In accordance with Standing Order 12.23(iii) amendments 1 and 2 tabled to the motion have not been selected.

Item 8 is a debate on the Committee on Senedd Electoral Reform's report, 'Senedd reform: The next steps'. And I call on the Chair of the committee to move the motion—Dawn Bowden.

Motion NDM7417 Dawn Bowden

To propose that the Senedd:

Notes the report of the Committee on Senedd Electoral Reform, 'Senedd reform: The next steps', which was laid in the Table Office on 10 September 2020.

Motion moved.

Thank you, acting Presiding Officer. I'd like to start by thanking the Business Committee for scheduling this debate today, because within the context of the COVID pandemic, of course, it's been right that the majority of the Senedd business is focused on how we can support our people, our communities and our economy in these unprecedented times. Nevertheless, the constitutional issues addressed in our report are central to democracy in Wales, and our ability, as Members of the Senedd, to carry out our representative, legislative and scrutiny roles. I therefore welcome the chance to debate these issues with Members.

In July last year, we debated the question of how many Members this legislature should have and how they should be elected. The Senedd resolved, by a clear majority, that more Members were needed, but agreed that further work was required to consider how that could be achieved. The Committee on Senedd Electoral Reform was subsequently set up in September 2019. We were asked by the Senedd to examine the recommendations made by the expert panel on Assembly electoral reform.

During our work, we heard clear and compelling evidence that the Senedd is currently undersized, that its membership should be more diverse, that the current electoral system constrains voter choice and Member accountability and that it is inappropriate that there is no mechanism for reviewing the Senedd's boundaries. There is not time today for me to outline all of the recommendations, which include, for example, that there should be between 80 and 90 Members of the Senedd elected by the single transferrable vote, that arrangements should be put in place to review the Senedd's boundaries on an ongoing basis, that voluntary and legislative interventions should be put in place to overcome the structural inequalities and societal barriers that stand in the way of a more diverse Senedd, and that we need to do more to increase levels of public awareness and understanding of what the Senedd does and how its work makes a difference to the issues that matter to people.

Investing in our democracy has a cost attached to it and those costs would have to be carefully scrutinised as the Senedd considered any reform Bill. But on the basis of the estimates that the Llywydd has prepared for us and the evidence that we've received, we believe that the additional cost is not only a price worth paying, but it's a necessary investment in our democratic processes and institutions. On the basis of the evidence we've heard, we believe that a larger Senedd would be cost-effective. It would improve the governance of Wales, enhance the scrutiny and oversight of Welsh Government and lead to more effective policy, more efficient spending and better legislation.

Even marginal improvements in spending or value could offset the cost of a larger legislature. But we won't see these improvements, and the Senedd elected in 2026 will not have the appropriate number of Members to carry out its important responsibilities unless political parties are able to reach consensus on reform proposals and agree to take legislative action early in the sixth Senedd.

In 2017 the expert panel acknowledged that there was no perfect moment for constitutional or electoral changes, but posed the question: if not now, then when? It challenged the Senedd to be bold and to take this opportunity to reform the institution, to invigorate Welsh democracy and to enthuse and energise voters so that the 2021 election delivers a legislature with the capacity to represent the people and communities it serves and becomes a Welsh Parliament that truly works for the people of Wales.

The powers to reform our Senedd have been in our hands since 2018. The first steps in the reform process have already been taken, with the result that 16 and 17-year-olds will be able to vote for the first time in next year's election. However, we have further to go before we can say that we have fully empowered our Senedd to meet the needs of those it represents—the people of Wales. We believe that our report offers a road map to guide the sixth Senedd as it takes the next steps in that reform process. We are, however, realistic; we know that there is more to be done to engage the public on these issues, and we know that Members and parties across the Chamber have different views. And we know that these are politically sensitive matters on which it is difficult to reach consensus.

However, as legislators and elected Members, we all have a responsibility to work together to invest in and strengthen our democracy in Wales. The evidence is clear: unless legislation is brought forward early in the sixth Senedd, we risk failing to ensure that our legislature can continue to deliver effectively for the people of Wales. We risk missing the chance to make sure that the scrutiny of policy, legislation, spending and taxation is informed by the perspectives of people from a diverse range of backgrounds. And we risk losing the opportunity to empower and engage voters through the introduction of an electoral system that maximises voter choice, clarifies Member accountability and delivers fairer and more proportional outcomes.

In publishing our report, I urge all Members and political parties to reflect on the evidence and to fully consider our conclusions and recommendations. I believe that the sixth Senedd can work together to reach agreement on the next steps for Senedd reform and to make sure that our Senedd remains at the heart of a flourishing democracy in Wales. Diolch yn fawr.

In accordance with Standing Order 12.23, the Llywydd has not selected amendment 1, tabled in the name of Gareth Bennett, nor amendment 2, tabled in the name of Neil Hamilton, though it is my intention to call both those Members to speak in the debate. Siân Gwenllian.

Thank you very much. This is a comprehensive report, without doubt, and there is great and detailed work that's been done by Members and committee staff. It is disappointing, despite that, that we by now have missed the opportunity in this Senedd to act on the evidence of another very detailed piece of work that was done at the start of the fifth Senedd under the chairship of Laura McAllister, and adding to the evidence of the need to strengthen the Senedd and to create a democracy that is representative of all of the voices in Wales—that's what this report does, in truth, rather than moving us forward quickly.

I believe that the business case is obvious and clear for us all by now and that the time has come for action. As you know, Plaid Cymru wanted us to act at once during this Senedd, in response to the report by Laura McAllister, and we did give an opportunity, through a motion on the floor of the Senedd, in July last year to that end. And at that time, Labour did, for the first time, agree in principle that we did need to increase the number of Members, but they weren't prepared to commit to putting that in place at that time, and the current Government will have to answer as to why we had to spend another five years with this deficient system. I'll be listening carefully in order to hear whether the Government will support unambiguously the legislation that we will need in the next Senedd.

Since its establishment, the Welsh Parliament has been very progressive as a legislature where equality was written into the DNA from the outset, but, evidently, much more work needs to be done. And for that, the responsibility is placed on our modern Senedd's shoulders to lead the way once again, to ensure that the Senedd does represent Wales in all its diversity. If we're willing to adopt the name 'Senedd', then, as a modern and diverse nation, we have to be a Senedd for everyone in Wales and a Senedd for the whole of Wales. All of the responsibility can't fall on political parties alone. It's evident that we need an element of positive action to realise this ambition. There are small steps being taken, and there are some steps that are praiseworthy being recommended in the report: a system of collecting data on the diversity of the candidate list of each political party, and a fund to support people with disabilities, for example, to support the election of some of those groups that are underrepresented in public office. But we need to go further than that.

Job sharing—you've heard me discussing this previously. I don't think that we need another working party to look at this. The focus, right from the outset of the next Senedd, should be implementing this in legislation. The evidence already exists. And I would be very eager to see the inclusion of statutory quotas to ensure appropriate representation for women and people of colour in the new legislation.

We don't have to wait until the next Senedd to start acting on this. There is a window and an opportunity, even in the remaining legislative timetable of this Senedd, to take steps towards making the democracy of Wales more inclusive and more equal at a local government level. Delyth Jewell has introduced amendments to the legislation that's being discussed at present in terms of local government, and passing those amendments would mean introducing STV in every council without exception, as well as other measures to protect the maternity rights of councillors and to ensure that it's not possible to have a cabinet of men only. I greatly hope that those small steps will have the Government's support and that we can move even now during this Senedd at least part of the way towards being a genuinely inclusive and equal Senedd.

Well, Wales has many problems at the moment, but I don't think we'll find many people in the outside world who think that the answer to any of them is more politicians, more Members of this place. The reality is that there is absolutely no demand whatsoever amongst the people who have elected us to this place to increase the size of the Senedd, and we know this just by looking at the electoral statistics for the last 20 years. There isn't a single election in which we've managed to get turnout to elect Members of the Senedd to 50 per cent. Recent opinion polls have shown a growing disaffection with this place and a growing demand to get rid of it—22 per cent or so in the last opinion poll that I saw. The idea that, as was said a moment ago, increasing the size of the Senedd would invigorate democracy is actually quite laughable and is actually an indictment of what we are at the moment—[Inaudible.]

We appear to have some technical difficulties. Can the sound operator just see if we can re-establish contact with Neil Hamilton?

I was muted—

Yes, sorry, Neil, we had difficulty hearing you. The sound feed didn't work. So, we've heard you up to a minute and 34, so, obviously, I will allow you to make up the necessary time for your argument.

Thank you very much for that. I proposed in an amendment—and I understand, of course, it's not been selected—that we should actually have a real consideration of this by the public at large in the form of a referendum. Angela Burns said in an earlier debate that the Welsh Conservatives say 'no' to referenda because ultimately we should have the power to proceed or not using our collective political judgment here, in line with our mandates. Well, of course the collective judgment of politicians is that there should be more politicians. I don't think that that's a very convincing argument to the electors. We all know what happened on Brexit, where 85 per cent of the Members of this place wanted to remain in the EU, but 53 per cent of the Welsh population wanted to get out. Indeed, many of the proponents of this argument for increasing the size of the Senedd wanted a second referendum on the Brexit referendum even before the result of the first has been implemented.

The Commission's argument is that the voice of the people can be adequately represented by what they call a citizens' assembly, but of course that wouldn't be the voice of the people, it would just be the voice of the Cardiff Bay establishment. It would actually be another shield against public opinion, and it would be just like, I think, those sham parliaments that we see in dictatorships like North Korea, where basically they're rubber stamps to produce what the establishment wants. These organisations would be filled with wannabe politicians themselves, or Cardiff Bay hangers on, or people who are funding beneficiaries of the institutions of Welsh Government and so on. The third sector I'm sure is very worthy, but they're all quasi politicos as well, and they're all sucking on the taxpayer teat, so of course they have a vested interest in continuing the existing organisation. A lot of these organisations are funded either directly by Welsh Government contracts or grants, so I don't think we should regard any of them as independent, and they're run by the political friends of Welsh Government. Wales isn't a democracy, it's a chumocracy, as has been comprehensively revealed in the Jac o' the North blog, for any of those of you who read it.

And, in practical terms, are we currently overworked as Members of the Senedd? I say that we're not. Members of the Senedd are in my experience very conscientious and I pay tribute to them, but I think they can cope with the existing workload. I was for a while a party group leader and on four of the Assembly committees, and I represent, along with others, Mid and West Wales, which is the most diverse, in geographical terms, region in Wales. Yet I could cope, and I enjoyed it, and we sit in Cardiff only three days a week—two days in Plenary and one day, usually, on a committee. Compared with other countries, we're not overworked. In the United States they're about to have an election to the House of Representatives; there are 330 million electors in the United States, and 450 Members of the House of Representatives will represent them. Italy has just had a referendum on whether to reduce the size of their Parliament. Seventy per cent of the people voted in that referendum to reduce the size of both houses of the Italian Parliament from 900 to 600.

This report has ignored the argument of those who are opposed to increasing the size of the institution, and of course David Rowlands resigned from the committee, and we got—UKIP, that is—a one-line mention in the report. So, all that this report does, I think, is to confirm that the Senedd is an echo chamber for Cardiff Bay politicos, and not really the voice of the people. So, I look forward in the election in May next year to debating this, and it's a very good thing that it's not being decided upon, as Siân Gwenllian and her colleagues wanted, during this Assembly. Because I think that this will be an extremely useful issue for those of us who think that devolution has actually been a failure in practice, and I very much look forward to joining battle on the hustings.

Can I say 'well done' to Dawn Bowden for chairing a committee on a controversial matter of singular importance to the functioning now and in the future of this Senedd, this Parliament of Wales? She did so with real skill, and with the help of an exemplary small team of clerks, despite the unexpected disruption of a pandemic and some local political challenges. I'll reserve my remarks on that for another day, but I simply note that I feel it is incumbent on all political parties in this place to engage with the arguments and the evidence no matter how difficult politically that is. And our role as parliamentarians is sometimes to be signposts to the future, not simply weather vanes to the prevailing populist winds. 

I'll touch briefly on some of the key findings and recommendations of our report, before turning to significant challenges in making this happen. And in doing so, none of us in the limitations of this debate can do justice to the wide-ranging detail and evidence in the report. I would simply say: go and read it and digest it. 

The evidence we heard on the size of the Senedd was compelling and clear and remarkably consistent—that the Senedd is currently too small and should increase to between 80 and 90 Members to improve our governance and representation, enhance our scrutiny and our oversight of the Welsh Government, and deliver more effective policy, more efficient spending and better legislation. 

On electoral reform, and again faced with remarkably consistent evidence, we conclude that the single transferable vote electoral system should be introduced to give voters greater choice whilst still maintaining the clear links between Members and constituencies, and producing more proportional electoral outcomes and, crucially, making every vote count—making it worth while voting in seats that have only ever produced a Labour or a Conservative representative, for example; making every Member work for every vote in every constituency.

And on diversity of candidature and Members of the Senedd, the evidence was clear that having a more representative Senedd with greater diversity of candidates and representatives goes hand in hand with reform of the electoral system and increasing the numbers of representatives. But equally clear was the crying need to see positive action to help overcome the structural inequalities and barriers that make this so difficult. So, political parties should get on with publishing information on diversity of their electoral candidates and set out their plans for increasing diversity and inclusion in the way that they work. And there needs to be more cross-party work on how job-sharing for Members of the Senedd and diversity quotas for protected characteristics other than gender as well could work in practice. And there needs to be financial support for people with disabilities who want to stand for election—[Inaudible.]

Can the sound operator again try and reconnect to the Member?

Acting Presiding Officer, I understand I'm not—

Yes, you've had about a 20-second interruption. You were just dealing with the point of diversity of candidates. If you could recommence from there. 

Thank you, acting Presiding Officer. The point I was making is that there needs to be more cross-party work on how job sharing for Members of the Senedd and diversity quotas for protected characteristics other than gender could work in practice. And there needs to be financial support for people with disabilities who want to stand for election, changing the rules so that spending as a result of disability or childcare or other care responsibilities does not count towards election campaign spending limits. And where parties can get on and do these things, they should just do it voluntarily, but, where legislation is needed and within our powers, subject to clarification with the UK Government, we should work towards this too.

But until 2026, we will be living with a 60-Member sixth Senedd, come what may. So, interim measures will be urgently needed to help the already overstretched 60 Members fulfil their representative, scrutiny and legislative roles effectively. The report makes it clear that we've already made many adjustments for the increased workload over an underpowered Senedd and that, going forward into the sixth Senedd, this may have difficult implications for working patterns of the Senedd and some unintended consequences, not just on the quality of our work but on the work-life balance that this Assembly, then, proudly set out to achieve. But it may be possible to learn lessons from new ways of working used during the COVID pandemic to try out other options between now and the end of this fifth Senedd. Now, there's far more to be discussed than can be covered in five minutes, so I go to my earlier comment: read the report in detail; it is compelling.

But, in my final remarks, I just want to address where we go from here, and this all depends on the will of this place right now, but also at the beginning of the sixth Senedd. The committee has tried to be of service to the Senedd by mapping out very clearly the very tight timescales for implementing these major reforms in time for the elections to the seventh Senedd. They are challenging, with key milestones to be met and decisions to be taken in the first few months, let alone the first couple of years of the next Senedd. And there will need to be a two-thirds majority to deliver these major reforms. These are high mountains to scale, but even before we get to those high mountains there's another whole range to overcome, and that requires the leadership of the main political parties—all of them—to be willing to take these matters back into their own parties, wrestle with them and come to a conclusion. I suspect for Plaid Cymru and the Lib Dems, those mountains will look relatively puny. For my own party, we'll see some heights rising ahead of us. I think the Conservative Party may have decided already not to bother under the current leadership—I don't know—and assorted others have already turned their backs on the challenge, or even on Wales or the Senedd already.

But ultimately, acting Presiding Officer, our committee has done what was asked of us. We took the decision early on, by the way, as a committee, which I commend, to constrain our activities, recognising that responding to the virus is of paramount concern. But having completed our work as best we can in these difficult circumstances, and having come to clear conclusions, we now return to the fundamental truth that we all recognised in the beginning: ultimately, this is a matter for political parties to resolve, for political leadership of those parties and for leadership of the next First Minister and Llywydd in this Senedd. There are mountains to scale, but we are a nation of mountains and used to scaling them. Twenty years after devolution, after at least five substantial changes to the governance of Wales, yet with no accompanying electoral reform—

You must conclude. This is beginning to be Everest without oxygen. Now please finish.

I will indeed conclude, acting Presiding Officer. This report sets out the path to take for the next stages for reform. The question is whether we're willing to take the steps along that path to ensure we have the democracy and the legislature we need and that we deserve in Wales. Thank you. 

Thanks to the committee for bringing today's debate, and also for the large and informative report that they produced. Now, Huw was just talking about the new ways of working and I think all of us are learning at the moment how to function under the so-called new normal. It is unfortunate that the massive crisis of COVID-19 occurred when it did, when the electoral reform committee had already finished most of its work, because COVID is going to have a major impact on how we work going forward, and that impact has not informed in any way the findings of this report. That isn't the fault of the committee, of course; it's just a misfortune of timing.

As I said, this is a voluminous report that has thoroughly examined several issues that were of interest to the committee. The problem is that other solutions, like planning in detail how to continue operating with 60 Members, were of almost no interest to it. So, the report barely touches on this. As Huw mentioned, it does go into it a little bit, but the underlying assumption is that we will ultimately have to have close to 90 Members here. So, I fear I must profoundly disagree with this assumption.

The fixation on getting extra Members was the starting point for this report, so it's a bit like the old joke when somebody is on a motoring holiday abroad and they ask a local, 'Can you tell us the quickest way to get to the city centre?', and the local says, 'Well, I wouldn't start from here.' That's my problem with this report: I wouldn't have started from here. I wouldn't have started from the presumption that this place cannot operate properly without another 25 to 30 Members. We sit here for two days in Plenary each week. In the House of Commons, they sit for four days a week. It's not like we're paid much less than MPs; certainly, we are paid a full-time salary. So, if we are overworked, why aren't we having Plenary for more than two days a week? 

A major problem is the business of committees. This is a big issue. But when we discussed this in 2017, I suggested that the number of committees, the amount of committee meetings and the number of AMs that would have to sit on committees could all be looked at. My remarks were treated rather witheringly. Lo and behold, a few months later we had a reorganisation and it was decided by the Business Committee that we didn't need eight Members on committees after all; we could have six.

So, given that, could we now also look at the number of committees we have or, more usefully perhaps, the volume of work that is undertaken? We could look to cut down on the number of meetings when we do the forward work programmes because, as we know, work expands to fill the time available. A witness was quoted as saying that in this report. Once committees are set up, they like to feel important, and they like to have a full programme of work, but let's be honest: we're not discussing legislation all the time on committees, are we?

Even if we are debating legislation, what good would extra Members do? We operate here in a party political system with party whips. Members are whipped as to how to vote on legislation. They don't just sit there and listen to the evidence and then decide for themselves how they're going to vote—they're told how to vote by the party whips. If you had another 20 Labour Members here, then what earthly good would it do? They wouldn’t provide any greater level of scrutiny since those extra Members would still be told how to vote by their party whips. This system would be the same if we had 60 Members, 90 Members or 100 Members, and we'd still get perfectly good opposition amendments being voted down by the Government. That is the reality of party politics, and that reality is being completely overlooked in this report.

This is a time of uncertain public finances. People in the real world are losing their jobs and their livelihoods. This is the very worst time to try and convince the general public of the need for 30 more Members of this Chamber, at a cost to them of millions of pounds a year. For that reason, while I appreciate the work that has gone into this report, I must oppose its findings completely and utterly. Many members of the public are concluding that we don't need 90 Members of the Senedd. We don't even need 60. We need precisely zero, because we don't need this place. But don't trust my opinion; ask the public themselves directly in a referendum if they want 30 more Members, or if they would rather abolish the Assembly altogether. I know which way I would vote. Diolch yn fawr iawn.

May I thank the Chair for her excellent address at the beginning of this debate, and the clerks and researchers for their very hard work over many months? This committee was formed following a decision of this Senedd. I regret, therefore, that not all parties participated in the activities of the committee, although it was a Senedd decision. The decisions of this Senedd should be respected.

The vast majority of the detailed evidence that we took over a period of months did come to the conclusion that this Senedd needed more Members and that they needed to be elected with the proportional representation system of STV in order to improve scrutiny. Improved scrutiny gives you better legislation and also saves money. That’s what the Auditor General for Wales’s report said recently when discussing the issue too: it would save enough money to fund the costs of the additional Members.

But, of course, there are those who oppose all of this. We’ve heard them this afternoon. They oppose the very existence of this Senedd despite the results of two referenda, with the result of 2011 showing that 64 per cent of the people of Wales were in favour of enhanced powers for this Senedd. However, there are people who still oppose recognising Wales as a political entity in any way whatsoever, particularly following Brexit. They want to abolish our Senedd and our nation and to sweep us off the face of the earth, and to take us back to some golden age of British empire when the sun never set on the red zones on the map.

But Wales has survived despite all oppression and we will continue to survive. But we do need to strengthen our political structures. We need to strengthen our Senedd. Yes, by having more Members from diverse backgrounds with enhanced powers. Sixty Members here and that is less than many of our county councils. There are 72 councillors in the chamber in the city of Swansea; 90 Members of the Legislative Assembly in Northern Ireland; and 797 Lords in the House of Lords, constantly increasing without any elections at all, and spending £5 billion to repair Westminster and nobody mentions it. No, we have withstood being swept off the face of the earth as a Welsh nation for eight centuries, now we need to strengthen our Senedd. That is the next step and, ultimately, independence: that is the only solution to all of those forces that seek to abolish our Senedd and our nation. Thank you.

I now call the Llywydd.

Thank you, Chair. I'd like to thank the committee and the Chair of the committee for presenting this important report, which has helped to maintain the momentum of the debate regarding the future work of the Senedd. As Members know, the committee's remit covered a range of topics identified in the report of the expert panel on Assembly electoral reform, which I established in February 2017.

As the Member in charge of the Senedd and Elections (Wales) Act 2020, I'm pleased with the progress that we've made thus far in extending the electoral franchise, but at the time of the Act's assent, I expressed my personal disappointment at the lack of consensus in favour of legislating on the size of the Senedd and the voting system used to elect its Members. Therefore, I welcome today the committee's conclusion that

'there is clear and compelling evidence that the Senedd is currently undersized'.

The Senedd itself has also expressed this view more than once through votes in favour of increasing the number of Members.

Many have already referred to the COVID-19 crisis, and it's true to say that that has changed the way that we work here. It has taught us how difficult it is to anticipate what challenges we will face in the future and has reminded us of the need for a Senedd that is more flexible and more robust. The pandemic has also made the debate on work-life balance even clearer, and here in the Senedd, as in wider society, we're asking Members to do more in less time. In my view, increased responsibility without increased capacity leaves us vulnerable to a decline in the quality of scrutiny, which is our primary role as a Parliament. For this reason, I welcome the recommendation that legislation be introduced early in the next Senedd term to elect between 20 and 30 additional Members to the Senedd in 2026.

I also welcome the recommendation that measures to alleviate capacity pressures should be implemented in the sixth Senedd, and many have referred to the need to do that as well as we start the work on the sixth Senedd. In my view, we should continue to consider all possible measures to alleviate the pressures facing the 60 current Members; those of us who are here at present and those who will be here following the next election.

In my role as Chair of the Business Committee and Chair of the Senedd Commission, I will seek to ensure that a review of the measures taken in this Senedd to address capacity pressures is part of our legacy work and ready to be implemented in the sixth Senedd. This will include consideration of the committee's other comments on ways of working, such as those outlined in recent correspondence from the committee Chair, Dawn Bowden, to me, and I'm grateful to her for those comments and recommendations.

Turning to the other recommendations made to the Senedd Commission, as a body, we will give careful consideration to how we monitor the impact of public information and education campaigns and the possibility of developing a systematic and proactive approach to assessing the impact of the scrutiny and oversight work of the Senedd. For my part, I will ensure that the Commission fulfils its role in this regard so that we can provide a Senedd that scrutinises Government and serves the people of Wales to the best of its ability.

I call the Minister for Housing and Local Government, Julie James. 

Thank you, acting Deputy Presiding Officer. I, too, would like to begin by thanking the committee for their very hard work. This has been an extremely difficult year, and as everyone has pointed out, COVID-19 has absolutely disrupted our processes and taken priority in all of our workloads. But in a time of unprecedented uncertainty where we have all be strained, the committee has produced a very comprehensive report and I'd like to pay particular tribute to the Chair of the committee, Dawn Bowden, for her commitment and hard work in this regard.

The reforms that we are talking about are, of course, already under way. The 2021 Senedd elections will be, for the first time in Wales, ones where 16 and 17-year-olds as well as qualifying foreign citizens will be able to play a full part in our democracy. The committee has outlined a number of recommendations to help the Senedd be a more diverse Parliament and better representative of the people it serves. Many of those recommendations are for the next Senedd to consider, but the committee has also identified a few more immediate issues, and today, acting Presiding Officer, in the interest of time, I'll confine my remarks to those.

I particularly welcome the committee's recommendations on enabling disabled people to stand for election. We've been working on our diversity and democracy agenda since 2018. We're taking action on this in two respects. First, we are bringing forward legislation this autumn to exempt disability-related expenditure from election campaign spending limits. And second, we're establishing a pilot 'access to elected office' fund. This will provide financial assistance to help disabled people stand for election, and it will be open for next year's Senedd election as well as for the local government elections in 2022. By removing barriers in this way, we aim to help create a much more diverse and representative Senedd.

The committee made a number of other linked recommendations, which I think are extremely important. We've already accepted the recommendation about commencing section 106 of the Equality Act 2010, when it was made by the Equality, Local Government and Communities Committee, and we are giving careful consideration to the recommendations about broader expenditure exemptions and financial assistance to help other under-represented groups and those with caring responsibilities.

The idea of a larger Senedd is not a new one, and, as everyone has pointed out, has been recommended both the Richard commission in 2004 and the independent expert panel in 2017. The referendum in 2011 gave a resounding platform for this institution, and I don't think we need to revisit it, as a number of people who have contributed to this debate have sought to do.

I do intend to publish the Welsh Government's formal response to the committee's recommendations in the coming weeks. The Welsh Government welcomes the committee's insight and once again would like to thank them for producing their report despite the extremely challenging circumstances.

It is, of course, acting Deputy Presiding Officer, at times of crisis when we see most acutely the need for a strong and representative Parliament for our nation. The committee's work is a significant contribution to that, and I pay tribute to them. Diolch yn fawr.

I call Dawn Bowden to reply to the debate.

Can I thank everybody who's contributed to the debate this afternoon for the largely supportive comments that have been made? Siân, Huw, Dai, the Llywydd and the Minister have all identified some of the key aspects of the report around equality and diversity, political consensus, new ways of working, scrutiny, better legislation, and the need for a stronger Parliament. That is all what this report sets out to do.

In terms of the contributions from Neil Hamilton and Gareth Bennett, they were utterly predictable. Neil Hamilton talks about evidence not being taken on the other alternatives, but of course evidence was taken from a very wide range of stakeholders. Everybody had the opportunity to submit their evidence and to submit their views, and whether they chose to do so was a matter for them. In terms of referenda, again, we've already heard that there is no requirement in law for a referendum. We've had two referenda on the establishment of this place and powers, and a third referendum would not be necessary unless the Member in charge of taking the legislation through the sixth Senedd indicated that that was what they wanted to be a part of the legislative process.

I do think it's important, Llywydd, just to point out that whilst it suits the populist political agenda of some people here to make all this about more Members and try to make that the headlines, and deflect from anything else, we have to acknowledge that is a central plank of the proposed reforms, of course. I truly believe that if we had a representative and deliberative consultation process with the public as we had planned to do—and Neil Hamilton's comments about a citizens' assembly just demonstrated to me that he clearly doesn't understand what a citizens' assembly is and how it works, because it is a very deliberative consultative process. It can join a wide range of people. We had planned to do that until the pandemic hit us, but we still need to convince people of the need for what we have set out to do.

So, there is still very much more to do in relation to the recommendations of this report. It is about how this Senedd truly represents the people of Wales through inclusivity and diversity, and how the people of Wales can deliver representatives who are truly reflective of their views with an electoral system that ensures that everyone in this place is directly accountable to a constituency that elects them. And again, I have to say to Neil Hamilton, I don't know what he does during his time as a Member of the Senedd, but for most of us, this is a 24/7 job, and it's not about three days a week sitting in Tŷ Hywel or in the Senedd. This is about the work we do in our constituencies, with our communities as well as the work that we do in this place. 

Llywydd, as far back as 2004, we had a commission set up to look at the many issues of powers and electoral arrangements for this Senedd. That commission recommended more powers and more Members. We got the first, but the second has not yet followed. Despite the commission and the McAllister review, votes in this Senedd and this committee report, we're still debating these fundamental issues. But how many more commissions, reviews and reports do we need to tell us what we already know? It is now about having the courage to take this forward, because this whole package of measures would deliver a more accountable legislature, more responsive to the needs of people of Wales, and more able to ensure good governance and good government. I hope this Senedd approves this report, and that we can build a political and public consensus that will finally deliver the changes proposed. 

Thank you. The proposal is to note the committee's report. Does any Member object? [Objection.] I see Members objecting, and I therefore defer voting under this item until voting time.

Voting deferred until voting time.