Constituency cull plan could be decoupled from AV referendum

Left Foot Forward

Left Foot Forward understands that there is increasing discussion among peers in the Lords to seperate the two bills to ensure a May date for the AV referendum.

Left Foot Forward understands that there is increasing discussion among peers within the committee handling the legislation in the Lords to separate the two bills to ensure a May date for the proposed AV referendum.

As originally referenced by the Edinburgh Evening News, with only three meetings of the committee scheduled before the February 17th deadline for Royal Assent, peers are concerned that given their responsibility to revise and scrutinise legislation time has run out to complete full scrutiny of the bill as it stands.

The AV segment, having already been passed by the Lords, could then proceed back to the Commons for a final vote before Royal Assent, whilst the constuency boundary changes legislation could continue later in the session or be rescheduled for a future session.

Peers are concerned that failure to seperate the legislation could result in the entire bill being delayed beyond the Royal Assent deadline ending the chance for a May AV referendum.

Such a separation would vindicate the intitial calls by leading progressives such as former Left Foot Forward Editor Will Straw and Fabian Society General Secretary Sunder Katwala for separate consideration and voting on these two critical constitutional changes.

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32 Responses to “Constituency cull plan could be decoupled from AV referendum”

  1. L DTUC

    RT @psbook: AV may pass as separate bill as the constituency boundary changes are stalled in the Lords http://bit.ly/i4Oz6X

  2. Sir Fred de Malagasy

    RT @leftfootfwd: Constituency cull plan could be decoupled from AV referendum: http://bit.ly/i4Oz6X writes @MarcusARoberts

  3. Mr. Sensible

    I hope you’re right, Marcus.

    In fact, I hope that this proposed gerrymandering can be killed off once and for all.

  4. JoshC

    They’re two seperate issues and should be treated as such so hopefully the Lords will decouple them.

    The two bills should never have been combined in the first place. Are we going to turn into America where politicians try to push through bad legislation by attaching it to good legislation, to reduce the time for scrutiny or the chances of it being rejected?

  5. Jordan Hall

    RT @leftfootfwd: Constituency cull plan could be decoupled from AV referendum http://bit.ly/ej0m9P

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