Sledgehammer to crack nugatory nut

 Peter Black has already commented on the Labour/Plaid co-operative's micro-management of a social issue, and I am with him 100%. Friday's BBC News brought another example of their complicating legislation, this time in the political field. 

Welsh ministers and Plaid Cymru are working on the fine detail before publishing a proposed Senedd reform law by autumn 2023.

BBC Wales has been told further changes agreed include:

• requiring candidates for Senedd elections to be resident in Wales;

• a ban on party defections so MSs who are elected to represent a party will not be able to resign and join another party in the Senedd - they will have to instead sit as independents;

• independent candidates will have to disclose their membership of any political parties in the year ahead of an election

The first proposal is clearly aimed at one individual, Neil Hamilton MS, who has chosen to retain his English residence. However, it seems unduly restrictive when one considers how the border weaves between England and Wales, cutting across transport links. 

It is noteworthy that Scotland, which has the same electoral system for her parliament as Wales has for the Senedd, has not chosen either of the other two measures. It is a symptom of the group-think and paranoia of Labour and the Nationalists that they want to constrain MSs in this way. It is rather like the hard-line Islamist line of "once a Muslim, always a Muslim" and of punishing any apostasy. 

It may also create more problems than it solves. Suppose there is a radical change of policy on the part of a Senedd party. Perhaps Labour in Wales changes its policy on Europe to mirror the Europhobia of the current Westminster leadership. There will be some Labour MSs who cannot in all conscience be whipped into line on this. Their natural retreat would be to the Liberal Democrats - but the proposed legislation would prevent this. Or take a current issue, that of deterring the use of private vehicles. The Conservatives would welcome Labourites who felt that traditional motoring was a crucial issue. 

The proposers clearly have in mind politicians who join the party which offers them most prospect of advancement and/or remuneration. Maybe there are too many of these around, but there are also politicians of conviction and conscience. Consistently, political surveys reveal that the general public does not like the party system. Labour and Plaid are seeking to reinforce it.

The answer, of course, is to do away with the party-based additional member system, not to revert to a first-past-the-post regime, but to a fair system which puts more emphasis on the individual representative and less on his or her party, if they have one.