Guess where George Galloway wants to move the Houses of Parliament? On his doorstep in Leeds

Other locations proposed by panelists on Independent Live debate included Birmingham, Tottenham, Manchester and Newcastle

From left: Ivan Massow, David Lammy, George Galloway, Amol Rajan, Janet Street-Porter and Maajid Nawaz at Tuesday night’s event (Micha Theiner)

Leeds should be the future home for the Houses of Parliament, George Galloway has suggested.

It would certainly make the journey back to his Bradford West constituency shorter.

He made the suggestion during a discussion on whether we should move our elected chamber further north when renovation begins on the Palace of Westminster, which is in desperate need of repair.

However the Respect MP was not the only panelist on last night’s Independent Live debate to propose moving Britain’s elected chamber closer to their home.

Labour MP David Lammy tried to keep a straight face when suggesting the Houses of Parliament could be moved to Tottenham, the constituency he represents in north London.

But it was surprising to hear another panelist, Ivan Massow, suggesting it would be a good idea for MPs to up sticks to Birmingham, considering he is hoping to replace Boris Johnson as London mayor next year and would surely want to keep hold of one of the capital’s most popular tourist attractions.

Mr Massow, battling to be the Conservative candidate in next year’s London mayoral election, said moving the Commons to Britain’s second city would “send out an amazing message to the rest of the country” and would halt the “animosity” directed at Londoners.

From left: Ivan Massow, David Lammy, George Galloway, Amol Rajan, Janet Street-Porter and Maajid Nawaz at Tuesday night’s event (Micha Theiner)

Mr Galloway argued Birmingham was only the centre of England, whereas Leeds was the centre of the United Kingdom.

He said: “We are very soon going to grasp this nettle and there is no reason for Parliament to be in London; London will do fine without 650 Members of Parliament running around.

The cost of restoring the Palace of Westminster has been estimated at more than £3bn (Getty)

“But it would make a huge difference to the north and so I argue that we should move the Parliament to Leeds, somewhere on the outskirts of Leeds – Manchester already has the BBC, does it also need to get the Parliament – Leeds is more or less the centre of the country, not Birmingham.

"Birmingham may be the centre of England but of course it’s not the centre of the country. So Leeds would be the I think the optimum place and we could purpose build a tower block for Members of Parliament to live in, ruling out the second home allowances.”

The Bullring Shopping Centre in Birmingham (Getty) (Getty Images)

Relocating Parliament to another city would open the door for an overhaul of British politics, such as halving the number of MPs and reforming the House of Lords.

Explaining why he would opt to move MPs to Birmingham, Mr Massow said: “During that great big debate we had around Scotland and the Yes vote, there was so much anger directed at London when in fact the cost of living here is about 40 per cent more, our salaries aren’t a great deal more and we get so much less spent on us here.

“I think perhaps if we moved Westminster to Birmingham it would not only send out an amazing message to the rest of the country, it would stop this animosity against London”.

Labour MP for Tottenham, David Lammy, speaking at the debate (Micha Theiner)

But Mr Lammy stuck up for London and suggested a location much nearer to home.

“Why don’t we move the House of Commons to Tottenham?,” he said, drawing laughter from the audience. “It’s not funny,” Mr Lammy responded, “why not? There are parts of this city… that are a long, long way from Westminster, so when we talk about where to move the Commons, can we not just run into this narrative that all the problems are in the north of England, all the problems are in sea-side towns and there aren’t problems in our midst, in our city.”

Experts have said the Palace of Westminster is in desperate need of repair and renovation could cost as much as £3 billion.