to run its own business without having reference to the House of Commons. To have continual reference, every time the assembly wanted to change its standing orders, to the House of Commons so as to seek its approval would be inappropriate. I ask the Committee to reject the amendments.

Bernard Jenkin (Conservative, North Essex)

Why do we need subsection (2)?

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

I was rather puzzled when it became clear that the hon. Gentleman wanted to make such a point about the subsection. I still cannot see that it has any real relevance to the amendments. I shall perhaps have a further discussion with him in more congenial surroundings to ascertain exactly what he is trying to get at.

Bernard Jenkin (Conservative, North Essex)

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

EQUAL TREATMENT OF ENGLISH AND WELSH LANGUAGES

John Marek (Labour, Wrexham)

I beg to move amendment No. 392, in page 25, line 31, leave out from 'effect' to 'to' in line 32.

John Marek (Labour, Wrexham)

I welcome the new timetable, which enables us to debate many more of the clauses than hitherto would have been possible. I hope to be able to contain my remarks to within two minutes so as to allow other Members to speak, followed perhaps by a reply from my hon. Friend the Minister. The purpose behind my amendment is to cut out weasel words. It turns, of course, on the English and Welsh languages. Subsection (1) reads, so far as is both appropriate in the circumstances and reasonably practicable. That really means that Welsh is not on the same level as the English language. Yet we have the Welsh Language Act 1993, which is an equality measure. That means that we put both languages on the same level. When Members of the Assembly utter words in one language, they have slavishly to be translated into the other language, whether that is required to be done or not. It may be that some assembly committees consisting only of Members representing the south-east of the Principality would work in the English language. The minutes may be bilingual, but the Members could work in the English language. If a meeting were held in private, it could be held in the English language. Equally, meetings not open to the public could be held in the Welsh language in north-west Wales. They would not necessarily have to be conducted in the English language. Equality does not mean that what is written or said in one language must necessarily be translated into the other language. There is inequality of esteem, parity and status. The Welsh Language Act 1993 gives equality to the Welsh language. The words that I have mentioned in the Bill detract from that equality. Ministers should go away and think about it. There is nothing wrong with leaving out the clause. It would allow the national assembly to give proper status to the Welsh language as and when necessary.

Cynog Dafis (Plaid Cymru, Ceredigion)

I shall speak about the importance of the equal use of the two languages. We should ensure that the essential issues are considered and make it clear that the right and the ability of Members to use the Welsh language in all debates and committees will be unconditional. There should be no question about whether it is convenient or acceptable that a Member uses the Welsh language. Instantaneous translation equipment and facilities must be available even when small groups meet in sub-committees and so on. That is the only way to ensure that we normalise the use of the Welsh language. That is what it is all about. Instantaneous translation equipment is sometimes regarded as a facility for the person who wishes to use the Welsh language. It should not be seen in those terms; it is there for the person who is among that unfortunate section who are not bilingual. There will, of course, be constant media coverage of the activities of the assembly, including television and radio coverage. It is important that, when Welsh is being used in a debate or Committee meeting, the feed from the translation is made available to the English media, so that there is no problem with their not being able to make use of clips, in news coverage and so on, of speeches made by those who are using the Welsh language. That is essential. It is terribly important that the assembly establishes the Welsh language not just as a high-status language but as a normal language.

Nick Ainger (Labour, Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire)

Sit down.

Cynog Dafis (Plaid Cymru, Ceredigion)

Because the hon. Gentleman is telling me to sit down, I shall do so.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

Briefly, I draw the Committee's attention to new clause 15, which says: Translation of oral proceedings shall be simultaneous and available to all members, staff and visitors.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

The Government are totally committed to the principle of equality. We believe that, in clause 46, we have provided for English and Welsh to be treated equally. We believe that that can be achieved by having regard to the Welsh Language Board guidelines issued under the Welsh language Act 1993. The advisory group is looking at all those issues in relation to the use of the language. We should expect the National Assembly for Wales to provide for equal treatment in all its proceedings in the appropriate way.

Elfyn Llwyd (Plaid Cymru, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

Surely the word "practicable" covers that eventuality. Doubling it up with the word "reasonably" seems biased against the equal use of the Welsh language. That concern was embodied in Plaid Cymru's amendment. I ask the Minister to consider whether we need the second word.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

Hon. Members are being a little pedantic about the use of the English language. Given that the advisory group will look at all those issues, and what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham (Dr. Marek) and by the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Mr. Dafis), I hope that we can accept the spirit behind our debate. We should expect the assembly to operate on proper principles of equal treatment for the Welsh and English languages. On those grounds, I hope that the amendments will be withdrawn.

John Marek (Labour, Wrexham)

That is only just about acceptable. It is all very well to complain of pedantry about the English language; we have been quite pedantic about the Welsh language, and about what is "reasonably practicable". However, the Minister is my hon. Friend, and I shall take his words in the spirit in which they were meant. I hope that he will think about the amendment carefully and, if necessary, table an amendment of his own in the other place. In the meantime, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

PRESIDING OFFICER AND DEPUTY

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

I beg to move amendment No. 294, in page 26, line 39, leave out from 'members' to 'shall' in line 1 on page 27 and insert— 'the deputy presiding officer. (1A) The Secretary of State shall be the presiding officer of the Assembly, but shall not otherwise be entitled to attend or to participate in or to vote in any proceedings of the Assembly. (2) The offices specified in this section.'.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

We hope to ascertain a more definite role for the Secretary of State for Wales, and also a sound basis for the position of the presiding officer. A growing band of people are still uncertain about what the Secretary of State's role will be after devolution becomes effective. He will lose a considerable amount of the power which, I assume, took up some of his working week, and the vacuum thus created has yet to be properly filled. Working on the dictum that the devil makes work for idle hands, I hope that the Secretary of State will take the amendments in the constructive and inclusive sense in which they are meant. We are not trying to smoke out from him whether he intends to stand for the assembly in his own right—well, we are actually, but I suspect that we shall not get much further today than we have in the past. What we know is that the right hon. Gentleman is devolving a substantial amount of his job to the assembly. I suspect that it may be to himself that he is trying to pass those powers, with another hat on, but the move will leave whoever is Secretary of State in his place without the same role—some would say, with an inferior role—although he will still have important financial roles, which we shall debate tomorrow. The amendment suggests giving the Secretary of State the role of presiding officer. He will thus be establishing a substantial authoritative role for himself, and a definite role within the new structure. He will have clout at Westminster and beyond, voicing the concerns of Wales. Whatever is decided, it is important to establish where authority lies on the various levels, and how best to ensure that Wales's voice is not muted or lost, but just inwardly directed by the devolution process. The First Secretary will have elected authority, and will be seen as the person who speaks for Wales. A perception could quickly and easily arise that, as the Secretary of State for Wales was the Prime Minister's choice, his voice was that of the Cabinet and the Government. Indeed, it would be peculiar and irregular if it were otherwise, although in the past no one has competed against the Secretary of State in the context of speaking for the people of Wales. There could be clashes between the First Secretary and the Secretary of State for Wales, just as Secretaries of State will argue with leaders of local authorities even when those authorities are controlled by their own political parties. Amendments Nos. 309 and 308 are contingent on the acceptance of amendments Nos. 294 and 295. Amendment No. 296 addresses the fears of the regions about the position of the presiding officer. People in the regions are concerned about the fair and proper working of the assembly. We seek to have their voice properly protected.

Ted Rowlands (Labour, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney)

Can the hon. Gentleman give us an example of a Speaker or a presiding officer of a democratically elected assembly who is not a member of that assembly?

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

I could give the example of the vice-president of the senate, but the Welsh assembly is a new body and we are seeking new methods. We are not constrained by the methods used in local government or Westminster. Let us see what we can offer.

Michael Ancram (Conservative, Devizes)

The A1 Gore of Wales.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

I am not sure whether that example would sell our proposition.

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman's continuing influence in Welsh affairs from his vantage point in Ribble Valley. Given that the two amendments are mutually exclusive, which one would he prefer?

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

We are trying to find out the views of the Government and the Secretary of State. It is proper for us to table amendments that, although mutually exclusive or contradictory, seek to draw out the Secretary of State. I hope that he recognises what we are trying to do. I may not have a preference: I am interested to know what the Government propose for the Secretary of State.

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

The Government may acknowledge the force of the hon. Gentleman's argument and be prepared to accept one of the amendments. I am merely wondering which one he would like us to accept.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

There is always a first for everything. If the Secretary of State were to agree with any of my suggestions, it would be a parliamentary first and would go down in history. Both amendments are important. There could be a conflict between the Secretary of State for Wales and the First Secretary, and there could be a problem given that the Bill will create a vacuum in the Secretary of State's time. We hope that he will consider the amendments carefully, and accept some of our propositions. He may make his own proposals, or even declare an interest by telling us that he intends to stand for the Welsh assembly and wants to pass some of his present powers to himself in another guise. Regional committees will be established: all we know to date is that there will be a committee of the north and other regional committees. We are seeking to have their voice protected by the constitutional safeguard of regional representation. The presiding officer would have to attract the majority support of the assembly, would have to have national appeal, and would have to win a third of the votes of Members of the Assembly representing each region. We believe that that device would allay the fears of the regions and the people who live in them. After the referendum, the map of Wales was clearly divided between those who were and those who were not in favour of an assembly.

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

indicated dissent.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

The Secretary of State shakes his head, but I remember the night clearly: 11 areas voted yes and 11 voted no.

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

The hon. Gentleman uses the same old arguments at every debate.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

If they are the same old valid arguments, it is important to keep stressing them. I had hoped that the right hon. Gentleman would agree with us about looking at ways to remove the fears of people in regions such as north Wales. They should be properly assured, and one way to do that is to give those who will represent the regions an extra say and protection for their views in the assembly. That is all that the amendment would achieve, and I hope that the Secretary of State will consider accepting it. It would give to a third of the representatives of the regions democratic authority in the choice of one of the most important positions in the assembly. The amendments are constructive, and I look forward to hearing the Government's views on them.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

It is good to see you, Mr. McWilliam, in the Chair because you are from one of the important regions of England. Despite the earnestness of the hon. Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans)—I almost said dribble valley—the amendments are ambivalent frivolities because they contain two different ideas—one about the role of the Secretary of State and the other about the procedure for an appointment. Clause 51 provides for the assembly to elect a presiding officer and a deputy presiding officer who shall be from different parties within the assembly. Clause 75 entitles the Secretary of State to attend and participate but not to vote in plenary meetings of the assembly. It is clear from a study of any constitutional assembly in the world that the Secretary of State could not preside over the National Assembly for Wales because the two roles are inimical. For a start, the Secretary of State has onerous responsibilities and duties in the Cabinet and must attend its meetings in London. That would take up a great deal of his time, so the idea of his presiding over an assembly in Cardiff, Swansea, Wrexham or wherever is nonsense.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

Following devolution, what will be the Secretary of State's role? Will he attract new and additional powers? According to the Bill, he will lose powers.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

He will have several roles, one of which will be to represent Wales in government at Westminster and to attend the many committees which, as the right hon. Member for Devizes (Mr. Ancram) will know, are held in Whitehall. He will also have to report to the assembly and take from that body to Westminster its views on Welsh matters. He will have a full job without the responsibilities of presiding over the assembly. The hon. Member for Ribble Valley advanced a completely different idea about how the presiding officer should be elected. It is plain that there is no agreement among Opposition Members about which amendment should have priority, and that means that they are not taking them seriously. The amendments are not necessary for the good working of the assembly and the one that requires specific votes from different parts of Wales would place an unnecessary constraint on it.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

The Minister may see it that way, but perhaps we could examine amendment No. 296 and the election of the presiding officer. Is it not important to protect representatives of Welsh regions? The referendum showed that some people, particularly in north Wales, had some fears about the procedure. Our amendment would give them an opportunity to have a proper and equal say in the election of the presiding officer.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

We have gone out of our way to try to get a better feel for views throughout Wales. We have introduced an unprecedented element of proportionality to the elections for the assembly. The hon. Gentleman and his party voted against that, but we are happy that that provision will help to take account of views throughout Wales. We do not need the prescription in the amendment and I hope that the hon. Gentleman will withdraw it.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

We gave the Government an opportunity to start to measure up to the words of the Prime Minister on the steps of 10 Downing street when he said that he would listen to the fears of the people of Wales. Some people in north Wales and in other regions expressed fears about the assembly being Cardiff dominated.

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

Swansea dominated.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

It may be Swansea dominated. We do not know where the assembly will land. Today's issue of the Western Mail states that an airport site is being considered by the Secretary of State. Perhaps the assembly will have a smoother landing there than it has had since its take off. Amendment No. 296 would have allowed the regions to be properly taken into account. It is a great shame that the Government have not taken up our suggestion, but I do not intend to press the matter. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

ASSEMBLY FIRST SECRETARY

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

I beg to move amendment No. 10A, in page 27, line 6, leave out from 'be' to end of line 7 and insert, 'Prime Minister of Wales or Prif Weinidog'.

John McWilliam (Labour, Blaydon)

With this, it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 91, in page 27, line 7, leave out 'Secretary or Prif Ysgrifennydd y Cynulliad'. and insert 'Minister or Gweinidog Pennaf y Cynulliad'. No. 200, in page 27, line 7, after 'Cynulliad', insert '(a post whose title may be amended by provision of the Standing Orders)'. No. 194, in clause 57, page 28, leave out lines 27 to 29. No. 199, in page 28, line 31, after 'Cynulliad', insert ', or by such title as the Standing Orders may provide'. No. 31, in clause 58, page 29, line 1, leave out 'a committee' and insert 'an Assembly Cabinet'. No. 5, in page 29, line 1, after 'a', insert 'cabinet'. No. 32, in page 29, line 2, leave out 'Secretary' and insert 'Minister'. No. 33, in page 29, line 3, leave out 'Secretaries' and insert 'Ministers, who shall be appointed by the Assembly First Minister'. No. 34, in page 29, line 3, leave out 'Secretaries' and insert 'Ministers, who shall be appointed by the Assembly First Secretary'. No. 35, in page 29, leave out lines 4 to 6. No. 21, in page 29, line 7, leave out 'executive' and insert 'cabinet'. No. 36, in page 29, line 7, leave out 'executive committee' and insert 'Assembly Cabinet'. No. 195, in page 29, line 7, leave out 'executive committee' and insert 'cabinet'. No. 22, in page 29, line 8, leave out first 'executive' and insert 'cabinet'. No. 37, in page 29, line 8, leave out first 'executive committee' and insert 'Assembly Cabinet'. No. 196, in page 29, line 8, leave out 'executive committee (to such extent as the executive committee' and insert 'cabinet (to such extent as the cabinet'. No. 23, in page 29, line 8, leave out second 'executive' and insert 'cabinet'. No. 38, in page 29, line 8, leave out second 'executive committee' and insert 'Assembly Cabinet'. No. 25, in page 29, line 10, leave out 'executive' and insert 'cabinet'. No. 39, in page 29, line 10, leave out 'executive committee' and insert 'Assembly Cabinet'. No. 197, in page 29, line 10, leave out 'executive committee' and insert 'cabinet'. No. 40, in page 29, line 14, leave out 'executive committee' and insert 'Assembly Cabinet'. No. 28, in page 29, line 14, leave out 'executive' and insert 'cabinet'. No. 41, in page 29, line 15, leave out 'executive committee' and insert 'Assembly Cabinet'. No. 29, in page 29, line 15, leave out 'executive' and insert 'cabinet'. No. 42, in page 29, line 17, at end insert— '(4A) The Assembly Cabinet shall remain in office only so long as it retains the confidence of the Assembly and no longer.'.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

The first amendment is about the description of the head of government in Wales.

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

On a point of order, Mr. McWilliam. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman before he gets into his swing. Two, totally different, ideas are dealt with in this group of amendments; one group is about what people will be called, the other is about a cabinet system as opposed to a committee system. If we felt it appropriate, could we have a vote on an amendment relating to the cabinet system?

John McWilliam (Labour, Blaydon)

That would have to be considered at the end of the debate, but of course it would be in order for the right hon. Gentleman formally to propose an amendment. Standing Orders allow the group to be broken up in that way.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

As I was saying, the amendment refers to the possibility of there being a Prime Minister rather than a First Secretary. To give the Welsh assembly higher status, we may need to change the title, First Secretary. If there is a First Secretary, he will on occasions have to speak to his opposite number in, for example, the Federal Republic of Germany, where each Land has its own Prime Minister, and we think that Prime Minister status would be appropriate. Such a situation would arise on many occasions. It would be nice to think that the leader of the assembly could discuss and even negotiate—perhaps with the motor regions—on an equal footing with leaders of other areas. We think that the title Prime Minister would be appropriate.

Denzil Davies (Labour, Llanelli)

I am intrigued. The hon. Gentleman said that the leaders of the Länder are Prime Ministers. I am sure his German is very good. What is the German title? There is no Prime Minister in Bonn as far as I am aware.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

I am not a German speaker. I speak French and halting Welsh, and my knowledge of German is not adequate to answer the right hon. Gentleman's question accurately. All I can say is that when Peter Walker was Secretary of State for Wales and met the Prime Minister of Baden-Wurttemberg, he was described as such in the British press. If they got it wrong, they got it wrong, but that was the description. I remember that well. The other amendments that we have tabled in this group, including amendment No. 5, refer to a cabinet system rather than a committee system, but unfortunately they were consequential on amendment No. 11A, which has not been selected. I hope you will not rule me out of order, Mr. McWilliam, if I briefly say that the head of each Committee would automatically become a member of the Cabinet. It would therefore be a hybrid system. All the amendments refer to a Cabinet in that context. It is somewhat disheartening to have to say that, although the amendments refer to there being a Cabinet, they do so in that specific context. We believe that the amendments that refer to a cabinet system remain linked with the current selection in the sense that they are probing what a cabinet system would be like in relation to the assembly. As we know, there has been much discussion in Wales about the possibility of a cabinet system rather than a committee system.

Michael Ancram (Conservative, Devizes)

Did I hear the hon. Gentleman right? Did he say that many of his amendments are merely probing amendments? We had understood this to be a matter of some significance and importance to the Liberal Democrats. We take it seriously ourselves. In the light of what has been said previously by his party, I should be surprised if these were just probing amendments.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

I mentioned at the outset of my speech the context in which the references to a Cabinet are being made. No doubt during the debate the ranking of a cabinet system compared with a committee system will be debated at some length. Some hon. Members may wish to put this matter to a vote at the end of the debate. If that is so, it is so. We Liberal Democrats have examined the possibility of a cabinet system compared with a committee system. Committees of the assembly will represent different subject areas, different regional areas—we hope—in Wales, and other aspects of government in Wales. That being so, our party feels that we need a decisive decision-making body, which could be of the Cabinet type, where decisions will be made directly as a result of good, honest, democratic debate in the Committees. We believe that that could produce a more rapid system of decision making and clearer accountability, which is an important issue in relation to how the assembly will function. We want it to function efficiently and effectively within a democratic framework. There are attractions in a cabinet system. It would give the assembly more status. It would also mean that Ministers in the Cabinet were able to take on responsibilities. Indeed, the functions of the First Secretary or the Prime Minister would be devolved to them and they would become more accountable. We would not wish to diminish too much the participation of Members of the Assembly in the committee system, where they would contribute significantly to the day-to-day running of the assembly and have input into the running of the Government in Wales, depending on the political configuration of the assembly. We believe that it is right to table these amendments. We need a good, honest, debate on them to find out whether hon. Members can be persuaded that a cabinet system might have some distinct advantages over the committee system as proposed in the Bill.

John McWilliam (Labour, Blaydon)

Order. Before I call the right hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley), I should like to apologise to him in case I might slightly have misled him. I suggested that amendments could be moved later; I must caution him that amendments now selected may fall if intervening clauses run against that line, so he may not get to that point.

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

I am grateful for that guidance, Mr. McWilliam. It is on clause 58 that the substantive question of a cabinet or committee system arises, but unfortunately—I do not criticise the selection; we are not encouraged to do that—the selection of amendments does not allow debate on an amendment to clause 58 that deals with the cabinet system. One of the most controversial aspects of the Bill in Wales is whether we shall be governed by a committee or cabinet system. It seems—if my interpretation is right—that we can have a debate on clause 52 on the name "Cabinet", but not on any of the substance of the clause in which related issues arise.

John McWilliam (Labour, Blaydon)

I want to be clear for the Official Report. That is exactly right.

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

I therefore assume that you will be fairly tolerant, Mr. McWilliam, if hon. Members go beyond the purview of clause 52 because we are bound to get into the substance of a cabinet system. Amendments Nos. 200 and 199 deal with the right to choose an appropriate title for the officials of the assembly; they deal with whether we should have Ministers or Secretaries. The assembly should be allowed the freedom to choose the title; it should not be prescribed in the Bill. The amendment would allow the assembly to choose, rather than have a decision imposed on it. Once the assembly is up and running, there is no reason why it should not have the power to change the nomenclature of its officers. In view of the spirit in which the Government introduced the Bill, I should have thought that they want to encourage that. I should be interested to hear what the Minister has to say about why that freedom cannot be allowed. 5 pm Amendment No. 194 would pave the way—as we then saw it—for the cabinet system, as would amendments Nos. 196, 197 and 195. Unfortunately, the amendment that deals with the guts of the cabinet system—the right to elect a cabinet—has not been selected. However, amendment No. 21, which has been tabled jointly by Plaid Cymru and the Liberal Democrats, involves the concept of the cabinet, so I want now to discuss whether there should be a cabinet or a committee system in the assembly. I and my colleagues feel strongly that there should be a cabinet system, for a number of reasons. We want to avoid some of the problems that arise in local government, where the committee system can sometimes be a vehicle for delay in decision making. Decisions have to go through a committee for ratification and are not valid until that committee has ratified them. We have all seen in our constituencies the frustration that is caused when people have to work through the cycle of local government committees before a decision can be ratified. That would be an unfortunate beginning for the assembly. It is possible to secure answerability for the assembly's Ministers or Secretaries—whatever they are called—to a Committee without there being a committee system. Indeed, the development of Select Committees in this House has made Ministers accountable to a Committee that deals with the subject area—although the Minister does not have to go to that Committee to get approval for any decision that he makes. It is right that the assembly's Ministers or Secretaries should be held accountable to a scrutiny Committee and appear before that Committee, perhaps more regularly than is the case in Westminster. I am convinced that a cabinet system would provide a better mechanism for taking quicker decisions. A cabinet system would also mean that when a Minister or Secretary of the assembly takes a decision, he has personal responsibility for it—it cannot be lost in the explanation that it was the Committee's decision to do this, or not to do that.

Denzil Davies (Labour, Llanelli)

I am interested in right hon. Gentleman's speech. Is he suggesting that if there were a cabinet system, the Cabinet would meet in secret whereas a Committee would meet in public? Is he advocating that?

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

The Cabinet that the right hon. Gentleman's party has established to run the countries of these islands meets in secret. That is inevitably the case when plans are being developed.

Denzil Davies (Labour, Llanelli)

Why?

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

The right hon. Gentleman should ask the Prime Minister why the Cabinet meets in secret. I am sure that, when the right hon. Gentleman was a Treasury Minister in the last Labour regime, he would have defended the need for discussions on the Budget to be held in secret. That is the difference between national government and local government. Of course, if the right hon. Gentleman views the assembly as a local government body—nothing more than an overgrown county council—I understand why he wants to have a local government system of committees. In such a case, the power of national government would not be available—

Denzil Davies (Labour, Llanelli)

What about the Council of Ministers? Would the right hon. Gentleman defend the Council of Ministers' meeting in secret?

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

The Council of Ministers does meet in secret. I know that the right hon. Gentleman has strong feelings about the way in which Europe works—or does not work—but there are times when it is necessary for the Council of Ministers to meet in secret. I would prefer greater openness and, indeed, a different system in the European Parliament. I would like there to be a second chamber—a chamber of the regions and nations. That would provide a different structure of openness. With regard to the government of countries—whether the government of the United Kingdom, France, Ireland, Denmark or, for that matter, Scotland—it is right and proper that a Cabinet should take responsibility. A cabinet system would allow a more cohesive approach to government. A joint responsibility would go along with a cabinet system, but may or may not go along with the half-baked committee system that the right hon. Gentleman would like. A joint responsibility is something which adds to the ability of government to take coherent decisions and to act in support of them.

Ted Rowlands (Labour, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney)

I thought that the whole notion behind many of the right hon. Gentleman's speeches over many months has been that there should be a new type of politics in Wales—a new style and openness in the assembly. Instead, he is describing the culture of secrecy, accountability and total collective responsibility of the Westminster model. I thought that we were supposed to pioneer some new style of politics.

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

That will happen through the scrutiny that can be made available on a much better and more rigorous basis with a cabinet system. Individual members of the Cabinet will be responsible for the stance that they take. The hon. Gentleman appears to want the assembly to be a body more akin to local government than to central Government. That is the essential difference between his point of view and mine. I want powers to be transferred from Westminster to Wales. I want decisions to be taken on a national level in Wales; I do not want the centralisation of local government on an all-Wales level. That would be the danger of going down the road advocated by the hon. Gentleman. I know that the hon. Gentleman has doubts about the model and about the assembly and that he wants a weaker model—

Ted Rowlands (Labour, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney)

No.

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

That may be the case—

Julie Morgan (Labour, Cardiff North)

I am disappointed with the right hon. Gentleman's remarks. He appears to be denigrating local government. Is he aware that the most recent survey of public opinion on local government and its democratisation shows that it has scored a great deal higher than central Government, for the very reasons suggested by my hon. Friend the Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Mr. Rowlands)?

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

I hear the hon. Lady. In no way am I denigrating local government, which does very valuable work, but there are valid criticisms of it and the speed it takes to produce decisions. Surely the hon. Lady has heard criticisms about how long it sometimes takes to get decisions out of local authorities. I was aware of that when I served on a local authority in the constituency of the hon. Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Mr. Rowlands), and I have seen it in my constituency. I have seen the frustration that occurs because of the requirements of the system. Local government serves an important function. There are people who give a lifetime's service to it and they do a dedicated job, but that does not mean that it is necessarily the best system for transferring powers to Wales. I assume that the hon. Lady is not advocating that the assembly should be more akin to local government than to devolved central Government. That is the essential point. We are talking about the devolved power of central Government.

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

I want to clarify a point that arose in the exchange between the right hon. Gentleman and my hon. Friend the Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Mr. Rowlands). My hon. Friend suggested that the White Paper and the Bill envisage that in no circumstances will any Committees of the assembly meet other than in public—

Ted Rowlands (Labour, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney)

I did not.

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

I am glad that my hon. Friend acknowledges that that is not the case. I draw the Committee's attention to clause 69(1)(b), which makes provision in the Standing Orders for Committees to meet in camera. I think that everyone accepts that there will be occasions when matters of commercial or personal confidentiality are considered and that Committees will require the opportunity to meet in camera. I think also that everyone has acknowledged that there will be occasions when the Executive Committee, for example—which will examine strategic matters such as finance and policy development—will want to meet in camera. That is why the Bill and, I should think, the Standing Orders provide for it to do so.

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

I am grateful to the Secretary of State for his intervention. Such a provision is not to ensure built-in secrecy but coherent decision taking—to ensure that people feel that they can express aloud their ideas, determine whether those ideas are working and, if necessary, withdraw them, which is inevitable in any strategic body. A strategic approach to the issues requires that that happens not only at an all-Wales level but at an all-UK level. There is broad consensus in Wales in support of a cabinet system rather than a committee system for the assembly. The support cuts across party-political boundaries. People in the Labour party, the Liberal Democrats, the Conservative party and Plaid Cymru realise the merits of a cabinet system. I remember that, after Lord Roberts—our old friend Sir Wyn Roberts—expressed an opinion on the matter, the Secretary of State said that there is essentially a continuum of possible models, running from a pure committee system to a pure cabinet system, and that the Welsh assembly will perhaps land on some point along that continuum. I shall be glad if the Minister, in his reply, will tell us how Ministers currently think that that balance will be struck. Is there any reason, if the assembly deems that it is appropriate, why the point chosen in the spectrum should not be at or close to the cabinet end rather than the committee end? If the assembly can take the decision, that will be fair enough—because it will be allowed to develop a cabinet system. If the Bill rules that out, however, amendments will have to be tabled either on Report or in the other place to ensure that the Bill allows the possibility of such a system.

Jackie Lawrence (Labour, Preseli Pembrokeshire)

I am curious about the wording of the right hon. Gentleman's amendments. As he himself has admitted that there are advantages and disadvantages with both systems, would it not have been more appropriate to table an amendment requesting that Ministers examine the advantages of both systems and the possibility of incorporating—perhaps later—the best of those systems, rather than doing what he is doing now: choosing one system that he admits has disadvantages?

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

As the hon. Lady knows, our original amendment was not selected; technically, we are debating only a name. We are therefore debating an enormously important issue without having a substantive amendment to allow us to achieve our objective. If she were so minded, yes, it would be possible to table, on Report, an amendment to achieve that end.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

The hon. Member for Preseli Pembrokeshire (Ms Lawrence) mentioned providing the best of both systems, which was the objective of amendment No. 11A. That amendment was not selected, which is a pity. I know that the right hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley) also is being thwarted by not being able to debate the matter on that broader basis.

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

I hope that amendments dealing with the substance of a cabinet system will be selected for the Bill's Report stage, unless by then Ministers have said either that they interpret the Bill in a manner that allows the assembly to develop a cabinet system or that they will table amendments in the other place or on Report to make such a system possible. It is immensely important to ensure that the assembly has a central and dynamic core to drive issues forward. A Cabinet would be answerable to the subject Committees and to the assembly itself. We should remember that the assembly will be composed of only 60 persons. The Executive will therefore not be remote from its membership. An Executive would enable the assembly to take decisions quickly, coherently and strategically. A cabinet system would also provide necessary credibility in Europe and elsewhere. The type of system that the assembly will use is a very important issue. I hope that other hon. Members will follow up on it, so that—regardless of which issues the House divides on today—we reach a conclusion on the desirability of a cabinet system and can hear from Ministers how they will satisfy the feeling that has been expressed by so many hon. Members on both sides of the House.

Michael Ancram (Conservative, Devizes)

I was somewhat entertained by listening to the comments on Cabinet secrecy. Every Friday morning, hon. Members have the wonderful experience of reading riveting stories about who is saying what to whom in Cabinet, who is being rude to whom and who is looking out of the window. Sometimes the theory of Cabinet secrecy is perhaps honoured more in the thought than in the action.

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

The right hon. Gentleman is not trying to tell the House that he believes those stories, is he?

Michael Ancram (Conservative, Devizes)

As I read that they come from "an official Downing street source", I perhaps rather naively think that they have some authority and assume that I am supposed to believe them. However, I will not get into a discussion on Cabinet secrecy, other than to say that any of those bodies can be as open or as secret as they think is appropriate at the time. I am in the rather surprising position of supporting amendment No. 10A, which the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Mr. Livsey) says is a probing amendment. He did not say whether amendment No. 11 A, which he felt he could not speak to, is also a probing amendment. Regardless, our amendments have been tabled in all seriousness. I tell the right hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley) that, in tabling our amendments, we did not draw a distinction between changing the name of the First Secretary and the theory of a cabinet system. We believe that the two essentially go together and are part and parcel of what we are trying to achieve. In amendment Nos. 91 to 41, we are effectively trying to change the name of the First Secretary to the First Minister, Secretaries to Ministers and the Committee to an Assembly Cabinet. I think that we are consistent in trying to do that. Amendment No. 42 is also in keeping with a cabinet structure, as we propose that a Cabinet should continue in existence only while it retains the assembly's confidence. That would be a right and proper part of the Cabinet's role. We propose replacing the committee system with a cabinet system. That is not a new idea for Conservative Members, as we discussed it during the referendum campaign and have talked about it since. The reasons for the replacement are essentially those mentioned by the right hon. Member for Caernarfon and the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnorshire. Reading the Bill, it is not easy to determine how the Committee, as it is described, would operate within an assembly. The Bill seems to be confused—perhaps because the practical detail is always difficult to envisage—about whether it is designed to share power among all the assembly's participants or to concentrate it. Either objective would be possible. Regardless of what happens to this group of amendments, the House will have to know a little more about how the Government think an Executive Committee will work in practice. A central question is where the power in the Committee will reside. Will it reside with the First Minister or with the Executive Committee? Will it reside with the individual Secretaries and with their Committees? Will it reside—as I sometimes fear is the case when there is confusion—with officials? One of our concerns is that the current blurred position will make accountability—not only to politicians but to the public—a serious issue. The people in Wales will want to know who is responsible for what and—if necessary, as is the case in politics—who to blame if things go wrong. The experience of local government and the committee system tends to show that political accountability can become blurred. With a committee system, it is easier to argue that responsibility is shared, that it is everyone's fault if something goes wrong and, if necessary, that it is to everyone's credit if things go right. My experience is that there tends to be a less than clear political focus, although I am in no way disparaging local government by saying that. My understanding of the Bill is that we are not creating, or at least we should not be creating, local government. A committee structure is perhaps less in keeping with what we are attempting to do than is a cabinet structure, as there is to be in Scotland. Under that system, those holding responsibility are appointed by the First Minister or First Secretary, as our amendments seek to provide. That also creates the accountability in that the First Minister decides who his Ministers will be and they are responsible for their intromissions. I am surprised that the Government seem to have set about creating what I can only describe as a constitutional mule—it is neither one thing nor the other, neither local government nor the type of cabinet structure to which we are accustomed. My experience of committee structures is that they give undue influence to officials. Throughout local government, officials play an important role in putting forward recommendations and hold greater sway over elected members than is the case in a cabinet structure. If the assembly is a genuine exercise in democracy—I make this point having said all I have to say about devolution—and if we are trying to make it work effectively, what is proposed would undermine it. The proposals for a committee system are a fundamental weakness in the Bill. Our amendments, and those tabled by the Liberal Democrats, would cure that weakness. I hope that the Government will consider them, as it is a matter about which we feel very strongly.

Julie Morgan (Labour, Cardiff North)

As we consider the structure of the assembly, it is important to examine the principles behind it and incorporate them into that structure. The first principle of the assembly is that it should be as democratic as it can be. That means that people who hold positions in the assembly should be democratically elected. There should be as little patronage as possible. I know that patronage is endemic in all types of government, but it should be limited, so I do not agree with the amendment, tabled, I think, by the Conservatives, that states that the First Secretary should appoint the Secretaries to the Cabinet. That would not be acceptable. The Secretaries should be democratically elected, as that would be in tune with what we are trying to do in Wales.

Dafydd Wigley (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

Although we are not allowed to debate amendment No. 201, the hon. Lady might have noted that it would provide for the election rather than the selection of a Cabinet.

Julie Morgan (Labour, Cardiff North)

Yes, I had noted that.

Michael Ancram (Conservative, Devizes)

The hon. Lady is making a case for electing members of the Cabinet. Would she like that to happen in Westminster, too?

Julie Morgan (Labour, Cardiff North)

We are not debating the system here, but patronage is too prevalent in all forms of government. We want a different style of government in Wales. At Westminster, some people are in government, some are out, and the rest of us have to knock on the door and try to influence what is happening from outside. We do not want to reproduce that system in Wales. As I was saying, the first principle on which we should structure the assembly is democracy. The second should be inclusiveness—we need to involve as many people as possible. That means that there should be a role for all Members elected to the assembly, including those who are not First Secretary or Secretaries. The importance of the National Assembly is that it should weld together the whole of Wales. We must ensure that everyone in the National Assembly has a role and feels that he or she has a part to play in planning the future of Wales.

Ted Rowlands (Labour, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney)

A stakeholder assembly.

Julie Morgan (Labour, Cardiff North)

Indeed. Another important principle on which to structure the assembly is the involvement of organisations from outside it. That can be done by some form of co-option, bringing in advisers and undertaking consultation. It will be done more easily and effectively via a committee system. A Committee should meet regularly and follow a programme of work; its members will develop expertise in the subject covered by it—although I hope that the Committees will cover a group of subjects rather than individual subjects. In my intervention on the right hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley), I referred to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation survey carried out in 1995. It revealed that the public had very little regard for quangos. That did not surprise us because one of the reasons we are to have devolution in Wales is the corruption of the quango system. The survey also showed that the general public had a much higher regard for local authorities than for central Government. I think that that has something to do with the element of secrecy in central Government and the fact that the Government are seen as being more removed from the people. I am concerned that the move towards a cabinet system in Wales has something to do with status and the feeling that in some way the overall British system is preferable. In setting up the National Assembly, we should be attempting to do something different. We should be creating something unique because we have a unique opportunity.

Cynog Dafis (Plaid Cymru, Ceredigion)

There might be an element of status, which is important in itself, but when we are talking about Ministers and Cabinets, we are not talking only about the British system. I am not absolutely sure that they are the norm, but I imagine that they are common in regional governments throughout Europe. That is bound to be the case in Catalonia, the Basque country and the German Lander. There is no contradiction between that and having a committee system that in fact enables wide consultation and participation and a thorough critique of what the Cabinet and Ministers might be doing.

Julie Morgan (Labour, Cardiff North)

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that contribution. There is no doubt that there is a mixture of systems in various regions and countries, but my point is that we need to come up with proposals that are dictated by what is good for Wales.

Julie Morgan (Labour, Cardiff North)

We should look at other models to find out what is best for Wales. Systems develop in certain ways. For example, the cabinet system could develop into a presidential system. One could say that that happened under Margaret Thatcher. There are dangers in every system. I do not consider everything in Westminster to be an abject failure—there is good and bad. We want what is best for Wales. It is clear, however, that we cannot discuss everything here. The advisory committee must work on the proposals, discuss them and produce advice for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. I hope that he will make that advice widely available for discussion and debate throughout Wales so that we can all participate in creating an assembly for everyone in Wales.

Oliver Letwin (Conservative, West Dorset)

I have been listening to the debate with increasing astonishment as I fear that the Committee has been debating a Bill other than the one before us. I thought that the purpose of considering a Bill in Committee was to investigate that Bill, rather than some abstract idea. I should like to speak to amendment No. 31 and the comments of my right hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Mr. Ancram), who alone alluded to the problem: what is being created here? The Bill refers to various Committees, and it would be otiose to mention them all. However, the hon. Member for Cardiff, North (Ms Morgan) said that it would be nice to do something different, creative and unique. The clauses under discussion achieve exactly that—to a far greater extent than she imagines. Subsections (7) and (8) of clause 57 have a profound effect on whether the assembly has Committees or a Cabinet. Unless I am much mistaken, they allow for the Committees to delegate the functions that have been delegated to the assembly by the Secretary of State—or other Secretaries of State—to their Assembly Secretaries. They allow a strange bath-tub effect of delegation downwards by the Secretary of State to the assembly and then upwards again from the assembly to a Committee, and from the Committee to its Assembly Secretary. The Assembly Secretaries, quite possibly endowed with plenary authority by their respective Committees, sit on the Executive Committee. Under other clauses of the Bill, the entire functions of the Executive Committee can be devolved upwards to the Assembly First Secretary. It is slightly unclear, to put it mildly, whether the Assembly Secretaries on the Executive Committee can devolve the entirety of their powers—which they may have gained from the Committees—to the First Secretary. However, it is clear that they can devolve anything that lies within the remit of the Executive Committee. What we have is by no means a committee structure reflecting that of local government. Any local government authority that acted in that way would immediately be taken to court and prevented from so doing. Nor do we have a Westminster system in which the Cabinet is accountable to the House and has to legislate through it. I admit that in present circumstances and with an equivalent majority, not much attention is paid to the niceties of Westminster, but, formally at least, the Bill is being debated in the House and in Committee, and the Government are accountable to the House. On the contrary, under the system outlined in this part of the Bill, the functions delegated to the assembly could be legislated on exclusively and in private—as the Standing Orders could determine—within the Executive Committee by Assembly Secretaries, each endowed with plenary authority, without the need to go back to their Committees or the Assembly.

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

That is quite wrong.

Oliver Letwin (Conservative, West Dorset)

The Secretary of State says from a sedentary position that that is quite wrong. It would be most helpful if he would elucidate on that.

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

The hon. Gentleman said that the Executive Committee would be able to legislate. The Executive Committee would have no legislative powers.

Oliver Letwin (Conservative, West Dorset)

If the Secretary of State had been attending closely, he would know that I was trying to say that the Assembly Secretaries could have been given plenary power by their Committees, so in the Executive Committee, each of them could legislate in their own domain as a sort of corporation sole legislature. To use the phrase of the hon. Member for Cardiff, North, it would be a creative, unique and different arrangement. In practice, if each Assembly Secretary had sole delegated power, they would discuss matters with one another. When they chose to act within whatever remit the Executive Committee had been given under the Standing Orders, they could also devolve their powers entirely to the First Secretary so that in those matters, the First Secretary could rule without reference even to the rest of the Executive Committee, let alone the other Committees or the assembly.

Jackie Lawrence (Labour, Preseli Pembrokeshire)

Does the hon. Gentleman acknowledge that the Assembly Secretaries are subject to a democratic process, as they have to be elected by their Committees? Plenary powers would have to be vested in them democratically by their Committees.

Oliver Letwin (Conservative, West Dorset)

I am delighted that the hon. Lady raised that point, as it brings me to my next and final point. It appears that the Committees will be new and democratic in their constitution because they will be disposed in proportion to the constitution of the assembly, which, it is expected, will be proportional to the electorate. So we are meant to have a system resembling that of local government, but more so, in which proportionality is reflected through the ascending hierarchy. Far from being the case, however, that is an illusion. The Committees will vote by simple, not qualified, majority. Therefore, it will be consistently the case that a single party—the Labour party—will be able, by simple majority vote, to give plenary power to each of the Assembly Secretaries, who no doubt will be from that party, thereby depriving all other members of the Committee of the slightest vestige of power. Those individuals will then be able to legislate for Wales.

Oliver Letwin (Conservative, West Dorset)

The hon. Gentleman is quite right. There could be circumstances under which the result of proportional representation would create a coalition. If the powers that I have just described were used in those circumstances, there would be an almighty constitutional muddle as the person chosen to have the plenary power could not come from all the constituent parties of the assembly. My point is not that it is a good or a bad system, but that it is an unholy muddle. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Devizes said, it has the appearance of a committee structure, but, in reality, it is either a committee structure similar to that in local government, but more so, or, according to the Standing Orders of which we have no current knowledge, it is the most autocratic system of legislation yet invented for an assembly not only in European history, but—as far as I am aware—in world history. Providing for both those possibilities, with an ambiguity that only a legislative draftsman could achieve, and without the Secretary of State in the White Paper or elsewhere having remotely alluded to the possibility of different approaches, has resulted in an extraordinary muddle.

Jackie Lawrence (Labour, Preseli Pembrokeshire)

I wonder whether the hon. Gentleman believes in democracy. Regardless of the constitution of the Committee, in which there may be a majority of one party, is it not the basic principle of democracy that when a democratic vote is taken, the decision rests on the will of the majority? It would appear that the hon. Gentleman is arguing against the very principles of democracy.

Oliver Letwin (Conservative, West Dorset)

I had intended to finish, but I shall reply to that important point. There are two kinds of democracy. There is the democracy of the ballot box, which is fundamental. That has led to a Labour Government with a massive majority at the moment. I fully accept that, as I accept that similar majorities might occur in the Welsh assembly. That is no problem. However, there is another aspect of democracy, which I suspect that the hon. Lady thinks is as important as I do. Of necessity, such an election occurs only every so often. Between elections, there should be a system of accountability that ensures that when legislation comes forward, it is debated and discussed in open assembly by elected representatives, who may or may not be of the governing party. I am describing a constitutional muddle that would permit control over legislation by a so-called assembly to be entirely concentrated in the hands of a few people with plenary power to legislate in private on behalf of the assembly and this Parliament, without reference to anyone and without debate. I suspect that that would satisfy the hon. Member for Preseli Pembrokeshire (Ms Lawrence) no more than it satisfies me.

Ted Rowlands (Labour, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney)

I support the system proposed in the Bill and the eloquent speech made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, West—

Rhodri Morgan (Labour, Cardiff West)

North.

Ted Rowlands (Labour, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney)

I mean my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, North (Ms Morgan). She demolished some of the arguments of the right hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley). It is a pity that we are not on clauses 57 and 58. As in many of his speeches, the hon. Member for West Dorset (Mr. Letwin) built great constructions around one or two points, but when we look more closely at his points, we see that they are less substantial than they appear to be. The Assembly Secretaries who form the Executive Committee will be elected by each of the Assembly Committees. It falls within the power of the Assembly Committees to dispose of or alter votes of no confidence in the Assembly Secretary if he cannot carry the support of the subject Committee that elected him. The Assembly Secretaries will be accountable to the Committee that gave them their status. If my interpretation is right, we are seeking a different model from that so touchingly proposed by the right hon. Member for Caernarfon, which is almost identical to the Westminster model, with all its strengths and weaknesses. The Cabinet would not be elected. A Cabinet cannot be elected; it is chosen by the Prime Minister—which the right hon. Gentleman and others also want. Under the structure in the Bill, at least the Assembly Secretaries have to obtain the support of the subject Committees that they lead. That gives them the authority to be Assembly Secretaries. Once there is a Prime Minister and other Ministers, there will be deputy Ministers. As a student of British government, I have watched the spawning of junior ministerial ranks. In the mid-1930s, I think that there were only 25 Ministers. Certainly before the first world war, there were no more than a couple of dozen Ministers. Since then, we have gained Ministers of State and Parliamentary Under-Secretaries. Such a system of deputy Ministers and deputy deputy Ministers might grow with a Cabinet structure. Lo and behold, we might even transpose from this place the concept of Parliamentary Private Secretaries. [Interruption.] I do not know whether my hon. Friend the Member for West Carmarthen and South Pembrokeshire (Mr. Ainger) was groaning or expressing hopeful anticipation of a role that he might play. I do not deny that I have had the pleasure of being a Minister through the patronage system, but, through the 1980s, I watched the growth of patronage in both major parties, including shadow patronage, which is as frightening because it is as binding and stifling as the real thing. That has lessened independence of thought and speech in the Chamber in the past 30 years. Transposing such a system to a Welsh assembly would result in the gradual growth of patronage systems in the assembly, creating a dominant powerful Executive of the governing group. If we have a Prime Minister, we shall have a shadow Prime Minister. If we have a shadow Prime Minister, we shall have shadow Ministers. If we have deputy Ministers, we shall have shadow deputies. I do not want the patronage system, which I have seen grow in my parliamentary lifetime into a stifling influence, to be carried to the new and interesting politics that I hope will emerge from the Welsh assembly. 5.45 pm What problem were we trying to address by creating an assembly? Surely the major problem was the concentration of power in one Department—the Welsh Office—and in the Secretary of State, who has a range of functions. Outside that system, we were trying to address the growth of the quango state. I thought that everyone campaigning for any form of devolution, however far down the road we wanted to go, wanted to bring a new spirit of openness to the decision-making processes. We wanted open debate and discussion, particularly on the allocation of resources. The hon. Member for West Dorset talked about legislation. The assembly will not legislate—not in the manner of the Scottish Parliament. We are establishing the assembly to have an open debate on the allocation of the £6 billion or £7 billion of Government resources that are the responsibility of the Secretary of State for Wales and the host of quangos that spend some of it. That is its fundamental task. It must be done more openly than a Westminster Cabinet style of decision making would achieve. The centrepiece of the case for devolution was that we would bring a breath of fresh air to the decision-making processes for the allocation of such large resources.

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

My hon. Friend is speaking with his experience as a former Minister in the Welsh Office. If there is any merit in the arguments for moving towards a Cabinet style, it is that hundreds of decisions have to be taken every day. They are not the major strategic spending decisions that my hon. Friend is referring to, but the day-to-day decisions that are necessary to give effect to the broad strategic decisions taken collectively by the assembly.

Ted Rowlands (Labour, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney)

Exactly. The notion that that cannot be done by open debate in Committees is nonsense. My right hon. Friend is right. We were seeking more openness in decision making at operational and strategic level on the allocation of spending and resourcing priorities. That is the primary function of the assembly.

Oliver Letwin (Conservative, West Dorset)

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that if he were trying to achieve his aim, he would have to recommend an amendment that deprived Committees of the ability to give their entire powers to Secretaries?

Ted Rowlands (Labour, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney)

The great value and extremely important function of our Committee proceedings is to make us read the texts over and over again. I spend quite a lot of time reading them. I began re-reading clauses 57 and 58 as a result of the hon. Gentleman's interesting observations. I understand why clause 57 gives powers to the Assembly Secretaries. The Assembly Secretaries, with the First Secretary, can make decisions independently. I think that that system exists in local government, where certain power is delegated to various smaller groups, such as chairmen of committees, at various times in the year. The hon. Member for West Dorset is wrong to imply that the Assembly Secretaries described in clause 58 would be unaccountable and—I think that he used the word—autocratic, because they derive their power entirely from their election by the subject Committees, as is laid down in clause 57. That is not an autocratic system; it is directly accountable. If one of the subject Committee Secretaries cannot carry his Committee, he will be out on his ear—not by the decision of a Prime Minister in some reshuffle, but by the power of the subject Committees and other Committees. The hon. Gentleman is right to say that that is a different model. The clauses do not construct a local government system. They construct a different decision-making process which is suited to the assembly's central task: to bring greater democratic pressure to bear on decision making and the allocation of resources. The difference between a cabinet structure and even a local government structure lies in who controls the information that is given to the elected members. In a cabinet structure, as I know from experience, the information given out is controlled—even at departmental and ministerial levels. Certain options in the debate—in the Whitehall system and among Ministers—are eliminated. What is released to the House of Commons is basically the preferred option. Sometimes, slight variations are offered in Green Papers, but, generally, the process is one of filtering information for final scrutiny. The system that we are suggesting is different. As my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, North suggested, it allows greater openness. It allows officials, to whom the right hon. Member for Devizes (Mr. Ancram) referred, to deliver more information to the assembly than could possibly be provided in a cabinet structure.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

The hon. Gentleman's theory about openness of government and giving control to Members of the Assembly is sound. Surely he should have begun that battle with his party ages ago. What about the closed list system, which concentrates power on political parties and not on individual candidates?

Ted Rowlands (Labour, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney)

I have made my views on the closed list system very clear to my right hon. and hon. Friends. On this occasion, I whole-heartedly support the clauses before us.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

This has been a very important debate. It was instigated by the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Mr. Livsey) and has produced a wide variety of views. Most importantly, for the first time in these debates, the official Opposition have made enlightened and constructive comments on the way in which the assembly should be run. The purpose of the amendments is to establish a cabinet model of internal organisation for the assembly. The Cabinet would consist of a Prime Minister of Wales—an Assembly First Minister—and, perhaps, Assembly Ministers, who would be appointed by the First Minister. That Cabinet would be collectively responsible to the assembly and would hold office only while retaining the assembly's confidence. I have listened very closely to both sides of the argument. The right hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley) made much of the difference between a cabinet model and a committee model, especially the local government committee model. My hon. Friends the Members for Cardiff, North (Ms Morgan) and for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Mr. Rowlands) made great play of what they felt were more open and inclusive forms of decision making in local government. In both cases, the strengths and weaknesses of the system are dependent on the people who are in charge. I recall some local government systems that included a full panoply of committees, but which were as closed and as secret as any cabinet committee structure. We must consider all systems in the context of who will be in charge. The Bill would allow, more or less, for either extreme to be accommodated. A cabinet model, more or less, could be accommodated, as the hon. Member for West Dorset (Mr. Letwin) tried to point out in a rather theoretical way. On the other hand, at the other end of the spectrum, a pure committee system could be accommodated. We believe that there can be points along the spectrum, and that the assembly can make its own decisions about how it might like to operate. The assembly will be a democratically accountable body and be able to decide such matters for itself. We do not want to prescribe the exact internal architecture of the assembly. The issue of how the Standing Orders might lead to the operation of the assembly has been given to the advisory group, which will pass on its thinking to the Commissioners.

Michael Ancram (Conservative, Devizes)

I am listening very closely to the Minister, and I thank him for the attention that he paid to our proposals. Does not he accept that the detail of the proposed committee structure is prescriptive? As my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans) said, the Bill is indistinct and confused in what it is trying to achieve. It would be for the benefit of the people in Wales, and indeed the system, if the Minister were to say now that he would accept one of the amendments as a token of his good faith in the imposition of a cabinet structure. I suggest that if he finds it difficult to accept the amendments relating to the Cabinet, he should consider amendments relating to the name of the First Minister or the First Secretary. If he could accept one of them, I would be satisfied. Obviously, if he could not do that, we should have to take our own view of what he meant by the refusal.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

The clauses allow for what the hon. Member for West Dorset thought was confusion, but what can be seen as flexibility in the way in which the assembly will operate. The Commissioners will obviously undertake their work having regard for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State's guidance—although they will also be informed by this debate. We believe that the advisory group and the Commissioners will continue to consult widely in Wales on any specific proposals on how the assembly might operate—whether it is much more of a local government system or one that moves towards a cabinet system. We believe that this debate has been very helpful in providing a view for the advisory group and the Commissioners to consider. We still see a need for consideration and flexibility in how these matters are to be handled; nothing is settled yet. The advisory group will be able to consider these things. I hope that, in that context, the amendment can be withdrawn.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

I hear what the Minister says, and I believe that he is correct in saying that we have had a good debate. I do not have time to go into all aspects of it, but obviously there are differences of opinion about whether there should be a complete cabinet or a complete committee system. Therefore, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Ieuan Wyn Jones (Plaid Cymru, Ynys Môn)

I beg to move amendment No.272,in page 27,line 7,at end insert 'and the Assembly First Secretary Shall be treated as being an office of ministerial level for the purposes of Article 203 of The Treaty of Amsterdam'.

Alan Haselhurst (Deputy Speaker, Saffron Walden)

With this, it will be convenient to discuss the following: Amendment No. 273, in clause 57, page 28, line 31, at end insert 'and the Assembly Secretaries shall be treated as being offices of ministerial level for the purposes of Article 203 of the Treaty of Amsterdam'.

Ieuan Wyn Jones (Plaid Cymru, Ynys Môn)

The Minister will recall the interesting discussion that we had on Second Reading. He responded to points that I had raised about the relationship between the National Assembly for Wales, and Europe and the European Union institutions. The purpose of amendments Nos. 272, 273 and 440 and new clause 9 is to flesh out and test the assurances that he gave towards the end of his speech on that occasion. I welcome the spirit of his remarks at the end of the second day of the Second Reading debate. We are moving in the same direction. However, there are matters that we want to have written into the Bill, although he will recognise that some of the amendments are probing amendments. Amendments Nos. 272 and 273 would allow the First Secretary or the Secretaries of the subject Committees to attend the Council of Ministers and to deliver the United Kingdom vote on certain matters. It is generally accepted on both sides of the Committee that there will not be many occasions on which the representatives of the assembly will be in a position to deliver that vote, but it is important for us to make it clear that they are authorised to do so when the occasion arises. The Minister said that there would be occasions, such as debates on minority languages, when it would be appropriate for Secretaries to attend the Council of Ministers and deliver the UK vote. We all accept that that would be on the basis of agreement with the UK, but it should be specifically authorised. As a former Member of the European Parliament, the Minister will know that the Maastricht treaty set out the circumstances that would allow representatives of regional Governments to deliver the vote on behalf of the member state. That treaty obligation is repeated under article 203 of the treaty of Amsterdam, in identical words to those in the previous treaty. We want it to be written into the Bill that the Secretaries, as officers for the purposes of the Council of Ministers, are authorised to deliver the vote. There is a good reason for that. Although the Minister acknowledged that that would be appropriate in certain circumstances, the assurance would depend on the good will of the Government of the day. I have no hesitation in accepting the good will of the current Minister, the current Secretary of State or any of the current ministerial team in the Welsh Office. However, I would be worried if there were a Government of a different political complexion, or a Government who did not have the same view of those matters. Although we acknowledge the commitment that the Minister gave on Second Reading, will he now take it one stage further and write it into the Bill, so that any future Government would not be able to say that the Secretary was attending the Council of Ministers through the good will of the UK Government? The Secretary's attendance must be authorised under the Government of Wales Act, as we hope the Bill will shortly become. As for amendment No. 440, the Minister will know that under the Bill the assembly is obliged to implement any directives that emerge from the European Council of Ministers and subsequently become EU law. However, I cannot find any obligation on the EU institutions to ensure proper scrutiny by the assembly of such draft directives; or to allow the assembly to pass on any comments or observations while the documents are still being considered in draft form. In other words, what mechanism is there to allow the views of the assembly to be heard before the Council of Ministers votes on draft directives? It is crucial that the views of the assembly on a number of key areas be put to European Union institutions. Agriculture is one such area. The Minister knows of farmers' concern about the current crisis; and about the importance of any reform of the common agricultural policy to rural areas of the type many of us represent, because of the effects that it will have on support for agriculture. It is vital that the assembly's views on any reform proposals under Agenda 2000 be taken into account by the European institutions. For that, we need clear structures and lines of communication. Another such issue is the environment; indeed, agriculture and the environment often go together. The proposal is to move away from direct support for agriculture—aids to production—and towards agrienvironmental payments. Here again, the assembly will need to scrutinise any key decisions that are made. Although transport is very important to Wales, I acknowledge that the assembly will have no responsibility for railways; but the Minister will know of the forthcoming strategic routes decisions to be taken in the EU, affecting, for instance, the north Wales coast railway line and the south Wales main line. How are they to be fitted into the European integrated transport structure? Are they to be regarded as key trans-European networks, or are they to be relegated to second-class status? Tourism is the fourth key area of scrutiny for the assembly in the context of European Union directives. We want the assembly to have the authority both to scrutinise the directives and to put its views to the relevant EU institutions. New clause 9 is a little more comprehensive than the amendments. Clause 34 provides that the Assembly may consider and make representations about any matter affecting Wales. New clause 9 is an attempt to find out what that really means in the context of our relations with the European Union. First, the First Secretary or other Secretaries should be part of delegations to the Council of Ministers by agreement with the UK Government of the day, either in a formal capacity or with observer status on some occasions. It is important also that representatives of the assembly be on those delegations, because many important decisions are taken well before votes are delivered or prepared statements made before the Council of Ministers. It is in the crucial negotiations leading up to decisions that assembly representatives need to be present. The second issue dealt with by the new clause concerns the selecting of representatives to ECOSOC, the Economic and Social Committee of the European Union. Who will decide who the representatives from Wales should be? I can find nothing in the Bill referring to ECOSOC, although there is a reference to the Committee of the Regions—another matter on which the Government need to explain their thinking. Schedule 8 amends previous legislation, stipulating that representatives on the Committee of the Regions can come from local authorities or the assembly. The Secretary of State will recall our debates on these matters, following which it was decided that representatives from Wales should be selected by local government representatives. He will further recall the problem to do with the authority of the representatives from some member states who had been selected by local government vis-à-vis the authority of others selected by regional government. The tendency was to have two classes of representative: regional government representatives being regarded as first-class members and local government representatives as second-class members. We may or may not wish to pursue that today; suffice it to say that it was the inevitable consequence of decisions taken in the past. Now we want to know the Government's intentions. Theoretically, under the Bill, there could be two representatives on the Committee of the Regions selected by local government, or two from the assembly, or one from each. Our view has always been—I hope that I carry my colleagues with me—that they should be selected by the assembly. Our reasons for saying so have always been clear—representatives to the Committee of the Regions should represent the whole of Wales. Local government representatives tend to give a voice to the areas that they represent. That is why our preference is for assembly representatives to serve on the Committee of the Regions. I have already discussed scrutiny on amendment No. 440, so I shall not dwell on it. Lastly, I want to touch on the issue of representation on United Kingdom permanent representation in Brussels. On Second Reading, the Minister said that it would be possible for staff serving the assembly to be representatives, on occasion, on UKREP. That is an important issue. As the Minister knows from his experience of delegations to the Council of Ministers, much of the work is carried out well before matters are put to Ministers. Many of the ground rules are agreed during the drafting of directives by the Commission. The Commission's directive on the reform of structural funds, for example, is currently exercising many minds in Wales. It is important that the views of the national assembly are made clear to the Commission through UKREP while directives are being drafted, rather than when decisions are being taken by the Council of Ministers. Those matters were canvassed in general terms on Second Reading. We now want more flesh on the bones. We await the Minister's response with interest.

Denzil Davies (Labour, Llanelli)

I was not going to speak until I heard the speech of the hon. Member for Ynys Mon (Mr. Jones). In so far as we debated the matter during the referendum campaign, neither the representatives of some of the farming unions nor Plaid Cymru thought that there was a problem. People who raised the issue were said to be trying to spoil things. Since then, we have discovered that there is a problem. When the hon. Member for Ynys Mon said that he wanted the Welsh assembly to be part of UKREP—the United Kingdom permanent representation—he laid bare the illogicality of his argument.

Ieuan Wyn Jones (Plaid Cymru, Ynys Môn)

Will the right hon. Gentleman take care to read the Hansard report of the debate on Second Reading? The Minister said: Assembly staff will be able to be part of UKREP". —[Official Report, 9 December 1997; Vol. 302, c. 892.]

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

If that is a fact, I do not see why it needs to be specified in the Bill. There is a real problem, as the hon. Gentleman knows. There was the perfectly understandable desire—many of us have been round this course during the past 20 years—to decentralise government in Wales and devolve power from the Welsh Office. That was the basis of the whole argument for devolution. The hon. Gentleman, it seems, is no longer happy with that, and wants to turn the assembly into a Government Department. Usually, the United Kingdom is represented on the Council of Ministers by Ministers with Departments. The hon. Gentleman is worried that, under the Bill, the Secretary of State for Wales will no longer have a Department, which will create problems when Ministers negotiate in the Council of Ministers and other European institutions. I understand the hon. Gentleman's dilemma. He wants to fill the void by sending Members of the Assembly to sit on the Council of Ministers. That is cloud cuckoo land, as is so often the case in the arguments of such people as the hon. Gentleman who want to move further and further down the road of devolution. The hon. Gentleman's proposal would create problems. For example, will the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry represent the whole of the United Kingdom or just England, given that her departmental responsibilities will be for England and not for Wales? Similar problems will arise in relation to agriculture, and those problems are created by devolution itself. I do not see how they can be solved, but perhaps the Minister can tell us. Devolution brings benefits and liabilities. One of the minuses is that we shall lose a Government Department headed by the Secretary of State for Wales. The advantage of that is that we can democratically debate the allocation of resources in the assembly, although Plaid Cymru does not want a democratic debate—it wants a Cabinet to determine the allocation of resources in secret, as the right hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley) said. A nation state's representation in the European Union is based on the Council of Ministers and, within the Council of Ministers, on Ministers who have Departments. The fact that Wales will have a Secretary of State without a Department will cause considerable problems. The amendment would make very little difference to the situation, which is a minus that Wales will have to accept.

Michael Ancram (Conservative, Devizes)

I broadly agree with the right hon. Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies). As he said, this is not a new problem. When a number of us raised it during the referendum campaign, we were accused of scaremongering—that was the word I heard most often. I am reminded that, in the foreword to the White Paper, the Secretary of State said: An elected Assembly will give Wales a voice—in Britain and in Europe—after years of neglect. He said not that he, as Secretary of State, would give Wales a voice in Europe after years of neglect—that is a strange phrase to use in a non-political document, but I shall let that pass—but that the elected assembly would. We were entitled, therefore, to see whether the Bill would establish a new way in which to create that stronger voice. Paragraph 3.46 of the White Paper states: Wales needs a strong voice in Europe. It says that the Secretary of State will continue to represent Wales in the Council of Ministers. As I said when we debated the White Paper, there is nothing new in that. The only new factor in the White Paper is that there will be arrangements to allow close liaison and consultation with the assembly. When we look for details of that in the Bill, however, we find that it is silent. The Secretary of State may be able to be the voice of Wales in the Council of Ministers, but, as the right hon. Member for Llanelli said, his voice will be weaker, as he will not have a Department behind him. Moreover, there are no arrangements to formalise how officials will advise him. Those who have held ministerial office in Wales and Scotland recognise that an enormous amount of preparation work is done by officials. They prepare for the deliberations of Ministers in the Cabinet Sub-Committee on European policy or work in the Commission on papers for the Council of Ministers. They can do that because, whether they are from the Welsh Office or the Scottish Office, they are officials of the United Kingdom Government. Yet nearly all those officials in Wales will be transferred to the assembly. How will they be brought back into that system of consultation? To whom will they owe their loyalty: to the assembly, which will be their master, or to the United Kingdom Government, on whose behalf they will appear to act?

Ted Rowlands (Labour, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney)

I am closely following the right hon. Gentleman's argument. He mentions a point on which we have not been able to engineer a debate in Committee—the concept of the concordat. I assume that the answer to some of his questions will be covered by the concordat, but we have not heard about it yet.

Michael Ancram (Conservative, Devizes)

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for making that point. As I was about to say, all the Government tell us is, "Don't worry; it will all be in a concordat." That, at least, is what we are told in relation to Scotland; I am not sure that we have been told it in relation to Wales. I know what a concordat means between Governments, but I do not know what it will mean in the framework of devolution. If it means an agreement between friends, it will not be worth the paper on which it is written when the friendships cease. How complicated will the concordat be? Will it deal with the problems of loyalty and allegiance among civil servants if they are used in that way? We are dealing with a highly complex matter that has not been thought through properly. The White Paper was pretty weak, but the Bill is totally silent. Even if there is a concordat, what will happen not if there is a political difference between London and Cardiff—as the hon. Member for Ynys Mon (Mr. Jones) suggested—but if there is a conflict of interest? We know that there may be a conflict of interest in the Scottish context between Scottish and Cornish fishermen, for example. Whose view would the United Kingdom representative advocate in that situation? If the interests of Welsh hill farmers conflicted with those of farmers elsewhere in the United Kingdom on the important topic of agriculture, where would the loyalty of the Secretary of State or the Minister who goes to the Council of Ministers lie? What concordat will bind him to neglect, if necessary, the interests of his area in order to represent the interests of another area where he has not been elected and has no democratic representative interest? The White Paper was pretty silent about those problems, but the Bill is completely silent. That is a major flaw in the legislation, which we warned the Government about during the referendum campaign and which has still not been addressed. It could lead to enormous resentment in the future, when the people of Wales find that, far from achieving the stronger voice that they were promised, their voice is much weaker. At present, the Secretary of State can attend meetings of the Council of Ministers. He can participate in deliberations, vote and, if necessary, lead—I think that a Welsh Minister led on one occasion. If those responsibilities are transferred to the assembly, what will happen if there is a conflict of interest?

Ieuan Wyn Jones (Plaid Cymru, Ynys Môn)

How many times did the Secretary of State for Wales deliver the United Kingdom votes during 18 years of Conservative government?

Michael Ancram (Conservative, Devizes)

According to the only figures that I have, that has occurred once since 1992. I do not have a complete answer, but the important point is that the Secretary of State had the right to do so. That right will be severely diminished—if it can be exercised at all—in the future. Not one element of that right will be transferred to the assembly. I find amendments Nos. 272 and 273, in the name of Plaid Cymru, highly unacceptable and difficult to understand in terms of the rules of Europe. Amendment No. 272 states: the Assembly First Secretary shall be treated as being an office of ministerial level for the purposes of Article 203 of The Treaty of Amsterdam". In terms of the treaty, it means that the First Minister could not only represent the United Kingdom but commit the United Kingdom within the European Union. Article 203 of the treaty of Amsterdam says: The Council shall consist of a representative of each Member State at ministerial level, authorised to commit the government of that Member State". I shall refer to the difficulties involved with that in a moment. The Liberal Democrat new clauses seek mandatory participation by saying that a member of the Welsh assembly "shall" participate. The new clauses go further and say that there should be United Kingdom representation of Welsh interests by a Secretary of the Welsh Assembly. Those issues raise enormous constitutional questions. The one point that is common to the proposed new clauses is that the Minister or the Secretary—whatever he will be called—who goes from the Welsh assembly to the Council of Ministers will also represent the United Kingdom. However, such people will not have a mandate from the United Kingdom; they will not be elected by the United Kingdom electorate. They will be elected according to the electoral mandate of the people of Wales. They cannot answer to the United Kingdom Parliament and they cannot be held to account by that Parliament. It would be constitutional nonsense to allow such a provision to prevail. For that reason, new clause 20 suggests the only possible means of squaring the circle: first, we should write into the Bill the obligation of the Secretary of State to consult the assembly before a matter of interest to Wales is considered by the Council of Ministers. Secondly—although it is the third part of the proposed new clause—on returning from a meeting of the Council of Ministers, the Secretary of State would be obliged to report to the assembly. That would ensure that the weak elements in the White Paper were at least present in statute, and could not be left to the whim or the invitation of a Government at Westminster. The third part of new clause 20 suggests that a member of the Executive Committee of the assembly may participate in a United Kingdom delegation to the Council of Ministers on the basis that he is asked to do so in appropriate circumstances.

Denzil Davies (Labour, Llanelli)

A problem remains even if that provision is written into the Bill. The Secretary of State for Wales will be a Minister without portfolio. I do not know whether there are any precedents that allow Ministers without portfolios to sit in meetings of the Council of Ministers with other Ministers who have portfolios.

Michael Ancram (Conservative, Devizes)

That is a very good question, but I shall not seek to answer it now. I do not claim that new clause 20 will solve the problem—I would not have started from this position in the first place. However, given that we are in this situation and that the Bill has created a large democratic deficit in relation to Wales and Europe, I believe that the Government should consider new clause 20 carefully.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

I realise that time is limited, and I have made short contributions to the Committee tonight. This is another extremely important matter. The Liberal Democrat new clause 5 gives the assembly the power to send a delegation to Europe. New clause 16 enables the assembly to set up an office for Wales in Brussels. We believe that there is a lack of statutory provision concerning the relationship between Wales and its assembly and the various institutions of the European Union. That has occurred despite the specific references that appeared in the White Paper and the Government's promise that the Bill would provide for Members of the Assembly to represent Wales on the Committee of the Regions. Apart from a provision in clause 30 enabling the power to designate a Minister of the Crown or a Government Department as being responsible for implementing European Community law, so that it is possible to designate the assembly for that purpose, and clauses 105 to 107 requiring the assembly to observe European Community law, the Bill is totally silent on the European dimension. I would raise many other issues if I had more time. However, I draw the Committee's attention to a statement made by the Secretary of State at a crucial point during the referendum debate. In a press release of 11 September 1997, the Secretary of State said: The Assembly will be able to take part in relevant negotiations on policy at all levels, up to and including the Council of Ministers. There will be scope for executive members of the Assembly to speak on behalf of the UK in those negotiations". We believe that it is essential to establish within the assembly a European Community Committee that will be responsible for the assembly's relations with the EU. The assembly should have the right to send observers to working group meetings to discuss matters devolved to Wales and the right to participate fully in preparatory meetings of the United Kingdom delegations to the EU. The assembly or its European Committee should have the right to scrutinise EC legislation before it is adopted. A Committee representing Whitehall and the assembly should be established in order to co-ordinate European policy in areas transferred to Wales. The assembly should also have the right to receive full reports from UKREP about EU meetings. Finally, we believe that there should be a written agreement or concordat that will establish the detail of the practical arrangements in order to ensure the effective working of the measures that I have outlined. None of those provisions are in the Bill, and we seek the Minister's response in that regard.

Rhodri Morgan (Labour, Cardiff West)

I am sure that all hon. Members are grateful to have had a discussion about Europe—albeit a rather short one. It was a bit like old times, as the hon. Member for Ynys Mon (Mr. Jones) said. 1 think that he was recalling the famous night when Plaid Cymru did a deal with the then Conservative Government and the former Secretary of State, David Hunt. It has been a little like old times in the past week, with Labour thinking about renationalising the railways and the Foreign Secretary doing a Henry VIII and getting rid of Anne Boleyn. We must consider whether it is practical for the assembly to represent what I believe must be the United Kingdom Government stance at meetings of the Council of Ministers. Clearly, the circumstances would have to be exceptional, and Parliament would have to agree to the meeting taking place. Some issues could arise when the Westminster Parliament would be happy for its interests in the Council of Ministers to be represented by the Welsh assembly. One example is minority languages. Wales is generally regarded as having done far more for the Welsh language than the French Government have done on behalf of the Breton language over the past 50 years for various historic reasons. A tragic example would be restitution of the land damaged by the Chernobyl nuclear power station accident 12 or 13 years ago. If Wales were the only part of the United Kingdom that still had land where lamb produced on it could not be eaten because caesium was still coming up through the new grass in the spring—I believe that that is the position—it would be logical for the Welsh assembly to send a representative to the Agriculture Committee or the Environment Committee of the Council of Ministers. That would clearly be sensible if it were a transferred function. There would have to be wholly exceptional circumstances and the transferred function would have to be by agreement with the Westminster Parliament. It would surely be curmudgeonly if we were to say that never should the Welsh assembly, or the Scottish Parliament for that matter, represent, even by agreement, the United Kingdom position at a meeting of the Council of Ministers. It would be appropriate that it should do so if a particular issue affected only Wales within the United Kingdom or where Wales was generally recognised as being in the lead and having the greatest expertise and investment in a certain interest. For the reasons that 1 have outlined, it is important that we establish that the Welsh assembly—although it must not give itself inappropriate airs and graces—can have an external arm. In the same way, the Welsh Office chose to make grants for Welsh-medium education in Patagonia, and to be a participant in the Europe of the four motor regions. In the person of Sir Wyn Roberts, it chose to talk to the Governments of Lombardy, Catalonia and so on. There was nothing wrong with that. Those activities did not attract criticism when the Welsh Office was part of the United Kingdom Parliament. It seems to me that there would be nothing wrong in those inherited rights, obligations and freedoms applying also to the Welsh assembly. The council of the isles may take that process in the direction of Ireland. There would be nothing wrong in that. Undoubtedly, there will be exterior interests to involve the Welsh assembly, and that will be appropriate if the assembly abides by the principle of not giving itself airs and graces.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

The amendments focus on the role of the assembly in discussions on European Union matters in the United Kingdom and within European institutions. I shall quickly get out of the new clause 16, which turns on the issue of representation in Brussels. That is something which the assembly will have to decide, as it will have to decide what resources it wants to put into it and how much it wants to do in Brussels. There is no need to have anything of that sort set out in the Bill. 1 should imagine that the assembly would want such representation. As the hon. Member for Ynys Mon (Mr. Jones) said, new clause 9 is dealt with in schedule 8. That schedule has been constructed to provide the assembly with flexibility when it comes to whether there should be two local government members, two Members of the national assembly or one member from each. We want the assembly to be able to make that decision. The assembly should not have any difficulties with that. Should we delineate in the Bill the role that the assembly will play in discussions with the European Union within the United Kingdom and within European institutions? We believe that that can best be dealt with through the development of concordats with Government Departments at Whitehall. Clause 106, for example, makes it clear that the assembly will have a duty to ensure the implementation and enforcement of Community obligations in Wales to the extent that such powers have been given to the assembly within the Bill. That being so, the assembly will have a direct interest in the effects of a wide range of European Union legislation.

Michael Ancram (Conservative, Devizes)

I want to pursue the matter of concordats. What will happen if the assembly and the Westminster Government cannot agree on a concordat in the absence of anything relating to that possibility being set out in the Bill? What provision will there be for dealing with that situation? Furthermore, how long does a concordat last? Is it signed between the Governments that then exist, to be broken if the Administrations of those countries change? Is a concordat just an informal agreement that, at the end of the day, is not worth the paper on which it is written?

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

I am surprised that the right hon. Gentleman asked that question. He knows that, when dealing with those matters, one Parliament cannot bind a later one. The concordat will be for the duration of the Parliament unless, within that period, both sides agree that there is a need to amend the procedure. There must be flexibility to that extent. As far as we are concerned, there will be no possibility of a concordat not being achieved. That is something which the Government and the assembly will be able to sort out. The assembly will be involved.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

We do not want such a structure to be set out in the Bill because we want the flexibility to get everything in place in our discussions with other Government Departments. The assembly will have the right in full to scrutinise European Union legislation and documents. It will be for the assembly to choose how it gets its view over to Europe. There will be several ways of doing that. There will be the official channel, which is getting the Government to take the assembly's view across to Europe through the Secretary of State. However, there will be Members of the European Parliament in Wales, and the assembly will be able to ensure that its views are known in Europe. There is no problem there. Negotiations within the United Kingdom to set the United Kingdom line will be a part of the assembly's role. Participation in relevant European negotiations will be open to the assembly at member and at official level. The staff of the assembly will be civil servants and accordingly they will be able to participate in placements at UKREP and other parts of the Commission, just as Government civil servants are already able to do. Those are matters that will be in the concordat. I am giving the Committee a flavour of what will be available.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

Why are not the layers of the concordat in the Bill, so that we might know precisely where we are?

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

That is because we are negotiating the concordat with other Government Departments. I have been talking about the sort of matters that will be dealt with and the role of the assembly. Assembly Secretaries will be present at relevant meetings of the Council of Ministers where that has been agreed with the lead United Kingdom Minister. Members have cited instances of when that would be appropriate, and that is what will happen. Assembly Secretaries will be able to speak on behalf of the United Kingdom in relevant meetings of the Council of Ministers.

Michael Ancram (Conservative, Devizes)

No.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

I am telling the right hon. Gentleman and a Committee of the House of Commons that the presence that I have described will be part of the agreement that we shall have within Whitehall and within government. There will be accountability to the House of Commons because all those matters will be publicly reported and known. The Secretary of State for Wales will be able to deliver to the House of Commons any information that the Opposition might want. There is no problem there at all. The assembly will also implement and enforce European obligations. The spirit of the amendments will be embraced in the concordat. There is nothing that cannot be dealt with in that process.

Ieuan Wyn Jones (Plaid Cymru, Ynys Môn)

I welcome the reassurances that the Minister gave on Second Reading, but I should have preferred to have seen them on the face of the Bill, or at least to have seen a draft of the concordat so that we could discussed it. On the basis of the assurances that he has given, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

MEMBERSHIP OF COMMITTEES AND SUB-COMMITTEES

Elfyn Llwyd (Plaid Cymru, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

I beg to move amendment No. 395, in page 27, line 12, after first 'The', insert 'voting'.

Elfyn Llwyd (Plaid Cymru, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

Amendments Nos. 395 to 398 are part and parcel of the same thing. Notes on clauses have a fairly long but inglorious pedigree in this place. The notes accompanying the Bill are a prime example of that genre. All human knowledge and science is there. They say: Clause 53 provides that the Assembly shall establish certain committees … and that it may establish any others which it considers appropriate. The second paragraph says the same thing, but in an even less useful way. [Interruption.] I do not for one second suggest that the Secretary of State drew them up, but somebody did. He is not forthcoming with any information that could be of great value to the debate, if I may say so with the greatest of respect. The amendment might be considered in part to be a probing amendment, but it has a serious point as well. Its intention is to put on the face of the Bill the right and obligation on subject Committees to co-opt non-voting members on to the Committees. Before I am shouted at from various corners about that being a quango, I can foresee that, occasionally, people who have considerable expertise on a particular subject would be invited on to the Committees. The Committees might also include people who are well qualified in matters concerning local government. Those people might occasionally be elected councillors, but they would generally have an expertise on a subject, as opposed to the way in which quango appointments are made—only on party lines. The purpose of this raft of amendments is to enrich the quality of debate and assist in the formulation of policy by the various subject Committees. Under the Bill as it stands, the subject Committees will have a vast amount of work to undertake. The assembly should be a truly inclusive chamber—"inclusive" being the big word in use at the moment, I thought that I had better use it; otherwise, nobody on the Front Bench would listen to me—that is relevant to the people of north-east Wales, south-west Wales, and so on. We have heard the same argument before, although it was made in a rather jocular manner. It is extremely important that the national assembly gains credibility and the necessary respect of all the people of Wales across the political spectrum and geographical spread of the country. One of the best ways to make the forum popular throughout Wales is to show that the policies are at the cutting edge and are based on the best research available, and that they are practical and practicable. The worst possible scenario would be for the decisions of the various subject Committees that will formulate policies to be challenged widely by the people of Wales as not being in the best interests of Wales. That would indeed be a step backwards. Although I appreciate that the Government's response might well be to leave the matter for due consideration by the Standing Order Commission, nevertheless this is a fundamentally important point which needs to be debated at this stage. There has been considerable speculation and discussion about co-opting on to the Regional Committees of the assembly, so the notion of co-opting is not new. It is as least as important to co-opt on to subject Committees. Most of us have had the benefit of being on a Select Committee, and in particular of having input from experts on a given subject. They do indeed enrich the proceedings and assist greatly in the evaluation of evidence and the preparation of reports and practical and achievable recommendations.

David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)

Given what the hon. Gentleman just said, perhaps he will tell the Committee whether those who give the benefit of their advice to the Committee have speaking and voting rights. I think that he will find that they do not.

Elfyn Llwyd (Plaid Cymru, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

The point of the amendment is to co-opt people who would not have voting rights. No doubt there will be others who will advise the Committee, and I accept what the hon. Gentleman says, but I also think that this would be a way to deal with the point in a slightly different and preferable way. Of course, civil servants and the like will assist the Committee, but my view is that the form should be strengthened, in the manner foreseen in the amendment.

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

Let us make it clear that there is nothing in the scheme as it exists to allow any Committee of the assembly to call people to give evidence, and so on. If the hon. Gentleman is pursuing that with his amendment, which suggests that the power of co-option should be available—I mean this in a genuine, inclusive way, and am not seeking an argument—it is necessary that he explains what he means by co-option. Does it mean that, to all intents and purposes, the individual is a full member of the Committee, but without voting rights? He really must explain precisely what he means by co-opting, as distinct from the ability of the Committee to call individuals to give specialist evidence.

Elfyn Llwyd (Plaid Cymru, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

I thank the Secretary of State for that question. Co-option means that the person becomes a member of the Committee, albeit a limited member. That is quite different from the position to which the hon. Member for Delyn (Mr. Hanson) referred. No doubt, there will be specialist advisers to each Committee, who would be members. They would not have voting rights, but would have speaking rights; otherwise there would be little point in having them there. To all intents and purposes, they would be members of the Committee, dealing specifically with the work of the Committee, and called on to advise it in that capacity. They would not be full members in terms of voting and so on, as that would be completely wrong, as the other members would have been voted on to the Committees through the ballot box, and it would make no sense at all.

Gareth Thomas (Labour, Clwyd West)

The hon. Gentleman, as a member of the Bar, will be familiar with the term "otiose", which has reared its head many times in Committee. Is not his amendment otiose in the sense that there is nothing to preclude the Committee from taking advice and from consulting more widely? Why is it necessary to formalise it in the amendment?

Elfyn Llwyd (Plaid Cymru, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

I do not know whether the people at large are getting the impression that barristers use the word otiose every time they get up, but the hon. Gentleman has used it a few times, as I have. I do not consider the amendment unnecessary; it would be a good step forward. If the hon. Gentleman will bear with me, I shall explain why. I believe that the Committees will face an extremely heavy work load, and that another pair of hands—or a couple of pairs of hands—would help, not to vote but to deal with policy and to do the necessary work.

Gareth Thomas (Labour, Clwyd West)

That would not be democracy.

Elfyn Llwyd (Plaid Cymru, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

It would not be democracy if those concerned were full members, but—[Interruption.] If the hon. Gentleman will allow me to develop my argument, he will no doubt rebut it later in his own way, and I respect the fact that he will probably wish to do so. It is vital for the relationship between the Executive—or the Cabinet, or whatever term is decided on—and the subject Committees and the assembly to be spelt out clearly. As a matter of sound constitutional law, the Executive should be clearly separated from subject Committees, and should be responsible for the strategic direction of the national assembly as a whole. The subject Committees will probably combine—I say "probably" because it is not clear in the Bill—two functions. One might be a scrutiny function similar to that of Select Committees, although the Secretary of State has just said that the Committees would have no power to require evidence or to summon witnesses. Perhaps the Minister will explain. The Committees will also have a wider policy-making role: without that, there would be little point in establishing them and requiring those serving on them to devote all their time, expertise and energy to their work. The Welsh Office buzz word nowadays is "inclusivity". I believe that, if that is to become a reality, the amendment will help. On 27 November, at a press conference when the Bill was launched, the Secretary of State said: The National Assembly for Wales will be a new and effective form of government. It will be based on modern working and political practices for the good of the whole of Wales. I hope to see political parties working together in a positive way and the development of structures which will allow people as individuals as well as other groups—local government, both sides of industry, the voluntary sector—to get their voice heard. The new … Assembly will be modern, open and accountable. Neither Westminster nor local government will provide the model: the National Assembly will make a fresh start based on the best practices from around the world. It will harness new technology and modern working practices to take Welsh democracy forward to the new millennium. I would not argue with that. If that is a reflection of what is to come, I welcome it whole-heartedly. The subject Committees will also be important in the national assembly set-up. In its document "Making the Assembly Work", the Institute of Welsh Affairs says: The work of the Subject Committees will be central to the Assembly's activities. Major briefs will have to be absorbed. The more Committees a Member serves on, the more demanding will be the task. There will be room for co-option of expert advisers"— I stress that— and the Committees should have the power to summon witnesses along the lines of the Select Committees in the House of Commons. I am not sure whether that is correct; the Secretary of State said that it was not likely. It will be up to the assembly to determine the number of subject Committees. The Institute of Welsh Affairs thinks that there may be six, but annexe A of the White Paper refers to nine. I understand that they will include Committees on education and training, health, agriculture, local government, and so on.

Ron Davies (Labour, Caerphilly)

I am sorry that I could not respond to the hon. Gentleman immediately, but he was making a number of points. He questioned whether the assembly would have the power to require people to attend. It will. The power is specified in clause 73(2), which lists the persons and organisations concerned. That is, of course, different from inviting people to give evidence.

Elfyn Llwyd (Plaid Cymru, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

I am obliged to the Secretary of State. It was the right hon. Gentleman who said initially that there was no power, so let me say—with the greatest respect—that I am not sure whether he is correcting me or himself. I did not mention summoning; he did. However, I accept what he now says without reservation, and welcome his statement of fact. The White Paper suggests that there will also be a secondary legislation scrutiny Committee, an audit Committee, and the regional Committees, about which we already know. There will also be a European Committee. It is entirely possible that there will be 15 or 16 Committees, and an even larger number of Sub-Committees.

Julie Morgan (Labour, Cardiff North)

The hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy (Mr. Llwyd) made some important points, some of which I want to take up. We have emphasised the need to involve as many people as possible in the assembly, and I think that we must use a range of measures to do that. Non-voting co-options is one possible method. That would aid the workings of the assembly by, for instance, addressing some of the problems that will be caused by the possible lack of representation of certain groups. For example, a Committee may be discussing disability, which will clearly be a major issue. A successful strategy for people with learning disabilities was pioneered by the Welsh Office, involving such people and their carers. We could enrich and improve the assembly's workings by allowing people with disabilities to come on to the Committees as non-voting members, but to contribute to their workings over a period. I do not think that any Committee can plan or discuss, for instance, a Wales strategy for disability unless it contains people who are disabled themselves, perhaps representing organisations for the disabled. That is relevant to a number of areas that the assembly may cover. For example, I hope that it will discuss a race equality strategy for Wales, and I hope that no such discussion will be held without the presence of black people. Indeed, I hope that both black and disabled people will be Members of the Assembly, although, given the way in which things work out, the odds are against it. I think it important for people who experience the issues that we shall try to address in the inclusive assembly that we are establishing to be part of the decision-making process. I believe that non-voting Members should be co-opted for a period, so that they can take part in the discussions and give the Committee the benefit of their experience. Someone else could then be co-opted for another period, depending on the subject area. Perhaps the assembly will be able to do that, but these points are very important, and should not be lost in the debate.

Gareth Thomas (Labour, Clwyd West)

The hon. Gentleman has had considerable experience of student union politics and debating societies. Does he accept that the subject Committees will have to make hard decisions—they will have to weigh up the niceties of the argument—so they must be accountable to the electorate?

David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)

I have a great regard for the hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy (Mr. Llwyd). He and my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, North (Ms Morgan) want to improve the Bill, and speak out of a genuine desire to make it a success. However, the proposals would have a serious impact on the workings of the assembly. One of the reasons why I was passionately in favour of the assembly on 18 September was because I was tired of the who-you-know, what-you-know quango state. There is a danger that the great and the good will be co-opted to the Committees through the who-you-know, what-you-know process. Accountability is the important thing for the assembly: accountability for decision making, for politics, for expenditure and for the arguments. There is no problem about an individual putting a point of view to a Committee in strong terms and giving advice as a lobbyist inside and outside the chamber and in formal presentations to any existing Committees. That would be a healthy way forward. Individuals with legitimate interests in the matters being discussed in the Committees should be able to express their views. However, there is a world of difference between that and an individual being part of the Committee. The logic of the hon. Gentleman's argument is that this Committee of the House should have co-opted members to give an experienced view on the points that we are discussing. At 8.30, we would vote having listened to their views. They may influence the argument, but that would not be democracy.

Elfyn Llwyd (Plaid Cymru, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

How can the hon. Gentleman say that having a minority of experts without voting rights co-opted on to a Committee is undemocratic? I do not follow his argument. There would be accountability, because the elected Members would vote and would ultimately make the decisions. With respect, I remind the hon. Gentleman that under the present constitution people are co-opted in the other place. I am not a defender of the other place, despite having a colleague there, but it has some very good working peers who are there specifically because they have an expertise.

David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)

I believe in the principle of accountability: people should have a mandate from the electorate to speak on an issue in a particular forum, and should not merely be selected by a body and accountable to a Committee. Members of a Committee should be accountable to and get their support from the people of Wales.

Desmond Swayne (Conservative, New Forest West)

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the Committee will have difficulty covering the issues in the time available even if only legitimately elected, mandated representatives speak? If a Committee must take account not just of evidence that it calls, but of co-opted members who sit on it as of right, its proceedings are likely to go on for ever.

David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)

The hon. Gentleman has a point: perhaps he has been co-opted to this Committee because of his position as the representative of the New Forest. At least he has a mandate to sit in the Chamber, so his argument is valid. I am not against the idea of outside expertise influencing the decisions and considerations of a Committee of the National Assembly for Wales. However, Members of the Assembly should be accountable for their decisions. The Committees should not contain people who might advance the prejudiced views of people who have not been elected to the assembly. There should be a clear division such as exists in Select Committees. Those Committees can listen to outside experts and invite written submissions but, ultimately, the members of the Committees determine the agenda, the political priorities and the outcome. That is what they have been elected to do. Occasionally there may be conflicts of interest. People could be co-opted for a four-year term at the end of which their priorities would be different from what they were at the beginning. What happens when there is a clear division between elected and co-opted members? Elected members have to be accountable for their decisions but I am sure that in my area the Daily Post would make a meal of divisions between co-opted and elected Members. There is a danger of conflict being created where it does not exist.

David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)

There is always accountability. Elected members on a committee are put there by crosses on ballot papers and not by the choice of another committee—a sort of self-selecting oligarchy. Accountability is what the assembly is all about. It is certainly what I campaigned for on 18 September. Co-opting is not a welcome practice in local government in Wales or elsewhere. Governments have not sought to encourage it and the model has not worked well in local government. The amendments seek to improve the Bill, to strengthen the democratic input to the assembly and to make it more inclusive. I fought for the assembly to end the quango state, but I fear that co-option would extend and develop the quango state. The issues that are in the amendments can be dealt with by Committees taking evidence, soundings and submissions. My hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, North (Ms Morgan) raised the valid issues of disabled people and those from ethnic minorities. Those can be dealt with by presentation and sympathy and by listening to people's views. It will not necessarily be dealt with by co-opting people. In some cases, dare I say it, such a move would be seen as patronising. People who are co-opted to a Committee because are disabled or from an ethnic minority may have intrinsic gifts that could, as independents or members of political parties, enable them to play a role in a Committee.

Julie Morgan (Labour, Cardiff North)

My hon. Friend makes an important point about people being patronised. It is always raised when efforts are made to be more inclusive and to have the views of minorities expressed in a committee. I agree with much of what my hon. Friend says, but when we try to be inclusive and a bit more adventurous to make everyone in Wales feel that he has a stake in the assembly, we sometimes have to experiment and run the risk of being accused of being patronising or of not sticking strictly to a mandate. We must take such steps if we are to become more inclusive.

David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)

I take my hon. Friend's comments on board because they are worthy of discussion. The debate has opened some bear traps and to be caught in them would not improve the process and would dilute my main reason for wanting the assembly. My hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd, West (Mr. Thomas) made a valid intervention about difficult decisions. Some decisions will be down to the elected Members who are accountable for them. Under co-option, people who do not have a mandate will be responsible for defending a difficult decision only to the people who co-opted them. People who owe their position to those who co-opted them to a committee are sometimes reluctant to speak out on difficult decisions that affect their interest group or their expertise group. Those who are outside the Committee structure can put a cogent case in evidence about why a particular stance should be adopted. Those who owe their position on a Committee to assembly patronage may temper their comments. The matter needs to be seriously considered, but on the basis of what has been said in the debate, I urge the Committee to reject the amendment.

Bernard Jenkin (Conservative, North Essex)

In part, the co-option that the amendments seek tries to compensate for the fact that the assembly is something of a monocameral legislature. The effort to bring in talent from outwith the political party maelstrom is not intrinsically objectionable. It is a good move and, as we contemplate parallel discussions on the future of the other place, we should keep it close to our hearts that there would be no point in having extra elected people in the Welsh assembly. The richness of political debate in the assembly could be enhanced by bringing in talent that is not imprisoned by party politics. There is much to be said for the speech by the hon. Member for Delyn (Mr. Hanson). We enter two caveats about the amendments. First, how far should the legislation determine the detail of the assembly's standing orders? That will be one of the themes of our comments. The Bill stipulates quite detailed arrangements but large areas will be left for determination by the assembly. How much is stuck in the Bill and how much is left to the assembly are arbitrary matters. Secondly, if we stipulate the composition of the Committees, the concept of party balance is important. Amendment No. 396, unlike amendment No. 397, does not state that there should be party balance in the Committees. Our amendment No. 85 deletes part of Clause 52(2)(b) to exclude the possibility of even advisory Committees not having party balance. Why should we not stipulate that all Committees of the assembly should have party balance? Why does party balance become unnecessary in an advisory Committee? All parliamentary Committees are advisory and Parliament can overturn a Committee's recommendations. All our Committees reflect party balance. Perhaps an alternative is to allow assembly Committees to operate an open-house policy similar to the one that applies to Committees that examine delegated legislation under which any hon. Member can attend and speak but may not vote. That may be one way to address the matter, but we cannot understand why subsection (2)(b) should read as it does.

Gareth Thomas (Labour, Clwyd West)

I did not expect that these amendments, touching as they do on co-option, would have generated so much controversy. I endorse the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Delyn (Mr. Hanson), who, in his opposition to the amendments, displayed a deep knowledge of local government, which perhaps was absent from comments made by some Opposition Members. Yes, the assembly has to be inclusive in the sense that it should reach out to all sections of opinion in Wales, but in my view, and it is shared by other Labour Members, inclusiveness should be achieved not in a formalised way, but by taking advice informally, by undertaking extensive consultation and by reaching out to people. In that sense, the amendments are unnecessary. My hon. Friend the Member for Delyn put his finger on something significant. In their eagerness to enshrine inclusiveness within the workings of the assembly, perhaps accidentally, Opposition Members have confused the whole issue of accountability. By having co-opted members on a subject Committee, various problems arise. One has been alluded to by the hon. Member for New Forest, West (Mr. Swayne). It involves the extent to which debating time could be taken over by a co-opted member. There is also a problem in relation to the influence that that particular co-opted member might have. Although patronising comments were made by the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Mr. Öpik) about the need for Committee members to take the advice of experts in their sector, but the fact remains that co-opted experts would not be accountable. That lies at the heart of the issue and it is why I cannot endorse the amendments.

Robert Syms (Conservative, Poole)

I agree with the hon. Members for Clwyd, West (Mr. Thomas) and for Delyn (Mr. Hanson). I do not believe that elected and unelected members mix well. For several years, I sat on a local authority, where there were problems initially with Church members who voted on the education committee. Then their vote was taken away, but some conflict always arose between those people and those who had authority and accountability. It is possible to be well informed, to be well briefed and to take the widest possible view and have just elected members determine policy. One has to remember that members not only serve on a committee, but have a broader responsibility to the body corporate. Sometimes, hard and difficult decisions may have to be taken. Elected members know that, at some point, they have to take those decisions. It will be easy for an unelected member to take over the show and to try to showboat somewhat, going against what might be politically necessary for the assembly. Overall, co-option is not sensible. Taking advice from the widest possible context is great, but elected members should debate and determine policy.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

We have had a constructive debate; it is good to see the official Opposition again making a constructive contribution. Clause 53 provides for the establishment of assembly Committees. It establishes the principle that the membership of each Committee should so far as possible reflect the political balance of the assembly, but that principle is not to apply where the Committee exists solely to provide advice". Amendment No. 85 seeks to delete those words, so that all Committees of the assembly, whether or not of an advisory character, would have memberships reflecting the political balance of the assembly. Amendments Nos. 395 to 398 provide for assembly Committees to have co-option powers, albeit limited to the co-option of non-voting members. We are not persuaded that Committees that are established by the assembly to advise it on a particular matter should inevitably be established on the basis of strict party balance. We think, for example, that the assembly might want to establish specialist advisory Committees where the interests or qualifications of individual members are more important than political affiliations. An example might be in relation to child abuse: an advisory Committee of Members with particular knowledge of how such a matter has been handled might considerably assist the relevant assembly Committee in formulating its policy. Therefore, given that these will be advisory Committees, rather than Committees with decision-making powers, we would prefer to retain the flexibility in the present wording of the subsection. If the amendment were accepted, it might be difficult on occasions to establish the right sort of advisory Committee on a specialist matter that often does not have any specific party political aspect.

Elfyn Llwyd (Plaid Cymru, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

When I moved the amendment, I said that it was probing. It has been an interesting debate. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

DELEGATION TO COMMITTEES, SUB-COMMITTEES AND STAFF

David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)

Why does the hon. Gentleman support co-option, but oppose delegation?

Bernard Jenkin (Conservative, North Essex)

We are inherently attracted to the amendment. We cannot understand why the assembly should be allowed to shuffle off its responsibilities on to unelected members of staff. I do not believe, although I stand to be corrected, that the Bill contains a definition of "staff'. Therefore, if we leave the Bill as it is, Parliament's intentions are far from clear. It is extraordinary that, after all the apparent clamouring for a Welsh assembly, no sooner will the assembly Members have all these responsibilities than they will want to hand them over to their members of staff. That is the implication in the Bill.

Bernard Jenkin (Conservative, North Essex)

I am always scared when I see a lawyer jumping up in front of me.

Bernard Jenkin (Conservative, North Essex)

Although—unlike the hon. Gentleman—I am not a lawyer, I do not think that that is what the clause says. It does not say that mundane matters may be delegated to the assembly staff; it says that any function may be delegated. It is perfectly reasonable for assembly staff to act on behalf of elected Members, but it is quite another matter for functions to be delegated formally to staff. I come back to the point made by the hon. Member for Delyn (Mr. Hanson). Although we are being told that the assembly will provide an escape from the "quangocracy" that has dominated Welsh politics for too long, allowing such delegation would seem to take us in the wrong direction. Undoubtedly, however, the Minister will be able to give us a full and adequate explanation. I look forward to hearing his reply.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

I thank the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Mr. Öpik) for moving the amendment, because it gives us a chance to explain exactly why the Bill makes such provision. As hon. Members know, delegation is the principal mechanism for distributing functions to Committees and to individuals within the assembly. In central government, a principle of constitutional law—known as the Carltona principle—acknowledges that a Minister's functions can be performed on his or her behalf by duly authorised officials. In considering the assembly, however, the Government had some doubt about whether the Carltona principle would automatically apply in the new and novel circumstances of the National Assembly for Wales. Rather than leaving the matter to chance, we thought that we would include in the Bill a clause dealing with the daily management of government, at least as practised at Westminster. I should underline the fact that delegating a function to an official does not mean that the assembly Secretary or the assembly will not be responsible if something should go wrong. Some planning appeals provide a simple current example of how a Minister delegates a function. In certain well-defined circumstances, the Planning Inspectorate carries on with the job of dealing with the appeals, and the Minister does not get involved administratively in that part of the procedure. Clause 55 attempts only to ensure that there is a proper defence for executing government functions in Wales as they are executed in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland. The proposed provision is exactly the same as current provisions applying in the Welsh Office and in relationships between Ministers and civil servants. Responsibility will still rest with the assembly Secretaries or the assembly, and the clause will not permit any passing of the buck. I hope that that explanation of the clause's intention—to clarify the position and to remove a legal loophole—will persuade the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire to withdraw the amendment.

EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

I beg to move amendment No. 27, in page 29, line 12, at end insert— '(3A) No function may be delegated to the Assembly First Secretary under subsection (3) above unless the executive committee (or the sub-committee, as the case may be) decides by no less than a two-thirds majority to make that delagation.'.

Michael Martin (Deputy Speaker, Glasgow Springburn)

With this, it will be convenient to discuss amendment No. 198, in page 29, leave out lines 13 to 17.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

The Bill would allow the Executive Committee to delegate any function to the First Secretary, in the same manner as it would delegate functions to staff members. We believe that that power is too wide-ranging and perhaps even dangerous. The amendment would prevent delegation to the First Secretary without a two thirds majority vote of the Executive Committee or of the Sub-Committee that is making the delegation. We think that the amendment would prevent one or two Members from deciding very narrowly to delegate functions to the First Secretary and that it would provide a necessary check.

Oliver Letwin (Conservative, West Dorset)

Amendment No. 27 takes us back to our earlier debate on amendment No. 10A—specifically, amendment No. 31, which was tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Mr. Ancram)—and on the articulation of clause 57 with clause 58. I believe that the Liberal Democrats, in tabling amendment No. 27, are guilty of a certain incoherence. They may share with my right hon. Friend the Member for Devizes and Conservative Members the ambition—which they expressed earlier in the debate—of establishing a cabinet system rather than a committee system, but their amendment will not achieve that effect. Amendment No. 27 would clarify the model that I mentioned earlier in the debate, but it would not help in developing cabinet government. In the case of one Committee—the Executive Committee—no information has been vouchsafed in the Bill. The Executive Committee is quite the most remarkable Committee that 1 have come across in a piece of legislation. Its powers are entirely indistinct; it may have very great powers or very few powers. The matter will be left entirely to the Standing Orders. Although the Minister may correct me in his reply, I believe that it would be within the scope of the Standing Orders, as permitted by the Bill, to give the Executive Committee complete power. I can find in the Bill no checks on the Executive Committee. Let us imagine the extreme situation in which the Committee has been given complete power. It would be extraordinarily important to determine whether the Executive Committee could or could not delegate all its functions to the First Secretary, giving him plenary power. As my hon. Friend the Member for Poole (Mr. Syms) said, that would be a case of one man, one vote. The one man would be the First Secretary, who would vote for all on all occasions. It would be the extremity of autocracy. In a more moderate situation, in which powers have been delegated to a number of Committees and in which the Executive Committee has a defined remit that is not so great as complete power, limiting the Executive Committee's ability to delegate its powers to the First Secretary would make sense only if there were a series of coherent and parallel amendments ensuring that—by a two thirds majority, or by some other qualified majority—the other Committees could delegate their powers to their Secretaries. Under those circumstances, we would have a coherent Bill as opposed to a mess. The amendment would, indeed, make the Welsh assembly in some respects parallel to local government. The assembly would be governed by Committees, each in turn governed by proportional representation reflecting the composition of the assembly. One could envisage that officers would work for a Committee as a whole, as in local government, and that decisions would be made on a rather muddled, but fairly transparent basis and with the guidance of officers, as in local government. If, on the contrary, the amendment is not accepted, we shall be in a muddle. One possible resolution of that muddle is to move in the opposite direction. We could have cabinet government, but of an extreme kind and without the accountability that my right hon. Friend the Member for Devizes rightly seeks to have installed in the Bill. This debate ought to give the Minister a chance to tell us what he so signally failed to tell us in response to the debate on an earlier set of amendments: in which direction the Government intend to go. Do they intend to establish Committees that will govern as Committees, with officers bringing forward matters for open discussion, as the hon. Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Mr. Rowlands) suggested, or do they intend to create the opposite system, whereby power is delegated to individual Secretaries or to the First Secretary who will be able to govern without the slightest accountability? Alternatively, do they intend to create something for which the Bill does not provide—a middle course in which a set of people who are not accountable govern Wales? If the third option is what the Government intend, I hope that the Minister, in replying to this rather incoherent, but well-intentioned amendment, will try to come up with a middle course—a system of government for Wales which would be recognisable as effective and accountable.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

The amendments give us the opportunity to reconsider delegation as a mechanism for distributing functions to Committees and individuals within the assembly and perhaps also to return to the earlier debate about the nature of the Executive Committee and the constraints on its powers—constraints that the hon. Member for West Dorset (Mr. Letwin) fears do not exist. The assembly is empowered to delegate functions to the Executive Committee. Subsections (3) and (4) of clause 58 permit the Executive Committee further to delegate functions to the First Secretary, but subsection (4) makes it clear that the assembly can "limit or exclude" the Executive Committee's power to do that in a given case. The Executive Committee does not have a wholly untrammelled right to pass up powers to the First Secretary. The assembly as a whole has a constraining power. Amendment No. 27 would limit the Executive Committee's ability to delegate to the First Secretary in the first place by requiring a two thirds majority to approve any such delegation. As the hon. Member for West Dorset pointed out, there is a contradiction in that amendment No. 198 would remove the assembly's powers to prevent or limit the delegation of a particular function to the First Secretary. We cannot accept either amendment. Amendment No. 27 would place a wholly artificial constraint on the Executive Committee's power to delegate, whereas our approach is to enable the assembly to develop flexibly to meet the new circumstances that it will face. I remind the Committee that clause 70 explicitly provides for the First Secretary to be held to account through questions, so there is no possibility of the unaccountable delegation of power. 8.15 pm In an earlier debate, the hon. Member for West Dorset was much exercised about the First Secretary's being able to legislate, as he put it, without any constraints. The hon. Gentleman was, perhaps, in fact considering the exercise of Executive functions, but I point out to him that clause 65(2) requires subordinate legislation to be approved by the assembly. Clause 66(2)(a) allows for approval by the assembly to be waived if the Executive Committee determines that in particular circumstances it is not reasonably practicable to seek assembly approval. That is a very specific and narrow remit. If that were done, clause 66(3) allows Members within 40 days to move a resolution that the subordinate legislation be revoked. Therefore, there are already a number of checks and balances within the legislation, even if powers are delegated from the Executive Committee to the First Secretary. The assembly is clearly always in control and could take steps to revoke an action or call the First Secretary to account.

Oliver Letwin (Conservative, West Dorset)

What the Minister has just said is very helpful. Much of his argument hangs on clause 65(2), but how wide is the scope of that clause intended to be? For example, would it prohibit the Secretary of a Committee or, in this case, the First Secretary from issuing a circular under the powers that the Secretary of State for Education and Employment has in England and which in Wales lie with the Secretary of State for Wales, and which will, therefore, have been delegated under the transfer order powers? Would it prevent him from issuing a circular or from making discretionary judgments about expenditures, or would it merely prevent him from bringing forward and enacting orders without taking them to the full assembly? If it would simply prevent the latter, would he simply have to do what is done in this House when an order is subjected to the affirmative or negative resolution? If that is the only check—that is, if the First Secretary or the Secretary of a Committee could take matters to the point of laying orders, often subjecting them only to a negative resolution—the democratic check that the Minister is claiming exists is very slight.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

I was replying specifically to the issue that the hon. Gentleman had raised earlier and with which I was not able to deal in the context of that debate because of the time constraint. The First Secretary will not have a free hand in terms of subordinate legislation because it requires the approval of the assembly. I have to say that I do not believe that a circular is subordinate legislation. Nevertheless, I find it hard to see the First Secretary, having had delegated to him from the Executive Committee the power to issue a circular, issuing circulars that would properly be the domain of the assembly's subject Committees. If that sort of delegation were to happen, the only fallback would be for the assembly to call the First Secretary to account if it believed that that circular was improper or that it provided advice of which the assembly did not approve. The assembly would, therefore, still have a check on the power of the First Secretary under any Executive Committee delegations to him.

Oliver Letwin (Conservative, West Dorset)

I am grateful to the Minister for allowing me to ask a further and final question. Does he agree that the Bill places no limit on the items that can be delegated to the Executive Committee? Although he does not suppose that the power of circular—which might be widely used, not just in matters of education, and might have behind it the power of expenditure—will be delegated to the Executive Committee rather than to a subject Committee, does he accept that it is possible because there is no limit on what can be delegated to the Executive Committee?

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

Yes. Technically, under the provisions of the Bill it could happen. However, the hon. Member for West Dorset should ask himself to what extent any politician in any assembly or parliament would be likely willingly to delegate everything upwards through an Executive Committee to one person. In the real world, that is not likely to happen. Even if it did, the assembly would still have the power to call the First Secretary to book and to make changes if the entire assembly disapproved of any decision. In that respect, we can be quite clear that the assembly has a check on the power of the First Secretary. Amendment No. 198 would prevent the assembly from limiting or excluding delegation to the First Secretary in any given case. It seems to go in the opposite direction. It might well be appropriate for a particularly controversial matter, such as a major town and country planning order, not be delegated to an individual for decision, as is the case now when the Secretary of State can call in an application of enormous significance. We would not want to prevent the assembly or any planning Committee from being able to consider such an issue rather than referring it to the First Secretary. Under subsection (4), the assembly has the right to limit delegation. That is important to cover certain specific controversial points. I hope that, having heard those explanations, the hon. Gentleman will be happy to withdraw the amendment.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

I thank the Minister for his explanation which was sincere and meticulous. His answers to the probing questions from the hon. Member for West Dorset (Mr. Letwin) made us realise that there were more than superficial powers controlling the First Secretary in respect of the Executive Committee. However, we must realise that the Executive Committee will be an extremely powerful body in the assembly. The debate has enabled us to find out more about the powers of the Executive Committee, the checks and balances in relation to the First Secretary and the lines of accountability. I am grateful to the Minister for his explanation and I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

MEMBERS OF SCRUTINY COMMITTEE ETC.

Bernard Jenkin (Conservative, North Essex)

We believe that the principle of setting a minimum number of members of the Audit Committee is a good one. We are open to persuasion as to whether the number should be eight, but it is incumbent on the Minister to explain why he has not suggested that there should be a minimum number.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

Clause 60 provides for the establishment by the assembly of a subordinate legislation Scrutiny Committee, whose function it will be to consider the vires of any proposed assembly order or to draw attention to any unusual use of the order-making power. Clause 61 provides for the establishment of an assembly Audit Committee, which will work closely with the newly created Auditor General for Wales. Each of those important Committees will be chaired by a member of one of the Opposition parties in the assembly. Each will have a membership reflecting the overall composition of the assembly. The Bill proposes that the actual number of members of each Committee should be provided for in Standing Orders. The amendments suggest a minimum of eight. The Government have no objection in principle to the Scrutiny Committee and the Audit Committee having eight or more members, but we do not consider it necessary to put a minimum number of eight on the face of the Bill. Taking account of the debate this evening and the fact that, in principle, the Government do not object to a minimum of eight members, it would be more sensible not to include that number in the Bill as there may be a later move to re-order matters and the Standing Orders provide more flexibility. It is more important that both Committees will be chaired by members of Opposition parties. When one considers the need to maintain a balance between the parties, it is clear that eight would be the absolute minimum. In practice, the figure is likely to be higher. We believe that the matter should be decided under the Standing Orders and, given the Government's view, I invite the hon. Gentleman to withdraw the amendment.

AUDIT COMMITTEE

Cynog Dafis (Plaid Cymru, Ceredigion)

I beg to move amendment No. 401, in page 30, line 19, after second 'the', insert 'Financial'.

Cynog Dafis (Plaid Cymru, Ceredigion)

I must be very quick. I simply ask the Minister to respond to the idea of establishing an Environmental Audit Committee in the assembly. The Government are committed to sustainable development and have established an Environmental Audit Select Committee in the House. They regard it as a key mechanism to ensure that environmental policies are delivered across Departments. I hope that the Minister can respond quickly.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

The hon. Gentleman knows that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has already told the House that, in accordance with the White Paper, he will bring forward an amendment on sustainable development. He has also asked the National Assembly advisory group to consider an Environmental Audit Committee because he has received representations on that. Given our positive view on sustainability and the request to the advisory group, I hope that the hon. Gentleman will withdraw the amendment.

Cynog Dafis (Plaid Cymru, Ceredigion)

rose—

REGIONAL COMMITTEES

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

I beg to move amendment No. 12A, in page 30, leave out lines 36 and 37.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

These are some of the most important amendments for debate tonight. They refer to the regions of the assembly. No offence is meant to north Wales by our proposal in amendment No. 12A to leave out reference to it. Our aim, expressed in amendment No. 17A, is to have four regions of Wales—north, mid, west and south-east. We want to restructure the Regional Committees. That is necessary to ensure inclusivity throughout Wales. Every region of Wales must feel that it is included in the running of the assembly and that it has a part to play.

Alan Williams (Labour, Carmarthen East and Dinefwr)

The four areas that the hon. Gentleman has referred to have different populations. Would not the mid-Wales Committee be exceptionally small? It would have only Powys and Ceredigion and would be unbalanced.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

As a Member for a mid-Wales constituency, I cannot accept that view. Powys alone runs for 132 miles—equivalent to the distance from the Severn bridge to Hammersmith flyover. On top of that there is Ceredigion. I cannot speak for the hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy (Mr. Llwyd), but the Development Board for Rural Wales considers his constituency to be part of that area as well. The population is not evenly spread throughout Wales. There has to be redress, because some areas are very rural—more rural than anywhere else in Great Britain below the highland line in Scotland. There are special needs of geography. The Liberal Democrats want the four Regional Committees to have the right to provide the assembly with advice about their region and to take on powers delegated from the assembly. We want to remove all references to north Wales, not because we want to be unkind to north Wales but because we want to put all the regions in the Bill and have fair play for the other regions to establish an inclusive assembly. The Bill establishes Committees for north Wales and the regions and states that they may provide advice, but it does not specify where they will be. It provides that Standing Orders will be used to determine the regions; we want to go further and specify them. Why is north Wales mentioned when none of the other regions are? We realise that it might have been felt that the people of north Wales were left out of the referendum process. We are sure that that was not the case, but there was a specific reference to reassure the people of north Wales that they would be included. The proposals in the Bill could stigmatise the north and suggest that it is inferior to the south. Of course it is nothing of the sort, but the proposals are not good for the north and make other forgotten regions, such as mid-Wales, even more forgotten. We do not want that. That is why we want to omit the references to north Wales. Amendment No. 90, tabled by the Conservatives, has some good points. It would remove references to north Wales and introduce five regions. We would support that, but the amendment would also remove the right of the regions to provide advice to the assembly about the area. We cannot support the amendment because of that provision. To have real teeth, the Regional Committees should be able to have responsibilities delegated from the assembly. We want local accountability, subsidiarity and true devolution. We want to bring devolution home to the regions of Wales. Our proposals are particularly relevant to the difference between rural issues and urban issues. How can a majority of south Wales urban Members take sensible decisions about rural affairs that affect mid-Wales and north Wales? Such debates need to be informed. Amendment No. 16A would help. It is important that Regional Committees should meet in the regions. Local matters should be considered as near as possible to the affected area. The amendments deal with many issues. We feel strongly that the regions of Wales should be defined so that they can participate in the whole and make a worthwhile contribution to a successful Welsh assembly and the successful government of Wales. People should feel involved in the decision-making process.

Owen Paterson (Conservative, North Shropshire)

The clause goes back to the dark days of the summer, when the devolution project was doing very badly in opinion polls in the north. The White Paper made specific mention of north Wales only. It was a clear plug to keep the doubting north Wales voter on side and an acknowledgement that the project was not going well in the north. The referendum result showed that the Government were right. Only Gwynedd and Anglesey voted for devolution. I live on the border and have relations near Wrexham. My experience is that those real doubts still exist. There is real concern in the north that the assembly will be dominated by the south. [Interruption.] Would the Secretary of State like to intervene? No. In the markets of Oswestry and Wrexham, there is no demand for a switch of governmental powers from Westminster to the south of Wales. That is a fact and it is acknowledged by the Secretary of State, whose razor-sharp mind is now being applied to the drafting of the Bill. My hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Mr. Letwin) has time and again proved how badly the Bill has been drafted. That may be because the Secretary of State has been distracted. He has had to put out a bush fire in his constituency party concerning the manner in which the referendum was conducted. He has also been scouring estate agents' windows in south Wales for a suitable site for the assembly. It is the job of us in opposition, stuck in the trenches, to try to come up with a Bill that will work. The relic of the White Paper in clause 62 cannot be left as it is. It is woolly, vague and typical of the general muddle of the Bill. Amendment No. 90 clearly states that there should be five regions. These would be roughly equal in size of electorate to the European constituencies, which vary from 17.9 per cent. of the Welsh electorate to about 21.6 per cent. I hope that that will satisfy the helpful intervention of the hon. Member for East Carmarthen and Dinefwr (Mr. Williams), who rightly criticised the Liberal Democrats' amendment—No. 17A—which proposes four uneven regions. The regions that we propose would also give some framework to the additional Members, who are bouncing around without any clear framework in which to work.

Elfyn Llwyd (Plaid Cymru, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Owen Paterson (Conservative, North Shropshire)

I would be delighted to.

Owen Paterson (Conservative, North Shropshire)

That is exactly the boundary that will be used for the election of regional list Members, which I understand the hon. Gentleman's party supports. We should return to the ordinary Welsh voter who has a problem and wants it solved. The Secretary of State and I have discussed the matter in the Welsh Affairs Committee, but not to my satisfaction. Let us consider a project that could involve substantial inward investment—possibly from a European business—but could cause potential long-term environmental problems. Does the voter go to his district councillor; does he go to his directly elected assembly man; does he go to the party hack—the additional Member—who is elected on the proportional list; does he go to his Member of Parliament, who will not be overtaxed by work once the assembly is set up; does he go to his Member of the European Parliament; or does he go to the great panjandrum himself, the Secretary of State, who will also be short of things to do once the assembly is set up? It is not clear. The rules have not been laid down. I particularly dislike the Liberal Democrat amendment, which adds yet more confusion to the muddle by proposing four areas, as opposed to the five that we propose. The ordinary voter has to pay the bill, yet there is not a hint of what the Regional Committees will cost. There is not a whiff of how they will operate. The matter is left to the Standing Orders. I would like some information from the Minister—otherwise, the proposals are a pig in a poke. We want the Regional Committees to work, but we would like to be able to tell the people of Wales what they will cost and how they will work. In the meantime, the Bill would be immeasurably improved if the House accepted our amendment No. 90.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

I warmly welcome the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Mr. Paterson) and congratulate him on his sojourn on the Front Bench. I do not know whether it is intended that another barrel be added to the gun that has been firing intermittently from the Ribble Valley. We shall have to see whether North Shropshire can meet the firepower requirements, which so far have not served the Opposition Benches well. Unfortunately, the hon. Gentleman did not get off to quite the start that I expected, given the confusion he showed while speaking to amendment No. 90 and commenting on those tabled by the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Mr. Livsey). Clause 62 requires the assembly to establish Regional Committees of an advisory character for all parts of Wales, but specifically one for north Wales. North Wales was specifically highlighted because concerns were identified from the start that north Wales felt isolated from Wales as a whole. In order to show that the Government were determined that north Wales would be an integral and full player in the National Assembly for Wales, we specifically suggested a North Wales Committee. There will be Regional Committees in other parts of Wales. We have left the advisory group to suggest the configuration which would make most sense politically, economically and socially.

Owen Paterson (Conservative, North Shropshire)

The Minister has not addressed the problem that people in north Wales are worried that the assembly will be weighted towards south Wales. If we leave the division of the Regional Committee areas to the assembly, south Wales will have the final say. That is the concern in north Wales.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

I fail to see how the configuration of two, three or four Regional Committees in the rest of Wales can have any significant bearing on the role of an Advisory Committee in north Wales. We identified specifically a part of Wales which should be most definitely recognised as a region with an Advisory Committee of its own. For the rest of Wales, where the matter was not so clear, we felt that it would be best to consult on the boundaries. Amendment No. 90 suggests that we should use the European constituency boundaries, which have a political role given the election of people on the additional Member list. We do not see any necessity to be constrained by that political situation when trying to make sense of the economic and social needs of Wales. The hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy (Mr. Llwyd) pointed out that to use the European constituency of Wales Mid and West would create a regional advisory Committee for almost all of west Wales—from north to south.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

That is a burden the hon. Member for North Shropshire has to bear. He is obviously cracking up under the strain. All the north Wales Members of Parliament campaigned for the National Assembly and they clearly felt that there was a positive aspect to having a Regional Committee for north Wales.

Rhodri Morgan (Labour, Cardiff West)

Recalling the debate on the Floor of the House on the boundary commission report that led to the creation of the five current Euro-constituencies, on which the most recent Euro-elections, in 1994, were fought, can my hon. Friend confirm that, whereas coherence is a desideratum in boundary commission reports, it is only a secondary desideratum to trying to achieve an equal population in each region, whereas, in any committee structure that we devise, coherence must come first and population equality would be only a subsidiary consideration?

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

I can confirm that my hon. Friend is correct on that point. The report resulted in much heart-searching in political parties in Wales about how best to configure the Euro-constituencies, bearing in mind the population requirements and the fact that, perhaps for other reasons, the boundaries that were chosen were not ideal. The advisory group will consider what the best configuration of regional advisory Committee boundaries in Wales will be. We need to bear in mind—the hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy did not mention it this time, but he has in the past—the local debate that is going on about the way in which his constituency and local authority area should be located for these purposes. The advisory group will be able to consider these issues, take advice from around Wales and come up with a proposal that can be debated more widely. Eventually, the commission that is established will be able to make formal proposals to the assembly. I think it is best for us to await its conclusions.

Elfyn Llwyd (Plaid Cymru, Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

The Minister mentioned my constituency. Can he confirm that the commission will not be bound solely by counting the population in each area, which would do a disservice to the process? As the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Mr. Livsey) just said, in some areas, due to geographical factors, life is quite difficult and different from that in, for example, a valley area. I hope that the commission will have the widest possible remit to allow it to come up with the best possible answer.

Win Griffiths (Labour, Bridgend)

Yes, it will have a wide remit. We would not want to make population a primary consideration, but obviously that can be considered alongside all the other issues that can make most sense out of where the boundaries of the Regional Committees should be. I hope that the amendments—with the agreement of the Committee—can be withdrawn. Let us see what conclusions the advisory group reaches; then we can debate on them.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

I think that the Minister should know that, in parts of Wales, there is extremely strong feeling on the subject of Regional Committees. I understand that he is saying that the advisory group will devote time and effort to try to define the regions more satisfactorily than, for example, the Euro-constituencies are now defined. I would not have welcomed the idea of the five regions in amendment No. 90 if I had known that that meant the Euro-constituencies because, as has been said, the Wales Mid and West Euro-constituency has an extraordinary geography. It stretches from one end of Wales to the other, encompassing not only the western seaboard but mid-Wales and the eastern boundary with England. I know not how we got it, but it covers a vast area of Wales. Especially among the agriculture community, given recent events, people are aware of the benefits of a Welsh assembly. They believe that, if the Regional Committees of the assembly represent an area that means something to them, the assembly may have the germs of some of the solutions that are needed to tackle the huge economic problems of the agriculture community. They believe that, in those circumstances, the assembly may ensure the maintenance of the structure of farms and the farming community and that resources to the agriculture community will not be reduced if there is a transfer of resources from production support to environmental schemes, for example. People want those matters to be debated in the Welsh assembly. People in some parts of Wales also want the Regional Committees of a Welsh assembly to allay the fears that a south Wales-based assembly would take away some decision-making powers from them; their fear that they cannot contribute adequately to the efficient and effective running of their region within Wales; and their fear that they cannot contribute as well as they might to the running of a Welsh assembly. The assembly must be a sensitive body because of the great variety of regions in Wales, it is very important that people feel included in the process. I believe that people will be persuaded that they are included in the process if they are given genuinely meaningful Regional Committees within the assembly and if those Committees can take decisions in the region instead of in the assembly building, far away. They need to be connected to the assembly. We believe that to be extremely important and I believe that I would let down people in some parts of Wales if I did not press the amendment to a vote.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

I beg to move amendment No. 16A, in page 30, line 40, after 'region', insert 'and carry out any of the functions which the Assembly has delegated to the regional committees following a majority vote of Assembly members.'.

Richard Livsey (Liberal Democrat, Brecon and Radnorshire)

Amendment No. 16A is the amendment that refers to the meetings of the Regional Committees within the regions of the assembly. I made that point—I beg your pardon, Mr. Martin—in my summing-up just now, and I should have made it as a separate proposal that meetings take place in a region.

The rest of the debate is in Hansard.