We move now to item 9, a motion to amend Standing Orders relating to early business following a Senedd election. Rebecca Evans to move the motion formally. 

Motion NDM7670 Elin Jones

To propose that the Senedd, in accordance with Standing Order 33.2:

1. Considers the report of the Business Committee, ‘Amending Standing Orders: Early Business Following a Senedd Election’, laid in the Table Office on 17 March 2021.

2. Approves the proposals to amend Standing Orders 6, 7, 8 and 17, as set out in Annex A of the Business Committee’s report.

Motion moved.

Formally moved. 

We were told in the Business Committee paper regarding withdrawal of a nomination neither the First Minister nomination or Presiding Officer election procedures make specific provision for a nomination to be withdrawn, and both Standing Orders use mandatory language in requiring further rounds of voting in the event of no candidate being successful in a particular round of voting. So, of course, they don't contain specific provisions relating to withdrawal of candidate, because it has mandatory language requiring that process to go to completion, and if you stand for one of these positions under our Standing Orders, you commit to seeing that process out. And if following a tie a political deal is made, so some Members of the Assembly would change their vote in a future ballot, we should have that future ballot so that we can see them changing their vote, and so that is public, and crucially we should respect and apply our Standing Orders. And I'm afraid in this case, that didn't happen.

Llywydd, you told us that Standing Orders couldn't consider every conceivable scenario and, in such situations, it is your responsibility to interpret the Standing Orders. But these Standing Orders required no interpretation. As the Business Committee said, they use 'mandatory language'. You decided that language was unreasonable and you decided to do something else, and, as a consequence of that, the leader of Plaid Cymru, your party, didn't have the embarrassment of having a further vote and losing that vote, having gone into this process under those agreed Standing Orders that, then, I'm afraid, were disapplied part of the way through. We don't support these changes. We thought that was a sensible process, the problem is that it wasn't applied. You shouldn't codify to respect a precedent when that precedent, at least in my view—and I haven't heard a contrary view at all that's convincing—was not compliant with the Standing Orders then in force.

The other very important issue, I think, here—and I find it harder to assess this issue, but it is very, very important—is in terms of Standing Order 6 and particularly Standing Order 8, the one in respect of the First Minister. I'll take Standing Orders 6.9 and 6.10 as an example, rather than Standing Order 8. Where you have two Members who are standing, then it's just whichever gets the greater vote that becomes First Minister, but then if three or more stand, there's a different provision as to what the hurdle is to become First Minister. That strikes me as very strange. It's not clear why the number of initial candidates should reflect the hurdle required to become First Minister. It's a really, really serious issue that, if we do have three or more Members standing, there's then a requirement for one of those Members to get a majority of all voting, including abstentions and potentially spoilt ballot papers, rather than the plurality, particularly given that that differs from when there are two candidates. I think that's a very strange provision. 

On balance, we oppose these changes, firstly for the other change I was just discussing, but also, on balance, for this. Because if we were to keep this and we were to have Standing Order 6.10, at least as it applies to the First Minister, it is such that, without it—without the change—if there were, say, an Abolish group of Members in the next Assembly, so long as we ensure that there were three or more Members standing and that there weren't otherwise, then by virtue of spoiling ballots and participating but abstaining, we could potentially prevent the appointment of a First Minister, if there was plurality but not majority support for the leading candidate. So, we'd still have an Assembly or Senedd, but no First Minister and no Welsh Government under him, which would be something that would be a positive move, as we would assess. Hence the possibility of blocking a First Minister appointment and leaving the situation in limbo—perhaps the UK Government could step in and assist us—would be one that we would welcome.

For that reason, we won't vote for these changes, but I certainly understand why other members of the Business Committee have proposed them, given the huge and really important inconsistency between the situation and hurdle that applies where there are two or three or more Members who'd initially like to be First Minister; and, of course, the situation is analogous for the Presiding Officer.

I have no further speakers. The proposal this time is to amend Standing Orders in relation to early business following a Senedd election. Does any Member object? [Objection.] Yes, there are objections, so I will defer voting until voting time.

Voting deferred until voting time.