The only pretence at an argument put forth on the
Liberal side in favour of abolishing an electoral anomaly which hurts the Liberals, and maintaining one which injures their opponents, is the statement that the withdrawing of the plural votes will somewhat reduce the number of electors in the under-represented constituencies. That this argument is of the flimsiest and least honest description can be shown by the fact that we, who may claim to have kept this question before the public for the last ten years, and as strongly during a Unionist as during a Liberal Administration, have never based our arguments upon the number of electors, but upon the population. Galway has 16,257 inhabitants, and returns one Member ; Wandsworth has 179,877 inhabitants, and returns one Member ; Kilkenny has a population of 13,242, and returns one Member ; the Romford division of Essex has 217,085 inhabitants, but has the same weight in the councils of the nation as Kilkenny. These are the anomalies which the present Government propose to leave untouched, while getting rid of the far less gross anomaly of plural voting. The Government have in no sense pledged themselves to bring in a Redistribution Bill, and we feel convinced that they will make no attempt whatever at redistribution, unless they are compelled to do so by being frankly told by the Lords that that is the price of abolishing the plural voter.
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