Today the Boundary Commission has released proposals for changes to Parliamentary constituencies to take effect after the 2015 General Election (so in effect for 2020). The impact of these changes will be to reduce the number of MPs from 650 to 600. This is part of wider electoral reform which includes an adoption of fixed term Parliaments and a promise to change the makeup and selection of the Lords. Ultimately these reforms are intended to reconnect the political system to those who are governed with a secondary commitment to reduce costs. These proposals are now subject to a 12 week public consultation which ends in December although the process to agree this change will actually take till 2013.

The reduction in seat numbers is based on the parameters set for it by the coalition which one presumes have some rational basis, although the early drafts of the policy set the number at 585 and I have never seen a meaningful justification for either number. It includes an equilisation of electors per MP irrespective of whether the constituency is in a rural expanse or a dense urban centre (final numbers to be within 5% of 76,000). Apart from asking the electorate if it is happy with the minutiae of the boundaries being proposed these changes will need to be adopted by Parliament so that in effect 50 of the current MPs are bravely committing themselves to having no seat to fight in 2020.

If we are to have electoral reform, is it not time to have a real reform rather than tinkering around the edges? If we are to ask Turkeys to vote for Christmas, then surely this should be a great Christmas, not an average old one. If we are to save money in the parliamentary system, then never mind £12M, what about a much more ambitious target.

The UK is not unique in using a bicameral parliamentary system with two houses of decision makers. However if the number of legislators per head of population indicate the effectiveness of a Parliament, then we need to accept that taken together our two houses of Parliament are the least effective in the developed world by some way. For example if our Commons was run on a system comparable to the Indian Lok Sabha there would be only 28 MPs for the whole Parliament. If we operated a system more similar to Japan the Commons would reduce to 232 members and a German system would give us 470 MPs. At present Sussex alone has 16 MPs and  Brighton & Hove three. If we were looking at a Japanese system this would give us one MP for the whole city which would be really sensible. Alternatively the German system would give us two MPs for the city as a whole.

The Second Chamber in the UK is even more out of step with the rest of the world. At present we have 790 Lords and the current discussion revolve around what proportion of these are elected as opposed to appointed with once again some trimming in numbers. However in a system comparable to India these 790 would reduce to 12. The Italian equivalent to our second chamber would reduce this number down to 320. Even in Austria which is some way down the table, there would only be 480 members of this upper house.

It should be noted that if the size of the legislature reduces too much, the power of the executive becomes disproportionate, but the changes being proposed do not really change this balance and there is no reason why we should not lose some of the Minsterial salaries. In absolute terms our two houses are largest across the major democracies and even after this change we barely change our position on the table of comparable Parliaments.

This change is intended to signal a radical reform of the Democratic structure of the UK Parliament in the hope that the British Public will return to the ballot box in significant numbers. The last two elections have shown a rising trend with 65% of people voting in 2010. To go back to the last time when 75% or more people voted one needs to return to 1992 and the last time more than 80% of people turned out on election day, you would need to revisit 1951. My views are that if we are to have a radical review, let us be really radical not only in terms of how many representatives and legislators we need, but also a review that considers who local people go to when they need help. At present it is very unclear if our MP or Councillor is the best person for the job. Let us have a system that connects both the national legislator and local administrator and gives us a political system that is as cohesive as the communities we are attempting to create. The same argument would suggest less adherence to pure numbers and more focus on the size and shape of natural communities.