House of Commons
Prayers
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Hon. Members
Object.
To be considered on Tuesday 8 May.
Leeds City Council Bill
Motion made,
That so much of the Lords Message [23 April] as relates to the Leeds City Council Bill be now considered.—(The Chairman of Ways and Means.)
Hon. Members
Object.
To be considered on Tuesday 8 May.
Nottingham City Council Bill
Motion made,
That so much of the Lords Message [23 April] as relates to the Nottingham City Council Bill be now considered.— (The Chairman of Ways and Means.)
Hon. Members
Object.
To be considered on Tuesday 8 May.
Reading Borough Council Bill
Motion made,
That so much of the Lords Message [23 April] as relates to the Reading Borough Council Bill be now considered.—(The Chairman of Ways and Means.)
Hon. Members
Object.
To be considered on Tuesday 8 May.
City of London (Various Powers) Bill [Lords]
Motion made,
That so much of the Lords Message [23 April] as relates to the City of London (Various Powers) Bill [Lords] be now considered. —(The Chairman of Ways and Means.)
Hon. Members
Object.
To be considered on Tuesday 8 May.
City of Westminster Bill [Lords]
Motion made,
That so much of the Lords Message [23 April] as relates to the City of Westminster Bill [Lords] be now considered.— (The Chairman of Ways and Means.)
Hon. Members
Object.
To be considered on Tuesday 8 May.
Transport for London Bill [Lords]
Motion made,
That so much of the Lords Message [23 April] as relates to the Transport for London Bill [Lords] be now considered.— (The Chairman of Ways and Means.)
Oral Answers to Questions
Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)
1. What steps he is taking to promote the refurbishment of empty and vacant homes in Northumberland.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Andrew Stunell)
I have allocated £150 million to bring empty homes back into use, and £160,000 has already been committed to a project in Northumberland, subject to contract. In addition, of course, Northumberland has received a reward of £630,000 through the new homes bonus for bringing 256 long-term empty homes back into use.
Guy Opperman
I thank the Minister for that answer. Does he agree that Northumberland county council, in drawing up its local development framework, should promote and maintain brownfield sites for development before any greenfield sites?
Andrew Stunell
I certainly agree with my hon. Friend, and I draw his and the council’s attention to the publication, two weeks ago, of the national planning policy framework, which sets out the importance of making sure that all such plans are founded on the principles of sustainable development. Of course, the Government want to encourage every local authority to focus on land of the least environmental quality, and that, of course, includes brownfield sites.
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)
In Newcastle, which is right next to the constituency of the hon. Member for Hexham (Guy Opperman), 99% of empty homes are in private landlords’ hands, so why are the Government increasing from six months to two years the amount of time that a property has to stand empty before the council can issue an order to bring it back into use?
Andrew Stunell
A high proportion of the 280,000 long- term empty homes are indeed in the private sector. That is why we have provided funding to support bringing them back into use for social homes, and a second round of funding where there are clusters of empty homes, which will be helpful in those areas. As for the orders that the hon. Lady referred to, only about 50 homes in the whole country have been subject to that procedure in five years. It is not a very effective measure, but it should be a back-stop, which is why we have put in place a new two-year limit.
Sir Alan Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (LD)
Is my hon. Friend aware that one category of accommodation that is now often empty is bedsitting rooms in sheltered accommodation for the elderly? We have an example of that in Wooler in Northumberland. Does he recognise that it will be necessary for us to create more suitable accommodation for elderly people, both to enable such properties to be taken out of use permanently, and to meet the requirements of an ageing population?
Andrew Stunell
I thank my right hon. Friend for his question, and draw his attention to the national planning policy framework. In drawing up its housing strategy, Northumberland unitary authority must take account of the needs in its area. Of course, the Government are funding a social and affordable homes programme, which will deliver 170,000 affordable homes by 2015. I very much hope that housing providers in Northumberland will be bidding for money from that fund in a suitable way.
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
2. What assessment he has made of the potential effect of funding reductions on the operational activities of fire and rescue services.
Mr Kevin Barron (Rother Valley) (Lab)
4. What assessment he has made of the potential effect of funding reductions on the operational activities of fire and rescue services.
Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab)
5. What assessment he has made of the potential effect of funding reductions on the operational activities of fire and rescue services.
Grahame M. Morris (Easington) (Lab)
13. What assessment he has made of the potential effect of funding reductions on the operational activities of fire and rescue services.
Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)
17. What assessment he has made of the potential effect of funding reductions on the operational activities of fire and rescue services.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Robert Neill)
Operational matters are best assessed at the local level. It is for each fire and rescue authority to determine the operational activities of its fire and rescue service through its integrated risk management plan, which is subject to consultation with the local community.
Alex Cunningham
I am extremely proud of the Cleveland fire service, which looks after the area of highest industrial risk in Europe. Its proactive work in Teesside communities has driven down house fire numbers, which have gone down and down, and it has excellent working plans with local companies. I am told that owing to the drastic agenda being pursued by the Tory Government, Cleveland has lost or will lose 180 firefighters. The Government are playing with people’s lives so I would like to know what the Minister’s message is to people in my communities, and who he will blame when there is a tragedy there.
Robert Neill
The Cleveland fire service does excellent work. The risks that it deals with on its territory are recognised by the fact that its funding per head of population by formula grant is the highest in the country and more than twice that received by many authorities in other areas.
Mr Barron
It is estimated that South Yorkshire fire and rescue service will lose 100 firefighters’ jobs. It is all very well for the Minister to say, “We’ll pass the budget cuts down and somebody else has to take the responsibility.” What happens if response times increase in South Yorkshire and the people in South Yorkshire, who are not a party to the decision that has been taken by the Government to cut the budgets, feel unsafe in their beds at night?
Robert Neill
Response times are dealt with through the integrated risk management plan. I say gently to the right hon. Gentleman that the reductions in expenditure of formula grant to the fire service are less than those for local authorities as a whole. They are part of the deficit reduction strategy, and he might like to reflect that part of the deficit caused by the Labour Government was the better part of half a billion pounds wasted on the aborted FiReControl project, which did nothing to keep anyone safe.
Bridget Phillipson
Tyne and Wear fire and rescue service has already made significant savings, including cuts of 28% to back office staff, but we are facing deep front-line cuts. May I urge the Minister again to look carefully at the situation faced by metropolitan areas such as Tyne and Wear, and ensure that he brings forward a funding settlement that is fair?
Robert Neill
I have met representatives of metropolitan fire and rescue authorities and meetings continue to take place at an official level, and we will meet representatives of any fire authority, regardless where in the country they come from. In Tyne and Wear, the formula grant per head at £29 is significantly above the average, which reflects some of the risks. In fact, the formula was updated by this Government to give a greater weighting to population density.
Grahame M. Morris
I refer the Minister to the answer he gave a few moments ago to my hon. Friends in relation to risk assessments. The hon. Gentleman will be aware of the excellent report that was carried out on fire deaths and injuries by the County Durham and Darlington fire and rescue brigade, which showed that poor health, social issues and deprivation are key contributory factors to high levels of fire risk. We are losing 40 firefighter posts, so what risk assessments were carried out before cuts to central funding were made to the Durham and Darlington fire and rescue brigade?
Robert Neill
With respect to the hon. Gentleman, he has not grasped the point that the risk assessment is dealt with at a local level by the integrated risk management plan, which is consulted upon with the local community and then approved by the fire authority. Durham’s funding per head has been maintained over two years at a steady level of £21 per head. It is worth saying that all metropolitan fire authorities have had increases in their capital grant of 50% to 80%, which is significantly more than under the previous Government.
Julie Hilling
Two hundred firefighter posts are being lost in Greater Manchester, but Cheshire and Essex are getting a 2% increase in their budgets. As there is a greater risk of fire, civil disturbances and industrial incidents—and in my constituency motorway incidents as well—in the metropolitan boroughs, how can the Minister possibly justify such a huge cut to the metropolitan authorities and an increase to the leafy counties?
Robert Neill
I was just looking at the figures that the hon. Lady gives me for her authority. It is worth observing that Greater Manchester is funded at the rate of £26 per head in formula grant. Cheshire, which was referred to, gets only £18 per head in formula grant, so I do not think she is giving a fair comparison.
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
At Castle Donington in my constituency there is a monument to the waste and profligacy of the previous Government with regard to fire services: a £14 million unused regional FiReControl centre that is still costing the taxpayer £5,000 a day. Particularly galling is the fact that Leicestershire has the lowest funded fire authority in the country. Will my hon. Friend remind the House how much the previous Government wasted on regional FiReControl centres?
Robert Neill
The figure that the Public Accounts Committee of this House gave was not less than £469 million, and I observe that in one year, 2010, the Labour Government spent £69 million on consultants, which is broadly the amount that the fire services have contributed to deficit reduction over two years.
Mr Tobias Ellwood (Bournemouth East) (Con)
Will the Minister congratulate Dorset fire and rescue service on its work in co-ordinating its efforts with the police and ambulance services in preparation for the Olympics? However, there is a worry that the improved resilience infrastructure will fall away after the Olympics. Will he do what he can to ensure that the much-needed blue light improvements are not dismantled after the games?
Robert Neill
I can certainly assure my hon. Friend that we will seek to do that. I have had the pleasure of visiting Dorset fire and rescue service and am impressed by the joint working that is being done. The Government, in all Departments, are anxious to continue improving interoperability.
Chris Williamson (Derby North) (Lab)
I have to say that I am a little puzzled by the Minister’s responses this morning—[Hon. Members: “This afternoon.”] That reinforces my puzzlement, as his answers have been so confusing. The point is that the Prime Minister, prior to the general election, gave a solemn pledge that he would veto any ministerial plans that involved cuts to front-line services, yet in the Minister’s Department we have seen thousands of firefighters losing their jobs, dozens of fire stations closing and response times going through the roof. As a consequence, he is putting the safety of the public at risk. Did he forget to tell the Prime Minister about his cuts, or is this simply another broken prime ministerial election pledge?
Robert Neill
A lot of fire and rescue authorities are making the savings not by cutting firefighter posts or reducing fire stations, but through shared operations, better joint working and, interestingly, amended shift practices—one thing that the hon. Gentleman seems to have taken on board rather literally.
Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)
3. What assessment he has made of the potential effect of council tax benefit localisation on low-income families.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Andrew Stunell)
An impact assessment is on my Department’s website. These reforms will give councils a greater stake in getting people back into work and will help to reduce the budget deficit. The Government are committed to supporting the most vulnerable in society and have been clear that pensioners should be protected and changes should support work incentives.
Mr Skinner
At a meeting on Friday local authorities from areas of high need, such as Chesterfield, Bolsover and North East Derbyshire, were still bemoaning the fact that they have just suffered a 19% cut in the money they receive from central Government. This proposal will mean another £500 million cut in areas of high need, which is equivalent to 10% for all those local authorities. It is high time the Government started listening less to press barons like Murdoch and more to the democratically elected voices in local government.
Andrew Stunell
I think that the hon. Gentleman is letting his phobias get the better of him. No local authority has faced a reduction in its spending power of more than 8.7%, and the figures he talks about are not real at all. I know that he did not always support the Labour Government’s policies, but he was right behind them on building up the deficit. He now needs to get behind this Government in tackling that deficit.
Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)
What impact has the two-year council tax freeze had on low-income households?
Andrew Stunell
Of course, it has been very beneficial to those on low incomes who are paying council tax and those who rely on council tax benefit support. I think that the Government should be commended for the action they have taken, and it is astonishing that some Members on the Labour Front Bench condemned the introduction of this proposal.
Mr Nick Raynsford (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)
May I draw attention to my interest as declared in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests?
I remind the Minister that we are talking about cuts in council tax benefit, that the Government’s own proposal is for a 10% cut, not 8%, and that that will translate into a 16% cut for those who will bear the burden because of the protection of those over pension age, but extraordinarily, if the Government believe in what they are doing, why have they been so embarrassed as to have done nothing for the past three months? We have been waiting for Report stage of the Bill leading to the introduction of those changes, but it has been parked. Where has it been?
Andrew Stunell
The right hon. Gentleman is of course a doughty fighter on these matters, and I assure him that the Bill will be back in the House within a week or two.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
Is not the best way to help those on low incomes to freeze council tax, and is the Minister aware that Harlow’s Conservative district council has frozen council tax not just for one or two years, but for three years?
Andrew Stunell
Clearly, a good way of reducing the cost to the state of the council tax benefit system, and the cost to the householder, is to freeze council tax, and I commend the hon. Gentleman’s local council on the work that it has done.
Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)
The Government’s own figures show that a cut of 16% in council tax benefit will cost the poorest families more than £161 a year, but does the Minister accept that, in fact, the cuts are likely to be far higher than that, up to 25%, depending on the number of pensioners in a local authority area? Does he think that this postcode lottery for the poorest families is fair? How can the Government justify cutting the incomes of 1 million struggling families while increasing the incomes of millionaires?
Andrew Stunell
The hon. Lady of course is completely off track. In reality, local authorities will have choices about how they manage the reduction and be able to choose, through the design of their scheme, whether some awards should be reduced. They can manage the reduction by reconfiguring the funding of other services, through efficiency savings, by using reserves or with flexibility over the council tax, which the same Bill before Parliament gives to local authorities.
Charlotte Leslie (Bristol North West) (Con)
6. What steps he is taking to devolve political power to cities.
The Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Greg Clark)
For more than 100 years power has been remorselessly sapped from our great cities, and I am determined to restore power to them. The Localism Act 2011 gave a general power of competence; our city deal programme devolves more powers; and this week’s mayoral referendums will allow local people to decide how their cities should be led.
Charlotte Leslie
Last week Bristolians heard about the resignation of Barbara Janke, the city council leader, making it six changes of leadership in the city in the past 10 years. Does my right hon. Friend agree that such chopping and changing makes a strategic vision for the city very difficult, and that what Bristol needs to fulfil itself is the vision, accountability and stability of an elected mayor?
Greg Clark
I do agree. I have the greatest respect for Councillor Janke, but six leaders in 10 years is no way to run a city as great as Bristol. The leaders of Liverpool, Leicester and Birmingham city councils have all said that they could lead their city better as an elected mayor. The mayoral referendum offers an historic choice to the people of Bristol: they have the chance to make it a turning point in the city’s history.
Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)
At the most recent meeting of the Liaison Committee, the Prime Minister, in a response to a question that I asked, said that
“I can absolutely assure you that on the city deals…we can do those deals with individual cities whether or not they are going to have a mayor.”
Yet, in the Yorkshire Evening Post on Saturday, the Minister agreed that there were powers that the Government would be happy to give to an elected mayor, but not to a traditional council. Does the Minister agree with the Prime Minister that powers can be devolved to cities irrespective of whether they have an elected mayor or an elected council leader, as long as they have strong governance arrangements?
Greg Clark
The hon. Gentleman and his Select Committee on Communities and Local Government know that I am always and everywhere keen to devolve power to local government, including to cities. What we have said to conclude our city deals is that there has to be stronger governance, and the case of Bristol demonstrates that. When there is a revolving door of leaders, it is impossible to have the necessary accountability, so there needs to be stronger governance, and an elected mayor meets that model.
Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)
If the Minister is so convinced of the benefits of elected mayors, why did he require dictatorial powers to force local authorities to hold elections? Would it not be fairer to have a yes/no question, rather than one loaded so much in favour of elected mayors?
Greg Clark
My hon. Friend will know that the Electoral Commission set the question. In fact, the terms of the referendum are very similar to that which the previous Government introduced in London to give the people of London a chance to vote on whether to have a mayor. I think that most people in London conclude that it has been a success.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
Why does the Minister persist in selling his reforms as introducing London-style city governance in other large cities in England? If he genuinely believes in London-style city governance, why will his proposed mayor of Manchester be responsible for governing only one tenth of the city region?
Greg Clark
The election is based on the current boundaries of Manchester, and that seems perfectly reasonable. I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman is asking me to abolish the councils that exist in Greater Manchester. Salford, which is part of Greater Manchester, will have a mayor who will be elected on 3 May, and the people of Manchester have a choice as to whether they want to join it.
Mr Adrian Sanders (Torbay) (LD)
7. What steps he is taking to simplify the regulation of private landlords.
The Minister for Housing and Local Government (Grant Shapps)
Excessive red tape in the sector would push up rents and reduce choice for tenants. That is why we are streamlining licensing processes for houses in multiple occupation and scrapping plans for an expensive and counter-productive state register of every landlord. This afternoon I am chairing a taskforce on rogue landlords in order to try to drive them out of the market.
Mr Sanders
One way of alleviating the regulatory burden on landlords but also improving safety and security for tenants would be to provide a simple standardised document containing all landlord and tenant responsibilities, from fire safety to antisocial behaviour. The planning system is about to benefit from a process of simplification. Will the Minister do likewise with the private rented housing sector?
Grant Shapps
I am pleased to report to my hon. Friend that standards are certainly improving in the private-rented sector. For example, satisfaction levels are higher than in the social sector and rates of energy performance are better than in the private sector. I like the sound of his idea, and I will certainly have a look at it. It sounds as though it might be comparable with a template lease, and it is worth further consideration.
John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab)
There are now more than 1 million families with children whose home is privately rented, and Shelter says that a third of them cut down on food to pay their rents and they can all be kicked out with less than a month’s notice. Why are the Government so out of touch with the pressure that people face that they are denying even the basic security of a legal right to a written tenancy agreement?
Grant Shapps
The right hon. Gentleman, who knows a thing or two about housing, is absolutely right to indicate the pressure in the system caused by more than a decade of building far fewer homes than are required, which has led to rents rising very quickly. There are now some signs that rents have started to moderate. The English housing survey shows that rents rose at a slower pace than inflation; LSL Property Services shows falls for the third month in a row; and Professor Michael Ball reports that they fell by a tenth in real terms between 2008 and 2011. The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, following on from the question by my hon. Friend the Member for Torbay (Mr Sanders), to suggest that we must always drive for improvements, and that may well include looking at leasing documents.
Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con)
8. What discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Transport on whether a precedent exists for a property bond to be established for homeowners whose properties are affected by High Speed 2.
The Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Greg Clark)
The Government’s approach to compensation for property owners was set out in the HS2 document, “Review of Property Issues”, which was published on 12 January by the Secretary of State for Transport, who, together with colleagues, was consulted in the usual way before publication.
Andrea Leadsom
I thank my right hon. Friend for his answer. Does he agree that as there have already been two years of property blight, which potentially remains until 2026, whereby people are unable to sell their houses normally, it might be necessary to consider a property bond to normalise the property market? Will he reassure me that if that were the case, his Department would not veto such a decision on the grounds that it might create a precedent for other national infrastructure projects?
Greg Clark
My hon. Friend, who is a great campaigner on this issue, knows from the answer that the Transport Secretary gave her in the previous session of oral questions that my right hon. Friend recognises the impact that the plans for HS2 are having on residents along the route of the line and has given an assurance that she will make sure that the package is fair to all those residents.
Dr Julian Huppert (Cambridge) (LD)
9. What recent discussions he has had on funding for Cambridgeshire and Peterborough fire authority.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Robert Neill)
On 31 January, I met representatives from Cambridgeshire and Peterborough fire authority, together with representatives of Suffolk fire and rescue authorities, to discuss their interest in the control centre building in Cambridge and funding matters. They also discussed their bid for joint control working. On 8 March, there was a follow-up meeting at official level.
Dr Huppert
I thank the Minister for those comments. Fire services such as ours in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, which are already low cost and largely have retained firefighters, are extremely vulnerable to excessive funding reductions. Beyond a certain point, there is no alternative other than the withdrawal of appliances and station closures. I accept the need for some savings, but there is still a lack of clarity about how much the service will have to save. Will the Minister meet me, staff from the authority and the service and other local MPs, who are also concerned, to discuss how much funding will be made available in future?
Robert Neill
The overall reduction in funding to Cambridgeshire and Peterborough fire authority is 1.5% of its spending power. I am glad to say that the joint bid with Suffolk to improve fire control room services was successful, and that it will receive £400,000 in revenue and £180 million in capital funding. I am always happy to meet hon. Members to discuss the circumstances in their constituencies.
Mr Speaker
Order. Poplar and Limehouse are a little way away from Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, to which nevertheless I feel sure that the hon. Gentleman’s question will exclusively relate.
Jim Fitzpatrick
I am humbled by your confidence, Mr Speaker, in my ability to speak about the funding of Cambridgeshire—and Suffolk, which the Minister also mentioned in his response to the hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert). In his discussions with those two county authorities, and others, did the Minister consider their funding of the fire service college, which is about to be privatised? How will he maintain control over the college and can he assure hon. Members about its future?
Robert Neill
I will happily answer that at an appropriate moment, but I doubt whether I shall be in order if I try to do so now. I acknowledge the hon. Gentleman’s interest in the fire service, but the discussions were about joint control room bids—a facility made available to all those interested in bidding. As he will recognise, the need to have such discussions about the future of joint control rooms arose partly because we were stuck with 30-odd-year leases on control rooms that were not usable because the previous Government never delivered the IT to go inside them
Mr Stewart Jackson (Peterborough) (Con)
For the avoidance of doubt, the fire service college is in the Cotswolds rather than the Fens.
Will the Minister support me in saying that we should pursue further shared and combined services with other fire authorities on, for example, payroll, administration and human resources rather than moving immediately to front-line cuts such as the closure of Stanground or Dogsthorpe fire stations in the city of Peterborough?
Robert Neill
I agree with my hon. Friend that there are sensible means of meeting deficit reduction targets, without having an impact on stations and staffing. I pointed that out in a letter to the shadow fire Minister, the hon. Member for Dudley North (Ian Austin), in December 2010. References to shared service, joint working, joint procurement, flexible shift patterns and working patterns are exactly the sort of issues that go-ahead fire authorities are taking on board.
Lorraine Fullbrook (South Ribble) (Con)
10. What steps his Department is taking to support local high streets.
The Minister for Housing and Local Government (Grant Shapps)
I published the Government response to the Portas review on 30 March. We have accepted almost all Mary Portas’s recommendations, and added some of our own.
Lorraine Fullbrook
I am proud to champion Leyland’s bid to be a Portas pilot, which will focus just as much on invigorating community spirit as on invigorating the high street. Does my right hon. Friend agree that local town teams can best support the regeneration of the high street and our town centres through full engagement with every level of the community, as Leyland in my constituency has done?
Grant Shapps
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There have been a remarkable 371 applications by town teams to become Portas pilots. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for her incredible work, which will doubtless be noted in the Leyland Guardian when it is next published, and wish her every success.
Hugh Bayley (York Central) (Lab)
Does the Minister agree that out-of-town shops can attract shoppers away from high streets? Will the Government consider introducing the opportunity for local authorities to impose car parking charges, even on privately owned car parks, for out-of-town shopping?
Grant Shapps
It is, of course, the case that the balance between out of town and town centre has a considerable impact. It is for local authorities to make those decisions. In the national planning policy framework, we set out a clear town centre first policy, but ultimately local authorities need to make decisions about parking. I strongly suggest to local authorities that it would be advantageous to them—Mary Portas backs up the point—to think carefully about the parking charges in town and concentrate on reducing those to make town centres more popular.
Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)
A useful tool to support high street shops and town centres is the Sustainable Communities Act 2007 (Amendment) Act 2010. The Act was passed more than two years ago. Can the Minister let the House know when the regulations that support that excellent legislation are likely to be laid so that local communities can take full advantage of it?
Dame Joan Ruddock (Lewisham, Deptford) (Lab)
I wonder whether the Minister agrees with me and Mary Portas that the clustering of betting shops in high streets is becoming a real problem. It means a lack of diversity in high streets and, in the case of Deptford high street, much antisocial behaviour. Why will the Government not give local authorities more and better powers to deal with that menace?
Grant Shapps
The right hon. Lady is absolutely right that the balance of shops is often very important. The Government said in our response to Mary Portas that we were carrying out a use class order review, which is ongoing. The right hon. Lady’s local authority, and those of all hon. Members, already have more options than they perhaps realise through article 4. They would certainly want to work with town teams to make the best possible progress.
Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)
11. What recent assessment he has made of the rate of house building.
Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)
12. What recent assessment he has made of the rate of house building.
The Minister for Housing and Local Government (Grant Shapps)
In 2011 just over 98,000 new houses were started—25% up on the numbers from 2009—and we are building 170,000 homes for affordable rent in the next three years.
Seema Malhotra
In London, private rents are rising and families are being forced to move away from relatives, and children from their schools. With 360,000 Londoners on social housing waiting lists, why did construction start on only 56 new affordable homes in the latest six-month period? When will the Minister take his responsibility seriously, and how will he address this grave problem in London?
Grant Shapps
It is important to give accurate figures in the House. Once again, the most comprehensive and accurate figures available must be those from the English housing survey, which demonstrates that rents have been not rising, but falling. Her Majesty’s Opposition refuse to accept those basic facts and keep repeating incorrect information about rents. They ignore the fact that under this Government, homelessness right now is at half the average level that it stood at in 13 years under Labour.
Debbie Abrahams
The Government cancelled housing market renewal, and only 210 houses were built in Oldham last year—for the Minister’s information, those are independent figures—which is the lowest level in seven years. Fewer than half those houses were affordable homes. With nearly 6,500 households on housing waiting lists in Oldham and 1.8 million nationally—that is also an independently validated figure—when will the Government get a grip on housing?
Grant Shapps
Here are the facts: the housing market renewal programme in places such as Oldham and elsewhere destroyed 10,000 homes in this country, but by contrast, the previous Government built only 1,000 through that pathfinder programme. That is what destroyed housing in this country. By contrast, through the demolition of the housing market renewal programme, this Government are building 170,000 more homes for affordable rent in the next three years. That will be more than were built in 13 years when affordable housing numbers declined under Labour.
David Tredinnick (Bosworth) (Con)
Is my right hon. Friend aware of the massive housing developments proposed under the old top-down system for Barwell and Earl Shilton in my constituency? There are to be 2,500 houses for each town, which is a 25% increase. Does he agree that meaningful consultation is absolutely vital, and that simply putting a notice up on a church wall or placing an advert in a free sheet is inadequate?
Grant Shapps
It is essential that there is proper consultation. Ending the top-down targets that the regional spatial strategies represented is absolutely the right thing to do, and will lead to more building in the longer run, simply for the fact that local communities will take responsibility and ownership, and, of course, take up the new homes bonus, which, I notice, Opposition Members have yet to return to the Treasury.
Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend join me in recognising the work that Boris Johnson has done in London on housing? There are 50,000 more affordable houses in London, with more than 1,600 of those in my London borough of Hounslow. He has promised to bring another 55,000 houses to London if he wins on Thursday. What can my right hon. Friend do to help him to deliver them?
Grant Shapps
Unlike his predecessor, Mayor Boris has been a champion for affordable housing in London, and indeed it seems very likely that he will have delivered 50,000 homes for affordable rent. It is worth bearing in mind that fewer than that were delivered throughout the entire country under 13 years of Labour.
Jack Dromey (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab)
The Housing Minister said that house building would be the gold standard on which this Government would be judged and that what brought him into politics was homelessness, yet we know from figures released today that house building is down 26% on average compared with what was achieved under a Labour Government, and that homelessness has risen by 23%. With millions in desperate need of a decent home at a price they can afford, will he now accept that his housing policies, like the Government’s economic polices, are hurting, not working?
Grant Shapps
The whole House has noticed that there have been no housing policies from the Opposition since the election. Housing starts in England in 2011 were up 25% compared with 2009, and in the same period the value of new housing construction was up 33% and construction orders were up 35%. Not for the first time, then, I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman has got his figures plain wrong.
Mr Graham Allen (Nottingham North) (Lab)
14. What his policy is on taking localism further towards independence of local government.
The Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Greg Clark)
I warmly welcome the public debate that the hon. Gentleman has led with the Local Government Association. He and I share a strong view that we must disperse power in our society. The Localism Act 2011 is an important step in that direction, but I regard it as a point of departure rather than a destination, and I encourage every council to respond to his report.
Mr Allen
The Minister will know that there is a strong and growing all-party campaign in the House and outside for statutorily defined independent local government. Does he think there is something in the DNA of the British people that means that, unlike the Italians, Germans, Americans, Canadians and everyone else in a western democracy, they are incapable of deciding how to run their own affairs locally and need Whitehall to tell them how to do it?
Greg Clark
Like the hon. Gentleman, I think that exactly the opposite is the case and that our towns, cities and communities across the country will prosper when they have the opportunity—and, indeed, the right—to do things their way, rather than the way Whitehall dictates.
Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)
The Minister’s determination to devolve political decision making to the lowest possible level is extremely welcome. Can he, for example, think of any circumstances under which he would dictate to a local city or local authority what flag to fly outside the town hall?
Greg Clark
I cannot imagine such a thing. How a community chooses to represent itself and with what images and emblems seems to me the epitome of local choice.
Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)
15. What contribution to economic growth he expects his planning reforms to deliver.
The Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Mr Eric Pickles)
Our planning reforms have simplified the system and put power into the hands of local communities to deliver the growth they need. Thanks to the excellent work of the Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark), who has responsibility for planning, our reforms arrive at a balance between economic activity, the environment and heritage.
Andrew Selous
Is the Secretary of State aware of a pioneering partnership in my constituency that is getting built not only a much-needed bypass but thousands of vitally needed homes? Does he agree that this is a case of where Central Bedfordshire leads today, others should follow tomorrow?
Mr Pickles
I congratulate my hon. Friend’s authority. This was the kind of thing we wanted to do when we embarked on the reforms. None of this would have been possible without the general power of competence or devolving local authority finance. It represents the future of local authorities.
Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)
With planning applications running six times higher in the south-east than in the north-east, how does the Secretary of State envisage his planning reforms will contribute to reducing regional growth inequalities?
Mr Pickles
I am sure the hon. Lady will be pleased to know that our planning reforms were welcomed by the North East chamber of commerce, which saw, as perhaps she will come to see, that the reforms are a liberation and will enable a good partnership between local enterprise partnerships and local authorities. They will enable them to work together with people in the north-east for the people of the north-east and will release them from some of the burdens that her Government left on the people of the north-east.
Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)
16. What criteria he uses when calling in or recovering planning applications; and if he will make a statement.
The Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Greg Clark)
The Government believe that planning decisions should be taken in, and by, local communities, and so use their call-in powers sparingly. Essentially, the powers are used when matters are of national significance.
Chris Heaton-Harris
The planning inspector’s decision on the Kelmarsh wind farm in my constituency helped to spark a massive campaign against onshore wind in this place and beyond. In such cases, how long does the Secretary of State legally have to recover or call in decisions, and what is the Department’s policy in this area?
Greg Clark
My hon. Friend will know that I cannot comment on a particular case—the quasi-judicial status of ministerial decisions is well understood at the moment. Once a decision notice has been given, that is the end of the Secretary of State’s discretion in the matter.
Andrew Stephenson (Pendle) (Con)
T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.
The Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Mr Eric Pickles)
I have been reviewing my Department’s plan to abolish the Audit Commission. Ministers have told the House previously that the abolition would save £50 million. I am afraid that was wrong: the revised estimate suggests that the abolition will save taxpayers not £50 million, but £650 million over five years. Combined with the scrapping of 10 other quangos, from the Standards Board to the Government offices for the regions, the reductions in my Department’s running will save £1 billion of taxpayers’ money.
Andrew Stephenson
Empty homes are a big problem in Pendle, so I welcome the £100 million of funding to bring empty homes back into use as affordable housing, and the additional £50 million to tackle some of the worst concentrations of empty homes. Does my right hon. Friend agree that that is far more than Labour did in its 13 years of power?
Mr Pickles
The Labour party’s idea of a housing policy was to demolish perfectly good houses. We felt it was important to get houses that had been left unoccupied back into business. That is why the scheme is available through the new homes bonus, and it is also the reason for the reforms to get clusters of unoccupied houses back together, which the Under-Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Hazel Grove (Andrew Stunell) spoke of earlier. We are determined that what are perfectly good houses, in areas where communities have lived together for many years, should be brought back into circulation.
Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)
Conservative councillors must have been very encouraged over the weekend to read the Secretary of State’s admission in The Sunday Times that lots of them are going to lose their jobs come Thursday. Families are struggling because of the failure of the Government’s economic policy, but at least they know that council tax is lower in areas with Labour councils than in Conservative ones. Would the Secretary of State like to congratulate Labour councils on their achievement?
Mr Pickles
I congratulate the shadow Secretary of State, not only on attending his son’s wedding last week, but on continuing the trend of fiddling figures. The only way he can get at those figures is to ignore all the district councils. In band D, the Labour party continues to be £62 more expensive than the Conservative party.
Hilary Benn
I know that the Secretary of State does not really do detail, but I would have thought that even he could work out the figures for himself. The band D council tax rate is £81 lower in Labour areas than in Tory areas. He has made great play of trying to keep council tax down, but as we heard earlier, because of his legislation, his plan next year is to increase the council tax paid by a lot of people who are on low incomes. Does that not show that, far from us all being in it together, the Secretary of State is determined to dump some people in it more than others? Is that not the real reason why he has thrown in the towel before polling day?
Mr Pickles
I understand that the right hon. Gentleman has form on council tax. When he was deputy leader of Ealing council, it increased by 65% in one year only, although we should not be surprised, because council tax has doubled under Labour. However, I repeat: the only way he can arrive at anything close to those figures is by ignoring every single district council in the country. As the small print of his figures clearly shows, he has ignored a third of councils in order to arrive at those ridiculous figures.
Mike Freer (Finchley and Golders Green) (Con)
T2. Does the Minister believe that the BBC’s recent coverage of Newham’s housing policy was fair and accurate?
The Minister for Housing and Local Government (Grant Shapps)
I do not believe that the coverage was fair, balanced or timely, given that the election for the Mayor of London is taking place in Newham exactly a week after the coverage. Given that the BBC chose not to mention to any Department that it was running the story, it is impossible to understand how it thought it could be running a fair and balanced story.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
T4. Does the Secretary of State agree with the Minister for Housing and Local Government that Birmingham’s claim to have only nine rough sleepers is ludicrous? Furthermore, is that the only thing that he finds ludicrous about the antics of those who are running Birmingham city council?
Grant Shapps
There is a wider point about the homelessness and rough sleeping numbers, which is that before this Government came to power, the figures were simply inaccurate. The majority of authorities did not return the relevant numbers. The change now is that we have required every local authority to send in its numbers and regularised the way in which rough sleeper numbers are collected, so that we can properly focus resources on tackling the scourge of rough sleeping.
Mr Edward Timpson (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)
T3. In Crewe, I have been helping a community of elderly residents at Linden Court after the local housing association attempted to move them out on just a few months’ notice in order to redevelop the site. Will my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State use his good offices to encourage housing associations to treat the elderly with the care, courtesy and respect that they deserve, particularly those whom they are considering moving out of their homes?
Mr Pickles
I am not sure that I need to use those powers, because my hon. Friend has used his considerable influence and I now understand that the housing association is having a rethink and looking into other ways of dealing with Linden Court, which I visited with him a few years ago. It is important that, when elderly persons are being moved out of their homes, they should be treated with enormous dignity, and local authorities and housing associations need to go about that task at a leisurely pace.
Tony Lloyd (Manchester Central) (Lab)
T7. An antisocial neighbour, whether the tenant of a private landlord, a social landlord or a public landlord, can not only make their neighbours’ lives a misery but destroy a whole estate. On that basis, rather than reducing the role of communities through local councils, why does not the Government give them real powers to ensure that they can deal with antisocial neighbours? Instead of calling it “getting rid of red tape”, we could talk about doing something positive.
Grant Shapps
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. That is why we are proposing to criminalise certain types of antisocial behaviour and ensuring that previous offences can be taken into account. For example, if someone engaged in antisocial behaviour in someone else’s community during the riots, that should clearly count against them when it came to their own housing situation.
Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)
T5. Many of my constituents believe that there should be less, not more, influence on our daily lives from the European Union. Will Ministers therefore take a vigorous stand against the EU proposal that the EU flag be flown permanently above 1,000 of our public and private buildings? Our country’s flag is the Union Jack.
Mr Pickles
This obligation is likely to be placed on us because of our control of the European development funds. We are currently under an obligation to fly the EU flag for one week a year. It seems to me that the flying of a flag should be a joyous act, rather than one imposed by another authority. The idea that we should be fined for not flying the EU flag is utterly ridiculous and a sign of a lack of confidence on the part of our EU partners.
Grahame M. Morris (Easington) (Lab)
T8. In the national press today, there are at least three reports of dramatic increases in bed-blocking. Bed-blocking occurs when patients cannot be discharged from hospital because social care packages have not been put in place by hard-pressed local authorities. This is now costing the taxpayer about £600,000 every day. Is not this more evidence of this Government’s failed policies on social care in local government? They are cutting too far and too fast.
Mr Pickles
We have put in an extra £7.2 million, but the hon. Gentleman makes a reasoned point. I feel that the reforms in the national health service and giving local authorities more responsibility for health should enable us to get a much better and much more closely co-ordinated and integrated process. The movement from hospital into care or into a person’s home needs to be better organised. The Government will certainly produce a White Paper soon to deal with this. I hope that it will meet some of the problems that the hon. Gentleman mentioned.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
T6. Ahead of the London elections, do Ministers share my concerns over alarms raised by local councillors in Tower Hamlets about alleged voting fraud? What steps are being taken to ensure the integrity of the ballot?
Grant Shapps
I do share my hon. Friend’s concerns, and I share the concerns of six Labour councillors who wrote to the Electoral Commission on Monday last week, pointing out serious worries about electoral fraud. I think the Electoral Commission should have picked this up sooner—back in February, when two Labour Members of Parliament complained about this. I have written to the Electoral Commission today to propose that it moves a lot faster and ensures that the police are present, as required, on polling day.
Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)
It is increasingly difficult to find housing in Newham within the rent cap that the Government have set. Instead of criticising the BBC for exposing what is happening, will the Minister take action to improve matters?
Grant Shapps
The right hon. Gentleman will be interested to hear that immediately that the Newham story was flagged up, we went on just one website to search for properties and we could find within the Newham cap of £15,000 rent a year—not the £21,000 maximum cap—1,000 properties available in Newham or within five miles of it. That is why it is a disgrace that the council was considering sending people halfway across the country.
Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)
T9. My right hon. Friend the cities Minister, the Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government, the right hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark), will have noted, not least from the Centre for Cities annual report, that progress in Gloucester is encouraging on a number of fronts, including the regeneration of major sites and the expansion of our specialist training company to provide apprenticeships and skills for our thriving small and medium-sized enterprises engineering centre. Gloucester would be delighted if the Minister could visit the city to look more closely at some of our successes and our challenges.
The Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Greg Clark)
It would give me the greatest pleasure to visit Gloucester, especially in the company of my hon. Friend.
Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)
The reason why Newham council is thinking of sending tenants to my constituency of Stoke-on-Trent is as a result of the massive failure of house building under the Tory Mayor of London. What assurances can the Minister give my constituents that they will not face an unplanned influx of residents because of Tory failings in London?
Grant Shapps
That is simple. This Mayor has delivered 50,000 affordable houses for rent, outperforming the previous Labour Mayor. If constituents vote for him again, he will deliver even more next time.
Jane Ellison (Battersea) (Con)
Has the Secretary of State had the opportunity to compare the track records on council tax for the current Mayor of London and his Labour predecessor?
Mr Pickles
It is a very straightforward comparison. Each year under Ken Livingstone, the council tax went up; each year under Boris Johnson, the council tax was either frozen or went down.
Dr Alan Whitehead (Southampton, Test) (Lab)
Does the Secretary of State intend to continue with his Department’s consultation on home improvements and related energy efficiencies in the green deal, or is he proposing to scrap it in the light of the advice from a No. 10 spokesman who said that the proposals were bonkers and would not happen?
Mr Pickles
We are currently considering all applications during the consultation. We will be looking closely at that and we will ensure that we do not place an undue burden on the public.
Tessa Munt (Wells) (LD)
Those on the housing list whose change in situation, such as having an extra child or additional medical needs, means they meet the criteria for higher banding of need for housing, or those who change the nature of their request, such as for a new location, have to restart their time on the housing list. Does the Minister think that that is fair, as it prevents us from collecting accurate data?
Grant Shapps
What is required is for local authorities to have a far greater say in the way their housing lists are run. That is why I am pleased to be able to report to my hon. Friend that that is exactly what is being proposed through the Localism Act—and it is exactly what is about to come into force.
David Simpson (Upper Bann) (DUP)
What discussions have taken place with the regional assemblies about the new planning proposals?
Mr Pickles
We have engaged in a number of discussions with the assemblies in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. They have been very constructive, especially at officer level, but it is still up to individual constituent parts of the United Kingdom to decide whether to implement the proposals.
Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)
The last Government shamefully ran down the right-to-buy discount. Does the Minister agree that that acted as a brake on the aspirations of those who wished to join what we Conservatives call the great British property-owning democracy?
Grant Shapps
My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. The right to buy, which enabled 2 million hard-working families to buy their own properties, was disgracefully run down, so that only 3,000 a year could take advantage of it under the last Administration. The right to buy is back, however: there is a £75,000 discount, and for every home that is sold another is built. That is the way in which to meet hard-working families’ aspirations in this country.
Ministerial Code (Culture Secretary)
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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Edward Miliband (Doncaster North) (Lab)
(Urgent Question): To ask the Prime Minister if he will refer the conduct of the Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport, in respect of his dealings with News Corporation, to the independent adviser on ministerial interests.
The Prime Minister (Mr David Cameron)
I answered questions on this issue at Prime Minister’s Questions last Wednesday, and the Culture Secretary made a full statement, but let me set out the position again.
I set up the Leveson inquiry last summer to investigate the culture, ethics and practices of the media, and the relations between the media and the police and the media and politicians. It is a full, judge-led inquiry, with evidence given under oath and full access to papers and records. No Government before have ever taken such comprehensive action. It is this Government who are putting these issues properly on the table and getting them dealt with.
Let me deal with the three issues raised in the question: the conduct of the Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport, the nature of the inquiry that is needed to get to the bottom of these issues, and the wider issues surrounding the relationship between politicians and the media.
First, let me deal with the issue of the Culture Secretary. As was made clear in his statement last Wednesday, in every respect with regard to the News Corporation bid, the Culture Secretary asked for independent advice and acted on it. He was not required to ask for or to follow such advice, but he did so. He acted fairly and impartially, and in line with the advice of his permanent secretary. Indeed, as he said in his statement to the House on Wednesday, he acted against the interests of News Corporation on four key decisions: on being minded to refer the bid to the Competition Commission, on refusing to accept News Corporation’s undertakings without taking advice first from the OFT and Ofcom, on extending the consultation, and on going back to Ofcom for further advice about the impact of phone hacking. I have seen no evidence to suggest that, in handling this issue, the Secretary of State acted at any stage in a way that was contrary to the ministerial code.
As for the Secretary of State’s responsibilities towards his Department, let me say this. The permanent secretary to the Department approved the approach that his department took to the quasi-judicial process, which included a small number of people acting as contact points with News Corporation, as is required and normal in such a process. The permanent secretary has stated that he was “aware” and “content” for contact to be made between the Culture Secretary’s special adviser and News Corporation. However, it is quite clear that that contact became improper and inappropriate, and went beyond the requirements set out by the Secretary of State or the permanent secretary. That is why the special adviser resigned, and he was right to do so.
There are correct procedures to follow in this regard, and they need to be followed scrupulously. That is why last week I asked the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Jeremy Heywood, and the head of the civil service, Sir Bob Kerslake, to write to all Departments clarifying the rigorous procedures that they should have in place for handling cases of this nature.
That leads to the second issue: the nature of the inquiry, or inquiries, best suited to getting to the bottom of this issue. I consulted the Cabinet Secretary, and decided that it was right to allow Lord Justice Leveson to conduct his inquiry and not to commission a parallel process to establish the facts. Let me repeat that what we have is a judge-led inquiry, witnesses required to give evidence under oath, full access to papers and records, and cross-examination by barristers, all live on television. There is nothing this tough or this rigorous that the civil service or the independent adviser could provide. Of course, it is not for Lord Justice Leveson to determine whether a Minister has broken the ministerial code. That is an issue for me, and I will deal with it properly. [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. Members are getting over-excited; they must not shout at the Prime Minister. They want to hear what the Prime Minister has to say, as do I, and it must be heard with courtesy.
The Prime Minister
I will not wait until the end of the Leveson inquiry to take action if action is needed. If new evidence emerges from the Leveson inquiry that the ministerial code has been broken, I will either seek the advice of Sir Alex Allan or take action directly, but the key point is this: in order to do this, it is neither necessary nor right to have a parallel investigation that could duplicate, cut across or possibly pre-empt what Lord Justice Leveson is doing. Lord Justice Leveson offered his own view on Wednesday, when he said that
“although I have seen requests for other inquiries and investigations…it seems to me that the better course is to allow this Inquiry to proceed.”
I agree with him entirely.
Let me briefly turn to the bigger picture. I am, and always will be, a fierce defender of the freedom of the press in this country—it is one of the central pillars of our democracy—but the relationship between politicians and the media has been too close for decades. The Leveson inquiry, which this Government have set up, gives Parliament and politicians of all parties the opportunity to get this right for the future. Already we have introduced transparency about the meetings we have with the media. Everyone can see which proprietors or editors I meet, whether publicly or privately.
Like other party leaders in our country for decades, I have tried to convince media outlets to support the policies of my party and, now, my Government, but let me be clear: there was not—there never has been—any grand bargain between the Conservative party and Rupert or James Murdoch. Indeed, look for one moment at the number of meetings Tony Blair and Gordon Brown had with Rupert Murdoch when they were Prime Minister: Blair seven; Brown 13; me four. The idea that there was some agreement that, in return for their support, we would somehow allow this merger to go through is simply not true. I have to say that if that was the case, while I respect him deeply, what on earth was I doing making the right hon. Member for Twickenham (Vince Cable) the Business Secretary responsible for this? [Interruption.] The proprietors of News Corporation have denied under oath at the Leveson inquiry—[Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. Members must calm down. There will be a good opportunity for questioning, but let’s hear the Prime Minister’s statement.
The Prime Minister
The proprietors of News Corporation have denied under oath at the Leveson inquiry any type of deal, and I will do the same.
Let me make this last point: unlike the Labour party, we were not trying to convince a centre-right proprietor of a set of newspapers with solidly centre-right views to change the position of a lifetime. We were arguing a simple proposition: that the last Government were irresponsible, exhausted, bad for our country and ought to go.
While I have said that the relationship between politicians and the media has been too close, I note that none of the Members on the Labour Benches have disclosed any of the meetings they had with News International or other newspaper executives while in office. While the country wants to hear about jobs, investment, living standards and the great challenges we face, like debt, they just play one-sided party politics. Instead of endlessly trying to use the Leveson inquiry for party political purposes, is it not time they were honest about what they did in government and faced up to the real mess they left this country in?
Edward Miliband
The reason why it was essential for the Prime Minister to come to the House today is that the Culture Secretary is in clear breach of the ministerial code—and the Prime Minister stands by and does nothing. He asks why this matters. It matters because we need a Government who stand up for families, not the rich and powerful. He is failing that test. Playing for time, he says we should wait for the Leveson inquiry, but Lord Justice Leveson could not be clearer. This is what his spokesperson said: “the simple fact is” that Lord Justice Leveson
“is not the arbiter of the ministerial code, whatever anybody else is saying. There is somebody else who has that role…Alex Allan”.
Lord Justice Leveson is doing his job; it’s time the Prime Minister did his.
Can the Prime Minister confirm that there are no fewer than three breaches of the ministerial code by the Culture Secretary? First, in the House on 3 March the Culture Secretary told the hon. Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry) that
“all the exchanges between my Department and News Corporation”—[Official Report, 3 March 2011; Vol. 524, c. 526]
—were being published. But he has now admitted that he knew, when he gave that answer, that there were exchanges that he himself had authorised between his special adviser and News Corporation. Yet none of those exchanges was disclosed, and we have 163 pages to prove it. The Prime Minister does not need to wait for the Leveson inquiry. Will he confirm to the House that this was a breach of paragraph 1.2 c of the code, which says that Ministers must provide full and accurate information to Parliament?
Secondly, on 25 January the Culture Secretary gave a statement to the House. We now know that two days before that statement, News Corporation was given confidential inside information—and this when the Culture Secretary had a constitutional duty to act in a quasi-judicial manner. The Prime Minister does not need to wait for the Leveson inquiry; will he confirm that that breaches paragraph 1 of the code, which requires the Minister to act with the “highest standards of propriety”, and paragraph 9.1, which says that Parliament must be told first?
Finally, the Culture Secretary would have us believe that his special adviser was on a freelance mission—six months of daily e-mails, texts, leaks and the leaking of confidential information about what opposing parties were saying. On one of the biggest media bids for decades, is the Prime Minister really reduced to the News of the World defence—one rogue individual acting alone? If the Culture Secretary really was that clueless about the biggest issue facing his Department, he should be sacked anyway.
The central question that the Prime Minister must answer, in view of three clear breaches of the ministerial code, is: why will he not refer the matter to the man whose responsibility it is—Sir Alex Allan? The Prime Minister is defending the indefensible, and he knows it. He is protecting the Culture Secretary’s job while up and down the country hundreds of thousands are losing theirs. We all know why the special adviser had to go to protect the Culture Secretary; the Culture Secretary has to stay to protect the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister has shown today that he is incapable of doing his duty—too close to a powerful few, and out of touch with everyone else.
Mr Speaker
Order. Members on both sides need to calm down. The Prime Minister wishes to be heard. I wish to hear him, and I hope the House does.
The Prime Minister
First of all, 15 years of secret meetings, pyjama parties, christenings and all the rest of it—and not one word of apology. Let me answer, very directly, the three points that the right hon. Gentleman made. First, he spoke about the response to my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry). If the right hon. Gentleman had done his research, he would have seen that the Secretary of State set out in full the proper answer to the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) in September 2011. If you are going to make these accusations, get your facts right before you come here.
On the second issue, the right hon. Gentleman raised specifically the information provided to News Corporation, and was completely wrong. On that, the special adviser has said:
“While it was part of my role to keep News Corporation informed throughout the BskyB bid process the content and extent of my contact was done without authorisation from the Secretary of State.”
So the second accusation is completely wrong.
The third accusation is also about the special adviser and the ministerial code. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State took responsibility. He came to the House, explained what had happened and gave a full account of himself. While we are on the subject of Ministers taking responsibility for their special advisers, can anyone remember a Minister taking responsibility for Charlie Whelan? Can we remember anyone taking responsibility for Damian McBride? What a lot of self-serving double standards we have had from the Labour party.
Let me just make two further points. The right hon. Gentleman says that this is an issue of judgment about what steps to take. Let us examine, briefly, what the judgment of the deputy leader of the Labour party was. She was asked very specifically, “You called for the Secretary of State’s resignation within 23 minutes of the evidence being provided to the Leveson inquiry. Did you read that evidence?” She said, “No, I didn’t need to.” She was asked, “Why didn’t you need to?” She said, “Because I heard the evidence of James Murdoch.” So that is it: he is Labour’s arbiter of standards and the ministerial code. What complete nonsense.
I am not belittling this issue. It is a serious issue, but it is not as serious as the eurozone, the jobs, investment and debt that we have to deal with. It is time we focused on that. Let me just say this to the right hon. Gentleman: endlessly questioning the integrity of someone when you do not have the evidence is bad judgment, rotten politics and plain wrong. We have learnt something about the Labour leader today and I think it is something he will regret.
Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)
I hope that the Prime Minister accepts that for more than 25 years every Liberal Democrat leader and colleague in both Houses has sought to break the insidious relationship between Labour and Tory Governments and the media. We therefore welcome the Leveson inquiry, which is doing an excellent job. If the Prime Minister accepts that that gives confidence to the public, will he also accept that referring this matter next month to the independent adviser will also give confidence to the public and that possibly, in the future, that should be done independently and not at the discretion of the Prime Minister of the day?
The Prime Minister
First, I very much agree with what my right hon. Friend says about the opportunity provided for the Leveson inquiry. I think we should be frank: the relationships between the media and the police, and between the media and politicians, and some of the ethics and problems in the media, have not been dealt with properly under Governments both Labour and Conservative, and this gives us an opportunity to deal with the matter. On the specific issue of the Secretary of State, what is more robust than a judge-led inquiry, with Ministers under oath—holding the Bible, speaking under oath and answering questions? That is the point on which we have heard absolutely no answer from the Labour party.
Margaret Hodge (Barking) (Lab)
On Wednesday, the Secretary of State told this House that the permanent secretary had “agreed”, “authorised” and “approved” the role of Adam Smith. On Thursday, the permanent secretary refused 10 times to confirm to my Committee that that was the case. On Friday, he then wrote to me stating merely that he was “aware and content” with Adam Smith’s role. Either the Secretary of State failed to provide full and accurate information to Parliament or he failed to require his civil servant to provide full and accurate information to a Select Committee of Parliament. Both are breaches of the ministerial code—[Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. If Members, rather than braying noisily, would allow the question to be finished, we will get on with it. The last sentence, please.
Margaret Hodge
Both are breaches of the ministerial code, both ride roughshod over the rights of Parliament and surely both need to be properly investigated by the independent adviser.
The Prime Minister
I did watch some of the permanent secretary’s appearance in front of the right hon. Lady’s Committee, when he thought he was going to be discussing the Olympic Games. What he said, over and over again, was that he backed what his Secretary of State had said at this Dispatch Box. When asked to clarify it, he made it absolutely clear that he agreed the arrangements within the Department, as I said in my statement, and he was aware of and content with the role of the special adviser. I know that the right hon. Lady sometimes allows her Committee to drift into these areas, but I am afraid that she is completely wrong.
Mr John Whittingdale (Maldon) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend accept that there is an urgent need to restore public confidence in the process that led to decisions in this matter and that to achieve that an inquiry needs to be held, in the open, in which witnesses give evidence in public, subject to cross-examination and under oath? Will he confirm that if at the end of that process there remain questions to be answered, he will refer the matter to the ministerial adviser—or it might be appropriate that it be looked into by a Select Committee of this House?
The Prime Minister
I can absolutely give my hon. Friend that assurance. I agree with him. Having seen some of the Leveson inquiry on television, I know that it is immensely powerful that people are questioned under oath, that all the documentation is carefully gone through and that questions on that documentation are properly followed up. As I say, that is far more robust than anything the independent adviser or the civil service could provide. As my hon. Friend says, I am not waiting for Leveson to complete his investigations. If at any stage information comes out that shows that anyone has breached the ministerial code, of course I will act. That is the right approach and I think people should respect the integrity of the fact-finding mission in which Leveson is engaged. It does not remove from me the necessity to police the ministerial code; that is my job and I will fulfil it properly.
Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)
One of the clear duties on any Secretary of State, for which they in turn are responsible to the Prime Minister and not to Lord Leveson, concerns the conduct of their special advisers. Given what the Prime Minister knows already about the palpable dereliction of duty by the Secretary of State in supervising that adviser, does he not believe that there are matters under the ministerial code that now merit investigation by the independent adviser? No one understands why he is seeking to shelter behind the smokescreen of Lord Leveson’s inquiry when the duty to have this investigation is on him.
The Prime Minister
I respect hugely the right hon. Gentleman and his experience in government and I think he would know that I consulted the Cabinet Secretary, asking the question, “What is the right process to follow to ensure we get to the truth and we deal with this issue?” The right process to follow is to allow Lord Leveson to find the facts of the case and if at any stage there is a question of the ministerial code being broken I can act. The ministerial code in respect of special advisers is absolutely clear: Ministers are responsible and they have to take responsibility, and that is what my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State did when he came to the House.
Mr Peter Lilley (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)
Given that the role of the adviser on the ministerial code is purely to advise the Prime Minister on whether a Minister’s actions are in breach of that code, and not to investigate or establish the facts of those actions, is it not sensible to allow the Leveson inquiry to establish the facts and, in the unlikely event—in my view—that it discovers that there is a prima facie case to answer, then to refer it to the independent adviser on the ministerial code?
The Prime Minister
My right hon. Friend is entirely right. It is worth examining for a second what would happen if the independent adviser was commissioned to set off down a process of factual discovery. He would have to look at all the information that is about to be provided and is being provided to the Leveson inquiry, which would literally duplicate the findings of fact and would literally be prejudging what the judge himself will be judging.
Mr Ben Bradshaw (Exeter) (Lab)
The Prime Minister has just claimed again that in relation to the BSkyB bid, the Government sought independent advice and followed it “at every stage”. Will he confirm that on 31 December 2010, Ofcom advised the Government to refer the bid to the Competition Commission and that the Government did not do that, so what he has just said to this House—they both said it last week—is simply not true?
The Prime Minister
I have to say to the right hon. Gentleman that he ought to know that we were acting in accordance with a law passed by his Government, the Enterprise Act 2002. That Act requires consideration of the company’s representations in terms of reference to the Competition Commission. If that is not taken into account, the matter could be subject to a judicial review. What I said, and what the Secretary of State said, which is that each stage he took independent advice and followed that advice, is correct.
Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)
All sensible people will welcome the Prime Minister’s approach to this very serious matter, but does he agree that it would be quite wrong to rush to judgment and that he has a duty to follow a just and exhaustive process?
The Prime Minister
I do think this is right. Perhaps we can recognise, if we go back over 10 or 20 years in politics, that it is frankly the easiest thing in the world for a Prime Minister to stand at this Dispatch Box and say to a member of the Cabinet, “Oh, it’s all getting a bit difficult—off you go.” I think it is important to get to the facts—to get to the truth. That is what I believe in doing. It is called natural justice, and we should have some more of it.
Mr Kevin Barron (Rother Valley) (Lab)
The Prime Minister is well aware that for many years now, the machinery has been in place for investigations of breaches of the codes of conduct for Ministers and for Members of the House of Commons. Why does the Prime Minister not implement that, as opposed to going to a third party?
The Prime Minister
Again, I say, “Can you think of a process that is more robust than a Minister having to provide, under oath, information to an inquiry, and answering questions under oath, knowing all the time that if anything in that information in any way breaches the ministerial code, it can trigger another judgment?” That is what is happening. That is what I agreed with the Cabinet Secretary, a civil servant of impeccable standing, and I am absolutely convinced that it is the right approach.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
This morning, I checked with my office in Wellingborough to see whether there were lots of complaints about the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and Mrs Bone said that there were hundreds and hundreds. They all wanted to know why Harry is not to become the England football team manager. There was not a single complaint about the Secretary of State. The message that Mrs Bone wanted to give was “Let the Prime Minister get on with running the country and solving the economic crisis.”
The Prime Minister
As ever, Mrs Bone is spot on, and I am sure that there are many like her, round the country, saying to us, “This is important—don’t belittle the issue—but there are many more important issues about jobs, living standards, and dealing with the debt that you should be getting on with.”
Frank Dobson (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
Does the Prime Minister not accept that all his problems spring from his original misjudgment? Having taken responsibility for the News Corp bid for BSkyB away from the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills because he had expressed antipathy towards News Corporation, it was stupid of the Prime Minister to hand that responsibility over to the Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport, who was already on record as being in favour of the bid.
The Prime Minister
I am afraid that I do not accept that at all. To be fair to my right hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Vince Cable), it was not just antipathy; he was recorded saying that he wanted to destroy the business. He could not carry on running that part of his Department. I sought advice from the Cabinet Secretary, and the Cabinet Secretary sought legal advice from the Cabinet Office. The view came back that it was appropriate to ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport to fulfil that role.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
Can the Prime Minister reassure the House that we are getting maximum value for money, in these cash-strapped times, from the office of the independent adviser?
Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)
I was at the meeting of the Public Accounts Committee at which, according to the Prime Minister’s statement, the permanent secretary said that he approved the approach taken by the Department in relation to using Adam Smith as a conduit. That is not what the permanent secretary said. He said:
“The Secretary of State made a full statement to Parliament…and he has made it clear that he is providing full written evidence and looking forward to providing oral evidence to the Leveson inquiry.”
Given that the terms of reference of the Leveson inquiry make no reference at all to the accountability of Ministers to Parliament, how can Leveson deal with the concerns that have been expressed?
The Prime Minister
Let me be absolutely clear about what the permanent secretary has done and approved. He approved the approach taken by the Department to the quasi-judicial process relating to the BSkyB bid. This included a small number of people—including Adam Smith, the special adviser—acting as a contact point with News Corporation. It is normal—indeed, required—in such a process to have contacts, and the permanent secretary has made it clear that he was aware and content for Adam Smith to be one of those points of contact. You can keep digging into this area, but I am afraid that it is not getting anywhere.
David T. C. Davies (Monmouth) (Con)
Will the Prime Minister tell us whether he, like previous Prime Ministers, has ever phoned the Murdoch empire to offer his services as a godfather, or perhaps offer No. 10 for a pyjama party? If not, does he think that what we are seeing is a call for openness, or more naked opportunism than one would find on page 3?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend puts it well. The point is this: I am perfectly prepared to admit that the relationship between politicians and media proprietors got too close. What is interesting about the Labour party is that it has not revealed any of the meetings that it had while it was in government, whereas we have been completely transparent.
Mr Tom Watson (West Bromwich East) (Lab)
The Prime Minister has insisted on the Leveson process to decide the fate of the Secretary of State, and he will be judged by that. May I ask that he assist the inquiry by providing the Leveson team with the private texts and e-mails of Treasury special advisers to Mr Frederic Michel and Graham McWilliam of BSkyB?
The Prime Minister
The point about the Leveson inquiry is that it is a judge-led inquiry. He is able to ask for any papers or material that he wants and this Government will provide it.
Conor Burns (Bournemouth West) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that the principles of fair play and natural justice dictate that accusations made about the Secretary of State at Leveson should be determined only after the Secretary of State has had the opportunity to give his side of the story at Leveson? Does he also agree that the motivation for this urgent question today has more to do with the failure of the Opposition to engage on the issues before the people of London and the people of Britain at the ballot box on Thursday?
The Prime Minister
The motivation is probably that the Opposition would rather do anything than get out and campaign for Ken Livingstone. I am willing to keep them here as long as they like. They must answer for their own motivation, but that is my guess.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
The one fact that the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State cannot get away from is the fact that James Murdoch knew precisely, word for word, what the Secretary of State was going to say before he said it, before the House knew on three occasions and before commercial operators in opposition to Murdoch knew it. Is that not a clear example of collusion between the Government and of a shabby deal between the Prime Minister and the Murdochs?
The Prime Minister
While we are on the subject of people who say things before they should, I would have thought that when the hon. Gentleman stands up in the House, he should make an apology. He stood up last week and claimed a whole series of facts about meetings that I had had with Rupert Murdoch based on privileged access that he had had—and he is not denying it—to this inquiry, and the facts turned out to be wrong. A man of honour would stand up and apologise.
Alec Shelbrooke (Elmet and Rothwell) (Con)
The press have a proud and historic role in British politics and it is right that political parties communicate their policy to the nation, but does my right hon. Friend agree that that is in stark contrast to a political party that thinks that national politics should be directed by the highest union bidder?
Mr Speaker
Order. Most questions have focused on the terms of the urgent question. I have sadly to tell the hon. Gentleman that that was a million miles away from it and does not require an answer. It was completely out of order. We will take another Member who, I am sure, will be in order—[Interruption.] Order. I do not require any sedentary chuntering in the background.
Mr David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con)
Can my right hon. Friend provide any information about the last time a proposed takeover bid was given the same level of scrutiny and independent advice as the BSkyB bid has been given?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is entirely right. The scrutiny that that was given, the process, the transparency—that was a proper process. As my right hon. Friend the Culture Secretary has explained, on four occasions he took steps that were not welcomed by News Corporation, but in everything he did, he was open, transparent and taking independent advice.
Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)
Why is the Culture Secretary getting better employment rights than the rest of the workers in Britain? Is it possibly because the Prime Minister knows that as long as the Culture Secretary is in the firing line, it prevents the bullets from hitting him, the Prime Minister?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Gentleman has the right at any time to take his pension, and I advise him to do so.
Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)
I welcome the open and thorough process that Lord Justice Leveson will be engaged in. I also welcome a Prime Minister who will be personally responsible for ensuring that his Government adhere to the ministerial code of conduct. Will he also make the decision that his Ministers cannot make, and require Lord Justice Leveson to report on his inquiry directly to him?
The Prime Minister
The point about the Leveson inquiry is that its report will clearly be a major political, media and regulatory event. He is effectively reporting not only to all in the Government, but to everyone in Parliament, in politics and in public life who care about this issue. I do think—I do hope—that all parties will be able to engage in this, because we have an opportunity to deal with issues of press regulation and relations between politicians and the media that have not been right in our country but that, frankly, we will only get right if we work on a cross-party basis.
Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)
As the only defence that the Secretary of State has is based on the fiction that the only way Ministers communicate with their special advisers is by e-mail, why has the Prime Minister forgotten the lesson of the David Mellor scandal, which is that a resignation delayed is a disgrace multiplied?
The Prime Minister
If the hon. Gentleman is really concerned, as I am, about making sure that all the information about this is properly looked into, what is preferable: a civil service-run process where you can look at papers and ask questions, or a judge-led inquiry with Ministers answering questions under oath where all the documents have to be revealed and the whole thing is pursued properly by a team of barristers who are expert at finding out the facts? This is why I do not really understand where the Opposition are coming from. If they want full factual disclosure before making a judgment about whether any ministerial codes were broken, this must be the most robust process.
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
In a previous scandal affecting Damian McBride, a very respected Member of this House, the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Alan Johnson), suggested that the then Prime Minister could not take responsibility for every single initiative or text from advisers in No. 10. Will my right hon. Friend say why he thinks the situation is any different now?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend makes a very important point. Taking responsibility for a special adviser means coming to this House and explaining what has happened. In this case the special adviser resigned immediately and gave his reasons for resigning, so on that basis I am very confident that my right hon. Friend has not broken the ministerial code.
Mr Gerry Sutcliffe (Bradford South) (Lab)
The permanent secretary will not be giving evidence to the Leveson inquiry, so when will parliamentarians have the opportunity to question him on the role he played? This is a very important issue, and DCMS has been used to these issues before, so when will parliamentarians have the opportunity to know exactly what the permanent secretary’s advice was and when it was given, and is the Prime Minister not shocked that the key person was the special adviser?
The Prime Minister
Let me answer all those questions. First of all, it is up to Lord Justice Leveson whom he calls to his inquiry. He has full access; he can call any civil servant, any politician—anyone he wants. That is the first point. The second point is this: in this House, our Select Committee, excellently chaired by my hon. Friend the Member for Maldon (Mr Whittingdale), is able to call, whenever it likes, whatever civil servants it likes and to ask those questions. On the issue about the way the Department ran the quasi-judicial process, yes that is why the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Jeremy Heywood, has written to all Departments to make sure that rigorous processes are followed in all quasi-judicial cases.
Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that a company that automatically sacked the director because one of his subordinates had got something wrong would never achieve anything worth while?
The Prime Minister
I have to say, on the argument made by the Labour party, that if its Ministers had resigned every time one of their special advisers had got something wrong, we would have had a new Government virtually every week.
Mr Michael Meacher (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab)
Is it not obvious that the real reason the Prime Minister is so reluctant to refer this matter to the independent adviser on the ministerial code is that, if the Secretary of State were forced to resign as a result, the Prime Minister would find himself on the front line and having to answer for every future revelation about the covert links between the Murdoch empire and the Conservative party? In those circumstances, is it not inappropriate that the Prime Minister, who has a vested interest, should take this decision, rather than Parliament, based on a substantive motion and a vote in the House?
The Prime Minister
The right hon. Gentleman could find any sort of complicated, circuitous explanation he wants, but he could always go for the simple one, which is that, having consulted the Cabinet Secretary and listened to the views of others, the best way to find out the facts is to allow Leveson to run its course. That does not in any way excuse me from exercising my duties under the ministerial code. That is the answer. Sometimes the simple explanation is actually the right one.
Jake Berry (Rossendale and Darwen) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend confirm that, if any major business were bidding for a large UK company, it would be perfectly normal for that business to have dialogue with the Department involved?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is right. It is important that that dialogue is carried out appropriately. In this case the special adviser did not act appropriately or properly, and that is why he resigned, but I do believe that it raises some wider issues, and that is why I asked Sir Jeremy Heywood to write to all Departments to make sure that in any quasi-judicial matters we get it right.
Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)
People in Wales will compare the privileged access that Mr Murdoch and his friends had to the Culture Secretary with the cavalier way in which the right hon. Gentleman treated campaigners for public sector television in Wales. That is a small matter in the grand scheme of things, but is it not just another example of his double dealing and double standards?
The Prime Minister
I do not accept that, because I think that we have done right by S4C and that broadcasting in Wales is a great success. Let me just make this point, which perhaps will get some all-party agreement. All media companies have their great causes and lobbies, and I would say, after seven years of being leader of the Conservative party, that one gets as much pressure from the BBC, from regional newspapers and from other papers about things that they are concerned about. It is worth putting that on the record.
Brandon Lewis (Great Yarmouth) (Con)
Having had a statement less than one week ago, and with the facts having remained unchanged since then, does the Prime Minister agree that, rather than listening to flip-flopping from the Leader of the Opposition, we should remember that just a week ago he himself said, quite rightly, that we should let Leveson do its job?
The Prime Minister
That is exactly what the right hon. Gentleman said. Let me just remind him. He said:
“I think…it’s right that the Leveson Inquiry takes its course.”
That is what he said—just a week ago. The trouble is that he was bounced by the deputy leader of the Labour party, who thought that this issue would get a good headline, 23 minutes after the evidence had come out, and because he has no judgment he backed it.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
Can I push the Prime Minister on something that really concerns me: the role of the special adviser? Any of us who knows about the role of the special adviser knows that they are not one of many officials, but people who work intimately and closely with their Minister. I do not believe for one moment that the Prime Minister does not know that that special adviser must have known everything that was going on, and have told his Minister on an hour-by-hour and a day-by-day basis.
The Prime Minister
All that information is going to be provided to the Leveson inquiry. My right hon. Friend the Culture Secretary has been very clear about the role he played and the role his special adviser played. The special adviser has been very clear about the role he played and the fact that he went way beyond anything that he was authorised to do, but the difference between the process we are about to go through and a normal Cabinet Secretary or independent adviser process, is that people are going to be answering questions under oath—questioned by a barrister, in a court. That is pretty powerful.
Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)
Does the Prime Minister agree that, even if the matter should have been referred to the independent adviser, they would almost certainly be heavily guided by the Secretary of State’s evidence in front of the Leveson inquiry anyway, given that it provides for the highest level of public scrutiny possible?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend makes a good point. We could not even guarantee that the independent adviser would be quicker, but as I tried to explain earlier there would be a danger of a duplicative fact-finding process that would cut across what Lord Justice Leveson is doing. But let me repeat again: I am not in any way denying that I am responsible for the ministerial code. If breaches occur, I must act, or ask the advice of Alex Allan in order to do so. I could not be clearer about it.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
The Prime Minister told Andrew Marr yesterday that he did discuss the BSkyB bid with James Murdoch at the Rebekah Brooks dinner. I wonder why, since there is nothing to hide, the Prime Minister felt unable to admit that last July, when it was put to him eight times by Members of this House.
The Prime Minister
What I have always said is that I have not had any inappropriate conversation about this issue—and, indeed, I have not. But clearly it is very important, in the context of this inquiry, to recall everything possible, and what I recall is that, because of the frankly rather embarrassing situation that we were in, whereby a Minister had said that he was trying to “destroy” a media company, it was perfectly appropriate for me to say that that was not correct or appropriate and that these things would be dealt with properly in future. That is a thoroughly responsible and sensible thing to say.
Louise Mensch (Corby) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend share my mystification as to how the Leader of the Opposition can deduce that there has been a breach of the ministerial code without seeing the texts and e-mails that passed between the Culture Secretary and Adam Smith, which are to come out in the Leveson inquiry?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend absolutely puts her finger on it. The fact is that the Leader of the Opposition does not want to wait for the evidence and does not want to wait for the information; he saw a passing bandwagon and jumped on board it. That is what happened.
Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
Is the Prime Minister seriously disputing the fact that the Culture Secretary said that he would publish
“all the documents relating to all the meetings…all the exchanges between my department and News Corporation”?—[Official Report, 3 March 2011; Vol. 524, c. 526.]
Is he disputing the fact that 163 pages of e-mails were published last week? Does he see no problem in that omission whatsoever?
The Prime Minister
The point I made is that my right hon. Friend dealt with that in the statement that he made on Wednesday, because his answer was subsequently given to the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) to explain the situation, as is absolutely correct.
Mel Stride (Central Devon) (Con)
Will the Prime Minister confirm that a civil service-led inquiry would have absolutely no power to summon a Minister under oath and that nor would it be held in public? Does he therefore agree that at this stage following the Leveson route is the best way of giving the Secretary of State his opportunity to clear the record and to find the truth?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is right. I do not want in any way to belittle what the Cabinet Secretary, a former civil servant or Sir Alex Allan are capable of in terms of proper inquiries, because this has happened in the past; it happened with my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox). It so happens that the process that we are currently engaged in—the Leveson inquiry—is many times more robust in getting to the facts of the case. Once we have the facts, and if they throw up any extra information, the situation in terms of the ministerial code has not changed.
Jack Dromey (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab)
Does the Prime Minister agree that if market-sensitive information was passed to News International in advance of an announcement being made, that would not only be a breach of the code but illegal?
The Prime Minister
I agree with the hon. Gentleman that a very serious accusation has been made about what the special adviser did and the information that has been passed, and that does need to be properly investigated.
Sajid Javid (Bromsgrove) (Con)
Charlie Whelan and Damian McBride were both special advisers to the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown), and both resigned in disgrace. Can the Prime Minister tell the House whether a ministerial inquiry was held at the time or, indeed, whether the matter was looked at by a judge-led public inquiry?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend makes a very good point. There have been occasions when special advisers have misbehaved and the Minister involved, far from taking responsibility, as my right hon. Friend the Culture Secretary has done in coming straight to the House, has just tried to shrug it off.
Mr David Winnick (Walsall North) (Lab)
Is not the core of the matter this: did the Secretary of State know what e-mails were being sent out and what was being leaked by a special adviser on this issue? If he did not know, how could it be argued that he was in control of his Department? Surely, therefore, this is a matter for the ministerial code and not for Leveson.
The Prime Minister
I agree with the first half of what the hon. Gentleman said, which is that it is important that we establish the full facts of the case. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has been absolutely clear, and so has the special adviser. The difference between this case and other cases where Ministers are involved in these sorts of accusations is that this is going to be examined by a judge in a court.
George Eustice (Camborne and Redruth) (Con)
As long ago as 2006, the Information Commissioner revealed that newspapers were driving an
“illegal market in personal information”,
and yet there was no judicial inquiry and the former Prime Minister, Tony Blair, did not dare criticise what he called the “feral beast” of the media until days before he left office. Now that we have the Leveson inquiry, does the Prime Minister agree that Ministers in the last Government should be given the opportunity to explain why they did so little in response to that report?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend makes a very important point. Frankly, it is, yes, a point for the last Government, but it is also a point for the last Opposition. These were powerful reports by the Information Commissioner, but the problem is that our political system did not react properly to them. That is one of the reasons it is so important to have the Leveson inquiry and to try to get to a situation where we have an appropriate regulatory system, so that when problems are thrown up, as they were by Richard Thomas in those reports, they are properly dealt with.
Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)
If it is the Prime Minister’s case that Adam Smith, who was appointed by the Secretary of State, exceeded his authority in his dealings with News Corp, will he explain what benefits Smith, rather than the Secretary of State, expected to get from pleasing the Murdochs?
The Prime Minister
Adam Smith, the special adviser, has made his role absolutely clear. He said:
“While it was part of my role to keep News Corporation informed throughout the BSkyB process, the content and extent of my contact was done without authorisation from the Secretary of State.”
That is what he said and the hon. Gentleman should listen.
Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)
Does the Prime Minister recall the words of his noble predecessor, Baroness Thatcher, who said that advisers advise and Ministers decide? Does not a judicious Prime Minister consider things thoughtfully and carefully before making up his mind, and would not only a socialist Yahoo make up his mind in 23 minutes?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is quite right. It is the easiest thing in the world to react to any Opposition leader or politician calling for a scalp or asking for a resignation, but one has to take the time and get the issue right. That is exactly what is being done in this case, and people will just have to be patient while the full facts are looked at.
Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)
As a former competition Minister who dealt with some quasi-judicial matters, I do not understand why a special adviser was involved in any case, since they are appointed purely to carry out political work on behalf of a Minister. Has the Prime Minister got to the bottom of whose idea it was that the special adviser should be involved? The House has still not been told.
The Prime Minister
Let me try to explain. A range of people were authorised to have contact with News Corporation. Clearly, if a company is involved in a transaction, it has to have some contact with the Department about process and the rest of it. The authorisation was given—it was agreed by the permanent secretary—so I think that the hon. Gentleman is barking up the wrong tree.
Gavin Barwell (Croydon Central) (Con)
Fred Michel said:
“Throughout the bid process, I met senior teams from all political parties on a regular basis to update them, ask their advice or share views on the situation.”
Does my right hon. Friend agree that, in the interests of transparency, all parties should publish all correspondence between their representatives at those discussions at News Corporation?
The Prime Minister
That is very good idea. To be fair, Fred Michel even met the Liberal Democrats, so we all need to be transparent about this.
Mr Speaker
The urgent question has run for 52 minutes and I have heard 42 Back Benchers, who had the chance to question the Prime Minister and receive replies. We now have another urgent question and we must move on to that. [Interruption.] I think that that is pretty fair.
Immigration Queues (UK Airports)
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
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Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)
(Urgent Question): I think that that is most fair. Thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting the urgent question.
To ask the Minister for Immigration if he will make a statement on the immigration delays at UK airports.
The Minister for Immigration (Damian Green)
The Government’s priority is the security of the UK border. The right checks need to be carried out to control immigration, protect against terrorism and tackle crime. We maintain thorough border checks. Despite those robust checks, the vast majority of passengers pass through immigration control quickly.
Let me give the House the actual figures. Between January and March, the average waiting times across the UK were six minutes for UK and EU passengers, and 25 minutes for non-EU passengers. The latest internal management information shows that, in the first two weeks of April, 99% of UK and EU passengers queued for less than 25 minutes and 96% of non-EU passengers queued for less than 45 minutes.
At Heathrow, the information shows that those target times were met every day throughout that period for UK and EU passengers, and on 11 out of 15 days for non-EU passengers. Over the weekend, there were some breaches of acceptable waiting times at Heathrow. That was caused mainly by the severe weather, leading to flight diversions and changing flight schedules, and the bunching of arrivals.
However, I stress to the House that our information shows that queuing times bore no resemblance to some of the wilder suggestions. Border Force data show that the longest queuing time for immigration control was one and a half hours on Friday night at terminal 5 for non-EU nationals, and times for UK and EU nationals were significantly lower.
These times are too long. Passengers demand an efficient service and the British public demand tough border controls. We need both. That is why we are establishing a new central control room for the UK Border Force at Heathrow; why we are putting in place mobile teams that can be deployed rapidly across the airport to deal with pressures; and why within weeks we will be implementing new rostering and shift patterns, which will provide additional flexibility, so staff can be deployed individually to meet unexpected surges in passenger flows. We are also working with airport operators and airlines to ensure they provide more accurate passenger manifests and flight schedules to help the UK Border Force to deploy staff at the right time, in the right place, to meet demand.
On top of those permanent improvements, as passenger numbers increase in the run-up to the Olympics, the UK Border Force will increase its staffing at ports and airports. The important factor is to have staff flexibly deployed in the right numbers, at the right times. That is what we are doing. The UK Border Force will ensure that all immigration desks at Heathrow and other key ports and airports in the south-east are fully staffed during peak periods over the summer. A contingency force of appropriately trained staff will be sent to the border to provide extra help to ensure passengers are processed as quickly as possible.
Border security is Britain’s first line of defence—it must not and will not be compromised—but our border force is also the first impression presented to overseas visitors and those returning home. Therefore, while we maintain the right levels of security checks, we will always seek to improve performance. That is what I—and UK Border Force—are focused on doing. This country needs a secure and efficient border, and this Government will deliver it.
Keith Vaz
I thank the Minister for his response and for acknowledging that there have been delays at Heathrow airport. As he knows, there is considerable concern about the length of waiting times in immigration halls at our airports at peak times. Of course, we must ensure that proper security checks are carried out—we do not want a repetition of the case of Sheikh Raed Salah, who was banned by the Home Secretary but able to enter Heathrow airport—but the queues have sometimes been in excess of two hours and they are and have been a serious embarrassment.
The Home Secretary made a decision in the aftermath of the Brodie Clark saga to suspend all risk-based checks. Given that, why are border desks not fully staffed at peak periods and why are electronic gates, including iris scanners, so often broken? The Home Secretary has appointed Brian Moore as the temporary seconded head of the UK Border Force, and his post has been advertised. How many times has Mr Moore visited terminal 5 at peak times?
Will the Minister confirm reports that BAA has been asked to refrain from handing out leaflets to passengers that apologise for the very long delays and advise them how to complain about them? Does he accept that hundreds of people in the arrival hall after 12-hour flights will be extremely frustrated and angry at having to queue for two hours at unattended border desks and at using—or trying to use—broken iris scanners? Does that situation not pose a public order risk?
As the Minister knows, over the weekend, the British Air Transport Association, border staff and BAA have all called for urgent action. I acknowledge what he has said today about what he intends to do, but it is important for him to hold a meeting with all those affected—all the stakeholders—and if necessary to hold it at Heathrow airport.
The UK Border Force is re-hiring former border officers to help with the Olympics. However, excessive delays in our immigration halls are not only an Olympic issue; they affect travellers today. What further action does the Minister propose to take to ensure that the reputation of Heathrow as a world-class airport and a premier international tourist destination is not damaged?
In my view, the Minister has a choice. He either hires more staff or looks again at the risk-based policy, which the Home Secretary has said she is open-minded about. The third option, which is to do nothing, is simply not acceptable.
Damian Green
I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his question. I hope I reassured him in my opening response that doing nothing is precisely what we are not doing. We are doing quite a lot, as I will detail a little more in a moment.
The right hon. Gentleman asked some specific questions. In the few weeks he has been in charge of Border Force, Brian Moore has visited Heathrow twice, including over Easter—one of the peak busiest times of the year—to see precisely how Border Force coped over that difficult and challenging period. The answer was that, despite the predictions we had that Easter would mean gridlock at Heathrow, actually it did not. Heathrow coped well over Easter.
The right hon. Gentleman also asked about e-gates and iris recognition immigration system gates. The IRIS gates commissioned by the previous Government are being phased out because they have come to the end of their technological life. They are less reliable than the e-gates that we are replacing them with and which provide a much better passenger experience.
The right hon. Gentleman asked about risk-based controls. As he knows, I have said—as has the Home Secretary in front of the Home Affairs Committee—that the principle of risk-based controls is a sound one to explore, but he will know that, as the John Vine report showed, what we had, when we thought we had risk-based controls, actually were not risk-based controls. Information had been withheld from successive Ministers over the previous five years.
The right hon. Gentleman asked, quite reasonably, what we have done. I have mentioned some of the actions we have already taken. We have rebalanced staff across Heathrow’s terminals; we are opening the new control room to allow us to monitor and deal with demand across the airports, so Border Force staff will not be stuck in terminals, as they used to be; we have completed our recruitment to mobile teams that can deal with unexpected surges; and we are encouraging all eligible passengers to use the e-passport gates, and are now getting close to 50% of those eligible to use them doing so, which significantly improves the flow-through, particularly for UK citizens.
We have, as a result, freed up more experienced staff from those e-passport gates to man the non-EU desks and to help reduce queues there. We are cross-training more and more of our staff so that they can work flexibly across all areas of border control. So very significant steps have been taken in the past few months to make the airports work more efficiently, and I am sure that passengers and the House will see the effects of that in the coming months.
Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his comments, but is there any way to give greater priority to British passport holders when there are very long queues?
Damian Green
British and—I suspect my hon. Friend might not wish to hear this—other EU citizens have priority. We do fewer checks on them, for obvious reasons. Our service level agreement is that 95% of them should go through in fewer than 25 minutes, as opposed to 95% in fewer than 45 minutes for non-British and non-EU passengers. We try to make the welcome back to this country for British tourists or business people travelling abroad as good as possible.
Mr Speaker
I beg the hon. Gentleman’s pardon. More particularly, I beg the right hon. Lady’s pardon. I am sorry. I had it down that she would be performing, but of course it would not be a normal day if we did not hear from the hon. Gentleman.
Chris Bryant
Thank you, Mr Speaker.
I have to say to the Minister that his was a ludicrously complacent answer. Surely it cannot be beyond the wit of man, especially with increased technology, to do two things at the same time: secure the borders and have reasonably swift queues. The problems at Heathrow and Gatwick have given a shocking impression of a Government who are out of control, just when Britain is facing a special security challenge in advance of the Olympics and when the British tourism industry is keen to make as good an impression as possible. I gather that No. 10 is now blaming it on the weather.
The figures that the Minister gave are not the full story. Even before last week, between 1 April and 15 April, Border Force missed its waiting targets for non-European economic area nationals on 13 out of 15 days, and even for people returning home to their own country, it missed them on four days. There was not a single day in that two-week period when it met all its targets.
It might be understandable if long queues meant better security, but no airport in the world is designed to kettle thousands of passengers for hours prior to passing through immigration, which is why it is vital that the Government provide enough resources to Border Force.
Sir John Vine expressly recommended that a clear understanding of what constitutes health and safety grounds for suspension should be agreed. Has that happened? Have there been any such suspensions in the last month? I ask the Minister that because I have been contacted by one passenger who says that on arrival on a Kenya Airways flight from Nairobi to terminal 4, his passport was not swiped at all. How many UK or other European nationals have had to wait more than the target of 25 minutes?
Will most people not be perplexed by the Government’s priorities? They have already cut 500 border staff—they are going to cut another 1,000—while at the same time they are spending £2.5 million on new uniforms. How can that possibly be the right set of priorities? Numbers at Heathrow are set to rise, not only for the Olympics and Paralympics, but year on year into the future, yet Border Force is running at 100% capacity, with no room for the unexpected—and clearly the Government are running way past their capacity. Is it not time that the Government shouldered their responsibility and gave Border Force the resources it truly needs to do the job properly?
Damian Green
Up to that point, we had heard the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), the Chairman of the Home Affairs Committee, make a thoughtful contribution to what is a serious debate. Sadly, the shadow Minister for Immigration has let the side down, with a rant that had no purpose whatever. He also clearly wrote it before he had heard my statement, which addressed the measures we are taking in some detail. The only solution he has—this is instructive, as a glimpse into Labour’s approach to everything—is to spend more taxpayers’ money; and this from a member of the Government who left this country bankrupt, because of their profligate spending over 13 years.
In the midst of that rant, the hon. Gentleman raised one or two issues, so let me deal with them. First, he talked about the uniforms and implied that it was a terrible waste of money to buy new uniforms. I have to tell him that the current Border Force uniform was bought by the previous Government and was designed to last only three years, so it is now out of date and has to be replaced anyway. That money would therefore have to be spent under any circumstances.
The hon. Gentleman also asked about what was happening at the border. However, I am afraid that he is relying on unreliable reports. The monitoring for this period shows that in the first two weeks of April, we met all our targets for EU passengers, meeting targets for non-EU passengers on 11 days out of 15. Of course I would prefer to meet our targets for non-EU passengers on 15 days out of 15, but he is relying on information that does not accord with the official figures given by Border Force.
I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman has no particular answers to give. Indeed, what is quite surprising about everything he said was—[Interruption.] He should agree with this statement, which was made last November:
“We seemed to have a consensus from Labour ministers and I thought from…Tory ministers as well that with every year that went by, you should be strengthening the checks at the borders, adding better technology and that kind of thing”.
That was said by the shadow Home Secretary. The hon. Gentleman is now saying that we should make fewer checks. I suggest that he and she get their act together.
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)
May I ask my hon. Friend to ensure that the hard-pressed border officers, who in times of pressure are told to get a move on, are still able to put their top priority—the safety and security of our country—first?
Damian Green
My hon. Friend is exactly right that, beneath this debate, we all need to remember—I can absolutely assure him that every member of Border Force securing our border knows this—that our first priority must be the security of our border. That is what had been compromised, we discovered, over many years, because when the queues rose at airports, people were ordered to reduce the checks. The big change that has happened in the past few months is that we now conduct proper checks at every airport, all the time, which is significantly improving the security of every citizen of this country.
Mrs Louise Ellman (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab/Co-op)
What representations have been made by the Transport Secretary to ensure that Home Office services enable our airports to operate efficiently and safely?
Damian Green
The Secretary of State for Transport—who is here, as is the Minister of State, Department for Transport, my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Mrs Villiers)—the Home Secretary and I meet regularly and we all agree on this matter. Although the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) does not seem to agree with his boss, I agree with mine, and we all agree on the need for proper checks and efficiently flowing airports. That is obviously a priority for the Department for Transport as well. It is a dual priority for every Government, and certainly for this one. I can only re-emphasise that we will not compromise border security in any circumstances.
Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)
Will the Minister tell the House whether equipment failures have been the source of any delays, and whether the contingency arrangements relating to equipment failure have been reviewed? If the problem is the result of the sheer volume of passengers, would he consider introducing genuine risk-based passenger assessment, which would have the potential to speed up the passage of people through airports and to improve security?
Damian Green
There have been one or two specific incidents in which either equipment failure or wider technical failure has contributed to problems. For example, there was a problem at Birmingham airport that was caused by a power surge that knocked out all the electrical equipment across the airport for a time. Accidents such as that will happen. On my right hon. Friend’s point about ever-rising numbers, which might well happen, this is a question of being able to deploy staff flexibly enough so that, when we know that more people are coming in, we can have more staff at the right gates and encourage as many people as possible to use the technology at the e-gates, which enables more people to go through more smoothly. That is the focus of what we are trying to do.
Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)
While no one doubts the Minister’s good intentions, does he not understand that quoting averages at passengers who have been waiting for two or three hours in very difficult conditions only makes Britain’s reputation worse, rather than better? Does he also understand that, among many senior business people—in Turkey, for example, but elsewhere as well—there is a high level of frustration at being put through an unnecessary number of hoops to get a visa in the first place, when they have been coming to this country quite safely for years, then at having to face an insulting environment when they get to Heathrow or Gatwick?
Damian Green
I make no apology for the fact that our visa checks are more thorough and more secure than they were when the right hon. Gentleman was Home Secretary in the previous Government. His other point is simply wrong. If he had listened to what I said, he would have heard me quite deliberately quoting the longest queuing times. I am not trying to hide behind averages. I said that the longest queuing time was one and a half hours, and that that was unacceptable and we would seek to do better. I should also say that the use of average times was not invented by this Government; the previous Government did it as well.
Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire) (Con)
My hon. Friend the Minister will know that everyone in the House—except perhaps those on the Opposition Front Bench—welcomes the steps that he is taking to improve efficiency in airports in order to move people through. Does he accept, however, that the absolute priority of the Government and the UK Border Force has to be national security?
Damian Green
That is right, and it cannot be emphasised often enough. Of course people feel frustrated when they are in a queue. We all feel that, but we would all feel much worse if we thought that our country was not being made as safe as possible. The borders are a significant line of defence against people who want to commit criminal acts, as well as those who want to commit acts of terrorism, and I am absolutely determined that we will not compromise our security in any way.
John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)
Will the Minister join me in paying tribute to the staff of the UK Border Agency, who have been working incredibly hard and flexibly over the past few months and, indeed, years? There are real concerns on the front line about the lack of staff numbers, and real worries about what will happen during the Olympics. We must not score an own goal in that regard. Will he take up the suggestion of my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) that he visit Heathrow and meet the front-line staff, the trade unions and other stakeholders to explore their views on what could be done to improve matters?
Damian Green
The hon. Gentleman can be assured that I visit Heathrow regularly. I am happy to join him in paying tribute not just to the hard work of those who work as immigration officers and customs officers at our borders, but to the dedication they bring to the job. They are very serious about keeping the wrong people and the wrong things out of our country. As I say, I visit Heathrow extremely regularly and will be glad to go there in the coming weeks to see the new control room and the more flexible rostering that we are setting up and to see the better use we intend to make of those dedicated staff.
Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)
Does the Minister agree that airports themselves as well as Border Force can do more to improve this process and make sure that the right number of staff are available at the right times to deal with the expected flight volume?
Damian Green
I do. There are two significant areas where work could be done by our partners at airports. One is in the provision of information so that Border Force can respond as quickly as possible to any delays caused by wind or that sort of thing that makes planes occasionally bunch in their arrivals. The other is the physical layout of the airports, which is a role for airport operators. For example, people need to have clear lines of sight so that they can see the gates for as long as possible, and as much emphasis as possible should be given to reassuring passengers that they are going through a process smoothly, as often happens on the retailing side of airports.
Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)
May I welcome the efforts that the Minister is making and join in the tributes to the important and hard work of the border staff? Does my hon. Friend agree that these delays, which he has explained this afternoon, are not limited to Heathrow, as they apply to Gatwick and Stansted? While I know he agrees—and has made the point—that the delays harm Britain’s reputation, does he also agree that British business men who have to go in and out of the country all the time as they engage in the hard work of the export industry are extremely irritated by the way in which they are regularly kept in unacceptably long queues? I know that my hon. Friend will do his best to get this matter resolved, but will he acknowledge the fact that these queue problems really need to be resolved quickly?
Mr Speaker
Order. It is always a great pleasure to hear the right hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Nicholas Soames). Erroneously, however, I called two Government Members in succession, so I will subsequently call two Opposition Members in succession to redress the balance. [Interruption.] It is certainly not the fault of the right hon. Member, to whose dulcet tones I feel sure we listened with considerable enthusiasm.
Damian Green
If the rules can be relaxed for anyone, Mr Speaker, they should be relaxed for my right hon. Friend. I take the importance of what he says. It is of course annoying not just for British business men coming back, but for foreign business people who also want as smooth a procedure as possible. That is why we worked so hard to introduce the e-passport gates. With every year that passes, 10% more British people get a new modern passport that enables them to use those gates, which can often provide a considerable improvement in itself. This debate is bedevilled by anecdote, with everyone having an individual story to tell, either good or bad. My own is that I came through Heathrow last Thursday and used the e-gates. I am happy to say that from arriving in the immigration hall to leaving took precisely four minutes.
Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)
Does the Minister understand that British subjects and British passport holders are not really interested in targets, but in getting back into their own country as quickly as possible? Will he now answer the question asked by one of his hon. Friends? Why can we not simply say to the European Union that we are going to give priority to our British passport holders, who are going to have a separate queuing lane so that they can join it and get in first? Surely that is what we should be doing as an independent country.
Damian Green
As the hon. Lady knows perfectly well, that would require significant changes to the law going way beyond immigration policy. I gently suggest to her that all her constituents who want to go on holiday to other countries in the European Union would feel slightly short-changed if they had to wait much longer because there was a separate lane there, too.
Mr John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)
Terminal 5 was a triumph of British construction whose reputation was seriously marred by inept management on its opening day. Now the country is spending billions on arrangements for the Olympics, brilliantly built and organised, and our international image is already being damaged by the queues being caused once again by the useless Border Agency management. Today the Minister’s main excuse seemed to be the weather at the weekend: the wrong sort of rain. When will he really get a grip?
Damian Green
I am not conscious that the word “rain” has passed my lips. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman would care to listen to what I am saying. Let me also gently point out to him that the management of terminal 5 has nothing to do with the UK Border Agency or Border Force, and that it was an entirely commercial operation at that time.
The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the Olympics. Of course we are aware that this summer will be much busier, which is why we will ensure that all immigration desks at Heathrow—terminal 5 and the other terminals—and at other key ports and airports in the south-east are fully staffed whenever necessary during peak arrival periods. We are working closely with the British Airports Authority and other airport operators to ensure that the supply of information to which I referred earlier is better than ever during that period, so that we can provide the best possible experience at our airports at a time when the eyes of the world will indeed be upon us.
Alok Sharma (Reading West) (Con)
We all want passengers to pass efficiently through passport control and immigration, but can the Minister confirm that what we will never see repeated is what happened on occasion during Labour’s watch in 2004, when all passport gates at Heathrow terminal 3 were left open and no checks were made at all?
Damian Green
I can only agree with my hon. Friend. That was indeed shocking. The whole point of the reforms that we have instituted since the John Vine report is to avoid the sort of crisis in which the first reaction is often to say “We will just let everyone through to avoid queues”, because that creates a much less secure border.
Jim Fitzpatrick (Poplar and Limehouse) (Lab)
When passengers arrive at airports and experience problems, they think that they should complain to the airports. We recently tried to amend the Civil Aviation Bill to require the Civil Aviation Authority to publish annual figures for delays at immigration desks, but we were effectively rebuffed by the Minister of State, Department for Transport, the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Mrs Villiers). Will the Minister assure the House that those who wish to complain will know how to complain and who to complain to, and that his Department will publish those annual figures?
Damian Green
I am happy to report to the hon. Gentleman, who I know has transport expertise, that I too have asked the question about the ability to complain, and that Border Force is now very alive to the fact that it needs to advertise the complaints procedure and make forms available at terminals. It is aware of its responsibilities in that regard.
Richard Harrington (Watford) (Con)
I am sure the Minister is aware that Hilton Hotels runs its entire worldwide operation from Watford, where it is a very large employer in my constituency and brings many, many tourists into the country. It is not concerned about the short-term matters that have been discussed by many people who have tried to take political advantage of the situation, both inside and outside the House. It is concerned about the need for the Government to make long-term arrangements to ensure that tourists arriving in this country from all over the world benefit from a world-class operation that ensures security for the country, and also makes it clear that it is as good as any other country in the world at putting people through immigration.
Damian Green
First, I must confess to my hon. Friend that I did not know that Hilton Hotels was based in Watford. I am ashamed of my lack of knowledge of a fact with which I have now managed to catch up.
Damian Green
The shadow Immigration Minister says that even he knew that, which makes me feel doubly ashamed.
My hon. Friend has made a very good point. It is not just for this summer and the Olympics that we need an improvement, although the summer will clearly be a hugely important time for our airports and the British tourism industry generally. What we need is a permanent improvement, which is why I hope that my hon. Friend has been reassured by the many changes that I announced in response to the original question. It is important not just to do something for the summer, but to change the way in which our Border Force operates and the way in which our airport operators and airlines go about their business, to ensure that there is a permanent improvement for all who travel into and out of the country.
Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)
As the Minister knows, my constituency is close to Heathrow. He may not know, however, that more headquarters of European multinational companies are located in it than in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland combined. In recent meetings with different representatives of those companies, the first question I am asked is, “Why are the queues so long and what are you going to do about it? We may move our investment elsewhere.” The Minister will be aware of Brodie Clark’s article in The Times on 23 April, in which he said that targeting in border checks led to a 10% increase in detections and seizures. Why is the Minister not using a targeted system, as that saves money and works better?
Damian Green
The problem with the figures Brodie Clark quoted—and which I am sure I quoted in the past—is that they came out of the pilot that we now know was tainted by the fact that, unknown to anyone else, Border Force was relaxing the controls in an unauthorised way. We will need to think about that again, when, and if, we get to that point. I have said that, in principle, risk-based controls are an option any Government should consider, but I hope the hon. Lady will be reassured by the fact that that pilot was ended because it was tainted, and since then we have taken, and are taking, a number of practical measures to ensure that the many important businesses in her constituency can do their job efficiently.
Mr Speaker
Order. I call Mr Richard Fuller. [Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman was previously interested, but he does not have to ask a question if he does not want to; it is not obligatory.
Richard Fuller (Bedford) (Con)
Thank you, Mr Speaker, but the question I was going to ask has already been asked.
Mr Speaker
The hon. Gentleman is in danger of setting a real precedent: that because it has already been said, it does not need to be said again. That really is setting a new precedent in parliamentary practice! I call Mr Stewart Jackson.
Mr Stewart Jackson (Peterborough) (Con)
Given the news that next year Hungary will issue Hungarian passports to ethnic Hungarians who do not live in the European Union, I am somewhat surprised by the Minister’s rather nonchalant response to the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Kate Hoey). Why in this particular situation is it impossible for a sovereign nation to disaggregate in respect of its treatment between its own citizens and European Union citizens, and why are we not doing more, for instance on criminal records checks of EU citizens at our ports of entry?
Damian Green
Criminal records checks depend on the quality of information we get from the sending country, and that will differ between different European countries. I am conscious of my hon. Friend’s attitude to the EU, but as we are talking about the immigration laws under the current laws of this country, I think we have said enough on that particular topic for this afternoon.
Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)
The queues at Heathrow are unacceptable, but there are also reports of long queues at Gatwick and the channel tunnel. Three weeks ago, I came into Gatwick at about half-past midnight and had to wait for more than half an hour to enter the country. I witnessed families with young children who were struggling badly with the delay. What inquiries has the Minister made into queues faced by travellers outside the capital?
Damian Green
As I have already explained, the service level agreement is that 95% of UK and EU passengers should be processed within 25 minutes and non-EU passengers should be processed within 45 minutes. Those are the targets Border Force has been set. Without knowing the details of the individuals to whom the hon. Lady refers, I cannot say whether or not they were processed in accordance with service standards. The point she makes about Calais and Coquelles is particularly ill-advised in that we have been told that, along with Easter, the February half-term is one of the busiest weeks at Calais and Coquelles because of schools coming back from half-term trips, and we prepared and planned, and there were no problems over that busy weekend.
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
What steps is my hon. Friend taking to prepare our borders for next week’s planned strike, and does he detect, as I do, a whiff of political opportunism in the timing of this urgent question?
Damian Green
On my hon. Friend’s second point, I think that that is taken as read. On the strike set for next week, I simply say that, as on previous strike days, we will make contingency arrangements to ensure our borders are open and Britain is open for business, and if any members of the immigration service are planning to go on strike, I urge them to think again. It will do them no good, and it may do some damage to this country. I very much hope this strike does not take place.
Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham, Ladywood) (Lab)
This morning, the Prime Minister’s spokesman sought to blame the bad weather for the meltdown at Heathrow last week, but bad weather cannot be blamed for machines that are not working properly, or—worse—a lack of adequate staff training. What is the Minister going to do to make sure, in particular in advance of the Olympics, not only that all the machines will work, but that all relevant staff will know how to use them?
Damian Green
As I have already explained, we are ensuring that more staff will be available at peak times during the Olympics. We are proceeding on the assumption that every flight landing at Heathrow for a seven-week period will be 100% full. That assumption is likely to be wrong, but it seems a prudent assumption to make. We are making all our plans about technology and people with regard to that overall plan. I hope that that will reassure the hon. Lady that we are fully aware of the importance of the Olympics period for this country’s reputation and we are doing absolutely everything that we can to make sure that our reputation is preserved.
Karen Bradley (Staffordshire Moorlands) (Con)
Can the Minister tell the House what steps he is taking to ensure that the most up-to-date working practices are used by the UK Border Force to ensure that the supply of labour meets demand, particularly at peak times?
Damian Green
My hon. Friend hits on exactly the right point. The deployment of staff in a flexible and efficient way, particularly around Heathrow, makes all the difference. That is why we have now set up the central control room, which will enable us to see minute by minute where queues may be building up and where the mobile teams that we have set up in the past few months can best be deployed. In that way, we will get the best possible value out of our many hard-working members of staff.
Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)
London Luton airport is seeking to expand and make a greater contribution to south-east airports’ capacity. However, the airport operator, Luton borough council and the staff themselves have serious concerns about undercapacity at immigration control and long queues. Will the Minister give specific attention to Luton airport?
Damian Green
Absolutely. We all want better airport capacity in the south-east of England, and I am sure that Luton airport will play an important role in that. One of the jobs of the UK Border Force is to make sure that people get through all airports as fast as possible. I know that e-gates were introduced at Luton airport relatively early, so that we can get the benefits of the technology. We will continue to treat Luton airport very seriously.
Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend agree that having secure borders is always more important than having short queues?
Damian Green
I hope that my hon. Friend has been reassured by my repeated assurance that absolutely the first priority of this Government and any responsible Government is the security of our border. That will not be compromised in any way.
Mr Denis MacShane (Rotherham) (Lab)
We want secure borders and decent queues. When we turn left on to a long haul plane, it is usually a nice experience. When we turn left at Heathrow terminal 5 or Gatwick, leaving the American, Canadian, Indian or Turkish passenger whom we have been chatting with, to struggle through those queues, it is a very unpleasant welcome.
I welcome what the Minister has said; it is a good idea to have squads who can run around filling in the holes. But every time I have come back to Britain recently—and I come back a lot—it is embarrassing that there are so many empty control points. I really hope that hon. Members—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. Hon. Members should be asking short questions, not making speeches. [Interruption.] Mr MacShane, you can throw yourself back on the Bench as much as you want, but it is not going to impress me. I brought you on early to get you in, and I am sorry that you are disgruntled.
Damian Green
The right hon. Gentleman cannot come back often enough for some of us in the House. I take his point, but the whole purpose of having flexible rostering and flexible use of staff is that when large numbers of people are arriving, more gates will be open. It is not rocket science; that is a sensible way to run an airport.
Kris Hopkins (Keighley) (Con)
The British public have not forgiven the previous Labour Government for their reckless open-door immigration policy, which reached the point where they could not put a number on how many people had come into the country. Will the Minister reassure us that we will give our officers as much time as they require to check who is legally allowed to enter the country?
Damian Green
Yes, and not only will we give them the time required, but we will allow them to use, on all occasions, the relevant technology. That was the problem before: when queues started building up, the technology was simply turned off. The investment made, in large part by the previous Government, in getting these electronic systems to make our border secure was not being allowed to do its job. We are determined not to repeat that mistake.
Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)
I know that the Minister travels with ordinary people on planes all the time, separated only by a thin curtain, but, in the light of his statement, will he condemn the remarks the Mayor of London made today that this crisis at Heathrow is damaging the reputation of the country?
Damian Green
I say to the hon. Gentleman that he is not up to date with the new era of Government austerity and that Ministers travel steerage class these days. The Mayor of London is, of course, concerned about the reputation of London and the ability of its airports to cope, and I look forward to working with him after he is re-elected triumphantly on Thursday.
Mrs Helen Grant (Maidstone and The Weald) (Con)
Does the Minister agree that queues at Heathrow are not the sole responsibility of the UK Border Agency?
Damian Green
My hon. Friend is quite right. When people talk about their experience, they will obviously measure it from the moment the plane touches the tarmac. Their view will depend on how long it takes to find a stand; how long the walk is to the immigration hall; and how long it takes to collect their baggage at the end of it. Immigration control and the actions of the UK Border Force are some of the things that people have to go through, but clearly people have other experiences between getting off the plane and getting out of the airport. We must all work together to ensure that that goes as smoothly and efficiently as possible.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
This may not be popular, but I am not sure that the Minister has any need to apologise for queues that result from genuine border security operations. However, will he give a commitment to update the House at the earliest available opportunity if subsequent investigations reveal that any of these delays were in part due to staff shortages or bad management decisions at UKBA?
Damian Green
I believe that the hon. Gentleman is a member of the Select Committee on Home Affairs—
Damian Green
Well, I will be appearing before the Committee in a couple of weeks’ time, so the hon. Gentleman will be able to ask me the question again then. Of course this will be a regular discussion to be had, because it is important, but I should remind him of what I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant): the UK Border Force has part of the responsibility for ensuring that airports run smoothly, just as airport operators and airlines do, and we all need to work together to make the experience of going through Britain’s airports as smooth and efficient as possible.
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
The hon. Member for Bradford South (Mr Sutcliffe) and I attended a briefing held by BAA, which led to our Select Committee writing to the Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport. I am pleased to say that he has responded and we have published the letter today, which suggests that greater co-operation is needed. Does the Minister agree that it is imperative that BAA takes its fair share of the responsibility to make sure that passengers get through the airport and that the UK Border Force and BAA do not drop the baton between them?
Damian Green
I am absolutely convinced that that is right. This is about not just BAA, but the airlines and Border Force. All of us need to work together, to share information and to share systems. As we do that, the experience will get better.
Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)
Despite the length of time that the Minister has been answering questions, I have still not heard him explain why there were 107 breaches of waiting times in the first 15 days of April, what caused them and what part staff cuts played in those delays.
Damian Green
I am sorry if the hon. Lady does not feel that she has been given enough information in the past 50 minutes or so, because I have tried to explain, repeatedly, that a range of things need to be improved at our airports to reduce these queues. To say that one reason accounts for all the delays that individual passengers may face is overly simplistic. That is not the way the world works and it is not the way airports work. What the Home Office, the Department for Transport, the airline operators and the airport operators agree is that a team effort is needed to make this better, and it is very important that we get it right.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
Under the previous Government, the morale of the UK Border Force was in freefall. Will my hon. Friend tell the House what steps are being taken to improve rostering and shift patterns to improve the morale at Border Force as well as to improve the experience of passengers at airports and ports?
Damian Green
We are changing the rostering arrangements to ensure that we have the people who are needed at the right time and at the right place. I am sure that the many hugely conscientious and hugely keen members of Border Force will recognise that having them in the right place at the right time will enable them to do their very important job more effectively than ever before.
Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)
Further to the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins), the Minister said that he intends to run Heathrow for seven weeks at 100% border capacity. What assurances will he give that regional airports and smaller London airports will not have staff taken away to bring about that goal?
Damian Green
As I have said—I am happy to repeat it—for the seven-week Olympic period, the UK Border Force will ensure that all immigration desks at Heathrow and key ports and airports in the south-east are staffed whenever necessary during peak arrival periods. I hope that will reassure him.
Conor Burns (Bournemouth West) (Con)
May I welcome the characteristic moderation and competence with which my hon. Friend has replied to this urgent question? Interruption.] His response has been much better than that of the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant). My hon. Friend will be aware that it is not an unreasonable expectation of returning British citizens or foreign visitors that we should be able to combine both speed and competence. My hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) asked about shift working and the like. Will the Minister tell the House whether he has had any conversations with the trade unions about their likely support for those measures and others that are necessary?
Damian Green
As I said, new rosters are coming in at Heathrow in the coming weeks, which have been agreed with the work force. That is a significant step forward, because it will mean that they can be there when they need to be there to do the most effective job. I can only repeat what I have said before: the vast majority of the workers in Border Force are extremely knowledgeable about their job and know how important it is. They want to do it as effectively as possible and it is the job of the management of Border Force to enable them to do that.
Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)
I happened to be in the immigration queue in Birmingham airport when the systems went down—the incident to which the Minister referred. I must thank members of the UK Border Force and staff at Birmingham airport who were on hand at the time to ensure that it was resolved as soon as possible. I noticed that there seemed to be a bit of confusion about what action should be taken when the systems go down. Will he reassure me that steps are in place so that, should that happen again, we will not have the kind of delays that could have happened?
Damian Green
One of the lessons we drew from the John Vine report was that there needed to be much clearer instructions about what to do in those very rare emergencies. That work is now advanced and is an extremely important part of the improvements that we will see.
Gavin Barwell (Croydon Central) (Con)
Given the combined challenge of securing the border, keeping unavoidable delays to a minimum and doing all that within a very constrained budget, does my hon. Friend agree that one of the things we most urgently need is a better working relationship between the UK Border Force and our airport operators?
Damian Green
Yes. We do work closely together, but we can always work more closely together. The Home Secretary, the senior management of Border Force and I are absolutely determined to set up systems that make it instinctive for Border Force, the airport operators and the airlines to work together, not only for the mutual benefit of all those organisations but, even more importantly, for the benefit of the hundreds of millions of passengers who use our airports every year.
Christopher Pincher (Tamworth) (Con)
Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and thanks to my fans for that unsolicited testimonial.
I should like to recapitulate a sentiment that has already been expressed, certainly by Government Members: having a few queues occasionally may dent Britain’s reputation, but security lapses do infinitely more damage to our reputation, and that is what our constituents are most concerned about.
Damian Green
That may be an appropriate thought on which to end this session, because it is absolutely correct that the first priority has to be the security of our borders; that is the first priority of this Government.
Points of Order
Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)
On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. The Prime Minister told the House earlier this afternoon that the Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport had, in answer to a question from my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann), published all the correspondence between the Government and News Corp relating to its bid for BSkyB, yet the answer makes it clear that that is not the case. It says:
“Records of meetings, telephone calls held between officials and press officers with outside parties and records of telephone calls and email exchanges between officials and Ministers and outside parties are not recorded centrally and would incur a disproportionate cost to collect.”
The answer concludes:
“A search for correspondence from officials, press officers and special advisers to and from all the individuals listed would incur disproportionate cost to collect.”—[Official Report, 7 September 2011; Vol. 532, c. 616W.]
Will you consider the matter, Mr Deputy Speaker, and see whether there is any way in which the Prime Minister can be brought here to correct the record, so that the House has accurate information on what actually occurred?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
The point has been made and is certainly on the record. If the hon. Lady is unhappy, perhaps it would be an idea for her to write to the Speaker with her views.
Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham, Ladywood) (Lab)
On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. Last Friday, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills announced the Government’s plans for student number controls to be applied to higher education institutions for the academic year 2013-14. The announcement was made in a press release on the Department’s website. This is the second time that the Government have not brought an announcement on student number controls to the House first. In addition, the Department has not yet provided a response to the consultation on student number controls following the publication of the White Paper last summer. Will you advise me, Mr Deputy Speaker, on how we can ensure that such important decisions, which have far-reaching consequences for higher education institutions and students alike, are made in the House first, and subject to full parliamentary scrutiny?
Mr Deputy Speaker
Mr Speaker has a strong view and opinion on the subject. He believes that this House should hear announcements through oral or written statements. Of course, the point is now on the record.
Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)
On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. In the Prime Minister’s statement earlier today, he refused—not for the first time—to answer a question from my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr Skinner) on account of his age. That sort of discrimination would not be accepted against black or female Members, so I have no idea why this House has tolerated, on numerous occasions, Members at the Dispatch Box refusing to answer my hon. Friend’s questions. Will you—or, indeed, Mr Speaker—say what action can be taken? I ask not on behalf of my hon. Friend, who can stick up for himself, but on behalf of every person in my constituency who gets discriminated against because of their age, and sees the Prime Minister do exactly that. This House should be above that. What action can be taken to make sure that today is the last time we have to see this disgusting spectacle?
Mr Deputy Speaker
There is no place in this Chamber for racism, ageism, gender discrimination—I could go on. That is about respect to all Members. The point has quite rightly been put on the record; I hope that people will take on board what I have said, and what the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Toby Perkins) has stated. Dennis Skinner is a long-serving Member of this House, and like all other Members, he should be treated with respect.
Mr Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)
On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. I wonder whether you or the Speaker have received a request from the Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General to make a statement on a report, published today by the National Children’s Bureau, that suggests that 25% of the children’s charities that took part in the research could close as a direct result of Government funding cuts, despite the importance of such charities in helping some of the most vulnerable in the country. Will that not be just one more reason for the country to think that the Prime Minister and the Chancellor are out of touch with reality and the rest of us?
Mr Deputy Speaker
As you know, that is not a point of order for the Chair, but the point is now on the record; anybody who wished to hear it has either heard it, or can read it in Hansard.
Sittings of the House (1 May)
(12 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Secretary, Office of the Leader of the House of Commons (Mr David Heath)
I beg to move,
That at the sitting on Tuesday 1 May—
(1) the House shall sit at 1.30 pm;
(2) there shall be no sitting in Westminster Hall; and
(3) the Speaker shall not adjourn the House, if a Message from the Lords Commissioners is expected, until that Message has been received.
All good things must eventually come to an end, and this extraordinarily productive Session of Parliament is no exception to the rule. The motion before us is quite usual in the run-up to Prorogation to facilitate the meeting of the House as it comes to the end of the Session. The first part of the motion sets out the time that the House shall sit tomorrow. Of course the House would normally sit at 2.30 pm on a Tuesday, but it is quite usual when the House is meeting to prorogue that it meets earlier than usual. Perhaps the proposed time is slightly later than would be normal in these circumstances. The reason for that is that the other place is debating the Joint Committee report on House of Lords reform on Tuesday morning and, as Parliament prorogues as a whole, the proposed time at which we are sitting reflects the negotiations in the other place to conclude the debate on the subject which began there today.
It is also in accordance with the past practice of arrangements for Prorogation to cancel the sitting in Westminster Hall, and paragraph (2) of the motion achieves that aim. It is unfortunate for Members who were successful in the ballots that their debates will not take place. Also, it is quite usual at the end of the Session that some scheduled business has to fall, once the House sets the time for Prorogation. I hope those hon. Members will be successful in securing debates early in the next Session.
By the time of Prorogation, we will have sat for a total of 290 days in this Session.
Mr Heath
As the hon. Gentleman says, as always from a sedentary position, it is the longest ever. This stems from the move to spring-to-spring Sessions, which moves the start of the Session to the spring from the autumn. It is the longest Session that I can remember, and it is right that we now bring it to an end with the final piece of legislation in the Government’s planned programme.
The business managers have aimed to balance the needs of the House this Session, providing adequate time for scrutiny of legislation, including the provision of multiple days on Report for nine Bills. Members should also be aware that 18 Public Bill Committees finished their work early. As well as introducing 40 Bills implementing a wide range of coalition policy, we provided 58 days for the Backbench Business Committee, with more than 40 of those enabling debate on the Floor of the House. I know that Members around the House will welcome this inclusion in the balance of time available to the House. I look forward to the outcome of the Procedure Committee report on the work of the Backbench Business Committee, as the House continues to improve it in the future. In addition, extra time was provided both for private Members’ Bills and for Opposition time, in recognition of the unusual length of the Session. I commend the motion to the House.
Question put and agreed to.
Sunday Trading (London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games) Bill [Lords] (Allocation of Time)
17:40 - The House divided: - Ayes: 281 / Noes: 112 - Question accordingly agreed to.
The Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Mr Mark Prisk)
I beg to move,
That the following provisions shall apply to the proceedings on the Sunday Trading (London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games) Bill [Lords]:
Timetable
1. (1) Proceedings on Second Reading, in Committee, on Consideration and on Third Reading shall be completed at today’s sitting.
(2) Proceedings on Second Reading, in Committee, on Consideration and on Third Reading shall so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at the moment of interruption.
Timing of proceedings and Questions to be put
2. When the Bill has been read a second time—
(a) notwithstanding Standing Order No. 63 (Committal of bills not subject to a programme order) it shall stand committed to a Committee of the whole House without any Question being put;
(b) the Speaker shall leave the Chair whether or not notice of an Instruction has been given.
3. (1) On the conclusion of proceedings in Committee, the Chair shall report the Bill to the House without putting any Question.
(2) If the Bill is reported with amendments, the House shall proceed to consider the Bill as amended without any Question being put.
4. For the purpose of bringing any proceedings to a conclusion in accordance with paragraph 1, the Speaker or Chair shall forthwith put the following Questions (but no others) in the same order as they would fall to be put if this Order did not apply—
(a) any Question already proposed from the Chair;
(b) any Question necessary to bring to a decision a Question so proposed;
(c) the Question on any amendment moved or Motion made by a Minister of the Crown;
(d) any other Question necessary for the disposal of the business to be concluded.
5. On a Motion so made for a new Clause or a new Schedule, the Chair or Speaker shall put only the Question that the Clause or Schedule be added to the Bill.
6. If two or more Questions would fall to be put under paragraph 4(c) on successive amendments moved or Motions made by a Minister of the Crown, the Chair or Speaker shall instead put a single Question in relation to those amendments or Motions.
7. If two or more Questions would fall to be put under paragraph 4(d) in relation to successive provisions of the Bill, the Chair shall instead put a single Question in relation to those provisions, except that the Question shall be put separately on any Clause of or Schedule to the Bill which a Minister of the Crown has signified an intention to leave out.
Subsequent stages
8. (1) Any Message from the Lords on the Bill shall be considered forthwith without any Question being put.
(2) Proceedings on any Message from the Lords shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion one hour after their commencement.
9. (1) This paragraph applies for the purpose of bringing any proceedings to a conclusion in accordance with paragraph 8.
(2) The Speaker shall first put forthwith any Question which has been proposed from the Chair.
(3) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown which is related to the Question already proposed from the Chair.
(4) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown on or relevant to any of the remaining items in the Lords Message.
(5) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question that this House agrees with the Lords in all of the remaining Lords Proposals.
Reasons Committee
10. (1) The Speaker shall put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown for the appointment, nomination and quorum of a Committee to draw up Reasons and the appointment of its Chair.
(2) A Committee appointed to draw up Reasons shall report before the conclusion of the sitting at which it is appointed.
(3) Proceedings in the Committee shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion 30 minutes after their commencement.
(4) For the purpose of bringing any proceedings to a conclusion in accordance with sub-paragraph (3), the Chair shall—
(a) first put forthwith any Question which has been proposed from the Chair, and
(b) then put forthwith successively Questions on Motions which may be made by a Minister of the Crown for assigning a Reason for disagreeing with the Lords in any of their Amendments.
(5) The proceedings of the Committee shall be reported without any further Question being put.
Miscellaneous
11. Standing Order No. 15(1) (Exempted business) shall apply so far as necessary for the purposes of this Order.
12. (1) The proceedings on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown for varying or supplementing the provisions of this Order shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion one hour after their commencement.
(2) Standing Order No. 15(1) (Exempted business) shall apply to those proceedings.
13. Standing Order No. 82 (Business Committee) shall not apply in relation to any proceedings to which this Order applies.
14. (1) No Motion shall be made, except by a Minister of the Crown, to alter the order in which any proceedings on the Bill are taken or to re-commit the Bill.
(2) The Question on any such Motion shall be put forthwith.
15. (1) No dilatory Motion shall be made in relation to proceedings to which this Order applies except by a Minister of the Crown.
(2) The Question on any such Motion shall be put forthwith.
16. The Speaker may not arrange for a debate to be held in accordance with Standing Order No. 24 (Emergency debates) at today’s sitting before the conclusion of any proceedings to which this Order applies.
17. (1) Sub-paragraph (2) applies if the House is adjourned, or the sitting is suspended, before the conclusion of any proceedings to which this Order applies.
(2) No notice shall be required of a Motion made at the next sitting by a Minister of the Crown for varying or supplementing the provisions of this Order.
18. Proceedings to which this Order applies may not be interrupted under any Standing Order relating to the sittings of the House.
19. (1) Any private business which has been set down for consideration at 7.00 pm, 4.00 pm or 3.00 pm (as the case may be) on a day on which the Bill has been set down to be taken as an Order of the Day shall, instead of being considered as provided by Standing Orders, be considered at the conclusion of the proceedings on the Bill on that day.
(2) Standing Order No. 15(1) (Exempted business) shall apply to the private business for a period of three hours from the conclusion of the proceedings on the Bill or, if those proceedings are concluded before the moment of interruption, for a period equal to the time elapsing between 7.00 pm, 4.00 pm or 3.00 pm (as the case may be) and the conclusion of those proceedings.
The motion applies to the proceedings on the Sunday Trading (London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games) Bill. I shall not detain the House unduly as I am aware that a number of Members will wish to speak on Second Reading. The motion seeks the approval of the House to consider all stages of this short but important Bill in a single day.
By way of background, briefly, the Bill will suspend the current restrictions that govern when some large shops may open on Sundays for the duration of the London 2012 games period. Currently, the Sunday Trading Act 1994 limits the opening times on Sundays of certain shops with the relevant floor area of more than 3,000 square feet. In particular, the Act restricts them to opening on a Sunday for a maximum six-hour period between the hours of 10 am and 6 pm. The Bill will temporarily ease those restrictions, allowing for a suspension that will be in effect between Sunday 22 July and Sunday 9 September this year. I should point out the inclusion of a sunset clause, which means that the Bill will cease to have effect after that date.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
Will my hon. Friend reassure a significant number of Harlow residents who have written to me that the Bill is just a temporary Bill for the Olympics, and that there are no plans to extend Sunday trading per se?
Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)
Everyone in this country has known for many years that we would be hosting the Olympics and Paralympics, so why has the Minister come forward with this Bill at the very last minute?
Mr Prisk
As usual, the hon. Lady is entirely prescient, because that is exactly what I was about to explain. The permanent relaxation of the Sunday trading laws was considered and rejected as part of the Government’s red tape challenge in June last year. A private Member’s Bill subsequently brought forward by my hon. Friend the Member for Fylde (Mark Menzies) proposed the suspension of the rules for the period of the games, albeit in a different form from the one being proposed today. Although his proposal was subsequently withdrawn, it focused our thinking on the issue and we came to the conclusion that we should provide for a temporary suspension of the rules, hence the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s announcement in the Budget.
To take full advantage of the suspension, businesses will need to prepare well ahead. They will need to agree trading hours and working hours with staff and ensure that customers know about their extended hours. More importantly, we believe that we need to ensure that shop workers have time to choose whether to work on those eight Sundays.
Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)
I am grateful to the Minister, who is being generous in giving way. Does the fact that he, as a Treasury Minister, is moving this allocation of time motion—[Interruption.] I am sorry. As a Business, Innovation and Skills Minister, can he confirm whether the pressure for this change came from the Treasury and not from BIS, because BIS is more concerned about the effect on smaller shops than the Treasury seems to be?
Mr Prisk
The hon. Lady’s question might have worked better if she had my correct job title. The point is that this is the policy of the Government, devised by the Government and supported by the Government, and we believe that it will add considerably to the opportunities that the Olympics present.
Using the fast-track legislative process will give businesses and shop workers the necessary time to make their own arrangements for the period of the Olympics and Paralympics. In deciding to use the fast-track procedure, we have consulted those directly affected and Members of both Houses. Indeed, consultations have been held with, among others, representatives from the Association of Convenience Stores, the Federation of Small Businesses, the National Federation of Retail Newsagents, the CBI, leading supermarkets and the unions, including USDAW and Unite. Indeed, Ministers have consulted senior religious representatives, the official Opposition and Members of this House. We are grateful to everyone for engaging in this process in what has been a very positive fashion, regardless of their views on the wider issue of trading or working on a Sunday.
Mr David Anderson (Blaydon) (Lab)
Is not the truth that the Minister had a consultation and then, as is normal for the Government, ignored the views of people, because most of the people he has just mentioned were actually against this happening? If he had listened to the views expressed in the consultation, we would not be debating this tonight.
Mr Prisk
Again, I do not want to stretch your patience too far, Mr Deputy Speaker, but the fact that the Bill was amended during its passage in the other House after we listened to those representations and on the very question of the notice procedure demonstrates that the hon. Gentleman is wrong on that point.
Graham Stringer (Blackley and Broughton) (Lab)
My point is about the speed and programming of the Bill. The hon. Gentleman will be aware that Sunday trading is one of the most controversial items in this House. I think that I am right in saying that it was the only item on which Margaret Thatcher was defeated when she was Prime Minister. Does he agree that that makes the Bill completely inappropriate for fast-tracking at the last minute and that this is a sneaky way of dealing with a very difficult issue?
Mr Prisk
I do not accept that at all. This measure does not do anything beyond eight Sundays and the Act will leave the statute book on 10 September, so the idea that it is some kind of Trojan horse is a false argument. As a practising Christian, I understand the concerns, and we have done our level best to ensure that we listen carefully to Members of both Houses.
To conclude, we believe that the Bill strikes the right balance between addressing legitimate concerns and ensuring that retailers have the flexibility to take full advantage of the tremendous commercial opportunities presented by the games. As such, I commend the motion to the House.
Mr Chuka Umunna (Streatham) (Lab)
I do not wish to speak for long on the programme motion, because I do not intend to extend the discussion beyond what is necessary, having already indicated our agreement to use the fast-track procedure. I shall explain more about that on Second Reading. I have a number of substantive points in relation to the Bill, but again the proper time for me to raise them is on Second Reading. I have a number of things to say about the handling of this matter, which has necessitated the use of the fast-track procedure, but again I shall mention those later.
In relation to the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer) made, I am happy to confirm that, with an awareness of the sensitivities of this matter, Her Majesty’s official Opposition are going to treat this as a free vote for all concerned on our Benches.
Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)
I was not going to make a speech, but the Minister refused to give way, and that forces me to stand at this point.
I shall make two brief points on the programme motion, which is what we are discussing. First, it is interesting that the Minister is proposing to allow shops to open for as long as they like, but allowing us to discuss this matter only until 10 pm this evening.
Secondly, the Minister mentioned all the people whom he had consulted on the matter. I do not think that any of us were surprised that he ignored the work force in shops or some religious organisations, but I was quite surprised that he ignored the chief executive of Sainsbury’s, who said that the measure was unnecessary. What everyone is trying to get to the bottom of is: who is the driving force behind putting through this temporary legislation? Who is really behind it? Perhaps this evening we might discover the answer to that question. I have read the Lords debate and I am none the wiser.
Mr Tom Harris (Glasgow South) (Lab)
I shall address my comments specifically to the programme motion.
We have known about the Olympics since 6 July 2005. Today, at the fag end of a weary and exhausted parliamentary Session, we are being asked to go through every single stage of a Bill that, as the Minister rightly said, is short but important. It is important because of the effect that it will have on the lives of many thousands of workers and their families in London. For him to say from the Dispatch Box that he does not want to speak for too long but wants to allow the rest of us to have our say, when we have to stop talking about such a massively important Bill at 10 pm, is rather disingenuous. I have a lot of time for the Minister—he is a good Minister, for a Tory—but on this particular issue I do not think that he is being entirely fair.
Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)
Is the hon. Gentleman saying that if somebody has a good idea towards the end of a time scale, it should be ignored because it comes at an inconvenient moment? If somebody comes up with a good idea, albeit late in the day, surely it is right that the Government take notice, listen and do something about it. He should commend that, not criticise it.
Mr Harris
The hon. Gentleman has a strange idea of what is a new idea. This proposal was debated and defeated under the Thatcher Government, and as the Minister said, one of his own Back Benchers, the hon. Member for Fylde (Mark Menzies), brought forward proposals on it last year. This is not a new proposal; it has been on the take-off ground for a long time.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. We are in danger of opening up the debate. We are just dealing with the allocation of time. I am bothered that the intervention was sidetracking you, Mr Harris.
Mr Harris
I am grateful for your instruction, Mr Deputy Speaker.
I also question the fact that this debate is taking place on, essentially, the last day of the Session, given that the issue has always been subject to a one-line Whip and is a matter of conscience. So the Government knew that a great many Members would not be in the Chamber, but would be out campaigning in the local elections. That shows a degree of cynicism that, even for this Government, is quite outrageous.
The Government knew that many people who are opposed to this measure on principle would not be here. That is a question for their business managers. In my notes, I have put an asterisk after the term “business managers”, because when it comes to this Government, that is a very generous term. We have had very many days during this Parliament when the Whips have been frantically running around looking for stuff to vote on and not being able to find it, and we have all been sent home early. Day after day, there has not been a vote, and suddenly an issue of importance comes before us on the last day of the Session and we are all expected to come down to London to vote on it. That is a disgrace.
Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)
I, too, oppose the timetable motion. During my years in Parliament, the House has not passed legislation as quickly as this unless there really was an emergency and it was crucial to get it through in a very short time by taking it all on one day. I genuinely think that the Government have messed up on this. The Bill could have come at any time during the past year, or even earlier, particularly once the Back-Bench Bill had been introduced, and there is no need to rush it through like this, leaving aside the principle of the issue, about which I have very strong feelings. As those of us who were around in 1994 remember, it has been an incredibly contentious issue about which people feel very strongly and on which Labour Members have always had a free vote.
I am very concerned that pushing the Bill through in this way is yet another example of the increasing tendency to say, “If it is about the Olympics and the Paralympics, anything can be changed or moved.” I think that the Olympics and the Paralympics are incredibly important to this country and that they will be a huge success, but people could be cynical about the fact that they increasingly seem to be used as excuses for all sorts of things to be done, changed and made different—including those who suddenly discovered at the weekend that they might have missiles of some kind on top of their houses.
We have to be very careful, as a Parliament, that we consider legislation within a time scale that treats it with the seriousness that it deserves. The Bill does not need to be rushed through in this way, and it should not be. I hope that many hon. Government Members—I presume that they have a free vote as well; if not, they should—will join us in opposing the Bill, or at least its timetabling.
Hugh Bayley (York Central) (Lab)
I cast my mind back to 1994, when the House passed the current Sunday trading legislation, which has passed the test of time. A good compromise was struck in that legislation—particularly in giving some Sunday lifeblood to small high street traders by preventing the bigger shops, particularly the out-of-town shops, from taking business away from them—but it was achieved only after hours and hours of debate. The Government are making a big mistake in using a procedure that was intended to deal with a national emergency such as a terrorist attack to take through a piece of legislation that it would be very easy to get wrong. Indeed, by rushing it through in a single sitting of the House, there is a danger that the Government will get it wrong.
Like my hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall (Kate Hoey), I believe that the Olympic games are extremely important, but they are a festival of sport, not a festival of shopping. The Government should think again and bring back a proposal when we have more time to debate it after the Queen’s Speech.
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
My hon. Friend the Minister knows that I have concerns about the Bill, and I wish that more time had been set aside so that amendments about geography could have been debated rather than being perceived as wrecking amendments.
Kevin Brennan
The hon. Lady says that she has concerns. Has she a free vote on the matter?
Dr Coffey
As the hon. Gentleman knows, every vote in the House is a free vote.
I stress to my hon. Friends on the Front Bench that the amendments that some of us thought about tabling would have tried to be helpful. As was mentioned earlier, we are considering a festival of sport—one of the greatest things that will ever happen in our country. The route from Stratford or Pudding Mill takes people through a shopping centre, and it would be odd if they could not buy something on their way home, but I am not sure what excuse there is for some of the shopping centres further afield to be open.
I understand that the matter is important for the Government and I did not table any amendments because I did not want to be perceived as trying to wreck the Bill, but I hope that any other debate on Sunday trading hours will be given time for hon. Members to discuss the subject properly.
Question put.
Sunday Trading (London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games) Bill [Lords]
22:00 - The House divided: - Ayes: 273 / Noes: 131 - Question accordingly agreed to.
22:15 - The House divided: - Ayes: 272 / Noes: 125 - Question accordingly agreed to.
The Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills (Vince Cable)
I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
I will start by setting out the context of the Bill. The opportunity to host the 2012 London Olympic and Paralympic games is a unique, once-in-a-lifetime national event, and we have to make the most of the opportunities that hosting them will bring. The games will attract significant numbers of visitors from around the world to the UK, and consequently the economic benefits to the UK are expected to be considerable. By way of contrast, the Australian 2000 games attracted 1.6 million additional visitors, and Beijing 4.4 million. We have had an independent estimate that about 6 million additional visits will be made to the UK as a consequence of the games.
The UK retail sector stands to be one of the prime beneficiaries of the additional demand, and the Bill will give retailers the flexibility to capitalise on the commercial opportunities presented by the games.
Vince Cable
I will happily give way, but may I first finish my introduction? Hon. Members know that I am always generous with interventions. I will take the hon. Gentleman’s in a few seconds.
The Government recognise that plans to relax temporarily the restrictions on Sunday trading between 22 July and 9 September—eight Sundays—have caused concern, but before I address those concerns, I will briefly outline the benefits that we believe relaxing the rules will deliver.
David Wright
I know that the Secretary of State is trying to outline the broad principles of the Bill, but I would like to ask him a simple question. Telford is 150 miles away from where the Olympics will be held. Why should shop workers in Telford have to work longer during the Olympics on Sundays, when they want to be at home with their families watching the games?
Vince Cable
They will not have to. We are discussing how individual workers can opt out, should they wish to do so or have a conscience, and to make that as easy as possible for them. As I will say later, though, there will be many opportunities across the UK, not just in London, for people to enjoy the benefits of the games.
Mark Field (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con)
I have some sympathy with the point made by the hon. Member for Telford (David Wright), but will the Secretary of State explain the difficulties there would have been with introducing a hybrid Bill, making exceptions for particular parts of London and other areas where the Olympics will be held? In comparison, this Bill will provide for a temporary measure that could apply to the whole of the UK but which, obviously, is unlikely to be utilised in areas outside where the Olympics will take place.
Vince Cable
Undoubtedly, there are practical difficulties in defining geographical boundaries, but actually that is not the real reason. The reason is that we believe that the whole of the UK will benefit, and we want the potential benefits of flexibility in the retail sector to apply.
Mr Andrew Smith (Oxford East) (Lab)
In the light of that answer, what sort of assurance can the Secretary of State give the House that the Bill, or the experience of deregulated trading during the Olympics, will not be used as a Trojan horse to introduce wider deregulation measures? Will he promise the House that that will not happen?
Vince Cable
The Trojan horse was invoked several times in the earlier debate, but I can give the right hon. Gentleman an absolute assurance that this is not a precedent. I shall dwell later on how we will reinforce that absolute commitment.
Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)
I am extremely grateful to the Secretary of State for giving way. He is being extremely generous very early on in his remarks. Will he give me some reassurance? What protection will be in place for, say, volunteer sports coaches or church workers with commitments on Sundays, if their volunteer commitments are threatened by having to work extra hours?
Vince Cable
Of course, they could opt out of the commitments, as is already provided for under existing legislation, which means that they will receive all the protections subject to unfair dismissal legislation.
Dame Joan Ruddock (Lewisham, Deptford) (Lab)
The Secretary of State will have had discussions with the major shopping chains throughout the UK. Have they indicated to him that they would wish to use this provision for all their stores throughout the UK, rather than just in London?
Vince Cable
The different companies will avail themselves of the Bill to varying degrees and in various parts of the country. The whole purpose is not to provide a blanket provision; it is to provide flexibility, both in time and in different parts of the country.
Sir Roger Gale (North Thanet) (Con)
I am sure that my right hon. Friend knows that I have been opposed to Sunday trading since day one. I voted against it under Margaret Thatcher, and I am still opposed to it. Will he give the House an absolute assurance that under this Government—he cannot bind a future Government—the Bill will not be used to introduce a more permanent arrangement thereafter?
Vince Cable
Yes; I have already given that assurance to the right hon. Member for Oxford East (Mr Smith), and I can repeat it to the hon. Gentleman. That is absolutely not the intention of the Government. I do not think I need to repeat it again, but I am happy to do so—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. The Secretary of State is trying to answer one intervention and there are about 10 people on their feet. I understand that people want to intervene on him, but they should give him a little time to get through his answers.
Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)
I am grateful to the Secretary of State for giving way, and I have a lot of sympathy with the comments that the hon. Member for Telford (David Wright) made. Some moments ago, the Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Hertford and Stortford (Mr Prisk) gave a commitment that the legislation would not go beyond September. However, that commitment appeared to be a personal commitment, albeit well meant. Ministers come and go, and I am sure that my hon. Friend is likely to be promoted upwards from Minister of State. Indeed, even Secretaries of State come and go. I wonder whether the Secretary of State will put it on the record that it is the commitment of the Government not to go beyond 10 September, and not the personal commitment of Ministers.
Vince Cable
I can repeat what I have already said. This is not just a personal commitment by the Minister of State or me; it is a Government commitment. There is a sunset clause in the Bill, which can be debated in detail as we make progress through the rest of the day.
Vince Cable
I will take further interventions later if hon. Members still have unanswered questions.
Let me say a little about the benefits. It is difficult to quantify them in a very precise way, but the Centre for Retail Research has estimated that an additional benefit to the UK economy of something in the order of £190 million will be generated by the games. Using old Department of Trade and Industry methodology, we estimate that the effects of today’s change will generate something in the order of £175 million, although we recognise that these figures are extremely imprecise.
As I have mentioned, the flexibility provided by the Bill will boost sales for retailers. Longer opening hours will be an effective showcase for British retailers, allowing visitors to sample the outstanding shopping we offer at a time that suits them. For shop workers, the Bill will create a welcome opportunity—for those who wish to take it—to earn extra money by doing more shifts, while at the same time protecting the right to opt out from Sunday working for those who wish to do so. In addition, it is likely that the suspension of Sunday trading restrictions will increase the opportunities for temporary employment. For consumers, the Bill will allow flexibility over when to go shopping, enabling individuals to combine it with attending Olympic events or watching the coverage on television as they wish. The Bill applies across the country, as was raised in an earlier intervention. The games are a national event, not just a London event. We want families, whether they live in the east of London or the east of England, to have the freedom to plan their weekends so that they can participate in the 1,000 events that will happen right across the country.
Luciana Berger
The Secretary of State has been kind in allowing interventions. He has said twice in his opening remarks that workers will have the opportunity to opt out. However, the date by which they would have to do so is 22 May, which is just over three weeks away. Does he acknowledge that that leaves people very little time?
Vince Cable
We are reducing the period to two months, in order to give everybody the opportunity to opt out before the games period begins, and we are talking to employers about how to ensure that they communicate to their work force the fact that that opportunity is available to them.
Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)
I very much support the Government with this Bill. However, if the Secretary of State believes it is right for shoppers and workers to have the right to shop and work any time they wish on a Sunday during the Olympic games, can he explain why he does not think the same people should have exactly the same rights to shop and work when they choose outside the time scale of the Olympic games? I do not understand why there is this great distinction.
Vince Cable
All the interventions so far have made a clear distinction between a temporary exception and a permanent change. I know that the hon. Gentleman feels strongly about the need for a permanent liberalisation, and there may be others in the House who do so too, but they will have to make that case separately, should an opportunity arise. This Bill does not reflect on the argument for a permanent change.
Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)
I share the concerns expressed about the way in which the work force will be treated, but I want to turn the Secretary of State’s attention to the economic argument. I have received representations from those running small convenience stores in my constituency who have told me that the extra hours will simply mean the larger stores—the main supermarkets—hoovering up any extra business, thereby damaging the smaller stores’ marginal profits in that period. Has the Secretary of State taken that into account in his economic assessment of the benefits of the Bill?
Vince Cable
Yes, we have indeed taken into account the Association of Convenience Stores, which has submitted some impressive evidence. The point that we have made back is that it is not simply a question of switching demand from one type of shop to another; rather, there will be substantial additional shopping and other activity. We believe that there will be net benefits, although they are very difficult to quantify.
Yasmin Qureshi
But 60,000 shopkeepers are saying that they will suffer as a result of the extension for larger stores, which will hoover up the rest of the market, as has been suggested. Is the Secretary of State really saying that those 60,000 shopkeepers are wrong?
Vince Cable
I think those 60,000 shopkeepers—that is indeed the number—are probably being too pessimistic. As I have said, there will be two effects. One will be an increase in demand, with more visitors and more shopping opportunities. At the same time, there will be some degree of switching. Looked at as a whole, the change will have considerable benefits for the British retail sector.
Mr Tom Harris (Glasgow South) (Lab)
An hon. Member no longer in his place made a valid point, even though I come at this from a completely opposite direction. The Secretary of State is responsible for business and enterprise in this country. He has said that there will be a huge economic benefit from the Bill even outside London during the Olympics and Paralympics. If he is correct and we see however many hundreds of millions of pounds-worth of economic growth outside London, is he saying that, as someone who is responsible for the economic growth of the country, he will be willing and able to resist the inevitable pressure to extend the measure, irrespective of when the Olympics takes place? Will he be able to resist all those pressures, especially in the current period of austerity?
Vince Cable
We will return in more detail to the areas outside London, but the Centre for Retail Research, to which I have referred, estimated that something in the order of 40% of the additional retail spending would take place outside London and the south-east.
Let me address the concerns that have been expressed. The Government are aware that the temporary suspension of Sunday trading is causing anxiety for some groups of people. Let me try to address those concerns. First, there is the suspicion, which we have already had aired, that the Bill is a Trojan horse preparing the way for a permanent relaxation of the rules. It is not: the Bill sets out clear time limits and contains a sunset clause. It is worth noting that Germany, which—for people who worry about these things—has notoriously tight restrictions on Sunday trading, eased its restrictions during the football World cup and then re-imposed them. They have remained in place subsequently. Any move towards the abolition of the UK’s Sunday trading laws would require new legislation, a full consultation and extensive parliamentary scrutiny. Let me repeat, therefore, that the Bill is not a signal of the Government’s intent on the broader issue of Sunday trading; rather, it is motivated by a desire to capitalise on the unprecedented benefits that accrue from the privilege of hosting the Olympics.
Frank Dobson (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
Have the Government given any consideration to the impact of this proposal on drunkenness, in view of the fact that one of the major contributions of the big stores is to sell booze at less than cost price? Is it not likely that, given the celebratory atmosphere, they will do so even more? I am a strong supporter of the Olympics and the Paralympics, but I am fearful that in many town centres this proposal will be more about people getting paralytic than about the Paralympics.
Vince Cable
That was a good pun, but the right hon. Gentleman will know that the licensing of alcohol is governed by separate provisions overseen by local authorities, so the Bill will not have the negative effect that he describes.
Mrs Madeleine Moon (Bridgend) (Lab)
The Secretary of State has talked a great deal about capitalising on the Olympics and showcasing the UK. Surely we ought also to be showcasing the tourist opportunities in our countryside and coastal resorts, where we do not, on the whole, find the large shops whose opening hours he is talking about liberalising. Is the Bill not going to draw people away from other trading and employment opportunities in the countryside and in our tourist resorts on the coast?
Vince Cable
I am just as great a fan of Welsh tourism as the hon. Lady, but as she says, large shops do not exist in many of the coastal areas of Wales, and they will therefore not be competing with the small shops either.
Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)
I do not want the Secretary of State to move on before we have dealt with his substantive point. He said that any future Sunday trading legislation in this Parliament would be subject to consultation. Will he now rule out any further legislation in this Parliament relating to Sunday trading?
Vince Cable
Of course I cannot commit Her Majesty the Queen or the processes of the House in deciding on its business. I can say absolutely unequivocally that it is not the intention of the Government to proceed to permanent liberalisation.
Stephen Pound (Ealing North) (Lab)
It might come as a shock to the Secretary of State and to the House to learn that this will be my second London Olympics, although I was swaying in a bassinet in Queen Charlotte’s hospital in 1948. If the Secretary of State will not accept that the Bill represents a win, win for Westfield and the end of the line for the convenience stores, will he tell us what the great body of consumers will be so desperate to purchase during the Olympics that they cannot purchase at the moment? What evidence does he have of a vast pent-up longing to go out and buy goods in east London that is not being met at the moment?
Vince Cable
The evidence for the pent-up demand comes from the additional number of visitors; it is as simple as that. We need to ensure that the retail sector can be as flexible as possible.
Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)
The Secretary of State has gone to great pains to state that this will be a temporary position, and that it is not part of a longer-term Government strategy. I have sympathy for him as someone who has been the victim of briefings from the Treasury, but does he acknowledge that there would be less concern about the measure if the Treasury had not briefed that this would provide an opportunity to determine whether there was demand for further liberalisation in the future?
Vince Cable
I am not aware of any such separate briefing from the Treasury. I am working alongside my colleagues on this; it is a Government initiative, not one from any particular Government Department.
Let me turn from the Trojan horse issue to the very genuine religious concerns that have been expressed. The Government are sensitive to the fact that, for many people, Sunday has particular religious significance as a day that is set aside for worship. We have therefore consulted the Churches in advance of the Bill—the Church of England, the Roman Catholic Church and the Church in Wales; Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own separate arrangements—in order to emphasise the temporary nature of the changes. I should add that the Lords Spiritual in the other place did not oppose the measure when they were reassured that this would be a one-off change.
Mr Chuka Umunna (Streatham) (Lab)
Given what the Secretary of State has just said about the religious sensitivities surrounding the issue, why will there not be a free vote on the matter for Government Members?
Vince Cable
I will endeavour, through my eloquence, to persuade my hon. Friends to vote for the Bill on its merits, and I am sure that they all will. This is an important piece of Government legislation designed to ensure that the games are a success.
I want to move on to the issue of workers’ rights. There is a worry that the temporary relaxation of the rules will water down the right of most shop workers to opt out of Sunday working. That is a unique employment protection that is not shared by the vast majority of the work force. It is also worth remembering that most workers in the retail sector do not come within the existing protections, and that many people choose to work on Sundays. That is their choice.
I want to stress that the Bill is not a charter for retailers to exploit their workers during the Olympics. Indeed, in response to concerns raised in the first instance by the Opposition, the Government tabled an amendment, which was accepted in another place, in order to ensure that the opportunity to exercise existing legal rights would not in any way be adversely affected should the Bill become law. The amendment reduces from three months to two months the notice period for some employees exercising their right to opt out of Sunday working. Shop workers for whom a one-month notice period already applies—which is the case in several leading chains—will be unaffected by the change.
Hugh Bayley (York Central) (Lab)
If the Bill is passed, the suspension period will run from 22 July to 9 September, covering the whole of the school holiday period. Shop workers, like other people, like to go on holiday with their children during the summer. Does the Secretary of State believe that retailers will allow their employees to take their holidays at that time, or might they put a block on them doing so during August if the legislation goes through? Has he consulted the trade unions on the holiday issue in particular?
Vince Cable
Perfectly normal contractual arrangements will apply in respect of holidays. We are speaking extensively to the main employers to ensure that they respect and support workers who wish to opt out, and protect their employment rights in the process.
Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)
Can the Secretary of State confirm whether an employer has the right to deny a valid application not to work?
Vince Cable
The existing rules and rights will apply; they will not be changed in any way.
Mr Umunna
Will the Secretary of State explain the practical effect of the change in the notice period for employees giving notice of their wish to opt out? For the benefit of those outside the Chamber, will he tell us how long the notice period would last if notice were given on, say, 10 May, and how long it would last if it were given on 10 July?
Vince Cable
I am trying to understand the logic of the hon. Gentleman’s question. As I understand it, if notice is given in good time within the two-month period, a worker will be covered for the whole of the period of the Olympic games. I would be happy to clarify that in writing if he wishes.
Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)
I am very supportive of many elements of the Bill, but one aspect that concerns me is the fact that the two-month notice period will mean that shop workers will have only 21 days before 22 May in which to give notice of their wish to opt out. What methods will my right hon. Friend use to ensure that shop workers understand that they must give that notice within the next three weeks?
Vince Cable
We are giving the message very strongly to employers that they should communicate that to their work force. There is now adequate time for workers to opt out of Sunday working, should they wish to do so. I want to make that absolutely clear; that is the purpose of the reduction of the notice period from three months to two months.
Mr David Anderson (Blaydon) (Lab)
Is the Secretary of State aware of the survey carried out among 20,000 members of the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers? It showed that 78% opposed extending opening hours during the Olympics, that 51% of staff already felt that they were being forced to work on Sundays when they did not want to, and that 73% said that the measures would add more pressure on them to work on Sundays in the future. That is what is happening in the real world. If the Secretary of State is serious about people being able to give notice of their wish to opt out, is it not incumbent on the Government to inform employees about that, rather than employers?
Vince Cable
I am not sure what is meant by saying that 73% of people believe this will affect future rights. These provisions are temporary and, as we have made clear, they do not extend beyond the period of the Olympic games. We have made it absolutely clear that existing rights are fully protected.
Vince Cable
I shall take one more intervention, but then I want to make some progress.
Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)
Does the Secretary of State recognise that the average retail worker in London is a woman who has a family? Does he also recognise that when we are on holiday in continental Europe and want to go shopping we often find the shopkeeper having a siesta? Why does he think that those visiting London are not able to shop between 11 am and 4 pm on a Sunday when they can shop for hours on six other days? Are these people so stupid that they cannot work out our current laws?
Vince Cable
I understand that, as I occasionally go on holidays across the channel. Several European countries are very pragmatic about how they deal with this. For example, the centres of major tourist areas are de-restricted in order to enable retailers to take full advantage of the provisions. Of course I am aware that most shop workers are women and have family responsibilities. That is why it is important that all workers, particularly women in this case, have the right to opt out.
Vince Cable
I shall move on now and take further interventions later.
The provision that I have described will ensure that, following Royal Assent, any shop worker who wishes to exercise the right to opt out so as to avoid the possibility of having to work on Sundays during the games will be able to acquire the right not to work on Sundays by the start of the suspension period. We have been working with employers—we are talking about 6,000 large stores—to help ensure that employees are aware of this right and of when they can use it. We know that many employers are talking to their staff about this Bill and how they can all take advantage of the benefits it offers in a way that suits all parties. In addition, the Government have given an undertaking to publish guidance for employers and employees outlining what the suspension means for them in respect of the right to opt out of Sunday working.
Vince Cable
I shall take the intervention from the Ulster Unionist Benches.
Jim Shannon
For the record, I am a Democratic Unionist, not an Ulster Unionist. In an earlier response, the Minister said that he was not sure what 73% of shop workers were after. What they were saying was that they were concerned about legislative change being made permanent for the future. The issue they were worried about was changing Sunday trading for ever.
Vince Cable
If that was the worry, we have dealt with it effectively, making it absolutely clear that this is a one-off, temporary and very specific change.
John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)
Let us be clear. Will employers be legally obliged to inform their workers of the new regulations?
Vince Cable
No, they are not legally obliged, but we are working with them to ensure that they do. I think most will welcome the commitment and loyalty of their work force, and they will take good measures to ensure that they are informed. There is no legal compulsion.
Joan Walley
For the sake of clarity, given that employers will not be required to set out the new arrangements, will the Secretary of State set out the rights of those who have already opted in to Sunday working, but who do not wish to work the extra hours that would be required as a result of the legislation?
Vince Cable
We have heard many negative interventions, expressing worry about the impact, but for most people, whether they be workers or consumers, the Bill provides wider opportunities. I am grateful to the hon. Lady for stressing an obvious, but much-neglected point in the debate.
Mike Gapes (Ilford South) (Lab/Co-op)
Will the Secretary of State tell us what legal advice he has had about what will happen if, in the period between now and the Olympics, someone decides to mount a legal challenge? Will that lead to a delay in implementation, or will it go ahead regardless?
Vince Cable
I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman is talking about a legal challenge to the Government, or a legal challenge to an individual employer. If the latter, there will no wider ramifications.
Vince Cable
Well, if the trade unions or others wish to make legal challenges, applying for a judicial review or through any other mechanisms, they are perfectly entitled to do so. We are not aware of any significant problem in that respect, but we will wait to see what happens.
Vince Cable
I have already allowed the right hon. Lady one intervention, so I hope she will not mind if I move on.
Let me return to the question of the wider impact on the rest of the UK. Some have argued that the provisions should apply only in London or only in those areas hosting Olympic and Paralympic events. We believe that that would be the wrong approach. We believe the games are for the whole country and not just for London, so the benefits should be shared as widely possible. As I said in response to an earlier intervention, research suggests that 40% of the benefit would accrue outside London and the south-east. That is why the Bill will apply to the whole of England and Wales. Scotland is already deregulated in respect of Sunday trading, and Northern Ireland has its own laws.
Vince Cable
I shall give way in a moment. If the hon. Lady waits patiently, I will take her intervention.
It would make no economic sense to relax the rules purely for London, which would merely extend the competitive advantage the capital enjoys in comparison with regional retail centres. Let us say we used the M25 to demarcate where the suspension would apply. It would mean that the Bluewater shopping centre, just outside the M25 could open late, whereas the Lakeside shopping centre just the other side of the Dartford crossing would be barred from extending its opening hours on a Sunday. [Interruption.] Moreover, tourism will not be confined to London.
Vince Cable
Let me finish this point. Then I will take hon. Members’ interventions, as I have done throughout the debate.
Tourism will not be confined to London. Sports events are taking place in a number of locations: football in Cardiff, Manchester, Newcastle and Coventry; sailing in Weymouth; mountain biking in Essex; rowing in Eton Dorney; Paralympic road cycling at Brands Hatch; and canoe slalom in Hertfordshire. In addition, big screens are being put up in towns and cities around the country to enable people to get together to watch the games. We want tourists and visitors right across the country to be free to take advantage of longer shop opening hours.
Ann Coffey
Like many others, Stockport town centre is struggling. Can the Secretary of State tell me what on earth the benefit will be to Stockport town centre to have the shops at Old Trafford open for extended hours on a Sunday, thus dragging shoppers out of Stockport. What is the economic benefit to Stockport there?
Vince Cable
There will be significant additional activity in the Manchester area. I cannot decide at this stage—and I am sure the hon. Lady cannot decide either—how the benefits will be distributed between north, south, east or west Manchester.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
What economic impact assessment tells the Secretary of State that all these visitors in London for the Olympics want to travel to Bluewater to shop on a Sunday? What does that say to the independent traders in my high street in south-east London who will be decimated if Bluewater can open for longer hours during that period?
Vince Cable
We have covered that already in our earlier discussion and I have provided figures on economic benefit. There is no question of traders in the hon. Gentleman’s area being decimated, but there is a genuine issue about how much shopping will be displaced from one type of retail outlet to another.
Mr Lammy
Why was it not considered appropriate to change our rules for the Commonwealth games in Manchester? When I was responsible for Liverpool as the city of culture, we did not think it important to change our rules for that city. Why are we reducing the Olympics to a culture of shopping, when it is supposed to be a celebration of sport and family life? How is this going to do justice to British culture; is it all about a shopping mall?
Vince Cable
I know that the right hon. Gentleman is, like me, a strong supporter of the Commonwealth, but I am sure he agrees that the Commonwealth games did not constitute an event on anything remotely like the same scale as the Olympics. However, it is possible that an opportunity was missed in Liverpool: perhaps we should have taken the same action then.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
The Secretary of State is being very generous in allowing Members to make their points. The headquarters of Nisa Today’s, a major supplier to convenience stores, is in my constituency. Research conducted by the Association of Convenience Stores shows that each convenience store will lose £1,500 a week as a result of the Bill. What has the Secretary of State to say to those small businesses, which are the backbone of the country?
Vince Cable
I am familiar with the research carried out by the Association of Convenience Stores, which has done a significant amount of work. I am sure the hon. Gentleman agrees that it is fair to say that its calculations were based on the most pessimistic assumptions. In other words, the ACS assumed that the bigger stores would take the maximum possible advantage of the opportunity, and that there would be the maximum possible switching of shopping from its stores to the supermarkets. I think we agree that, in the real world, we are probably not dealing with the extremes.
Vince Cable
I will take two more interventions, one from each side of the House. I am sure that other Members who wish to ask questions will be able to ask them during the main part of the debate.
Mark Field
I think many of us feel that, 25 years ago or thereabouts, we reached a sensible compromise over Sunday trading, which would benefit smaller businesses while imposing certain restrictions on the large supermarket chains. I support the Bill, especially because the west end shopping organisations desperately want its provisions to be adopted. However, I fear that the lobbying has been carried out solely by the largest supermarkets. I broadly support what those supermarkets do in general, but does the Secretary of State recognise that there is an overwhelming feeling that they not only maintain a dominant position in many of our high streets, but will use the Bill as a precedent for the future?
Vince Cable
First, those supermarkets will not be able to use the Bill as a precedent, because we have made it clear that it is not a precedent. Secondly, many other stores—not just supermarkets—will benefit. We have already explained, in some detail, that a large number of consumers and workers will be able to take advantage of the Bill.
Vince Cable
I will take one more intervention, and then I must conclude my speech.
Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)
Is the Secretary of State not creating a precedent in terms of large sporting events? What if, on the next occasion when the Welsh win the rugby grand slam, the supporters say, “They have already done it for the Olympics; why should they not do it for us?”
Vince Cable
Given that I represent Twickenham, I think that I have some sense of the impact of major sporting events, and no one has suggested that the legislation should be changed specifically for rugby union events.
Vince Cable
I want to end my speech now. I have taken a great many interventions, and there will be further opportunities for Members to intervene later.
The Government have listened to the concerns expressed about the proposal to suspend temporarily the restrictions on Sunday trading, and we have made every effort to consult and work with a wide range of interested parties. We have spoken not only to the Churches, but to large businesses including supermarkets and other retailers, and to representative bodies such as the British Retail Consortium, the CBI and the British Council of Shopping Centres.
Vince Cable
No, not on this occasion.
We have also spoken to representatives of small businesses such as the Association of Convenience Stores, the National Federation of Retail Newsagents and the Federation of Small Businesses, and to trade unions including the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers and Unite. We believe that the Bill strikes the right balance between stressing the legitimate concerns expressed by those groups and securing the flexibility that is needed to ensure that British retailers can take full advantage of the opportunities presented by the Olympic and Paralympic games, such as the opportunity to showcase the United Kingdom’s skills, talents and businesses to the rest of the world.
The games will be an occasion for unparalleled entertainment, and we want to make certain that everyone can take advantage of them to the full. Allowing UK retailers extended Sunday trading is a small change that could have a significant impact on the enjoyment of the games, on the national economy, and on our international image. I commend the Bill to the House.
Mr Chuka Umunna (Streatham) (Lab)
I am a London boy and very, very proud of it. I believe that the richness, the dynamism and the energy and drive of this city are unrivalled. We were all immensely proud when, on 6 July 2005, we watched the president of the International Olympic Committee announce that our country’s bid to host the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic games here in London had been successful. I remember seeing, on television, the shadow Olympics Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Tessa Jowell), the former—and future—Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, and assorted athletes such as Denise Lewis leap about and jump for joy when they heard that the bid had been successful. That was a wonderful moment. Now we find ourselves just 87 days away from the start of the opening ceremony—from seeing the Olympic flame flicker above a state-of-the-art stadium in Stratford, east London.
Robert Flello (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Lab)
Does my hon. Friend recall hearing, at the same time as the announcement of the fantastic news of the bid’s success, the announcement of a synchronised shopping trolley event? If it happened, I missed it, but the Secretary of State seems to be suggesting that it is the new Olympic sport.
Let me now make a serious point. What would my hon. Friend say to workers up and down the country who have tickets for a Sunday Olympic event, and who now know that they will not be able to attend other than through the back door or through devious means because their employers will not let them go?
Lyn Brown
I am minded to support the Bill, although I feel sad about the fact that I will not be in the same Lobby as many of my colleagues. Can my hon. Friend tell me whether there have been discussions with the Government, and specifically with the Secretary of State, about an Olympic premium for those who will be expected to work on a Sunday and to give up much more of their time than they have had to give up hitherto? I am particularly worried about the fact that it seems likely that there will have to be two lots of shift patterns on Sundays, and that there will not be enough staff to work those shifts on a voluntary basis.
Mr Umunna
We have raised that issue with the Secretary of State. Although, according to the Government’s Business Link website, a premium should be considered in circumstances such as this when employees are required to work at unusual times, the Government have decided not to do anything about it.
David Wright
At what point did the Government raise the issues in the Bill with Opposition Front Benchers? How much notice was given? Does my hon. Friend not find it rather strange that there has been week after week of Back-Bench business when the Government could have presented the Bill and we could have had a proper debate, but it is being rushed through the House in a single day?
Mr Umunna
I was coming to that point.
With the bid won, our party, in government, proceeded to work in close collaboration with others to make a success and a lasting legacy of this once-in-a-lifetime event for the United Kingdom. The stability and transparency of the cross-party working to which my hon. Friend has referred was crucial to the success of our Olympic planning. It was therefore a huge disappointment that the first we heard of these measures was in the omnishambles that was the pre-briefing of this year’s Budget in the Sunday newspapers during the weekend before the Chancellor’s Budget statement. That was the first that we, and others, heard of the proposal to suspend the restrictions on Sunday trading between 22 July and 9 September this year, during the period of the Olympics.
Mr Gerry Sutcliffe (Bradford South) (Lab)
I am a former Sports Minister who sat on the Olympic Board, and a former consumer Minister who had to deal with the issue of Sunday trading. I wonder whether my hon. Friend knows the origin of the motivation for this proposal. I certainly never heard anyone call for it during my time on the board, and when, as consumer Minister, I talked to organisations such as the Association of Convenience Stores and the Federation of Newsagents, no one said that they wanted it. Where has it come from?
Mr Denis MacShane (Rotherham) (Lab)
It is interesting that this Bill has been introduced so very recently. Never has a major legislative proposal emerged so quickly, especially when the opposition to it is so very strong. I have received many e-mails, letters and constituent complaints about it. It is causing a great deal of stress to all small shopkeepers, who are the very people who keep our local communities alive. Only a Liberal Democrat could have invented the idea of giving power to Walmart in America—and with that company’s scandal in Mexico!
Mr Umunna
I have not received a single representation in favour of this Bill, but I have received many opposing it.
This proposal was briefed and released with no advance warning, consultation or negotiation with either us or relevant affected stakeholders. That breaks with the previous spirit of collaborative working. Since taking office, the Government have had many months to plan for the games, and preparations had already been well advanced by my right hon. Friend the shadow Olympics Minister and other colleagues when we were in office.
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
Some time ago, the Prime Minister said that
“from here on I want a family test applied to all domestic policy. If it hurts families, if it undermines commitment, if it tramples over the values that keep people together, or stops families from being together, then we shouldn’t do it.”
I know my hon. Friend does not have much time for the Prime Minister, but does he not think that that is reason enough to abandon the Bill?
Gavin Shuker
My hon. Friend is being characteristically generous in taking interventions. He has tabled a number of amendments that would significantly improve the Bill. It is telling that we are dealing with this Bill on the final day of what has been a two-year parliamentary Session. That tells us everything we need to know about the coalition. Does he agree that this Bill speaks volumes, as it shows that in the coalition’s view, working people are for the economy, rather than the economy being for working people?
Mr Umunna
That is certainly the view of many outside this House, too.
One has to ask why the Secretary of State and his colleagues have introduced this legislative change so late in the day when they have been in office for almost two years. That raises a further question: what other matters have they forgotten to consider in advance of the Olympics? It is worth reminding the House that the Government brought the London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games (Amendment) Act 2011 before Parliament six months ago, after the ten-minute rule Bill to which the Secretary of State referred. Would not the more competent and sensible course of action have been to deal with this matter then, instead of thrusting it on us now, out of the blue, in this rather rushed and haphazard fashion?
Mark Field
Despite the concerns that have been expressed, the reality is that this measure is likely to end up being something of a damp squib. Many shops will not open. Does the hon. Gentleman not accept the Secretary of State’s assurances that no precedent will be set and that this measure will definitely last for only a short period, and that Members will have the opportunity to hold all supermarkets to account to ensure that Sunday trading is not extended beyond sensible limits in years to come?
Mr Umunna
The problem in this respect is that the silence of the Chancellor of the Exchequer on these matters has been deafening. If he had said something publicly to reassure people, many of the questions the Secretary of State is having to deal with may not have been posed in the first place.
I mentioned the sensitivities that arose from tampering with the existing settlement under the Sunday Trading Act 1994. Given those sensitivities, it would have made sense for this Bill to have been considered in a more timely manner. Because of the sensitivities, the convention has been for there to be a free vote on these matters, and I have said that that is how the Labour party is treating tonight’s vote. We do so not least because for some the Bill raises important issues of conscience.
Mike Gapes
Will my hon. Friend say to those people who will be affected by these measures that, even if the Government get this appalling legislation through, our party will resist any erosion of the rights of retail workers in this country and that we will fight tooth and nail to ensure that the Government will not make this a long-term change?
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
Did my hon. Friend notice that when the Secretary of State was explaining why he considered the Olympic and Paralympic games to be a special case, he referred to the football World cup in Germany, which is a completely different event? Does my hon. Friend share my concern that this Bill will set a precedent for future sporting and cultural events in this country, and open the door to far wider changes to the Sunday trading laws?
Ian Mearns (Gateshead) (Lab)
We in Tyneside have a long history of putting on large, huge participation sporting events, such as the great north run—and St James’s park is full most weekends. The great north run has taken place annually for the past 30 years or so, and there has been no great demand for the shops to be open on the Sunday while it takes place. Where is the demand for this change coming from? I cannot see it.
Mr Umunna
I agree. As I have said, no representations have been made to me arguing in favour of the measures in the Bill.
I was talking about those who may object to the Bill as a matter of conscience. For many, Sunday is a day of worship, but for many others, it is not. For everybody, however, Sunday is more than a day of rest. It provides us with something no amount of money can buy: quality time with friends, family and loved ones. Members may have an unhealthy fascination with Sunday political television programmes such as the Marr and Murnaghan shows, but we do not let that get in the way of a good slap-up Sunday roast with our nearest and dearest.
Dame Joan Ruddock
My hon. Friend makes a very valuable point. We should also think about those workers who currently work on Sundays. Does he agree that the Bill allows for a doubling of the number of hours—and, therefore, shifts—that can be worked on Sundays in the big stores, and that that may well lead to a doubling of the number of people involved? Does he agree that it is utterly disingenuous to suggest that the measures will be a matter of choice for those workers?
Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)
In 2004, I promoted the Christmas Day (Trading) Bill, which became an Act later that year. One of the main supporters of the Bill were the Christian Churches in this country. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is a little ironic for the Prime Minister and his Cabinet colleagues to introduce this Bill given that they talk about the importance of Christianity to the nation?
Hugh Bayley
I am trying to make up my mind whether the Government have been caught napping and forced to ramrod this legislation through the House in a single day or whether they are just trying to avoid scrutiny. In making up my mind, I would be interested to know whether the Secretary of State has indicated that he will accept any of my hon. Friend’s good amendments, which would mitigate the measure.
Mr Umunna
I do not know about the hon. Lady, but when I spend time with my family on a Sunday, we do not necessarily go shopping in large stores, although I suppose that there may be those who do. The point that we seek to make, which I think is appreciated, is that whether people object to the Bill as a matter of conscience or whether they do not have a great religious affinity, we all regard our Sundays as special, regardless of our creed or background. For that reason, when the noble Baroness Thatcher sought to end Government regulation of Sunday trading through the Shops Bill in 1986, she was defeated; unfortunately, that represented her only defeat in the House of Commons during her time in office, despite the best efforts of my party.
There was, however, a relaxation of the law in 1994, and it allowed large stores to open on Sunday for a maximum of six hours between 10 am and 6 pm. Small shops are not subject to those restrictions and can open when and for as long as they like. Our small shops estimate that they do 15% to 20% of their trade on Sunday, so they see the current rules as an important way of levelling the playing field with their much bigger rivals. That point has been made forcefully by the Federation of Small Businesses and the Association of Convenience Stores.
There have been consultations on changing the permanent Sunday trading settlement. We consulted on it in government, but the response always indicated little desire, if any, for an alteration of the permanent settlement. That situation does not appear to have changed. The Government have twice consulted on the matter, in their retail growth review and the red tape challenge, and neither of those consultations elicited evidence of a desire for change. Likewise, in a GfK NOP poll for the Association of Convenience Stores in 2010, 89% of the public opposed further liberalisation of Sunday trading laws.
I will say it again: as a point of principle, and given the importance that we all attach to our Sundays, we would strongly resist any attempt to alter the existing Sunday trading regime on a permanent basis, and there is clearly no desire for that change. As the Secretary of State said, the Government have introduced the Bill as a temporary measure in the light of the exceptional event that will be happening on our shores. He and the noble Lord Sassoon have said that the Bill will not be used as a Trojan horse to effect any permanent change. As I said, the Chancellor has not been forthcoming with a reassurance in that regard, but if he were to seek to use the success of a temporary relaxation of restrictions in the Bill as justification for permanent change, he would be wrong. As the former Olympic athlete Baroness Grey-Thompson said on Second Reading in the other place last week, given the completely and utterly exceptional nature of the games, the temporary measures in the Bill could not be treated as an accurate trial of whether such a relaxation would work or be justified on a permanent basis.
As has been said, the rationale advanced by the Government for the relaxation on a temporary basis is primarily economic. The Government say that the Bill presents an opportunity to show that Britain is open for business. As was pointed out in the other place, that would tend to suggest that at the end of the eight-week period, we will be shut for business, but that is surely not the message that we intend to convey.
We asked the Government to publish their impact assessment for the Bill so that all could see it. Unfortunately, they did so only after Second Reading in the other place last Tuesday, although thankfully this House had the benefit of seeing it before today’s debate. It is clear from the assessment that although it would be foolhardy to deny that substantial economic benefits are likely to flow from London’s hosting the 2012 Olympic games, it is far from clear what economic benefits will flow from the measures in the Bill.
The impact assessment states:
“The unique nature of the Olympics and Paralympics makes an accurate assessment of the potential impact difficult”.
It is not clear how many large shops will choose to take advantage of suspension or how shopping patterns and demand will change. I suspect that the substantial economic benefits that we are likely to derive from the games will, in the main, be unaffected by the Bill. Notwithstanding that, and at the risk of contradicting myself, we do recognise that a temporary lifting of Sunday trading restrictions during this historic and exceptional event does at least deserve consideration; the fact that it is difficult to discern the economic benefit does not mean that there is not any. That is why, on pragmatic grounds, we agree to the fast-tracking of the Bill and have sought to reach a constructive consensus on the way forward.
At this juncture, I should point out that all along, we have approached negotiations on the Bill in good faith in the interests of ensuring that the country gets the maximum benefit from the games. In fairness to the Secretary of State, the Minister—the hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford (Mr Prisk)—and the noble Lord Sassoon, although the handling of the Bill has been somewhat wanting, I believe that they have approached the matter in good faith as well, for which I am grateful to them.
That said, we were clear from the outset that, if we were to recommend support for the Bill, we would need to be satisfied that sufficient employment protections would be put in place. Of course, it is the employees who would be required to work on the Sundays in question, and who otherwise might not be required to do so, who stand to be most adversely affected. In particular, we would need to be satisfied that those employees would be free to choose and would not be forced into working on those Sundays given that they, like everyone else, may want to be able to enjoy what the Olympics will offer.
Ian Lavery
I asked the Secretary of State a question earlier and was a little baffled by the response; perhaps my hon. Friend could be clearer. Is it misleading to suggest that individuals could simply opt out of working on a Sunday during the period? Would they be able only to apply to opt out, it being up to the employer whether to grant that application?
Mr Umunna
On the first part of the question, I should say as a former employment lawyer that, notwithstanding the technical rights in the Bill and in legislation, the reality of the situation may be different. The employee may have rights, but they may feel under pressure to agree to a request to work. In relation to my hon. Friend’s second point, if somebody has served notice to opt out and objects to working on a Sunday, the employer legally could not force them to do so.
Yvonne Fovargue (Makerfield) (Lab)
My constituents have been going to their employers saying, “We need extra hours because we lose our tax credits unless we do 24 hours.” Does my hon. Friend agree that it is totally unrealistic to expect them to say that they do not want to work on Sundays because they object to losing their family time?
Mr Umunna
It is reasonable for any employee to object to working on a Sunday so that they can spend more time with their family.
Members on both sides of the House will have been contacted by USDAW, the shop workers’ union, on this issue. USDAW does an excellent job for its members and we are proud to be associated with it. Its members power one of our most successful and internationally competitive sectors. In short, its 400,000 members are wealth creators and we should celebrate and take notice of them. USDAW has surveyed more than 20,000 members, and some 78% of those surveyed oppose longer opening hours on Sundays during the period of the operation of this Bill; 51% said they already felt pressurised to work on Sundays against their will; and 73% said that longer Sunday opening would lead to pressure on them to work on Sundays against their will.
Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)
It is already clear that many shop workers feel pressure to work on Sundays, despite the legal protections enshrined in the original Sunday Trading Act 1994, which are totally ineffective. Does it not say much about the Tories that the hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant) argued that this Sunday trading would give more flexibility to families without realising that the families of many shop workers would have their Sunday time destroyed by this Bill? Do they not also deserve time with their families at the weekends?
Mr Umunna
Of course I agree with my hon. Friend that those workers deserve time with their families; she is absolutely right about that.
The group of employees who stand to lose most under this Bill are those who started employment after the provisions of the 1994 Act came into effect and who, under their contracts of employment, not only work on Sundays but can be required to do so in addition to working other days of the week. So we have asked for two things. The first relates to the fact that, in general, there is no statutory minimum period of notice that must be given by employers to shop workers notifying them of a request to work on Sundays. The only thing an employer is required to do is to give new employees a written statement within two months of the start of their employment telling them that they could be asked to work on Sundays and explaining their right to opt out. Importantly, there is no requirement for employers to tell their employees when they will exercise their right to require them to work on Sundays after they have started employment. It would be unreasonable, as well as a breach of trust and confidence under the employment contract, not to give any notice, but the point is that there is no prescribed minimum period of notice that employers must give.
Many employees will have received the written statement I have just mentioned a very long time ago. They may not even realise that they can be made to work on Sundays and that they can subsequently object, because it has never become an issue before. Because of the exceptional nature of the Olympics and the fact that a relaxation of trading restrictions on Sundays will inevitably lead to increased demands on shop workers to work on the Sundays concerned, we feel that it is not unreasonable to require employers to give employees two months’ notice of a request to work on any of the Sundays in question. To put it simply, how will employees know that the law has temporarily changed, that they can object to working on Sundays and that they should object in time if proper notice of a request to work on those Sundays has not been communicated to them by their employer?
Philip Davies
The hon. Gentleman said that 78% of USDAW workers did not want to work extra on a Sunday. Given that the Labour party has been banging on about how it wants the Government to do things that will create extra jobs, it is ridiculous to see that party equivocating on something—liberalising Sunday trading laws—that would create extra jobs. Why does he want to prevent the 22% who do want to work extra on a Sunday from doing those extra hours? When I worked for a supermarket chain and asked people in the store to work overtime, I found that the easiest time to get them to work extra hours was on a Sunday, because that suited so many people. Why is his party equivocating about something that is good for those employees and would create more jobs if it were rolled out permanently?
Mr Umunna
I have worked in several shops and I do not recall everybody rushing to work on a Sunday. I have already referred to the Government’s impact assessment, and it is far from clear that liberalisation on a temporary basis will create lots of jobs. I have seen no economic evidence to suggest that an overall liberalisation would create loads of new jobs if the permanent regime were changed.
Gavin Shuker
Is not the point here that Sundays are perhaps easier to fill because many employers pay a premium to have staff working on a Sunday? When I worked in Woolworths for five years, I received time and a half on a Sunday. Is not the reality—[Interruption.] There should be no laughter about the demise of Woolworths, because it was a great store for pick ‘n’ mix, among other things. Labour Members fear that this measure will act as a Trojan horse and that we will be on a slippery slope whereby we end up with those rights being diminished, and with time and a half or time and a third arrangements going completely.
Mr Umunna
My hon. Friend is quite right, and of course that is the great concern.
I was about to deal with the notice of objection required from employees. Under the existing regime, they can object and opt out of working on Sundays by giving three months’ notice to their employer, as the Secretary of State mentioned. The effect is that they can be forced to work during the three-month period but not after its expiry. The late introduction of this Bill means that it would not be possible, under the current arrangements, for employees to give notice to object within the three-month time frame, so the Government have agreed to reduce the notice period to two months during the period of the suspension of the usual arrangements.
That is good, but it is not sufficient. Ideally, we would like the notice required from employees in this instance to be reduced to one month. The late passing of this Bill and the close proximity in time to the Sundays in question mean that the two months that the Government have agreed to will allow very little time for employees to consider their position—a notice period of one month will afford them a little longer.
A further issue has been brought to our attention during the passage of the Bill. It has been mentioned today and it was raised during the Committee stage in the other place. We make no apologies for not raising it earlier; had the Bill been brought forward at a much earlier stage, we would have been able to flush out and deal with these issues in a timely fashion, in the usual way, in advance. The temporary relaxation of trading restrictions on the Sundays concerned is rather open-ended; the affected stores can open for as long as, and until as late as, they like. That is clearly unsatisfactory and some kind of limit should be imposed so that workers are not exploited. Our amendments propose that the opening runs until an 11 pm limit, allowing workers such as those in London, for example, to make their way home before the tubes and the trains stop. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) has said, many of these workers are women.
Robert Flello
My hon. Friend will be aware that although London has been blessed with a good public transport system, other areas of the country do not have anything more than a basic Sunday service. Getting to work is already a struggle for a lot of workers on Sundays, but getting to work on a bus service that is very haphazard is almost an impossible ask.
Mr Umunna
I completely agree with what my hon. Friend says, which is why we have tabled our amendments. Again, I do not believe that they make an unreasonable request. If the Government were to agree to our amendments, that would reinforce the message that this is not a Trojan horse for permanent change and it would, in part, help to keep Sunday special. The Government have already indicated that they will oppose our amendments, which is a great shame.
In conclusion, I appreciate what the Government are seeking to do with this Bill. I do not think the proposed measures are as straightforward as they sound in the first instance, and the relative merits and adverse effects of the Bill are finely balanced. One would have thought that the Bill would command the support of the large stores that it purports to seek to help, but the House may wish to reflect on the comments of the chief executive of Sainsbury’s, Justin King, who also sits on the board of the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games. When asked whether he supported the temporary relaxation of Sunday trading restrictions in The Sunday Telegraph at the beginning of this month, he responded:
“We don’t believe in, have not campaigned for and will not campaign for a general relaxation of the Sunday trading laws
Our customers aren’t asking for it. I’ve never had a letter from a customer saying, ‘Please campaign for longer opening hours on Sundays’. The compromise that’s been reached is essentially to keep Sunday special. If you want to do your shopping on Sunday, you can.
You can do it unhindered in small shops but only for six hours in big shops. That seems to us to be the happy British compromise. We’re content that Sunday is special and we don’t see customer demand for a change in the current law.”
So this is not a straightforward issue and, again, I am not clear where the support for the Bill is.
As I said, Labour is treating this matter as a free vote, but in the absence of ground being given on the issues I have mentioned, and taking account of all the thoughtful and considered views that have been put to us by business, employee and other groups, we do not feel able, on balance, to recommend to Opposition Members that, in exercising their free vote today, they support this Bill. Notwithstanding whether it passes, the House should be in no doubt that Labour Members are incredibly excited about London 2012 and have no doubt it will be a huge success for our country.
Gordon Henderson (Sittingbourne and Sheppey) (Con)
I begin by declaring my long-standing support for the retail trade. It would be very strange if I did not, because I have been associated with different aspects of the retail trade for most of my working life. When I left school in 1964 at the age of 16—hon. Members can do the maths—I went to work in the stock room of my local Woolworths store in Chatham. As I was a parliamentary candidate in Luton South in 2001, the hon. Member for Luton South (Gavin Shuker) and I have at least two things in common, but of course he is a lot younger than me, and would not be aware of the conditions in shops when I first started out. In those days, we worked five and a half days a week, with only Wednesday afternoons and Saturdays off. That experience made me appreciate the special nature of Sundays. Even today, as a Member of Parliament, I try hard not to work on Sundays. Many in the retail industry would love an opportunity to do the same, but sadly, for all sorts of reasons, they do not have the choice of treating Sunday as a special day of the week.
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)
It seems to me that people in the retail trade have a choice; they do not have to work on a Sunday. Indeed, under the Bill, stores do not have to open on a Sunday.
Gordon Henderson
I take it that my hon. Friend has never worked in the retail industry, so he would not understand that often people have no choice other than to work on a Sunday. Let me give one small example. My wife had a couple of small shops, one of which was in a shopping centre. The contract stated that she had to open on a Sunday. That meant that she had to work on a Sunday, though she does not do so now. People might not be forced by their employer to work on a Sunday, and might have a choice, but they are often forced to do so due to circumstances, because the shop is open.
Philip Davies
My hon. Friend rightly says that some people do not want to work on a Sunday, and I certainly respect their right not to do so, but does he accept that many people want to work on a Sunday? Why does he think that people should not be forced to work on a Sunday, but want to deprive people who do want to work then of the chance to do so? We already have fully liberated hours in Scotland, and the sky does not appear to have fallen in there.
Gordon Henderson
I accept that there are people in the retail trade who want to work on a Sunday, and of course those people already have the opportunity to do so. [Interruption.] Yes, I do. Stores are allowed to open on a Sunday for six hours between the hours of 10 am and 6 pm. Major stores are open. Small stores of under 3,000 square feet are allowed to open any time on a Sunday. If people in retail want to work on Sunday, there is always the opportunity to do so. We are not talking about that; we are talking about relaxing the rules still further.
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend agree that stores are not allowed to open on Easter Sunday, and the world did not stop on that day?
Gordon Henderson
I could not agree more. The special nature of Sunday was recognised by the Sunday Trading Act 1994, which restricted opening hours to the times that I mentioned. It is worth pointing out that in recent years, some larger stores have tried to bend the rules by opening an hour earlier for what is called browsing time, during which time shoppers can fill up their baskets but cannot put those goods through the till. It is such tactics that make many workers suspicious of the proposals to suspend Sunday trading restrictions during the Olympics and Paralympics. I fear that many retail chains will feel that the proposals give them the green light to campaign more vigorously for restrictions to be dropped permanently.
Dame Joan Ruddock
I am old enough—perhaps the hon. Gentleman is, too—to remember when the big stores opened on Sundays illegally, before we had the legislation. That is another reason for a lack of trust when it comes to the motives that some of them have.
Gordon Henderson
I cannot say that I remember that, and I go back a long way, albeit out in the sticks; perhaps the practice was prevalent in London. It certainly was not prevalent in the Medway towns, or in Sittingbourne and Sheppey, where I live now.
Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire) (Con)
I am probably old enough to remember when there were no stores to open. I have some sympathy with what my hon. Friend says, but does he recognise that the relaxation will apply for eight weeks, and that there is no proposal to extend that? Does he very much welcome the fact that we are talking about an eight-week period, and does he hope that we would think long and hard before there was any suggestion of extending the period?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Before the hon. Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Gordon Henderson) responds, may I remind Members to face the middle of the Chamber when they speak, so that the microphones pick up what is said, and so that I can hear what is said?
Gordon Henderson
I take the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies), but the 1994 Act recognised that Sunday is special. Perhaps he should explain why Sundays during the Olympics and Paralympics are any less special than those during the rest of the year. That is the point. This is not about opening; it is about Sundays.
One reason that we have been given for suspending the restrictions is that it would allow those visiting for the Olympics and Paralympics to shop if they so choose. Let me ask the Minister another question: why can all those visitors not buy their souvenirs and trinkets from the hundreds of small shops that are under 3,000 square feet and already have unrestricted Sunday trading hours? Indeed, rather than suspending Sunday trading restrictions to help the large stores cash in, would it not make sense to keep the restrictions in place during the Olympics? That would give a much-needed boost to small shops that are struggling to survive in the face of competition from supermarkets, which continually extend the range of non-food items that they offer.
Philip Davies
I am puzzled as to why my hon. Friend thinks that it is important for Sunday to be kept special for workers in supermarkets, when he does not seem to think it worth keeping it special for people who work in small convenience stores. If he wishes to be consistent, surely he should want it to be special for those people, too.
Gordon Henderson
I agree 100% with my hon. Friend. The point is that Sunday is special; the 1994 Act recognised that by providing for certain opening hours for large stores, and certain opening hours for small stores. I am not looking to change that; the Bill looks to change that for eight weeks this year. That is all that I am objecting to.
As I have mentioned, my wife had a couple of small shops; they closed because she could no longer face the competition from supermarkets that were moving into selling non-food goods, and the type of fancy goods and gifts that she sold, so perhaps I ought to declare an interest.
There is something else that puzzles me. We have been given assurances by the Front Benchers, but if it is true that it is important to suspend the restrictions because only large shops will be able to cater to the needs of visitors who come for the Olympics and Paralympics, why does the suspension have to take in the whole of England and Wales? I simply do not understand that. I appreciate fully that loads of visitors might stream into Stratford and the borough during the Olympics, but I cannot see that happening in Sheffield, Stourbridge, Swansea, Sittingbourne or Sheerness. Unless the Government intend to lay on buses that go from Stratford straight to Sheerness on the Isle of Sheppey, bringing thousands of people down to shop in Black Cat and other places—we would be grateful for that—I do not see why the measures have to apply nationwide, rather than being restricted to London.
Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)
On the contrary, will we not be looking for a significant boost in north Kent from the Olympics? We have Ebbsfleet in the area, and in the Rochester and Strood constituency we are very much looking forward to the Olympics and the business opportunities generated from them.
Gordon Henderson
I have great respect for my hon. Friend, as he is well aware, but I think he is being a little naive if he thinks thousands upon thousands of people will be streaming out of London down to the Medway towns. I hope I am wrong, but I suspect I am not.
There may be an argument for holding a debate on the principle of changing the current restrictions on Sunday trading, and that debate might convince me to support it. There might even be an argument for undertaking a trial period to test the water. But, of course, this is not such a debate, or so we are led to believe. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and my hon. Friend the Minister have given assurances from the Front Bench that the Bill is a temporary measure, but frankly, I am not convinced. I believe that this proposal is nothing less than a trial run for a permanent relaxation of the restrictions. If it can be proved that sales have increased significantly during the trial period, pressure will no doubt follow for the 1994 Act to be repealed once and for all. I hope I am wrong, but I suspect I am not wrong, which is why I cannot and will not support the Bill.
Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)
Britain’s success in hosting the 2012 Olympic games provides a fantastic opportunity for people throughout the country to experience directly this world-class sporting and cultural event. Our business and tourism industry can thrive during the summer. From the beginning of the bid process there has been cross-party support to make these the best games possible for the thousands and thousands of extra visitors we are expecting. Unfortunately, the Government have handled very poorly the suspension of existing Sunday trading restrictions, resulting in confusion and anger from those directly affected—namely, shop workers and small businesses.
If the Bill is not being used as the thin end of the wedge for permanent change, why did the Government not limit the temporary relaxation of Sunday trading laws to the specifically affected areas—that is, London? We have heard that there are events in one or two other places, but those are much smaller and they will not receive the large number of visitors that will come to London.
Nick de Bois (Enfield North) (Con)
Does the hon. Lady agree that the problem with the idea that this is the thin end of the wedge and a trial for permanent expansion is that it would be a ludicrous trial basis, given that we will have hundreds of thousands of new visitors and customers and it would be foolish to make a judgment based on that new market?
Meg Munn
Many, many people are concerned and suspicious of that. Clearly, the view expressed by the hon. Gentleman has some merit, but the concerns expressed by his hon. Friend the Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Gordon Henderson), who has worked in the retail industry, also have a great deal of merit.
Helen Jones
My hon. Friend, like me, represents a constituency a long way from London. Does she agree that it is most unfair that shop workers in my constituency and hers should be forced to work on Sundays, and that convenience stores should suffer the resulting drop in trade, because the Government have decided to extend the experiment throughout the country?
Jim Shannon
Is the hon. Lady aware that the Chancellor has said that the suspension will be a temporary measure, but that the Treasury may “learn lessons” from this experiment? What lessons does she think the Government may learn?
Meg Munn
If the Treasury decides to come forward with that, the hon. Member for Enfield North (Nick de Bois) will no doubt express his strong view that it has no merit whatever.
The Association of Convenience Stores has been mentioned by a number of hon. Members already. Its poll showed that Sunday trading liberalisation is unpopular: 89% of the public were opposed to further change in the law and, as we have heard, a survey of more than 20,000 USDAW members conducted after the March Budget announcement found that 78% opposed the suspension of Sunday trading laws during the Olympic games. As it is, 51% already come under pressure from their employers to work Sundays, and 73% said that they would come under more pressure to work on Sundays if shops were allowed to open for longer. Shop workers deserve the right to enjoy the Olympics just like everybody else.
Robert Flello
My hon. Friend is making a very good and thoughtful speech. Does she agree that there are two other concerns? If a shop worker has been lucky enough to get a ticket to an event on a Sunday, there is a risk that they will go to their employer and be told, “No, sorry, you’ve got to get rid of the ticket. You’re not going,” or that their colleagues will be upset because the employee will say to their employer, “I have a ticket. I would like to go,” and the employer will say, “Yes, you can go, but that means one of your colleagues now has to fill your place on Sunday.”
Meg Munn
My hon. Friend introduces just two circumstances that could occur. I shall shortly come on to others that cause me concern.
It has already been made clear that workers wishing to exercise their right to opt out of working on a Sunday under the Bill would have to notify their employer by 22 May. That is surely unreasonable. Many workers will not be aware of this important date, and I ask the Minister what the Government intend to do to tell them. I remind the House that these additional opening hours could be 7 am until midnight, hours that could significantly affect family life.
Without appropriate safeguards during the Olympics, extended Sunday working hours will provide an excuse for employers to move contracted weekday hours to a Sunday. Despite current Sunday opt-out rules, many shop workers are already being forced to spend that time at work. They experience difficulties getting into work on a Sunday, as we heard. Some also experience the problem of a lack of child care, which is especially hard for single parents. There is currently a demand for retail staff to be flexible with working hours. An extension of Sunday trading hours will simply add to the strain.
When I visit supermarkets in my constituency, what I hear from the staff is that many employers are issuing low-hours contracts, meaning that employees have to work whatever additional hours are available and offered, rather than what fits their own circumstances. The hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant) made the point that sometimes workers indeed want extra hours because they do not have a contract that gives them enough money to live on. If their contract is 20 hours whereas they would like to work full-time, they may well be offered only the Sunday hours. So the idea that there is real choice is ill-founded.
We know that in surveys workers have commented as follows:
“Large stores give you 28 days to change your contract to comply with their requests to cover the extra shifts. This is bullying because they know people need to keep their jobs.”
Another said:
“Although Sunday working is optional, to ask for a Sunday off is a crime and to try and book it off as a holiday, 9 out of 10 will get refused.”
Other staff are worried about the increased risk of crime within stores, with fewer police working on a Sunday and fewer staff in the stores.
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)
The hon. Lady and other Members have alluded to the USDAW survey and the concerns of existing employees. Is there not another issue? Given the hoped-for and anticipated increase in trade generally in the retail sector during the Olympics, people who are not currently in retail but will be over the next few months will feel under even more pressure, as they are very new employees who do not understand the difficulties of pressure in the workplace?
Meg Munn
Of course there will be that concern for newly employed staff, but we know from existing practices that extra staff may well not be taken on. The existing staff will be expected to cover the additional time by reducing the hours worked from Monday to Friday. There are many problems. Managers in particular feel the pressure of having to work Sundays themselves, with the added pressure of having to ask their teams to cover longer hours. Like many other Members, I have been contacted by constituents and petitioners who find that very difficult.
Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)
On that point, I am not sure how many hon. Members have actually worked in a shop, but I worked for Marks & Spencer on the shop floor for seven years and know that it is physically quite a demanding job. When looking at the expectation that people will work yet more time, we need to remember that physically that will be quite difficult for some. The other issue I want to touch on is benefits. A number of these people, if they do extra hours, will go above the benefit cut-off point for a few weeks and then down again. Does my hon. Friend agree that that is potentially a bureaucratic nightmare?
Meg Munn
I will make a little progress.
The Association of Convenience Stores has strong concerns about the Government’s impact assessment. Two major studies referenced in the assessment failed to make the case for a significant amount of additional spending resulting from the liberalisation. The Centre for Retail Research has estimated an overall increase in sales of £189.9 million, but the impact assessment fails to set this in the context of the sales value of the UK retail sector, which is in excess of £300 billion. It uses a limited research base and is not a sound basis for estimating the impact of the legislation. This study is just a reflection of the Government’s hasty action in introducing legislation without understanding the full implications.
The total cost for the 40,000 convenience stores across England and Wales will be £480 million over the eight weekends of the Olympic and Paralympic games, which again raises the question of why these legislative changes will apply to the whole country. The impact assessment fails to recognise that convenience stores might be strongly affected. The Co-operative group has strongly expressed the view that the legislation threatens high streets and secondary shopping locations up and down the country, rather than helping them to stay vibrant. It believes that any relaxation of the existing Sunday trading laws will have a detrimental effect on independent retailers, who make a vital contribution to sustainable and viable local communities.
I must echo some of the feelings expressed in contributions made by hon. Friends. What is this desperate need to get to a shop? Under the coalition Government, we now live in a country in which it can take two weeks to get an appointment with a GP when something is wrong, so why do they think people cannot wait a few hours to get into a large shop? I must say that the reasons for that escape me. The Government must make it clear that there will be no future attempt to change Sunday trading rules without an extensive consultation period. If these changes are purely in the interests of national and community gain throughout the period of the Olympic games, they should be subject to more vigorous scrutiny, target the specific areas of London that will be affected, assure a temporary time limit and guarantee that shop workers’ rights will be protected.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Order. Members should please resume their seats. This is a popular debate and a number of Members have indicated that they wish to speak, and of course we will have the wind-ups as well, so at this stage I appeal to Members to focus on some time restraints in order to get as many Members in as possible, and even allow time for Committee stage and Third Reading.
Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)
I want to make a few remarks about this short Bill and seek assurances on behalf of some interested parties about its scope and limits. On the whole, I believe that it makes sense for the tourists who will flock to the UK for the Olympics to be able to spend as much time as they want in shops, and at times that they find convenient. The economy needs it and I believe that we should not hamper the retail sector in taking advantage of it.
Mrs Moon
Does the hon. Lady not accept that the people who will flock to the UK also need to see the other areas that we can rightly be proud of, such as our countryside, our heritage and our cultural opportunities? These are also places where people can spend money, enjoy themselves and get a wider view of the UK than simply our large and convenient stores. Why are we not promoting our cultural, heritage and environmental opportunities, rather than just our shopping?
Lorely Burt
I could not agree more with the hon. Lady; we should be promoting other tourist opportunities in other parts of the country, as I believe we are. I am hopeful that, because we are allowing the extension of Sunday trading to other parts of the country, they might also benefit in some part. As I was saying, the Bill does not spell good news for everyone, particularly in areas to which Olympic and Paralympic tourists will not be flocking. We have heard the argument about small shops and the fear that the window of competitive opportunity will close for the period covered by the Bill.
Bob Stewart
It seems to me that, if there is no demand for extended hours on a Sunday, large shops will not open. That is highly likely, and it might well be a damp squib in much of the country, and I hope that that happens.
Lorely Burt
I totally agree. I think that many shops outside the tourist areas will elect not to open, because if trade is predicted not to increase, why would they spread the same volume of revenue over a longer period, thereby incurring larger overheads?
Andrew Gwynne
I understand the hon. Lady’s argument, but is not the danger for, and the concern of, small convenience shops that the larger stores will open for longer and, because there will be no increase in overall trade, all that will happen is that they will suck the custom away from small traders?
Lorely Burt
I have agreed with everyone who has intervened, which is probably not very politically correct. I completely acknowledge the point that the hon. Gentleman makes, but I think that sensible economic decisions will be made by the larger retailers in non-tourist areas. Indeed, the British Retail Consortium is divided on the issue, and not just along the line dividing large and smaller shops. However, small shops in the tourism areas will reap additional revenue benefits by virtue of where they are located. I do not think that it is all doom and gloom, but I do think that the potential bonanza is likely to be realised only in the main tourist areas.
I do not think that this is the time or the place for reopening the Sunday trading debate. Many small retailers fear that the Bill will pave the way for Sunday trading by the back door without protection or consultation with the groups opposed to widening Sunday trading, such as the Keep Sunday Special campaign. Organisations such as the Association of Convenience Stores and unions representing shop workers, such as the Union of Shop Distributive and Allied Workers, found that the majority of their members were also opposed to the Bill, as has already been mentioned. Of course, there is also the fact that a large proportion of shop workers are women with caring responsibilities, so it would be wrong to make anything other than temporary changes without all those affected having a proper say.
Of course, some people will welcome the opportunity for more hours of work on a Sunday, although we have heard about the USDAW workers and there has been great discussion about how employees can be pressured against their wishes into working on a Sunday. I have sympathy for anyone who is pressured into Sunday working. However, I gently remind the House that for other industries there is no legal opt-out for Sunday working because the needs of their business dictate that some staff must be there on a Sunday. I think that we need to keep a sense of proportion when considering this temporary period.
On the two-months’ notice for shop workers, I have concerns that 22 May, the limit on when notice has to be given, is too short a period for shop workers not only to plan for, but to learn about the changes that are coming forward. It represents fewer than three weeks, so can the Minister assure me that workers will be informed in time and that any blank refusal to accede to a legitimate request from an employee will be covered by industrial relations legislation?
The Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Mr Mark Prisk)
The hon. Lady makes a specific point, and I am aware that several Members want to speak, so I shall be brief. I can give her that assurance. That is absolutely clear. Many workers like the fact that they will be able to have a shorter notice period, because they will be the ones giving notice and they recognise that it is advantageous to them, so the hon. Lady makes a sensible point and I am happy to assure her on that basis.
Lorely Burt
I am grateful to the Minister for that assurance.
Several Opposition colleagues have mentioned the Bill’s timing. A private Member’s Bill to the effect of this Bill was brought to the House just before Christmas, and the question has been put, “Why not take forward that Bill, rather than the Government imposing their own?” I imagine the answer is that proper reflection on its implications and consultation with all parties would need to take place, and it has. Will the Minister confirm that proper consideration, not any devious motive that Opposition Members might invent, was the reason for this Bill?
Mr Anderson
My understanding is that across government the norm for consultation is 13 weeks. The Bill was first brought before the House formally on 21 March, and the end date for notice is 22 May—which amounts to just over eight weeks. Surely that is not proper consultation.
Lorely Burt
The hon. Gentleman makes a reasonable point, but given the time scale, the fact that the Government have had to put forward their own consideration and think through the implications themselves, and the short and temporary nature of the legislation, a shorter period is not entirely unreasonable.
Liberal Democrats have been banging on about a sunset clause, a phrase that has been dear to us for many years, so can the Minister assure us also that the sunset clause in this Bill will ensure that the legislation is not used as a precedent for future changes to Sunday trading laws, and that proper pre-legislative scrutiny and consultation will take place if the relaxation of such laws is ever considered again?
Graham Stringer (Blackley and Broughton) (Lab)
Unusually, but not uniquely, I did not support London’s bid for the Olympic games. I said so in the House during preparations for the bid, and I advised against it. I did so for two reasons, one of which is relevant to the debate. The first reason, which is not really relevant, is that no other UK city was allowed to compete with London for the right to represent the UK in the International Olympic Committee’s competition.
The second reason is that I simply did not believe the prospectus that London put out on the impact and cost of the games. Financially, that view has turned out to be right, as the cost of the games has increased by a factor of threefold or fourfold, the sustainability criteria have been thrown out of the plans for the Olympic games and the participation that was promised has not occurred. It has been repeated, as it was repeated during the bid, however, that the economic benefits of the Olympic games will be spread throughout the country.
I do not doubt—I am certain—that there will be economic benefits from the Olympic games. They will be felt in east London, in particular, and throughout the rest of London, but no Minister—from any party when in government—whom I have ever asked about the Blake report, which the previous Government commissioned, has answered my questions on it. The report showed that, although there would be benefits, there would also be a £4.5 billion disbenefit to the rest of the United Kingdom, meaning that the benefit to London would be even greater.
One can of course go to individual businesses and find that there will be a particular benefit. Steel will be provided for the Olympic games from Bolton, for instance, and one can go around the country and find such things, but the Blake report, which was produced at a time of economic growth, stated that overall there would be a disbenefit.
No Minister has contradicted the report, because it has been kept a great secret from them by officials or by more senior Ministers who know about it, but if one takes that analysis and places against it the Sunday trading proposals in the Bill, which will increase the Sunday trading of large stores, one sees that the impact is likely to be negative on many small stores and street traders throughout the rest of England.
I received a letter 10 days ago. It is not, as it happens, from a shop that will be affected by the legislation, but it shows the difficulties that small traders are currently experiencing—similar to many convenience stores on the street corners and high streets in our towns, cities and rural areas. The man in question runs an angling shop, which, when my 12-year-old son was into fishing, I used to visit fairly regularly. He wrote to me and—excuse the language, Mr Deputy Speaker, and the inaccurate constitutional position that my constituent took—said, “Will you sack that idiot in the Cabinet Office who has made people fill up all their cars with petrol. I used to employ four people in this shop, I am having the greatest difficulty making ends meet, I might be out of business within six weeks and trade was just beginning to increase in the spring. Now everybody’s gone and spent their money on their cars and nobody is coming into my shop.”
That shows how difficult small traders are finding things at present. If we take the fact that the Olympic games are going to have a negative impact, that overall there will be less money about throughout the regions and that people are going to go into Sainsbury’s, Tesco, Asda and Morrison’s at times when they could not previously go into them and spend money, we find that the Bill is going to put small businesses out of business. They will not exist, and the Bill will have a greater negative impact on them than probably anything else at present.
That is the prime reason why I oppose the Bill, but I also urge some caution on the figures that Government Front Benchers have provided, because they are not net figures. I do not doubt that 6 million people are likely to come into the country during the Olympic games period, if that is what we are told, but the experience of many host cities is that, although people go to watch the games and to enjoy the sporting and cultural experience, many people who would otherwise visit the city—to look at the Tower of London and London’s other great tourist experiences, for example—do not do so. Los Angeles’ lowest bed occupancy in more than a decade occurred in 1984, at the time of its Olympic games.
I have been fortunate enough to go to a number of Olympics, and had Members been in Atlanta in 1996 they would not have known that the games were taking place—unless they had been in the stadiums or nearby. As many people went to those games as went to any other Olympics, but other people left the city. Even according to the impact assessment—my hon. Friend the Member for Streatham (Mr Umunna) did a very good job of showing how inadequate it is—the impact is unlikely to be as impressive as it might seem.
It has been said several times that this will not be a precedent. I would advise people to go and look at a dictionary. Whatever anyone says, it is a precedent, because it has not happened before. Hon. Members are saying—I do not disbelieve them; they are honourable people—that they will not use it as a precedent, but other people might do so. Nothing can stop that, and it will be extremely bad for small shopkeepers and small businesses.
Andrew Gwynne
My hon. Friend is right to point to the concern that this may be used as a precedent. Was he as surprised as I was that the Secretary of State, in giving an example of this, could not cite another Olympic host city but had to cite the football World cup in Germany?
Graham Stringer
I was not surprised. I suspect that this is driven by lobbying by the very big stores, which want to open permanently in the long term—
Graham Stringer
It is also, as my hon. Friend says, driven by the Treasury. Ministers would not be able to give examples from other Olympic games because this has not happened in those cases.
I have been fortunate enough to go to a number of Olympic games, and the last thing that would have occurred to me at any of those games would have been to find the local supermarket and spend time in there. That did not occur to me, and I suspect that it will not occur to the people who come to London. This is about something larger—the power of very large supermarkets to change the structure of shopping in this country.
Brandon Lewis (Great Yarmouth) (Con)
With the Olympics, we have an amazing opportunity ahead of us whereby, as many have said over the past few years, we have a shop window on the world. It is sensible that the Government are making sure that the facility is there for shops to open the doors so that people need not just look through the window but can come to spend some of their money in this country while we have them here.
When I was council leader in Great Yarmouth, it was likely that we would have an Olympic event—mountain biking—although it has now been moved and will take place in the council authority of Castle Point. At various briefings and meetings with people from Barcelona, Athens and Australia, we kept hearing about the impact in their towns, during and after the Olympics, of people returning home and talking about them. The effect of being in that shop window was absolutely phenomenal, with an increase of up to four times in the number of visitors over the subsequent four or five years. It is therefore important that the Government make sure that they do all they can to open the doors of London to every visitor in every way possible. It is logical that when visitors come over here from Europe and around the world, one of the things they will potentially think about at weekends, including Sundays, is going shopping.
Yasmin Qureshi
The hon. Gentleman talks about London, but my constituency is 230 miles away from the Olympics. This Bill will not benefit anywhere in Bolton, but it will result in certain shops forcing their employees to come in on Sundays.
Brandon Lewis
My constituency is not hosting an Olympic event and is more than 100 miles away from London. However, as I suspect the Minister will outline, if there were to be some rule about this affecting only London or areas where there is an Olympic event, it is likely that there could be issues to do with competition law and other similar matters, apart from the hybrid Bill problem.
It is important that we open up this opportunity. Over the years, when I have spoken to people in various parts of London, they have talked about going to places such as Dubai, and particularly about the amazing shopping there. Shopping centres around the world are becoming destinations in their own right. That is why people went to Lakeside when it first opened, and then to Bluewater and to Westfield.
Mr Umunna
Does the hon. Gentleman accept that ultimately the problem that the Bill presents is that we have to counterbalance the economic issues that he has raised with the rights of others? He used Dubai as an example, but Dubai notoriously treats its workers and employees in all those shopping centres in an absolutely dreadful fashion.
Brandon Lewis
I referred to Westfield, Bluewater and Lakeside because people are making trips to shopping centres which are themselves becoming destinations. Obviously, with the Olympics, the sporting venue is central, but people will be going to events at these venues, with or without other family members, and at weekends, when they are not at those events, having Sundays available to shop gives them another opportunity to spend their money in this country at a time when I would have thought most Members would welcome that extra investment in our economy.
We must also bear in mind that we are talking about some stores potentially choosing to open for eight hours on specific days.
Mrs Moon
The hon. Gentleman is the Member for a constituency that is a small coastal resort. In my constituency, I have the resort of Porthcawl. Sunday traffic through that resort is fairly critical to the largely very small traders and shopkeepers within it. If we have this extension of Sunday trading for the large stores, are not visitors in my constituency’s coastal resort and that of the hon. Gentleman’s likely to be drawn away to the larger stores rather than spending their time enjoying our wonderful coast and perhaps spending in the ice cream parlours, cafes and small shops that are open?
Brandon Lewis
I disagree with the hon. Lady: Great Yarmouth is the second largest seaside resort in the country, and we have large stores and small independent stores. However, I understand her point—there is a risk of that. But there is also the advantage that when a visitor is in London for the Olympics, we may be able to advertise to them the fact that while they are here they are not that far away from Norfolk and the Broads, from where they can visit the seafront at Great Yarmouth and enjoy a classic English holiday.
Dr Thérèse Coffey
I have visited Great Yarmouth and it is a delightful place—just as delightful as the towns in my constituency. Does my hon. Friend agree that it would be useful for the Minister to explain why the Bill covers two Sundays when the Olympics and Paralympics are not happening—namely, 19 and 26 August, for which perhaps these arguments cannot be used?
Brandon Lewis
I am sure that the Minister will cover those details. One of the key reasons I am happy to support the Bill is that, as the Secretary of State confirmed, it is a temporary measure for the Olympics to open this shop door to the world. If it applied to a longer period beyond that, there would be an issue.
One of the unique selling points of small independent stores is their ability to have more flexible hours. My constituency is a mixture of big towns with all the big stores open 24 hours a day and small rural areas with village shops for which, over a longer period, this would be a real problem. When I talk to some of those small retailers, they say that they do not see the big stores in town and on the edge of the town as being as much competition as they might be in other areas. In their view, they offer a personalised service that is better than and different from that offered by the large stores. Equally, in some rural areas, they benefit from the fact that they are local to people who do not want to travel into the town or to out-of-town stores.
On Friday, I had a meeting with some local independent retailers in Great Yarmouth, all of whom had come to see me about their concerns about plain packaging. They are worried that that will massively affect their business, and I have sympathy with that. I asked them specifically about this issue, knowing that we were going to have this debate, and none of them had any great concern about the impact that it would have on them; in fact, quite the opposite. Their view was that it is a very good thing, on a temporary scale for the Olympics only, to have the shop door open; they understood the logic of it and were supportive of it.
We should support this Bill because it represents a clear economic opportunity for this country. If stores want to open, and if people want to work and take advantage of this opportunity, they can do so. It is not being imposed; it is a really good opportunity to say to the world, “We’re open and we’ve got some of the best shops and facilities in the world.”
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I rise to state clearly that we oppose the change in Sunday trading and that the Democratic Unionist party, of which I have the pleasure of being a member, will divide the House on the Bill if the Labour party decides not to do that.
I have always loved the Olympics. As everyone has said, that is not the issue. We are all as pleased as punch to have the Olympics here, and pleased that there will be such a big event in London. Many of us will try to make our way over here to watch the sport. When I was younger, I stayed up late to watch the winners as they were awarded the gold, silver and bronze medals. I was always proud to see the Ulster flag or the Union flag being hoisted. Many people felt pride in their hearts for the success of our Olympians.
I am not an official Olympics sponsor by any means, but I want to lay out from the beginning my opinions, which I believe reflect those of my party and of a great many people whom we represent. They are not against the Olympics or the money, but they want the best for the workers—the theme that has run through the discussion today. Perhaps some Government Members will want to speak about that, too. As was said earlier, we all knew in 2005 that the Olympics were coming, yet seven years later, this measure is nudged in at the last. Only a matter of weeks before the Olympics, we find that the Government are trying to push through legislation that will change a great many people’s working lives.
Margaret Thatcher and the comment about a nation of shopkeepers have been mentioned several times. My father and mother were part of that nation of shopkeepers. I grew up with parents who owned the local shop. When I went into business, I was a retailer to the shops and when I owned a business, it had close connections with the shops. My son has taken over that business. Three generations of my family have been involved in the retail trade and I believe that that qualifies me to say that we need Sunday as a day of rest. We will therefore oppose the legislative change to Sunday trading.
It is impossible to function well for any space of time when working a seven-day week. That is why people have the option of working only five hours on Sundays, and why the smaller retailers feel that they can take time off or shut their businesses on that day. That view is backed up by the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers, which said that the vast majority of shop workers and retailers oppose extending opening hours in England and Wales for eight Sundays from 22 July.
The Secretary of State said that he had contacted the unions. However, if we contact people and get a clear point of view, do we ignore it or do we act on it? John Hannett, USDAW general secretary, made some interesting comments:
“USDAW members want MPs to put family, sport and the Olympics first…by voting against this ill-conceived and rushed piece of legislation. The vast majority of shopworkers don’t want to work extra hours on a Sunday and they quite rightly blamed their increasingly difficult struggle to maintain a semblance of normal family on the twin demands for more flexibility and unsocial working hours. These demands also reduce the opportunity of workers and their children to participate in organised sports and leisure activities.”
As someone who has experience of trying to juggle family life with the pressure of a business—everyone in the Chamber experiences juggling family life with the pressure of work—I wholeheartedly agree with the union representatives on that matter.
Yasmin Qureshi
Does the hon. Gentleman know that 1.4 million parents already work regularly through the weekend? The Bill will simply increase the number of parents who work on Sundays.
Jim Shannon
I thank the hon. Lady for her comments, which clearly sum up an issue that many people have mentioned. We should encourage families to sit together and watch the Olympics, not force mum or dad or both into another shift at work. People who do not want to work on Sundays are increasingly being pressured to do that. With more shifts that need workers, it will soon be impossible for them to have a Sunday with their families or at their church.
David Simpson (Upper Bann) (DUP)
At the beginning of the debate, the Business Secretary gave us a figure of x million pounds that the Bill could generate. He gave the impression that it would perhaps turn round the UK economy. However, I am sure that my hon. Friend agrees that if the measure is passed, people will simply spread their shopping over a longer time, and that the net gain could be very small.
Jim Shannon
I thank my hon. Friend for making an important point. I sometimes wonder, when figures are bandied about in the Chamber, on what they are based. Where do £75 million or £185 million come from? Is the economy on the turn on the strength of the Olympics and nothing else? We hope so, but reality may be very different.
Mr Gregory Campbell
Does my hon. Friend agree that, in a series of shallow comments that the Business Secretary made, the most shallow was probably the contention that a few extra hours for eight weeks would dramatically turn around the prospects for the economy and increase employment? The idea that that could be realistic is absurd.
Jim Shannon
Some Government Members have said that the Bill is a recipe for changing the economy, but, as my hon. Friend states, it is not.
Some Members touched on religion and church worship. It is important that we do not simply touch on it and dander on about it for only 20 seconds of our contributions. For many people in this country, attending church on Sunday is important to their lives. It is important for their family life, their moral standing and for their life in the church and the standards that they maintain in their lives. That should not simply be brushed aside or briefly mentioned. Those who want to attend church—they have a right to do so—should be able to do that.
Clearly, I understand Ministers’ points. However, in the current economic climate, people are fearful about retaining their jobs and subsequently about annoying management. My hon. Friend the Member for East Londonderry (Mr Campbell) made an important point about young people who are perhaps in their first few months of work and are asked to work the extra hours on Sunday. They feel that they have been there only a wee while and they need the job, so they will sign up to the extra hours straight away, even though they do not believe that they should have to do that. The Government need to take account of that. The management may not strong arm those people per se, but there is a clear mentality that suggests that, if they do not do as asked, they will miss out on other shifts and get a black mark against their name. That is the thin edge of the wedge.
In the Budget debate a few weeks ago, there was little or no direct comment on the Chancellor’s announcement about suspending Sunday trading law. However, the hon. Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier) raised concerns that
“the move could be a trial run for a permanent change in the law.”—[Official Report, 21 March 2012; Vol. 542, c. 860.]
The Bishop of Chichester said in the House of Lords that he was concerned that removing all restrictions for eight weeks
“sounds suspiciously like a stalking horse for the wider deregulation for which some large retailers have been campaigning for a long time.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 22 March 2012; Vol. 736, c. 1042.]
Not to be outdone, the Chancellor confirmed that the suspension would be a temporary measure, but added that the Treasury could “learn lessons” from the experiment. What lessons will the Treasury learn?
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
The point about whether the Bill is a Trojan horse has been mentioned several times. Our fears are compounded by quotes that appeared in The Sunday Telegraph, in which a senior Whitehall source was quoted as saying that
“the Treasury believes the move would provide evidence of the economic benefits of a permanent relaxation of Sunday trading laws”.
The House can understand where the fears come from because officials were giving such briefings. My hon. Friend is therefore right to highlight that.
Jim Shannon
I thank my right hon. Friend for those comments. It is an underlying issue for us all. We feel that the Bill is the thin edge of the wedge. It is little wonder that it has provoked many people outside the House, who feel that a permanent deregulation of Sunday trading is just around the corner.
Mr Prisk
We have had a Trojan horse and stalking horse—the debate is in danger of becoming too equine—but as the Secretary of State has said, and as I said in the debate on the allocation of time motion, we have no intention of making the measure permanent and have included a sunset regulation. I understand the concern that many hon. Members have expressed, but we want to make that clear. I hope that will give the hon. Gentleman some comfort, whatever equine form he intends to allude to next.
Jim Shannon
I am reminded of a comment I made last week: if it smells like a horse and looks like a horse, we do not want it to become a donkey.
Mrs Moon
We have heard the reassurance from the Government that there is no stalking horse and that no precedent is set by the measure. I spoke to a young student at the weekend who is working in a local supermarket to earn the money to pay for his university tuition fees. I asked him about the Bill, and his response was: “We were promised no rise in tuition fees. How much do you trust these offers and promises?” What does the hon. Gentleman suggest I say to that young man?
Jim Shannon
Obviously, it is not for me to say—perhaps the Minister can comment on that—but we all know what we feel in our hearts, which is clearly the issue.
Last year, two listening exercises were held on whether to repeal the current restrictions on Sunday trading. The results showed that the current settlement was proportionate and that there was no real appetite to change the law. In fact, a lot of people are opposed to any change or relaxation. The hon. Member for Blaydon (Mr Anderson) commented on this earlier, but an USDAW survey of 10,000 shop workers, which is a significant number, clearly illustrates their opinion. Seventy-seven per cent. oppose longer opening on Sundays during the Olympics; only 12% support it, but we are pushing ahead with legislative change. Forty-eight per cent. of staff are already under pressure to work on Sundays when they do not want to do it to start with, and 71% of shop workers believe that longer Sunday opening will lead to more pressure on them to work on Sundays against their will, which is the very issue described by my right hon. Friend the Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds), which many hon. Members feel is important.
Those figures could not be clearer. What is the point of asking people and then ignoring their response? There is no point. The democratic process means that we should listen to the opinions of our constituents and represent the majority of them in the House. It would be remiss of all hon. Members not to aim to do so. The question is: if we do not allow the extra hours of trading, will retailers’ Sunday opening hours harm our reputation and ability to host the games? The answer is no, and there is no evidence to say otherwise.
Visitors will still be able to eat in a plethora of first-class restaurants and enjoy the ambiance of typical English pubs, and purchase any necessaries in the many garages that are now almost like small supermarkets. Why do we need the big stores for that? Visitors can still go to a Sunday market or enjoy an evening at the cinema or concerts. Will their view of the UK be tainted by the fact that some stores open for only a few hours one day a week? Again, the answer is no. None of that would detract from people enjoying what we have to offer or stop people returning and enjoying the long and rich British history of which we are all proud to be part.
We can be assured that people will enjoy their visit not because our supermarkets are open seven days a week, but because they are greeted with a smile in the streets, or because they see beautiful towns and thrive on our legendary hospitality in this country. The length of time that shops are open is irrelevant, and we should not change Sunday trading laws.
Any Olympian will say that the body needs rest from training. If they push too hard, they will see no benefit, but will suffer breakdown and injury. Our business people work hard and deserve their few hours off at the weekend. To take that away will only cause harm and injury to our families and individuals across the country, and I cannot support that.
The Prime Minister has said that we need to emphasise our Christianity and go back to being that Christian country that we were once famed as being. I wish that was true and I wish the evidence meant I could say, “Yes, that is exactly right,” but tonight there is a one-line Whip for Opposition Members and a three-line Whip for Government Members. Is it true, as the Prime Minister has said, that we must emphasise our Christianity? The proof of the pudding is in the eating, and we will see what happens when it comes to the vote later on. That being the case, enabling people to enjoy their family life, their attendance at church and the inspiration of their preachers, and their day of rest, is a firm foundation, and to take it away is to erode that foundation, which I wish to see retained. I believe many Members on both sides of the Chamber wish it to be retained.
I oppose the relaxation of Sunday trading legislation and urge hon. Members to consider more than profit and loss, and more than the ledger book, when casting their votes tonight.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
Out of respect for the number of right hon. and hon. Members who wish to take part in tonight’s debate, I will try to keep my comments short. I congratulate the Government and welcome the introduction of the Bill, because I believe it represents a common-sense solution at a time when the eyes of the world are upon us.
Some in the House may remember that I previously proposed amending Sunday trading laws during the Olympics by introducing a ten-minute rule Bill before the summer recess, so it will come as no surprise that I am entirely supportive of this measure. People will find unacceptable the idea of visitors from all over the world finding Britain shutting up shop at 4 pm or 5 pm on a Sunday in a tough economic climate.
Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)
Which countries have longer opening on Sundays than ours?
Mark Menzies
The USA is one example. An hon. Member asked whether other countries that have held the Olympic games amended Sunday trading laws, but many did not have to amend their laws. Sunday trading legislation in Scotland is very lax—people in Scotland can shop at 10 o’clock at night if they so wish—so saying that the proposed change in the law in England will be somehow draconian is wrong.
My Sunday Trading (Amendment) Bill had a very clear purpose. The aim was, for the six weeks of the Olympics and Paralympics, to facilitate visitors shopping in and around London and other games venues to allow them to get the most from the event. It was driven by a couple of things. First, I spoke to the Westfield shopping centre, which is right next to the main Olympic park. Westfield had concerns about the sheer volume of people who would be packed in because of the concentrated six-hour Sunday shopping period. Allowing it to flex its trading pattern would help to facilitate the movements of the vast numbers who are shopping while huge numbers are also coming in and going out of Olympic venues.
The second key driver was that three out of the four official Olympic trading venues on the Olympic site were too big to open for more than six hours on a Sunday. We would therefore have had the crazy anomaly of people travelling from all hon. Members’ constituencies to the closing ceremony or the men’s 100 metres final and coming out of the main stadium to get their merchandise and finding that the shops had shut. The practicalities did not make sense. Those were some of the key drivers behind my ten-minute rule Bill.
Before entering this place, I spent 15 years in retail, so I do not lack an understanding of the sector or the pressures on shop workers. Many right hon. and hon. Members, particularly Opposition Members, have made valid points about the pressures on people in trying to maintain a home-life balance and so on—I respect them for doing so—but the Minister has made it clear, as I did in my Bill, that existing shop worker rights should not only be protected but enhanced to ensure that people are not compelled or pressurised to work longer.
The temporary relaxation of Sunday trading will come at a time when students, in particular, will be desperate for additional shifts. When I worked in stores and was trying to fill up my rota, students were always desperate for additional shifts, particularly on Sundays, because they were an awful lot easier to fit into their normal routine. Most retailers in this country, particularly larger ones, will proceed responsibly, because they will not want to upset work force relations. Unions such as USDAW have a role to play. They will be working on behalf of their workers, and if there is any hint or suggestion that people are being forced or compelled, they will not be shy—and neither will Members who have spoken tonight—in naming and shaming retailers who are going against good practice. That is one of the things that gives me great reassurance. I do not, therefore, approach the Bill with great fear or concern. People in general, and particularly those who represent shop workers, will not be shy in ensuring that the Bill is not used and abused.
Much of the policy is built on the premise that during the Olympics, there will be a retail boom—a bonanza in which millions of pounds are sloshing about—but the opposite could be true. People are creatures of habit and tend to do the same thing, but they might not. Instead of sticking to their normal shopping routine, they might stay at home to watch the men’s 100 metre final, the javelin, Tom Daley in the diving or whatever. If we see such behaviour, retail sales, rather then being maintained or boosted, might fall off a cliff. By allowing retailers to flex their trading hours, the Bill gives people the opportunity to do their shopping at an alternative time, rather than not do it at all. Although that might be less the case with food shopping—supermarkets might get off lightly—non-food retailers, particularly clothing retailers, could be hit. The Bill is a common-sense, practical solution to help address that situation.
I want to turn to small stores. Most people do not seek out small stores, particularly small independent stores on the high street. It is often the big boys—Marks & Spencer, Selfridges, Harvey Nichols and so on—that drive people into their town and city centres. As a result, they will often then visit the small independents. If people think that the high street is not open on a Sunday, they will be less likely to visit, but if they know that M&S and other big multiples are open, they might make the effort, and as a result some of the small independents might benefit from increased footfall. It is beholden on town centre managers and big retailers up and down the land to think sensitively about how they market and promote their extended opening hours and help to ensure that small retailers benefit as a result.
It would be completely wrong to think that multiples will have a uniform opening strategy across the country. I am pretty sure that big retailers in London and out-of-town shopping centres will open on a Sunday, but they will do so on a case-by-case basis. Retailers are commercial operations, and if they do not think that opening longer on Sundays will produce the necessary sales uplift to the meet the increased overheads and staff costs, they will not open. Some are concerned that this will happen across the country and that everyone will be hard hit, but we do not know that yet. We have to wait and see what commercial decisions retailers take.
The Government have put forward a common-sense solution. The sunset clause gives me the reassurance to vote for the Bill tonight. It provides protection for the work force and recognises that they have to be protected. Having listened to the powerful contributions from Opposition Members, I know that they will not be shy in holding retailers to account, if there is any deviation. This summer represents an outstanding opportunity for the UK, and I want retailers and people who want additional shifts to benefit from it. I want us to get on with this and make it something well worth doing.
Valerie Vaz (Walsall South) (Lab)
It is always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Fylde (Mark Menzies), even though I oppose the majority of what he said.
I rise to oppose the Bill, and I will vote against it on three main grounds. The first is to do with how it affects working people in the retail trade. Many Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Streatham (Mr Umunna), said that they used to work in a shop, and so did I, along with my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), in my first job. We started our working lives on Saturdays and in the holidays in Dickins and Jones in Richmond, so we know what it is like. The hon. Member for Fylde said that students were desperate to get the extra work, and yes, they are. However, the point is that because they are single, they do not have families to go home to—they do not have to juggle jobs with other things, as women have to—which is why they want the extra work.
Many hon. Members have mentioned the fact that USDAW, which is the fastest growing union—one wonders why—has conducted a poll of 20,000 people, 78% of whom were against Sunday trading. However, a poll that I have seen shows almost the same thing, and it was conducted this year. It was a poll of 10,000 workers, 77% of whom said that they were opposed. That poll, of 10,000 people, surveyed more people than do the polls taken by some of the papers on who will be the next Prime Minister. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) mentioned that 71% of workers believe that the Bill will erode their rights not to have to work. Many people—71%—believe that longer Sunday trading will lead to more pressure on them to work. Members should know that we already have evidence from our constituencies—I have had evidence in my constituency—of pressure being put on people to work on Boxing day. That pressure already exists, and I have written to many of the big retailers, in particular Asda, which was the store concerned in that case.
Secondly, the Association of Convenience Stores has said that its members are against the proposal. Lots of Members have mentioned that, but the ACS has put a figure on how much the eight weeks will affect its members, and that figure is £480 million. One has to worry about that, because the ACS has also said that some of the smaller shops will close, with jobs having to be lost. We are talking about convenience stores, which will be there long after the Olympics have gone, and we should take account of their view.
Thirdly, over 60% of the retail work force are female, and whatever anyone says, we tend to have to juggle work and our families the majority of the time. Therefore, the proposals that the Government have put before us will affect families no matter what Ministers say.
Alison Seabeck
My hon. Friend makes an important point about the bulk of the workers being female. We should also bear in mind that if shops are opening longer hours on Sunday, those workers will be subject to Sunday services, which means that getting to and from work by public transport will undoubtedly take them a lot longer, thereby taking a much bigger chunk out of their day.
Valerie Vaz
My hon. Friend makes an important point, because the people who travel on the buses are mostly women.
All those who do other things on Sundays—my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) mentioned that people like to go and visit places of interest—will be prevented from doing so. The Minister mentioned that he was of Christian faith, and it is a basic point, but there will also be people who want to worship or go to church. Many people find that the early evening Sunday mass sets them up for the week, yet families will be prevented from going.
Mr Prisk
The hon. Lady says that families will be prevented. However, we made it clear—this is something that, as the Minister responsible, I wanted to make absolutely clear when I was asked to take the Bill on—that there will be no change to the statutory rights of the workers. We wanted to ensure that the notice procedure was adjusted so that people could opt out when they wanted to, but beyond that there is no change in the statutory rights. I hope that the hon. Lady will appreciate that that is one thing we have tried to do; indeed, I was grateful to the official Opposition for working with us to try to achieve it.
Valerie Vaz
I thank the Minister for that intervention. I do not know whether he has ever been a worker right at the bottom of the pile, but it is very difficult for such people to refuse when an employer tells them to do something. Many people, myself included, have been prevented from getting promotion because they were not flexible enough. People who work in shops also have to think about that, because a refusal to work on Sundays could be used against them.
I have a number of questions for the Minister. Has he had any discussions with the police about the extra numbers who will have to be on duty as a result of the crimes that could take place in shops during the longer opening hours? Secondly, what evidence led him to say that the Bill was needed? Was there a special adviser, a point man, whose job was to liaise with Westfield, for example? Thirdly, is the Minister aware of a GfK/NOP poll conducted in 2010 that showed that 89% of people were against further liberalisation of Sunday trading? The workers are against the Bill, small businesses are against it, and it is against family values. None of those people wants it, and the majority of the British people will gain no benefit from it. I urge Members to vote against the Bill.
Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)
It is a cause for real celebration that our country is hosting the Olympics and Paralympics this year, but I have grave concerns that the Bill will be pointed to as a precedent for further deregulation of Sunday trading by others who are not in this place today, some time in the future, notwithstanding what I am sure are the entirely honourable assurances to the contrary from Ministers. I understand the reasons for the Government bringing forward the Bill, but as a matter of conscience, I cannot let the debate pass without registering my concerns about its potential impact and warning against any permanent deregulation.
Sunday is still a day on which many people in this country can come together with family and friends to wind down, to exercise, to have a different kind of day or, most importantly, to recharge our batteries. That is an essential component of our health and well-being, individually, relationally and as a nation. We erode it further at our peril. Will further deregulation actually create any increase in productivity? I am reminded of the old adage that work expands to fill the time allotted. The same could be said of shopping, but does anyone really win?
It is interesting to note that there are businesses that choose to stay closed on Sundays, even though they could open for a number of hours, and that those businesses flourish. One example is a motor dealership in Cheshire run by Mark Mitchell. Anyone who goes there on a Sunday will find it closed, and a sign on the door that reads:
“On Sundays our staff are at home with their families.”
Mark Mitchell’s business has been one of the most consistently high-performing car dealerships among its peers for years.
My concerns about the welfare impacts of the legislation are shared by many others. I shall quote just a few of them. The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children makes the point that parents need time with their children. It states:
“Spending time with children is important to their development and studies show that children’s development is best encouraged by parents spending time with them, providing them with emotional support, giving everyday assistance and monitoring their behaviour and discipline. Working during weekends when children are at home for longer means missing out on their development and socialisation.”
In 2006, a cross-party group of MPs and peers chaired by Lord Anderson found that the then Department of Trade and Industry had
“failed to pay sufficient attention to the impact that extended Sunday work could have on parents and the time they have with their children, on juvenile anti-social behaviour and the resultant increase in expenditure by local authorities and the effects of a poor work-life balance on health.”
Research by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation found that parents of both sexes—and their children—disliked weekend working, especially on Sundays, yet
“one-quarter of mothers and just under one-third of fathers worked once a month or more on Sundays”.
Do we want more? Do we need more? Is the cost in health and well-being worth paying?
Research conducted by the university of London showed that those parents in lower socio-economic groups were more likely to say they had no option about working at atypical times and hours, and that there was no scope to negotiate more flexible arrangements. This is in comparison with parents in professional jobs, who were more likely to say their working arrangements were chosen to suit their career aspirations. For this reason, it is clear that working on Sunday without any choice disproportionately affects lower socio-economic and disadvantaged groups.
Children are not the only ones who might need time with their families. Those with other dependants, such as elderly, disabled or terminally ill relatives might have fewer options for alternative care, and their needs are more unpredictable than those of children. These workers need greater flexibility, so enforced longer weekend working hours could create substantial difficulties for carers.
The wider community, not just families, benefit from Sundays as we now enjoy them. For many people of faith, Sunday has a special significance. Religious freedoms are important. As a Christian, I believe that our minds and bodies were created to function best when incorporated into our week is a day when we do not have to function at full tilt. Some would call it a Sabbath rest. I do. That is something that we ignore individually and as a nation at our peril, paying the price in increased stress, weakened family ties and many other ways. We are asking our children to pay that price, too. Individual and corporate productivity actually declines rather than increases, and the very thing we have fruitlessly chased is lost at the price of many other values and principles of far greater worth. I sincerely hope that this is not the Olympic legacy that this Bill creates.
Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)
The Olympic games have had an adverse impact on my constituency. For example, we have seen a number of miners’ welfare charities suffer. They are usually funded by different revenue streams, but some of those have focused their finances on the Olympic games here in London. The Olympic games were heralded as providing a beacon of employment for people throughout the country, but that has not happened in my constituency, where very few people, if any, have benefited from any of the tenders for various forms of employment at the Olympic village.
That said, it is important to set out my wholehearted support for the Olympics and Paralympics. I am optimistic about them and I dearly hope that they will be a huge success. It has been suggested that this is a once-in-a-lifetime sporting occasion, so that is great—we should all work together to make sure that it succeeds. The original bid was led by the last Labour Government and it was carried forward in a spirit of cross-party collaboration. It was unifying and collegiate, and it sought to bring on board the widest range of organisations to create a lasting legacy for Britain—something of which we could all be proud. That is why the way in which these proposals have been handled—or, rather, mishandled—by Ministers is so disappointing.
The issue of Sunday trading has always been a divisive issue, one that splits many communities. Whether it be the Keep Sunday Special group, the trade unions, Church groups or community groups, the issue has proved truly divisive. It on behalf of those people and groups that I would like to speak, so I shall put their views to the House tonight.
It is puzzling that this issue is coming before us today, when the games are just three months ahead of us. It has been asked why this issue was not dealt with last year when the London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games (Amendment) Bill was considered. Instead, we are being asked to make a last-minute judgment without any proper consideration of the consequences or of the impact on workers, small businesses and other affected groups. Ministers have made no effort to hold proper consultations. On the contrary, we have experienced their usual high-handed antics and failure to have any regard for the people on whom their policies will have an impact.
I am seriously concerned about the impact on shop workers, and on employment rights in the workplace. The last-minute attempt to push through these changes clearly does not allow enough time for workers to be informed of the need to exempt themselves if they do not wish to work on Sundays during the Olympics. The Secretary of State said earlier that employers were not even obliged to inform employees of that requirement, and I believe that a wide range of them will be entirely unaware of the provisions in the Bill.
Many Members have mentioned USDAW’s poll of more than 20,000 members, which revealed that 51% of shop workers were routinely put under pressure to work on Sundays when they did not want to do so, while 73% believed that the pressure on them to work on Sundays against their will would increase as a result of the extended working hours during the Olympics. Shop workers who already work unsocial hours during the week, and who rely on Sunday’s limited trading hours to spend time with their families, fear that they will lose that precious time. The views of those workers should have been of paramount importance, but the Government should at least have listened to them. The poll also revealed that 78% of shop workers opposed longer opening on Sundays during the Olympics, and that only 11% supported it.
Mr Anderson
Does this not conform to a pattern? Just as throughout the debate on the Health and Social Care Bill the Government consistently ignored the voice of the people we ask to deliver our health services, they are now ignoring the voice of the people who work to keep our retail services going. What they are doing now is completely and utterly in line with what they do in other contexts. They are so out of touch that it is untrue.
Ian Lavery
I could not agree more with my hon. Friend.
I am sure that not just my constituents but those of every other Member have expressed concern about the legislation that is being pushed through at this late stage. There are many reasons for their concern, all of them valid. First, why should ordinary people not have the same opportunity to sit and watch the fantastic Olympic games on a Sunday afternoon? The answer is “Because they are shop workers.” Those workers fear that pressure will be put on them to work on more Sundays and for longer hours during the games, and that the Bill will set a precedent for the introduction of weekday hours on Sundays which would not be reversed after the Olympics.
I have asked a number of questions today about the voluntary aspect of Sunday working. If, at a time when 22.2 people are after each jobcentre vacancy, someone who works in a shop in Wansbeck says to the manager, “I don’t want to work on Sundays”, the manager is unlikely to say, “That’s fine: we understand. Do you want to watch the triathlon?” What he will probably say is, “There are plenty of people out there who are willing to work on Sundays. Bear that in mind, and come back tomorrow to give me your views.” Any Member who believes for one minute that the Sunday working will be voluntary is living in cloud cuckoo land. If it is as easy as that, why did we not ask employees to opt into working on Sundays during the Olympics, rather than asking them to opt out? Many shop workers are forced to work on Sundays now, in spite of the Sunday opt-out rules. Like other people, they want to be able to choose how they spend their Sundays. The shorter trading and working hours on Sundays often mean Sunday is the only day they can spend time with their families. In spite of the pressure that is put on a significant minority of staff, most can still choose whether to work on Sundays, allowing them the option to spend time with their children or other family members on that day, or to attend religious worship. They know that if trading hours are extended, they will be forced to work on Sundays.
Many Members have given examples of workers not having a choice about whether to work on Sundays. Pressure is already exerted on many workers to change their hours and work on Sundays, in spite of the current opt-out right. Many shop workers are on flexible contracts that require them to work on any five days out of seven. A lot of companies would not employ someone who did not agree to work on Sundays. There are huge difficulties, therefore.
The impact on family life has been well aired tonight. The precious time families have together could be disrupted for two, or even three, months. Extending the Sunday opening times would have a devastating effect on staff, especially those with children. Many Members have pointed out that it is the only time that many people can spend with their families, because of school and other commitments including employment commitments, in the week. One lady said that she gets to spend only six hours a week with her children. Another commented that extending Sunday hours
“would truly destroy what little home life we have left.”
Someone else said:
“I have tried to organise working hours with kids and I believe Sundays to be a family day. Unfortunately I have difficulty getting weekend days off to spend time with my kids as they are at school Mon-Fri”—
as are most kids! Shop workers would welcome shorter working hours.
Chris Ruane (Vale of Clwyd) (Lab)
A few weeks ago, I tabled a parliamentary question on the issue of the amount of time parents and children get to spend together. The answer is that it has increased dramatically. Society has made gains in this regard. In 1975, mothers and children spent between eight and 21 minutes per day together. That had increased to between 51 and 86 minutes per day in 2000. That is progress. If these proposals are introduced and become permanent, we will regress.
Ian Lavery
I fully agree, and I was not aware of those statistics.
Many staff find it difficult to work on Sundays because of practical problems, such as lack of transport due to Sunday bus and train services. Where I live, there are very few transport facilities in any case. We in south-east Northumberland have not even got a train service.
Retail staff also experience seemingly endless demands for flexibility in their working hours. They know that if stores open for longer on Sundays, existing trade will shift from other times of the week and staff will be required to work more hours on Sundays and fewer at other times, such as weekdays, when it may be easier and more family-friendly for them to be at work. Based on the evidence of current widespread practices in retail, we know that if shops open for longer on Sundays, additional staff will not be taken on, but, instead, current employees will be forced to shift more of their working hours from weekdays to Sundays.
Is it not in everyone’s best interests to support the Opposition amendments? I hope the whole House agrees that the hard-working people in this country, and in particular those in the retail sector, are crucial to the success of the Olympic and Paralympic games—something we all crave for. No one here hopes that the games will not be a tremendous success. We want the games to be the envy of the world, but why have the Government not listened? Is it that ordinary people working in shops do not count? Is it that the Government are simply out of touch, or that they simply do not care?
There have been many guarantees. People have said that the Bill should not be seen as a test case for the future relaxation of the laws—“a Trojan horse”, as it has been described. The Minister and the Secretary of State have said that it will definitely not be; the Secretary of State was adamant that under his brief no such precedent would be set. However, as has been said, if the Bill goes ahead it will be a precedent.
The fact is that we have all experienced what the coalition Government have done in the name of the best interests of the nation, the national interest—“We have come together as a coalition in the national interest and we have to make difficult decisions.” We have seen the decisions on VAT and tuition fees. I tell you now, Madam Deputy Speaker, that not many people out there trust a single word that the Liberal Democrats say; if they and the rest of the coalition are telling people out there to believe them, they have a hard job on their hands. We should listen to hard-working ordinary people, who should be allowed the same choices as everyone else during the fantastic period of the Olympics.
Richard Drax (South Dorset) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Wansbeck (Ian Lavery); I agree with his general thrust, although not with everything that he said.
I must declare an interest in the Olympics, as the sailing games, to be hosted in Weymouth and Portland, are in my constituency. We are very proud of that. With that in mind, I must speak up for my local shops and constituents—the very lifeblood of a coastal seat such as mine. They feel threatened by the temporary liberalisation of the Sunday trading laws for eight weeks this summer. Those eight weeks—games or no games—are the eight weeks on which convenience stores in holiday destinations such as South Dorset depend for most of the year’s profit. When the large retailers close for the day, the smaller ones continue to work flat out.
Michael and Barbara Clements, who run the local SPAR shop in Weymouth, tell me that their busiest time is between 4 pm and 9 pm on Sundays. Sensitive to seasonal demand, their takings increase significantly in summer. Mr and Mrs Clements tell me that normally they would make one third of their annual income during the summer—the precise period when Sunday trading restrictions are to be lifted. As a result, they will lose out, which strikes them as unfair and unnecessary—unfair because they cannot possibly compete against the giant multiples, and unnecessary because the Olympic and Paralympic games will take place at a few well publicised sites around the country.
Although one could conceivably make an argument for opening shops in the immediate vicinity of the Olympic village and sites, the need to open every large shop in the country is not overwhelmingly apparent, and such a move is not supported by the majority of those who work in them. As a spokesman for the shop workers’ union said, the Olympics is not a festival of retail and shopping is not an Olympic sport.
The statistics cited by the hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) seem to be similar to the ones in my speech, so perhaps she borrowed them. The Association of Convenience Stores estimates that the temporary suspension will cost small shops £480 million over those eight Sundays—a not inconsiderable sum. That is an average of £1,500 per store per Sunday for eight weeks. Most importantly, the Clements and many other small shop owners are anxious to ensure that the Bill is not the thin end of the wedge. They would like some form of guarantee that, having experimented with the idea once, the Government will not revisit it. I hope that the Chancellor, wherever he is, is listening. To that end, they welcome the sunset clause, which will repeal the eight-week liberalisation of Sunday trading, without any further debate, on 9 September. That is to be welcomed. Like the Clements and many others in South Dorset, I hope that this will be an end to it.
Much of the research used to underpin this very rushed Bill is left over from earlier attempts to liberalise Sunday trading laws, but there is genuinely no demand for this move. Again I refer to what the hon. Member for Walsall South said when I talk about another of the statistics I have here. We should remember that in the poll to which she referred 89% of the public were opposed to further liberalisation of Sunday trading.
Finally, although we welcome the Olympics with open arms, it is important that when the games are gone, the communities that hosted them are left with desirable legacies only—the ones we were promised. [Interruption.] Bless you. [Interruption.] My hon. Friend the Member for Solihull (Lorely Burt) has been sneezing, and I hope she gets better. The legacies we were promised were: more housing; faster broadband; better roads; and communications and services. We do not want damaging new laws that hurt precisely the small businesses we have pledged to support and encourage. Lest we forget, in the hurly-burly of a coalition Government—a sneezing Government— those are our core voters; they are the very fabric and soul of the community. We must support them. I shall end by saying that I will support the Government tonight on the relaxation of the provisions in law for this period only, but when they come back before the House, as they will have to do, I shall not be supporting that move.
Rosie Cooper (West Lancashire) (Lab)
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for allowing me to contribute to the debate. May I begin by telling the House that I have been a member of the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers—that great campaigning union on behalf of shop workers and their families—for more than 30 years? For much of that time, I was in the buying division of Littlewoods.
I wish to make it clear at the outset that we all want the Olympics and Paralympics to be a great success, but this Bill is a sledgehammer that is being used to crack a nut and it is a step too far. I wonder whether it was the realisation that the five Olympic stores would be caught by the existing Sunday trading regulations that initiated the need for the Bill. We have ended up with a Bill that will allow a complete suspension of Sunday trading regulations across the whole of the UK, and I am not assured—not one bit assured—that the Bill is not a prelude to rolling back the existing Sunday trading regulations, as it allows a free-for-all and abandons the principles underpinning those regulations. To add to that threat, we have heard the Chancellor stating that the Treasury could “learn lessons” from this experiment.
We are told that the Bill will create more jobs and economic growth. Indeed, we may see a small increase in the number of temporary jobs and increased spending for eight weeks, but these are not permanent jobs and this will not be sustained economic growth. I get a sense that the Government desperately hope that the Olympics will provide an eight-week boost to the economy, such as their policies are currently holding back.
What we need is a strategy and policies to ensure job creation and economic growth for 52 weeks of the year, and not just an eight-week hope. I am sorry to disagree with the hon. Member for Fylde (Mark Menzies), who is not in his place, but I am not persuaded that students will rescue extended Sunday trading hours during the Olympics, because this will be forced on some shop workers and hard-pressed families.
A cost-benefit analysis carried out by the Department of Trade and Industry in 2006 concluded that extending the hours of Sunday trading would not result in any increase in retail sales or employment. People visiting the United Kingdom for the Olympics will be able to shop for an incredible 150 hours during the week, from Monday to Saturday. We have very extensive and relaxed shopping hours, especially compared with some European countries. On top of that, we must not forget that on Sundays, shops can open for trading for six hours.
Many small businesses rely on Sunday trading, as it is the only competitive advantage that they can secure over the large chain stores. They rely on the existing regulations to maximise their income; that enables them to stay open and keep providing jobs for local people. Eight weeks’ deregulation could have an enormous impact on those small businesses. We often hear the Government say that small businesses are vital to local economies and are the backbone of the British economy. The same much-vaunted small businesses that the Conservatives praised in opposition now appear to be collateral damage.
Finally and most importantly, we must consider the impact of deregulation on shop workers. As we have heard many times in this debate, the USDAW survey found that the majority of shop workers oppose the Bill. The figures cannot be ignored. Sunday is a day of collective rest and worship—a day for families to spend together. In our Christian country, Sundays are special. The message that the Government are sending is that not all Sundays are special—just some of them. How long will it be before none of them is? This is a very slippery slope. I have heard Ministers’ assurances, but the public judge us on what we do, not on what is said, and what we are doing is smashing through Sunday trading regulations. People will believe that this is a cynical attempt to desensitise the issue.
Retail workers and their families already bear the burden of existing opening hours for shops. People are working different shifts and hours, which makes it hard to have a good work-life balance and to be home at the same time as the rest of the family. That is why Sunday trading restrictions have always been important for retail workers. They, too, should have an opportunity to enjoy the Olympics. If the Government want shops to open longer on Sundays, perhaps they should be prepared to get behind those tills on a Sunday. Only when they do so will they have a sense of what they are expecting of our retail workers. Sadly, this is yet another example of how out of touch with ordinary families the Government are. Please do not tell us that we are all in this together—we are obviously not.
I urge all hon. Members to oppose the Bill as a statement of support for shop workers and their families, who will be asked to give up even more of their family time during the Olympics and Paralympics if the Bill is passed, and as a statement of support for small businesses that rely for their income on Sunday trading at a time when they are not in direct competition with major chain stores.
Mr David Anderson (Blaydon) (Lab)
There is an old saying that in politics timing is everything, but as we keep on being blessed by the Budget that keeps giving, even that old adage is being tested. We have spoken tonight about the retail review and the red tape review, and the hon. Member for Fylde (Mark Menzies) told us about his private Member’s Bill, which was brought forward before the last summer recess. All of a sudden, at the last minute, there has been a great rush to move things forward. Why the rush? We have known about the Olympics since 6 July 2005, and were planning for it long before then. Lots of public money and time have been spent, and people have been working together in lots of private business partnerships. This should have been planned properly.
The truth is that at no point before 21 March this year did anyone seriously suggest that workers needed to work extra hours on a Sunday. In case anyone needs reminding, 21 March was day one of the Chancellor’s year zero. The Chancellor—the man with two names—decided that it must be so. This is his answer to the double-dip recession, the plan A for growth: we will work our way out of the mess that he has got us into. What is his idea? “Let’s make shop workers work longer hours on a Sunday.” What a farce.
One of the saddest things about this farce is that decent Front-Benchers in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills have been sidelined. We have seen the sad spectacle of the Member whom we used to know as the sage of Twickenham reduced to being the stooge of Westminster, the stooge of George Osborne.
This whole thing has been compounded by the abuse of fast-track emergency legislation. Why? Are we at war? No, although I must say I thought we were going to talk about the war when the Secretary of State mentioned Germany. I am quite happy to have a discussion with the trade unions about Sunday opening hours if the Secretary of State is happy to have a word with the trade unions about whether we should have German-style rights at work. They would be very interested in having that debate. Are we going to be hit by a natural disaster? I do not think so. Does the nation face a constitutional crisis? Well, yes, we do, but no one would think so if they had been in the Chamber earlier when the Prime Minister brushed aside the calamity that is his handling of the Murdoch saga.
The truth is that the Bill is a fig leaf for the failure of the coalition’s excuse for an economic strategy. It is an abuse of the House and of the nation that emergency-style legislation is being used in this way. The Secretary of State says that it applies to only eight Sundays. I remind him that that is a whole summer to young kids. That is the time when those kids will be looking forward to spending the best quality time of the year with their parents, and that is going to be stolen from the children of this country.
But there is another issue about timing and another example that needs to be raised in the debate. What could be a more fitting time to talk about some of the hardest working and lowest paid people in our country than the day after The Sunday Times rich list was published— 1,000 people who between them own £414 billion? Think about it. If they a spent £1 million a day on average for the next year, they would still be left with £48 million before they evaded tax and before they claimed any interest. A nice little earner for them which has seen them have an average 4.7% increase in their bank balances, while ordinary men and women face pay freezes, pension contribution rises and the dole queue.
I do not suppose that many of those who work at Asda, Morrison’s or Sainsbury’s will be writing out the cheque this week to send their son to Charterhouse, where it costs £30,530 a year, so that they can emulate our wonderful Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. Clearly, that was money well spent by his parents. No, this is just another example of the arrogance of the people who rule this country, and their genuine ignorance of the lives of ordinary men and women. My hon. Friend the Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper) suggested asking some of those on the Government Front Bench and their colleagues to go and work on one of those Sundays. Let me make a suggestion. Why do they not do it on the second Sunday in August? Instead of going out shooting grouse, let the people from my constituency shoot the grouse while they go and serve in the stores.
Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)
My hon. Friend is making a great speech and I agree with everything he says about social justice, but on the issue of culture, media and sport, does he not think it is pathetic if those on the Government Benches think that when people come from all over the world to this country, all they want to do is go shopping and not see the marvellous buildings, paintings, landscape and all the other things that this country has to offer?
Mr Anderson
Absolutely right. My hon. Friend lives in one of the areas of our country which has some of the most beautiful countryside and some of the most important cultural resources. She knows exactly what she is talking about. People coming to visit this country can shop for at least 150 hours a week. They do not need any more than what they have already got.
The hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) was only half-right last week when she slammed the posh Tory boys for not knowing the price of milk. The fact that they do not even care that they do not know the price of milk is the real insult to the people whose job it is to buy and sell milk. The voice of those people has been heard in the Chamber today and it is vital that we hear their pleas for sanity. It is vital that we listen to their concerns about the impact on their family lives. It is vital that we should not deprive them of the chance to enjoy the greatest sporting event in the history of our nation. It is vital that we do not make them pay more for the dubious privilege of working the most unsociable hours of the week.
A number of Members have mentioned the lack of public transport on Sundays, which means that many people will have to use taxis, and because it is a Sunday they will have to pay the premium rate. Another point that has been raised consistently by USDAW members is the cost of child care at the weekend—if people can get it at all. Again, the Government are hitting women and children in this country. It is vital that we do not allow this act of callous disregard to become the thin end of the wedge that so many Members right across the House are worried about tonight.
There is another issue that this ludicrous timetabling ignores. If the Bill goes through tonight and what the Minister has said about the opt-out is right, which means that people can tell their employers, “I do not want to work on these Sundays”, we will see the influx of a huge number of temporary workers into the workplace in a very short space of time, and I have real worries about whether there will be time to train them for what can be very dangerous workplaces. I know that the Conservative party takes a dim view of health and safety at work and sees it as an optional extra, like something from a pick ‘n’ mix, but in retail stores health and safety legislation is vital. When people are dealing with 32-tonne trucks or working in warehouses where forklift trucks are moving about, they need to be fully aware of the risks involved. When they are selling goods that are refrigerated or cooked, they need to be up to speed with health and hygiene legislation. When they are working at heights, lifting or handling goods or using chemicals to keep places clean, they need adequate and proper training. I realise that Conservative Members are out of touch on this and have as much knowledge of, and as little regard for, the real world in which workers exist as did their Victorian forefathers, but that is no reason for the rest of us in the House to turn our backs on those workers. They need our help and support today.
I urge hon. Members to listen seriously to what Cardinal Keith O’Brien said yesterday when he called the Government’s policy agenda “immoral”. He was not just using the term in a religious manner; failing to treat people properly and to consider their health and well-being and ignoring their basic human right to spend time with their family is immoral, and this lousy charade should be rejected out of hand.
Dr William McCrea (South Antrim) (DUP)
I think we all acknowledge that the pace of life today is very fast for everyone. Many people feel that they do not have enough time. People are running around, seeking to earn a living or fulfil their vocation, caring for loved ones, nurturing meaningful relationships and so on. Families are being bombarded with demands to spend more at a time when pay packets are limited, employment is scarce and pressures on family life seem to be increasing.
The Bill is, in my opinion, the thin end of the wedge in a plan for something greater than that which is proposed tonight. I make no apology for stating in this House that I believe in keeping the Lord’s day special and am totally opposed to any plan that amends Sunday trading laws in the context of the Olympics. No changes to Sunday trading legislation are needed to enable all Olympic visitors to have a great day out enjoying time with family and friends. Recently the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) made a pointed comment on the proposal:
“The case for lifting these restrictions during the Olympics doesn’t seem to me to stand up for a moment…So why are the big retailers peddling this…? The answer is simple. They want an even bigger share of the retail cake, and, as usual, they are ruthless in its pursuit, regardless of the adverse effect on local convenience stores, some High Streets—and even more important, that Sunday is special.”
As I said, life seems busier than ever before and there are significant demands on our time. Having one day in the week set apart and free from the concerns of work and school is something that we as a nation should cherish. It is a time to pause and slow down from all that goes on during the rest of the week. I suggest that that is good for us. Stress and mental illness are on the rise in our country. The Health and Safety Executive estimates that each case of stress-related ill health leads to an average of 30 days off work and that a total of 13.5 million working days are lost in Britain each year as a result of work-related stress. The loss of Sunday as a special day will not help to combat the problems that we face. We should try to protect and promote that special day, not try to make it just like any other.
That view is shared by many millions of people throughout the United Kingdom, and the Government should take note of their views, along with those of business, Churches, unions and workers who are opposed to the further liberalisation of Sunday trading laws. Sunday should be a day of rest and worship, and a day to spend time with the family, but the passing of this Bill will lead to difficulties for people who wish to do those things.
In 2010 the Conservative party manifesto stated:
“Britain is one of the least family friendly countries in the developed world. This will change with a Conservative Government. We will not be neutral on this. Britain’s families will get our full backing.”
A move such as this one, for which the Government are seeking our support tonight, runs contrary to what was in their manifesto. It is not good for families.
Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)
I agree with everything the hon. Gentleman is saying. Does he share my presumption that the Conservative party, when it talked in its manifesto about “Britain”, actually meant the United Kingdom and included Northern Ireland?
Dr McCrea
That might have been unintentional, but I am happy to say that certainly hon. Members from Northern Ireland make it abundantly clear that we are a vital, vibrant part of the United Kingdom, and we would like the Conservative and Liberal coalition to remember that, please.
I was talking about a particular part of the Conservative party’s manifesto, however, and already in the United Kingdom more than 1 million families have at least one parent working both weekend days, and over 400,000 more people work on Sunday than was the case pre-1994. Why would we want those figures to increase? How is that good for family life? If Conservatives are not convinced by their own manifesto, perhaps they will listen to the words of a very famous person, Winston Churchill, who said:
“Sunday is a divine and priceless institution...the necessary pause in the national life and activity; it is the birthright of every British subject...and above all our great heritage, and one which is our responsibility, privilege and duty to hand on to posterity”.
We want the Olympics to be a success and to be of great economic and social benefit not just to London, but to the whole United Kingdom, but those who suggest that these Sunday opening hours are somehow going to have minimal economic impact while being the answer to our economic ills are living on a different planet.
Do we think that tourists and other people throughout the United Kingdom will be weeping simply because they have only six hours to shop on a Sunday? Do we think that they will not spend their money during the other six days of the week because of limited Sunday opening hours? I thought that the games were supposed to be a festival of sport, not of shopping, but the emphasis seems to have turned around.
This Bill will not enhance the games, but it will put extra pressure on workers, mean that more will have to work when they do not want to and produce no net benefit. We should vote against it not only to ensure that this Sunday trading does not happen during the period of the games, but to send a clear message to the Government that the further or permanent deregulation of Sunday trading laws is unacceptable. We support keeping Sunday special. I heard the Secretary of State telling us that he could give an unequivocal assurance that this Government have no intention of allowing this to be looked on as a precursor to a relaxation or deregulation of Sunday trading. I have to say to the Minister that this is of course the same Secretary of State from the same party that promised there would be no increase in tuition fees. Emphatic promises from such a person may not necessarily sit well with the population throughout the United Kingdom.
In his opening remarks, the Secretary of State said that this issue was a sensitive religious issue, yet if that is so—and it is—then why are the coalition Government forcing their parties’ Members, against their consciences and against everything they stand for, to go into the Lobby to vote for this? If it really was a sensitive religious issue—and it is—then I say to this Government, “Put your money where your mouth is and let them have a free vote.”
Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)
The hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) is a hard act to follow. I thank him for making those points very strongly.
I will vote against the Bill for three reasons: first, the economic arguments are not very convincing; secondly, and most importantly, I am very worried about the effect on workers; and thirdly, I still believe that there is a case for keeping Sunday special.
I very much welcome the Olympics coming to the UK and the opportunities that that offers to showcase the UK, and I am sure that we will welcome many foreign visitors. However, let us be realistic about those foreign visitors. If they are coming to see the Olympics, they can go shopping on Saturday, they have six hours to go shopping on Sunday, and they can go shopping again on Monday if they want to go to a big store, but I think that the vast majority are more likely to pop into a convenience store or go into cafes or restaurants, because that is what people do when going to a sporting event. However, they will have plenty of chance to go shopping if they so wish.
As regards UK residents, let us be honest: people have a finite amount of money to spend, particularly as this Government seem incapable of finding a growth strategy and are letting us slide back into recession. We are seeing displacement trade, with the same amount of spending being spread over more hours, and we are likely to see big stores drawing away yet more trade from local convenience stores, as the hon. Member for South Dorset (Richard Drax) said. I am disappointed that he seems incapable of voting against the Bill even though he talked about people who may lose their livelihoods in his constituency because they depend on the times when an awful lot of people use convenience stores because none of the big supermarkets is open, particularly on Sundays from about 4 pm to 9 or 10 pm. The danger of extending Sunday opening hours for the big stores is that it will have a very detrimental effect on small convenience stores. In the past, supermarkets have driven people out through loss leaders, whether it was fishermen because they had bargains on their fish counters or the local music shop because their popular items were available in the bigger type of store. In the same way, this summer some local stores may close because eight weeks is too long for them to do without the trade that they have usually been getting.
Of course, life has changed and we have far longer shop opening hours than 50 years ago, and we accept that emergency workers have to do some Sunday shifts. However, Sunday is a day when children are not at school but at home. Many workers do not work on Sunday, so it is a time for families to be together and for parents to spend valuable time with their children. The majority of shop workers are women on low incomes, and if stores are open for longer on Sunday, there will be pressure on them to do more of their hours on Sunday. They will not get more hours; rather, instead of doing them on weekdays, they will be asked to do them on Sundays, cutting down on the time they have to spend with their families and children. Many of those women will walk to work because there is no transport on Sunday, particularly very early in the morning or late in the evening, and that raises huge issues regarding their safety. It is bad enough walking when it is for a 10 am start and a 4 pm finish, but if it is much earlier or later, there are far greater implications for safety.
The Government are rushing this Bill through having not realised that there would not be enough time under the existing legislation for someone to give three months’ notice if they do not want to work on Sundays. Now the proposal is that workers have to give notice by 22 May. Again, there is a huge rush to get that done. Some families may well have prepared activities for the summer holidays, when they want to do something special on Sundays—they may already have plans afoot.
It is all very well to say that such working will be voluntary, but it will never be voluntary. People will feel pressurised into working, that their promotion chances are damaged and that it is not fair on their fellow workers if they opt out of working on a Sunday. The idea that such working is voluntary is nonsensical for many reasons.
Andrew Gwynne
I support my hon. Friend’s case. Has not evidence from the 1994 Act shown that, far from such working being voluntary, many shop workers have been pressurised into working on Sundays?
Nia Griffith
Absolutely, and the Bill will create extra pressure.
Last but not least, there is keeping Sunday special. Times have changed since my childhood, when the chores were finished by Saturday afternoon, and Sunday was a day when we certainly did not play cards or do any household tasks—people would never be seen washing the car or digging the garden. Families do lots of different things now, but Sunday is a time for worship, contemplation and reflection—time to take off from the working week. As many hon. Members have said, for the mental health of our nation, it is extremely important to have that break, and a day that is a little different from the rest of the working week. That is another reason for my firm opposition to extending Sunday opening hours.
Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East) (Lab)
The majority of my constituents value Sundays as a special day, and I am sure that that is reflected in other parts of our country. The majority of people in our country still have Sunday as a day off, and it gives families a chance to spend time together. The Prime Minister said that
“from here on I want a family test applied to all domestic policy. If it hurts families, if it undermines commitment, if it tramples over the values that keeps people together, or stops families from being together, then we shouldn’t do it.”
Findings from the National Centre for Social Research show that around 1.4 million parents already work regularly through the whole weekend. The so-called right to opt out on Sunday has not worked in reality, as it has often been impossible to exercise in practice and many employees have no such choice. Technically, while each employee can give three-months notice not to work on Sunday, everyone knows that that does not work in practice. Realities on the ground mean that people end up working on Sunday, and I know that many employers already pressurise their workers to work on bank holidays, too.
We are told that the Bill constitutes a temporary measure, but we also know that the Chancellor has said that the Treasury may “learn lessons” from the experiment. Many of us believe that it is the thin end of the wedge, and that it will not be long before all shops can stay open for 24 hours a day for the entire week.
In this country, we have many social problems and having parents who work round the clock does nothing to help. The economic argument for extending large stores’ hours is not strong. The only companies that “may”—it is not certain that they will—benefit from the extension are large stores, which already make huge profits. We know that small shopkeepers, who are the backbone of our economy, will suffer tremendously. The Secretary of State said that small businesses were being too pessimistic, but that is not true. The Government are not taking a realistic approach to the effect of the change on small businesses.
Many hon. Members have referred to research by the Association of Convenience Stories, which opposes the Bill. The hon. Member for South Dorset (Richard Drax) said that my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) had mentioned its figures. I can now reveal that the magical document to which we have all referred is the House of Commons Library research paper, which states on page 16:
“The Association of Convenience Stores…is also opposed to the Bill because it thinks it will have a negative impact on small convenience stores. Based on figures from one thousand convenience stores, the ACS estimates that the total cost (in terms of lost profits) to the convenience sector in England and Wales of suspending Sunday trading restrictions for eight consecutive Sundays to be £480 million.”
In addition, the British Independent Retailers Association, the Federation of Wholesale Distributors, the National Federation of SubPostmasters and the Rural Shops Alliance, which together represent more than 60,000 shops, oppose the Bill. That is on page 17 of the House of Commons Library research paper, so hon. Members are not making these figures up or plucking them from thin air—they are real figures. They are being represented not by trade unionists or left-wing socialists, but by small business people who are genuinely and sincerely concerned about the impact of the extra hours, which will effectively be used up by the big conglomerates that will benefit from them. The small shops will suffer tremendously.
It is still not too late for the Government to change their mind. In 2006, the then Department of Trade and Industry, which is now the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, carried out an independent assessment on whether there was an economic or business case for extending the hours. It decided that the current balance was fine and that there was no proper, coherent economic argument for change.
We have heard Ministers say that the extension is for only eight weeks, but they are in the summer period, when most children and young people are off school, college or university, and when many families spend quality time together. Forcing parents to go out and work for those eight weeks so that the big shops benefit—and only the big shops will benefit—is clearly wrong. I therefore urge the Government to reconsider the Bill.
Chris Ruane (Vale of Clwyd) (Lab)
It was not my intention to speak tonight—I have been dutifully sitting on the Front Bench for two hours in my role as a Whip, listening to passionate speeches from both sides of the Chamber. I pay tribute to the many Members who have contributed. The DUP Members spoke with soul and spirit, and the hon. Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) gave a considered and passionate speech, as did many Labour Members.
One of the contributions that disappointed me was that of a Conservative Member. On being challenged as to where the proposed ideas come from, he said that we should look to America and held up its shopping malls as something we should copy. There is a theory that in the 18th century, the biggest buildings were cathedrals, which showed our spirituality. In the 19th century, the biggest buildings, including the Palace of Westminster, were Government buildings, which showed our belief in order. In the 20th and 21st centuries, the biggest buildings are shopping malls.
Gavin Shuker
My hon. Friend does not have to look too far away for the genesis of the idea for the Bill. It was contained in the red tape challenge documents of last year.
Chris Ruane
Absolutely. We are seeing huge shopping malls spread across the UK, but there is more to life than, “Work, consume, die.”
Helen Jones
Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government’s attempts to define the nation by how much it shops simply shows that the expense wasted on their education did not give them any sense of values?
Chris Ruane
As a political class, we have gone along with that trend. I include the previous Labour Government. We operated on the terms of “consumer” and “producer”; rarely was the term “citizen” used. We have lost a lot over the years.
If we want American shopping malls as the positive, we must live with the negatives of American society. Twenty-nine per cent. of American children have mental illness and 40% are obese; the proportion is likely to increase to 60%. Oliver James puts mental illness across the western world down to advertising. The purpose of an advertisement is to sow discontent and make people unhappy, so that they go out and buy the product. Two per cent. of American GDP is spent on advertising and it has the mental health rates I described. One per cent. of UK GDP is spent on advertising, and the rate is 0.5% in mainland Europe.
We need to slow down and ask ourselves as a society—and the Government have to ask themselves—what people out there want. They might say they want shops, but that is not what they truly want. In the rat race, even the winners are still rats. It is now recognised that to be a shopaholic, like an alcoholic, is to have a mental illness. People feel the need to shop and prove themselves through materialism, but let us remember that the flipside of consumerism is alienation, and the flipside of materialism is individualism. The breakdown of society, promoted since the 1980s, has a lot to do with it. People are far from their natures. Many of us—I include myself in this—are on this hydraulic treadmill. People try to provide for their children and buy the latest fashions—otherwise they are not normal—but this hydraulic treadmill, which is spinning too fast, will be sped up if we adopt this measure and make it permanent. We need to slow down.
I tabled a parliamentary question, answered on 15 March, about family happiness. The answer came back from the Minister that children were happier in a family if the parents judged themselves to have good relationships, but to have good relationships, they need a day off a week—at least—on which they can talk. Apparently a family was more likely to be happy if it ate more meals together. My favourite meal of the week is the traditional British Sunday roast. That will not be cooked or served if parents are out working. The third criteria for a happy family was discussing important matters. The most reflective day of the week is a Sunday.
We have made many gains, especially under the previous Government, including on flexible hours, the minimum wage, and maternity and paternity leave. Those were positive measures, but some Government Members see them as red tape and bureaucracy. I hope that tonight’s proposal is not a way of attacking those gains or a back-door way of disassembling what Labour has achieved over many years. We need to slow down. We need time for awareness, to sniff the flowers, to notice, to reflect, to have silence and to express gratitude. To do that, however, we need at least one day a week off. We broke into that. Many people now work six hours on Sundays, but we should not extend that. We do so at our peril and the peril of our children and families.
Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)
It is a great pleasure to speak for the Opposition in this debate on the Government’s proposed changes to Sunday trading laws, which purport to be in order that we might all—shop workers excluded—enjoy the Olympics the more. I am an avid follower of sport in general, but the fact that in attending the debate, in all its glory, I have missed out on viewing one of the most important club football matches in my lifetime could hardly be a matter of regret.
On 6 July 2005, millions of Britons stood glued to their radios or television sets to hear the announcement from the International Olympic Committee that London had beaten off challenges from some of the other great cities of the world—Paris, New York, Moscow and Madrid. Now the games are just 87 days away—or, as the Home Secretary would have it, 86 days. Those of us who celebrated in our workplaces at the news that the greatest show on earth was coming to Britain could only imagine the work that had gone on behind the scenes to secure the games. Since they were secured, the 80,000 seat Olympic stadium in Stratford, east London has been completed on time, on budget and with a near-impeccable safety record. According to John Armitt, 98% of the facilities for the Olympics have been built by British companies, and altogether an estimated 75,000 firms are expected to win work related to London 2012.
When we think of the preparation, the expertise and hard work that went into winning the Olympics, it calls into the sharpest possible focus the contrast with the Government’s shambolic performance on this issue. How can it be, when we have known for seven years that the Olympics were coming, that two years after the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister had their “Brokeback Mountain” moment in the rose garden, we should be debating this legislation under emergency powers designed for the introduction of counter-terrorism proposals?
Sadly, any pragmatic case for the proposals has been utterly undermined by the shambolic nature of the Government’s attempts to convince us of their need. No credible business case has been made in favour of the proposals. Like much of this Government’s policy, they have been made up on the hoof, without any credible evidence, because someone thinks they might move on the news agenda, or be useful for political positioning. This is fag packet politics that sounds like it has emerged over a damn fine claret at the Carlton club, rather than credible, evidence-based policy to deliver jobs and growth. It is, in fact, an appropriate way to end this Session.
I would like to mention a couple of the contributions that hon. Members have made. The Secretary of State admitted in his opening speech that 40% of the benefits of the legislation would fall outside London—proof, if ever it were needed, that much of the shopping will not be the result of the Olympics, but an extension of the shopping that would be done anyway. It will therefore be displacement activity, away from small businesses and towards larger businesses.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) reminded us that the Prime Minister had said that all future legislation would have to pass the family test—a comment repeated in a rambunctious speech by the hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea).
The hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field) spoke largely in favour of the Bill, but said that he believed that the legislation would be a damp squib. That was pretty much as full as the praise got. The hon. Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Gordon Henderson) talked about his experience as someone working in the retail sector, reminding us that workers at the bottom of the pile often do not really have the choice of saying yes or no to their boss. He told us about the important opportunity that we could be creating during the Olympics to give a boost for small businesses that want to take the opportunity to promote the greatest show on earth, here in this country.
The hon. Member for Enfield North (Nick de Bois) told us that using the evidence from this experience as a basis to extend the legislation in future would be a ludicrous basis on which to propose future policy—as though the fact that something was ludicrous would be a reason for the Government not to pursue it.
My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Meg Munn) highlighted the fact that under the Government’s proposals, workers would have to opt out by 22 May. She talked about how unrealistic that was, given that we are talking about the legislation only now. My hon. Friend the Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) reminded us that the bulk of retail staff are female. She also reminded us of the impact on their families of being asked to work during the Olympics, at a time when so many will be wanting to spend more time with their families, enjoying the great spectacle.
The hon. Member for South Dorset (Richard Drax) made a wonderful speech against the Bill—and then told us that he would vote in favour of it. I fear that he has been in the coalition a little too long. He focused on the importance of Sunday evenings to small businesses—a point repeated by many hon. Members. He also said that the legislation was rushed and that there was no demand for it, further undermining his determination to vote for it.
My hon. Friend the Member for Wansbeck (Ian Lavery) was sceptical that the provisions to protect workers would make any difference to workers on the ground. Just before I got to my feet, my hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Clwyd (Chris Ruane) made a thought-provoking speech, urging us all to slow down and warning us—this was possibly aimed in the direction of his own loved ones—to beware of becoming shopaholics. None the less, it was an important contribution and one that I enjoyed.
The Secretary of State spoke of many of the groups that he had consulted, but he declined to tell the House what they had said. He told us he consulted the Federation of Small Businesses, but the FSB said that the Bill was:
“Contrary to Government rhetoric about supporting small business on the high street”.
He told us he had consulted the Association of Convenience Stores, but it says:
“Liberalising Sunday Trading would cost businesses and jobs.”
He also told us that he had consulted USDAW, yet its briefing included the comment from Mr M from Stoke-on-Trent, who said of the proposals:
“If this is allowed to happen, it will erode my working terms and conditions”.
The Secretary of State might well have consulted a multitude of organisations, but he seems to have paid precious little attention to what they told him.
On this side of the House, we are a party whose leader, my right hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband), has committed to make Labour the party of small business. At every level, when we see the actions of this Government, we see how desperately small business needs the Labour party to be that voice in politics that the governing parties have left so far behind.
It is a matter of tremendous regret that, because of the way in which the Bill has been programmed, we will not have the opportunity to vote on our amendments. One of them would have enabled us to keep Sunday special, by allowing for the expansion of the Olympics while maintaining the difference and remaining mindful of the effects of the measures on shop staff. It would have limited the proposed number of hours to 13 on a Sunday. Another amendment would have entitled shop workers to two months’ notice of a request by their employer to work on a Sunday during the Olympics. That would have given them a realistic opportunity to discuss the request with their family and to exercise their right to opt out. A further amendment proposed the reduction of the notice period for exercising the opt-out to one month, so that shop workers could have a credible opportunity to decide whether they wished to work on a Sunday.
As Members on the Government Benches consider which way to vote, they might want to think about what the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) wrote on the ConservativeHome website. I do not know whether you are a regular reader of that website, Mr Deputy Speaker; I am not, but this is damned good stuff, so I might start reading it more often. The hon. Lady wrote:
“During the budget speech, the Chancellor announced that ‘we will introduce legislation limited to relaxing the Sunday Trading laws for eight Sundays only, starting on 22nd July.’ It appears, however, that the previous day his aides had got a little carried away during a media briefing”—
this is what I was telling the Secretary of State about; he will be happy to hear this—
“and informed the press that this measure would, in effect, be a pre-cursor to relaxing Sunday trading permanently...However, there isn’t a single person in Westminster who believes that for one moment.”
That is, that the measure would last for only eight Sundays.
“If the eight Sundays show an increase in profit for the stores concerned (and why wouldn’t they with the number of visitors expected in London during the Olympics?), those figures will be used to support a simple extension of what will then be existing legislation, to roll out full trading hours across the UK for seven days per week.”
I could not have put it better myself.
So, we have heard from Members across the House—and Mid Bedfordshire—from the small business community, from a director of Sainsbury’s, and from a coalition of thousands of voices across the country who are against these half-baked proposals. We have heard precious little to recommend them, and that is why I will be exercising my free vote to vote against them. I urge my colleagues from across the House to do the same.
The Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Mr Mark Prisk)
This has been an energetic and often constructive debate, despite the broad range of views and concerns raised. I am grateful to the shadow Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Streatham (Mr Umunna), and his colleague, the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Toby Perkins), for supporting us in the Division Lobby earlier this evening on the fast-track procedure. We appreciate that. We have sought to enter into discussions with all parties involved, prior to the measure coming before both Houses, and we are grateful to the hon. Gentlemen for their support.
We have heard a number of thoughtful contributions, including those from my hon. Friend the Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Gordon Henderson) and the hon. Member for Solihull (Lorely Burt). I shall come to the question of sunset clauses in a moment. My hon. Friend the Member for Great Yarmouth (Brandon Lewis) rightly highlighted the economic benefit that would result from the measures. My hon. Friend the Member for Fylde (Mark Menzies) is well informed on these issues; I shall touch on the question of flexibility in a second. We also heard from my hon. Friends the Members for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) and for South Dorset (Richard Drax); I am sorry that I missed his contribution.
We also heard speeches from the Opposition Benches, including those from the hon. Members for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer) and for Sheffield, Heeley (Meg Munn), as well as from the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon). He will know that the Bill does not actually affect Northern Ireland, but we enjoyed his contribution anyway. We heard from the hon. Members for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz), for Wansbeck (Ian Lavery), for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper) and for Blaydon (Mr Anderson). We heard a passionate contribution from the hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea), as well as speeches from the hon. Members for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi), for Vale of Clwyd (Chris Ruane) and for Chesterfield. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Chesterfield missed his football match, but ConservativeHome will be delighted to know that it now has a new subscriber to its deliberations.
The concern has been expressed that this Bill is somehow a Trojan horse, preparing the way for a permanent relaxation of the rules for large stores. Let me assure hon. Members again that that is not the case. I thought my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton spoke eloquently about the issue of families and family time. I think she is absolutely right, so let me say to her that the Bill affects just eight Sundays and the deliberate inclusion of a sunset clause means that the Bill will be removed from the statute book after 9 September. Indeed, as the Secretary of State has made clear, if a future Government were to consider a permanent relaxation, they would have to undertake a full consultation and present new legislation to this House. As the Secretary of State also pointed out, we have no such plans.
Joan Walley
Will the Minister clarify the position of the people in families who have opted in to Sunday working for those eight weeks? Will they be required, if they continue to be opted in, to work the additional hours that result from the extension?
Mr Prisk
We have made it clear that this Bill does not change their statutory rights. Some will be engaged in contractual discussions. I have made it clear to employers, and I am happy to put it firmly on the record again today, that we will want to sit down again with both unions and employers over the coming weeks to make sure that if there are contractual issues, we are aware of them, and we will want to support them. That is important. We must make sure that this is not just about the statute before the House, as it is also about the contractual arrangements, which in some cases are better than the statute itself.
Several Members have raised the question of how much the economy will benefit from this temporary relaxation of the rules. For example, at Atlanta in 1996, about $5.1 billion was added to the Georgian economy. If we look at Sydney in 2000, we see that there was an improvement in the visitor economy of about $1.5 billion. We accept that, given the unique nature of the Olympics and Paralympics, it is difficult accurately to predict the precise financial benefit in advance.
In 2006, the then Government commissioned an assessment of the impact of a permanent relaxation of the rules. Based on those figures, a temporary suspension of the rules for eight Sundays would deliver benefits of up to £176 million. As alluded to by several hon. Members, the Centre for Retail Research has indicated that the figure would be closer to £189 million.
Mr Prisk
No, I will not, because the hon. Gentleman has made no contribution to this debate, other than intervening at the beginning. He made no speech and I want to respond to those who made the effort to speak in the debate, rather than those who make an occasional interruption. [Interruption.]
I was talking about the Centre for Retail Research, but some independent assessments have been even more bullish. The New West End Company, for example, estimates that the benefits of the measure for London retailers alone could be more than £180 million.
It is important to bear in mind that in these difficult times this measure will clearly benefit many of our hard-pressed retailers and their staff. We are supporting events not just in London. With football in Manchester, Cardiff, Newcastle and Coventry; sailing in Weymouth, as my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset mentioned; mountain biking in Essex; canoe slalom in Hertfordshire; and rowing in Eton Dorney, the benefits, the activities and the visitors will clearly spread far beyond the east of London. At the same time, big screens are being set up in towns and cities right across the country to enable people to gather and watch the games together. We believe that the Bill will help to make the most of the games economically, as well as showing to thousands of visitors from abroad that Britain is indeed open to business.
Yasmin Qureshi
The Minister talks about the economic benefits, but an important issue many of us have discussed is the effect on small shopkeepers, who are saying that they will be virtually destroyed for those eight Sundays when the hours are extended for larger stores. Have the Government and the Minister thought properly about their concerns?
Mr Prisk
I used to run a small business. I am strong and passionate about this issue. I want to deal first with workers’ rights, after which I will undoubtedly wish to come on to the question of small shops. The hon. Lady is absolutely right about the importance of this issue, which is why I wanted to ensure that I spoke to the Association of Convenience Stores and, of course, to the Federation of Small Businesses.
Several Members feared that the Bill sought to cut away the rights of shop workers who are currently protected by the law. That is not what the Bill will do, and it is not our intention. During consultation, concern was expressed about the existing rights of shop workers wishing to give notice that they did not want to work on Sundays. Having listened carefully to those views—to which many Members alluded today—we decided to amend the Bill to shorten the statutory notice period to two months, thus allowing shop workers to serve their notice after Royal Assent. The net effect is to ensure that those who do not wish to work on Sundays during the games will be able to notify their employers in the usual way. That is an important principle.
In practice, as I said earlier, many of the shop workers affected have contracts with their employers for even shorter notice periods. For example, relevant workers at both Sainsbury’s and Tesco need to give only one month’s notice.
Mr Umunna
I should be grateful if the Minister would respond in particular to the point about the need for employers to give their employees notice of the change in the law that the Minister is pushing through today. While I am on my feet, however, may I ask him who exactly has argued for the change? I have received no positive representations from any organisation so far.
Mr Prisk
The change is supported by the British Council of Shopping Centres, Tesco, Morrison’s and Asda, to name but a few. I think that they are important employers in this context.
The Government have listened to the concerns that have been expressed. We recognised that there was a case for the Bill to be absolutely clear about affected shop workers’ rights, and that is why last week we tabled the amendment that is now incorporated in the Bill, as a result of discussions with Opposition Members and also with specific regard to the questions raised by USDAW.
We recognise that the question of employers’ notice is important to shop workers. Employers have made it clear to us that that they will undertake to give notice to their employees, which we consider to be the appropriate arrangement, but we will engage with them to ensure that they do so. I believe that that is the best way of delivering what I suspect to be the aim of both parties, and that making it a statutory requirement would be complex and unnecessary. The key point is that the Bill does not change existing rights.
We should also not ignore the fact that many shop workers, especially young people, would like to earn more money. In these difficult times, they would like to make ends meet. As my hon. Friend the Member for Fylde pointed out, it is a shame that some Opposition Members barely mentioned those workers; they seemed to be concerned about only some workers.
The hon. Member for Streatham seemed to fear that, as a result of a sudden change in the law, workers would have to undertake more than one shift. However, other employment law protections will continue to apply. I am thinking particularly of the Working Time Regulations 1998, which regulate working hours and—I know that this is of concern to the hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley—ensure that the entitlement to daily and weekly rests will continue.
Let me, in the brief time that remains, deal with the question of small shops. At present, such shops—notably local convenience stores—enjoy the advantage of no restrictions on their Sunday opening hours. Naturally, they guard that advantage jealously, and I do not blame them for doing so. Some—including the hon. Lady—have argued that the Bill will badly damage businesses, possibly to the tune of £480 million. I have discussed the figures that have been mentioned with the Association of Convenience Stores in order to understand them better, and I must tell the House that they significantly overstate the problem. They assume that every large store will open for the largest feasible number of hours, and that all the people who currently shop at their local convenience stores will switch to the big supermarkets for the entire eight weeks. I am clear in my own mind that that is not likely to happen. This, too, is a principle: Government Members take the question of shops, particularly small shops, very seriously, which is why we will continue to work with them.
The Olympic and Paralympic games present a unique opportunity for the whole country to back our athletes, but they also present an important economic opportunity, as hundreds of thousands of visitors will come here to enjoy what Britain has to offer. Alongside the sporting and cultural activities, there is a great opportunity for our businesses, including in retail, to make the most of this special occasion. This Bill will help them do that, not least by creating far greater flexibility for them over the eight Sundays identified.
However, we have also listened carefully to the legitimate concerns that have been raised, and the inclusion of a sunset clause, the clarification and notification procedures for affected workers, and the clear statement that the Bill will be revoked after 9 September are all responses to them. We therefore believe the Bill strikes the right balance, and we commend it to the House.
Question put, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
Business without Debate
Rare Disease Strategy
(12 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Edward Timpson (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)
As ever, I am grateful, and indeed delighted, to have the opportunity to address the House in this timely and much-needed debate. Just eight days ago, along with 37,000 other hardy souls, I stood, full of trepidation and excitement, at the start line for the 2012 London marathon. I was running with my wife, Julia, and am pleased to report that we finished the course together in just under four hours. Far more importantly, our run raised over £6,000 for the national charity CLIMB.
That is all very interesting, you might say, Mr Deputy Speaker, but what has this rare accomplishment for a Member of Parliament got to do with a rare disease strategy for the UK? To explain, CLIMB stands for “children living with inherited metabolic diseases” and is a charity based in Crewe in my constituency. It is one of an important network of rare disease charities that strive to raise awareness of rare diseases, not least through Rare Disease day, which takes place on the last day of February each year. Under the stewardship of Steve Hannigan, CLIMB provides vital advice and support to many children and families affected by one of the around 730 known metabolic diseases. One of those children is my nephew Leo.
Leo was born in 2001 with an inherited metabolic disease known as MCADD. Approximately one in 10,000 babies born in the UK has MCADD, which means that they are missing an enzyme that helps break down the fats that provide energy for the body, particularly after long periods without food. This inability to break down fat leads to the build-up of medium-chain fats that can produce toxic substances and lead to severe symptoms, including seizures and possibly coma and death. As Leo was born before the introduction of routine baby screening for MCADD in 2008, neither medical professionals nor his parents knew that he had the disease.
For Leo, all was well until he was 10 months old, when he contracted pneumonia that was coupled with three days of severe hypoglycaemic episodes. Because the knowledge of rare diseases among medical staff was and, indeed, remains limited, and because he had not been screened for MCADD, no one picked up on this underlying rare condition and the need to treat him accordingly. More by luck than by informed professional judgment, thankfully Leo survived.
When Leo suffered a further hypo episode at 14 months, triggered by nothing more than a routine cold, the doctor on duty, who had some knowledge of MCADD, realised that his low blood sugar was unexplained, and subsequent relevant tests revealed a diagnosis of the metabolic disease.
Leo is now 11 and living a full and active life, but, with the mortality rate of children under the age of one who have undiagnosed MCADD being approximately 25%, the routine screening that CLIMB long campaigned for, and which is soon to be introduced throughout all four nations of the UK, is a vital tool in saving lives.
In the past year alone, more than 80 newborn babies have been diagnosed with MCADD—80 babies whose disease would otherwise have remained undetected and who would have been at significant risk. That is why I wanted this debate: to be able to speak up for all those, like Leo, with a rare disease, to put a proposition to the Minister and to question him about, how we can improve the services, information, treatment and support that those with rare diseases receive in order to ensure that we maximise their quality of life.
We are not talking about a handful of isolated cases. With close to 7,000 distinct rare diseases having been discovered, and with five new diseases described every week in medical literature, rare diseases are collectively far from rare. In the UK it is estimated that 3.5 million people, or one in 17, will be affected by a rare disease at some point in their life, with 30% of patients dying before their fifth birthday.
So what is a rare disease? The European commission on public health defines rare diseases, sometimes known as “orphan diseases”, as
“life-threatening or chronically debilitating diseases which are of such low prevalence”—
affecting fewer than one in 2,000 people—
“that special combined efforts are needed to address them.”
About 80% are genetic in origin, but many are auto-immune, such as Crohn’s disease, and others are infectious in nature.
Motor neurone disease, cystic fibrosis, muscular dystrophy and Huntington’s disease may be some of the more widely known rare diseases, whereas acquired non-histamine induced angiodema and Adair-Dighton syndrome are just two of the many thousands of others that I have come across in my own research.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
One rare disease that I am aware of is Prader-Willi syndrome, which affects the muscular build-up, eating habits and sleep patterns of some 2,000 people in the United Kingdom and 50 people in Northern Ireland. Does the hon. Gentleman feel that, if there is to be a strategy for the United Kingdom, it must involve all those regions where health matters are devolved to the Administration? Does he feel also that along with such a strategy and, given all the different areas that there are, we need to have something for respite care, because parents, and the way in which they play their part, are vital?
Mr Timpson
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising a particular issue in his constituency in Northern Ireland. He is absolutely right that we need to ensure that the strategy we develop for rare diseases supports not just those who suffer from the disease, but the families who every day, for every hour, have to cope with it and support them. We need to ensure that that is a central part of the strategy.
Such diseases—especially those, including the one to which the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) refers, that are particularly rare—are no less important, however, and therein lies the problem. Most rare diseases are under the medical and public radar—too exceptional to attract the attention, recognition and resources required and, above all, the coherent plan needed to tackle the fragmented, inefficient and often inequitable services on offer.
That is why I welcome the Government’s current consultation on the development of a UK strategy for rare diseases and why this debate is so apt. For too long, rare diseases have been placed in the “too difficult to do” pile, but with the onset of changes to health care commissioning and the refocus on putting patients at the heart of the NHS, there is a real opportunity to do things more effectively and much smarter. That means that the consultation must be ambitious, provide strong leadership, and be unambiguous about how the core vision that it reveals can be successfully implemented practically and realistically on the ground across all four home nations.
I have taken the time to read the consultation document, and although it makes many of the right noises, there is a nagging doubt as to whether it meets all the challenges faced by those with rare diseases. I am told by those working in the field of rare diseases that Lord Howe, the Minister who, together with his colleagues in the devolved nations, is responsible for the document, genuinely appears to understand the importance of getting this right. I trust, therefore, that he and they will listen carefully to the submissions they receive, including mine this evening and those of other hon. Members.
So what needs improving? It is clear from my many conversations and my correspondence with clinicians, patient groups and charities working on and living with rare diseases that the ad-hoc nature in which services have developed has led to the principal problems of delays in diagnosis; misdiagnosis; lack of information, communication and awareness; limited research; scarce and unequal access to orphan medicines; poor commissioning and care co-ordination; and a failure to monitor outcomes.
That is not to say that it is all bad news. There is, as ever, some fantastic best practice already taking place. The TREAT-NMD—Translational Research in Europe: Assessment and Treatment of Neuromuscular Diseases—network for neuromuscular diseases, the European Huntington’s Disease Network’s REGISTRY, and the Tay Sachs walk-in clinic at Guy’s hospital are all good examples of innovative, effective and efficient service delivery on which any strategy should seek to build.
Margot James (Stourbridge) (Con)
I congratulate my hon. Friend on this very important debate. Does he agree that some rare diseases at least have a high profile, which is advantageous in garnering research and funding? I should like to draw his and the Minister’s attention to a rare disease that has a very low profile—FOP, or fibrodysplasia ossificans progressiva, which is a tragic condition where bone grows in muscle. The funding and research that are required for this condition are set back due to its low profile. Will my hon. Friend join me in wishing to raise the profile of this rare condition and many others with such a low profile?
Mr Timpson
My hon. Friend has done just that. I know that she has recently become patron of the charity FOP Action. I believe that this disease affects only one in 2 million people. I congratulate her on taking up that task and wish her and the charity well in raising awareness and the profile of that disease so that even the very small number of people who are affected by it receive the best possible care and support throughout their lives.
In the short time that this debate allows, it is not possible to dig down into the detailed analysis of where the system is currently failing to meet patients’ needs, but I urge the Minister to concentrate on six specific areas, the first of which is diagnosis and screening. As I have said, diagnosis is a major issue. Rare Disease UK has found that nearly half of all patients wait over a year for an accurate diagnosis following the onset of symptoms, with 20% waiting over five years and 12% over 10 years. Misdiagnosis is also a key problem, with almost half of patients being misdiagnosed and almost a third being so three times or more—an avoidable waste on many levels.
One lady who contacted me was Kay Parkinson. Kay set up Alstrom Syndrome UK, a support group for people affected by the same rare genetic disorder that so tragically took the lives of her two children, Charlotte and Matthew. Their desperate story of misdiagnosis, unnecessary and delayed medical interventions and ultimately the most terrible heartache lays bare the consequences of a failure to diagnose early and to diagnose accurately. Through Kay’s dedication, Alstrom Syndrome UK has set up multidisciplinary clinics, funded by the NHS national specialised commissioning group, to help inform patients and professionals of the specialised clinical services available. Its frustration is that it is still unable to find out who and where diagnoses of Alstrom syndrome are made so that it can link them to the specialised NHS services available.
To improve diagnosis, there needs to be: an increase in health care professionals’ knowledge and awareness of rare diseases through initial and ongoing training, particularly for paediatricians; improved links between specialist centres and local services to help with that education, and consideration of the inclusion of appropriate rare diseases in newborn screening, which has proved so successful in the case of MCADD.
The criteria that the National Screening Committee uses should be reviewed to ensure that rare diseases are not being treated unfairly. It is disappointing that the UK lags well behind many other countries in the number of rare diseases for which it screens. For example, in India, the figure is 39; in Poland and China, it is 25; and in the UK, it is just five. Improved access to diagnostic and carrier tests is necessary for even provision across the UK.
Secondly, we need better information. I have spent time between late night votes productively, you will be pleased to hear, Mr Deputy Speaker, in navigating my way around Orphanet in the Library. Orphanet is the European portal for rare diseases and orphan drugs. It provides pretty comprehensive information for patients, professionals, the public and the industry, but is not widely known. Lack of reliable, up-to-date information that helps rather than hinders the prospects of diagnosis remains a significant barrier.
The development of a UK-wide, trusted single portal of information, which has listed against each condition a named clinician who can act as a source of advice and information, would be a major step forward. It would be further enhanced by implementing the international classification of diseases—ICD-11—in 2015. That will bring about the capture of data on the incidence and natural history of rare diseases that are currently poorly understood. The Government should be preparing for such implementation as we speak. I hope that the Minister can give me and other hon. Members assurances that that is the case.
Thirdly, we need research. According to Sir John Burn, professor of clinical genetics at Newcastle university, who was kind enough to contact me, the 80% of rare diseases that have a genetic basis can now be solved using the latest DNA techniques. However, until the 23 regional genetics centres are honed into a single approval structure, huge barriers to research will continue.
Without clinical research networks, the problems of duplication and the perceived lack of impact of research will remain. The knock-on effects are continuing poor relative funding levels and holding back the development of diagnostic tests and treatments.
To ensure that clinical research networks are effective, disease registries need to be established that bring together all clinical information from all patients with a particular condition or type of condition. That will help to deliver more robust research as well as providing more co-ordinated planning and service delivery for the patient.
Fourthly, we need co-ordination of commissioning and care. I have already alluded to the disconnect between the pockets of expertise at regional level and the lack of any real cadre of experts in commissioning locally. That leaves many patients being bounced around the system, with no tangible results or benefits.
Developing a hub-and-spoke model between centres of excellence will help bridge that gap and create meaningful clinical networks. However, ultimately, the new national commissioning board provides a perfect vehicle for ironing out disparities in provision throughout the country. I therefore ask the Minister to explain exactly how the national commissioning board will help create models for cluster-type service delivery for rare diseases.
To ensure that that objective is reached, a national champion for rare diseases, with the necessary clinical clout, is essential in the form of a national clinical director. Bearing in mind that that was a recommendation by the former chief medical officer in his 2009 annual report, I ask the Minister to set out as far as he can the Government’s thinking on that.
The consultation also talks about each patient having a designated care co-ordinator in the same way as cancer patients have now. That is eminently sensible as it fulfils the objective of delivering patient-centred care, and I would be amazed if the Minister felt unable to agree to it in principle.
Fifthly, on access to orphan medicines, the evaluation and appraisal of orphan medicines is different from that of most others. Decisions on whether or not to fund treatments are often made on an individual basis and are very much dependent on which home nation, or indeed which primary care trust, the patient is from. To improve equality of access to orphan medicines requires a proper and consistent appraisal based on the issues specific to them. At the moment, that is lacking, and it follows that a reassessment of the criteria for access is necessary.
Finally and sixthly, on implementation and outcomes, ultimately any strategy is not worth the paper it is written on if it does not deliver significantly improved outcomes for patients. In the case of rare diseases, that could not be more relevant. Processes are important, but the outcome for the patient is the lasting legacy. Effective implementation of the strategy and the monitoring of outcomes flowing from it are crucial. Clear lines of responsibility for delivering the UK plan must exist and the national commissioning board has a big role to play. Without that accountability, we may never truly know whether this has all been worth our effort.
My greatest personal challenge so far this year has been to haul my body round 26 miles, but it is small beer compared with the challenges faced by the 3.5 million people in the UK who continue their battle with a rare disease. However, perhaps the greatest challenge is to our NHS, which over the years has had no choice but to adapt to the changing health needs of, and treatments available to, its patients. For people with rare diseases, the NHS needs to adapt once more. It can do it, and I hope this strategy will ensure that it does.
The Minister of State, Department of Health (Mr Simon Burns)
May I begin by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mr Timpson) on securing this debate on what is a most important topic for a great number of people, and on the sensitive way in which he outlined his concerns, particularly those that affect his family? May I also congratulate him on running the London marathon an hour and a half quicker than the shadow Chancellor?
As we have heard, anybody, at any stage in life, can be affected by a rare disease, which can range from manageable conditions that do not affect daily living to debilitating conditions that have a significant impact on one’s quality and length of life. The Government are committed to providing the best quality of care to people with rare conditions, and the importance that we attach to services for people with rare conditions is clearly demonstrated in the reforms we set out in the Health and Social Care Act 2012. Through the Act, specialised services, which are currently provided at both national and regional level through a range of NHS organisations, will be brought together under one roof. From April 2013, the new NHS Commissioning Board will directly commission services for people with rare diseases on a national basis.
My hon. Friend asks for an explanation of how the NHS Commissioning Board will operate to ensure cluster-type service delivery in respect of rare diseases. Moving to a national standard system of commissioning but maintaining a regional focus gives the geographical and speciality oversight that he describes. National specifications will lead to services being defined once for England, allowing clear planning to take place across the country.
Mr David Anderson (Blaydon) (Lab)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mr Timpson) on a fine speech. As the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on muscular dystrophy, may I ask the Minister about two connected points in respect of what he has just said? There has been a great development within neuro-muscular services and work by the House and the Department. Will the Minister meet the all-party group and the muscular dystrophy campaign to discuss the progress of the national neuro-muscular work plan? Will he also give us an assurance on the positive advantages in the south-west region—he mentioned regional development—and confirm whether there will be strategic clinical networks for neuro-muscular services across the country?
Mr Burns
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I recognise the tremendous work he does in this area of health care and congratulate him on his efforts. With regard to a meeting, I will pass on his comments to my noble Friend the Earl Howe, who has responsibility for this area of health care. On the hon. Gentleman’s second point, I am more than happy to give him the assurances he seeks.
The proposed operating model for specialised commissioning links national service knowledge and expertise with local contract knowledge of providers and pathways of care, cementing the new system together in the interests of patients. The benefits to patients with rare conditions are clear: a single national commissioning policy and better planning and co-ordination will result in improved consistency across the country.
My hon. Friend asked me to set out the Government’s thinking on the suggestion from the former chief medical officer for a national clinical director for rare diseases. I can assure him that there will be a director within the NHS Commissioning Board with lead responsibility for specialised services for people with rare conditions. The board will also consider the most suitable form of clinical advice covering the domains of the NHS outcomes framework. Rare diseases come under domain 2: long-term conditions.
Our commitment to people with rare conditions is demonstrated through our recently published, “A UK Plan for Rare Diseases”. The consultation was launched on 29 February—Rare Disease day—and was produced jointly by the four nations of the United Kingdom. The consultation will continue until 25 May and is an important step on the way to producing the final plan. I urge everyone with an interest in this area of health care to contribute to the consultation process.
This will be the first time that the UK has developed a plan to tackle rare diseases, and the consultation represents collaboration across the four nations of the UK. It brings together a number of recommendations designed to improve the co-ordination of care and to lead to better outcomes for people with rare diseases. We suggest that improvements can be made through earlier diagnosis, better co-ordination of services, stronger research and better engagement with patients and their families. Many of these recommendations will be of direct benefit to patients and can help the NHS to be more efficient and co-ordinated and to save money.
Earlier diagnosis through clear care pathways to expert centres can prevent disability, and in some cases save lives, by allowing an earlier start for effective treatment. It will also save money by avoiding more intensive or emergency treatment. More co-ordinated care saves patients’ time, money and stress by avoiding multiple visits to various clinics. As many rare diseases are of genetic origin, we must also embrace advances in genetics and genomic medicine and ensure that the NHS is ready to support and take full advantage of these developments.
My hon. Friend has already mentioned that people with rare diseases need to be able to access orphan medicines. Our priority is to give NHS patients better access to the innovative and effective drugs that their doctors recommend for them, including those designated as “orphan drugs”. The new system of value-based pricing will bring the price the NHS pays for drugs more in line with the value it delivers. Notwithstanding this, we know that there may be instances where an individual medicine should not be assessed under value-based pricing. We will keep the situation under review. If, as we begin to implement value-based pricing, it becomes clear that some treatments would be better dealt with through separate arrangements, we will explore alternative options.
The consultation document sets out a coherent approach to tackling rare diseases. It recognises existing developments while setting out a number of further developments, such as on better information for patients to help them manage their condition. My hon. Friend asked for reassurance that we are putting steps in place in preparation for the introduction of the international classification of diseases—ICD-11. I can assure him that the NHS is moving towards widespread use of systematized nomenclature of medicine clinical terms—Snomed CT—in preparation for the introduction of ICD-11.
The consultation will inform the final UK plan for rare diseases. We hope that the final plan will offer a framework for managing rare diseases wherever they occur. Each nation of the UK will then take forward implementation of the plan in accordance with its own priorities and patterns of service. In England, much of the implementation of the final plan will be for the new NHS Commissioning Board to take forward, in close dialogue with Public Health England.
As my hon. Friend will appreciate from my comments in this relatively short but important debate, he has raised an extremely important issue that all too often is forgotten in the mainstream of the NHS, where people concentrate on more acute services, rather than this highly specialised area. My hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge (Margot James) mentioned a particular illness or condition. May assure her that following her intervention, I will ask my noble Friend the Earl Howe to write to her about the issue she raised?
In conclusion, the development of the first ever UK plan is an important signal of our continuing commitment to providing good quality services to people with rare conditions. The consultation is aimed at a wide audience, including not just clinicians and NHS specialised commissioners, but patients, their carers and families, support groups, specialist organisations, researchers, academics and colleagues from across social care. I call on all hon. Members to encourage their constituents with an interest in rare diseases to take part in this important consultation.
Question put and agreed to.
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Written Ministerial Statements
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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ECOFIN
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr Mark Hoban)
An extraordinary meeting of the Economic and Financial Affairs Council (ECOFIN) will be held in Brussels on 2 May 2012. The following items are on the agenda to be discussed:
Revised Capital Requirement Rules (CRD IV)
The council will discuss the presidency’s compromise on the Commission’s proposal to replace the capital requirements directive (directives 2006/48/EC and 2006/49/EC, as amended by directives 2009/111/EC and 2010/76/EU), with a regulation on prudential requirements and a directive on the access to the activity of credit institutions and the prudential supervision of credit institutions and investment firms, together known as “CRD IV”.
The UK will push for the full implementation of Basel 3 and for member states to have sufficient flexibility to protect financial stability in their jurisdiction.
Follow-up to the G20 meeting of finance ministers and governors and IMF spring meetings (Washington 20-22 April 2012)
The Commission will update member states on the IMF spring meetings, which took place in Washington on 19-22 April, including a meeting of G20 finance ministers and Central Bank governors. The Chancellor updated the House on the outcome of the discussions at the spring meetings, including on IMF resources, in a statement on 23 April.
Counter-Terrorist Asset Freezing Regime
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr Mark Hoban)
Under the Terrorist Asset-Freezing etc. Act 2010 (“TAFA 2010”), the Treasury is required to report quarterly to Parliament on its operation of the UK’s asset freezing regime mandated by UN Security Council resolution 1373.
This is the fifth report under the Act and it covers the period from 1 January 2012 to 31 March 2012. This report also covers the UK implementation of the UN Al-Qaida asset freezing regime and the operation of the European Union (EU) asset freezing regime in the UK under the EU regulation (EC) 2580/2001 which implements UNSCR 1373 against external terrorist threats to the EU. Under the latter regime, the EU has responsibility for designations and the Treasury has responsibility for licensing and compliance with the regime in the UK under part 1 of TAFA 2010.
Annexes 1 and 2 to this statement provide a breakdown by name of all those designated by the UK and the EU in pursuance of UN Security Council resolution 1373.
Following the publication in February 2012 of the Treasury’s response to the independent reviewer’s first report on the operation of TAFA 2010, the Treasury is continuing work to implement the independent reviewer’s recommendations. Progress on these will be reported in future reports to Parliament.
The following table sets out the key asset-freezing activity in the UK during the quarter ending 31 March 2012:
Activities | TAFA 2010 | EU Reg (EC) 2580/2001 | Al-Qaida regime UNSCR 1989 |
|---|---|---|---|
Assets frozen (as at 31/03/2012) | £33,000 | £11,000 | £71,0001 |
Number of accounts frozen in UK (at 31/03/12) | 68 | 10 | 38 |
New accounts frozen | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Accounts unfrozen | 1 | 0 | 1 |
Number of designations (at 31/03/12) | 40 | 37 | 329 |
(i) new designations (during Q1 2012) | 0 | 0 | 11 |
(ii) Delistings | 2 | 14 | 25 |
(iii) individuals in custody in UK | 14 | 0 | 2 |
(iv) individuals in UK, not in detention | 5 | 0 | 7 |
(v) individuals overseas | 13 | 12 | 260 |
(vi) groups | 8 (0 in UK) | 25 | 69 (2 in UK) |
Renewal of designation | 34 | n/a | n/a |
General Licences | |||
(i) Issued in Q1 | (i) 0 | ||
(ii) Amended | (ii) 0 | ||
(iii) Revoked | (iii) 0 | ||
Specific Licences: | |||
(i) Issued | (i) 6 | (i) 0 | (i) 0 |
(ii) Revokd | (ii) 1 | (ii) 0 | (ii) 0 |
1This figure reflects the most up-to-date account balances available and includes approximately $64,000 of suspected terrorist funds frozen in the UK. This has been converted using exchange rates as of 02/04/12. |
The key area of activity during the quarter was:
Reviews of the remaining 36 existing designations, not reported on in the previous quarterly report, were conducted during the quarter, which resulted in the renewal of 34 designations and the delisting of Habib Ahmed and Selman Bozkur. The renewals and delistings were all publicised on the Treasury website. All current designations under TAFA 2010 are listed at Annex I.
Legal Challenges
Three legal challenges against designations made under both the Terrorism (United Nations Measures) Order 2009 and TAFA 2010 were ongoing in the quarter covered by this report. The challenges brought by Ismail Bhuta and Habib Ahmed were withdrawn during the quarter, in accordance with agreed terms of settlement. There were no specific developments during the quarter in the case brought by Zana Rahim.
Proceedings
In the quarter to 31 March 2012, no proceedings were initiated in respect of breaches of the prohibitions of the Act or the Al-Qaida (Asset-Freezing) Regulations 2011.
Designated persons under TAFA 2010 by name |
|---|
Individuals |
1. Hamed ABDOLLAHI |
2. Bilal Talal ABDULLAH |
3. Imad Khalil AL-ALAMI |
4. Abdula Ahmed ALI |
5. Abdelkarim Hussein AL-NASSER |
6. Ibrahim Salih AL-YACOUB |
7. Manssor ARBABSIAR |
8. Usama HAMDAN |
9. Nabeel HUSSAIN |
10. Tanvir HUSSAIN |
11. Zahoor IQBAL |
12. Umar ISLAM |
13. Hasan IZZ-AL-DIN |
14. Parviz KHAN |
15. Waheed Arafat KHAN |
16. Osman Adam KHATIB |
17. Musa Abu MARZOUK |
18. Gulam MASTAFA |
19. Khalid MISHAAL |
20. Khalid Shaikh MOHAMMED |
21. Ramzi MOHAMMED |
22. Sultan MUHAMMAD |
23. Yassin OMAR |
24. Hussein OSMAN |
25. Zana Abdul RAHIM |
26. Muktar Mohammed SAID |
27. Assad SARWAR |
28. Ibrahim SAVANT |
29. Abdul Reza SHAHLAI |
30. Ali Gholam SHAKURI |
31. Qasem SOLEIMANI |
32. Waheed ZAMAN |
Entities |
|---|
1. BASQUE FATHERLAND AND LIBERTY (ETA) |
2. EJERCITO DE LIBERACION NACIONAL (ELN) |
3. FUERZAS ARMADAS REVOLUCIONARIAS DE COLOMBIA (FARC) |
4. HIZBALLAH MILITARY WING, INCLUDING EXTERNAL SECURITY ORGANISATION |
5. HOLY LAND FOUNDATION FOR RELIEF AND DEVELOPMENT |
6. POPULAR FRONT FOR THE LIBERATION OF PALESTINE—GENERAL COMMAND (PFLP-GC) |
7. POPULAR FRONT FOR THE LIBERATION OF PALESTINE (PFLP) |
8. SENDERO LUMINOSO (SL) |
2 For full listing details please refer to http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/d/terrorism.htm |
Persons designated by the EU under Council Regulation (EC)2580/20013 |
|---|
Persons |
1. Hamed ABDOLLAHI* |
2. Abdeikarim Hussein AL-NASSER* |
3. Ibrahim Salih AL YACOUB* |
4. Manssor ARBABSIAR* |
5. Mohammed BOUYERI |
6. Sofiane Yacine FAHAS |
7. Hasan IZZ-AL-DIN* |
8. Khalid Shaikh MOHAMMED* |
9. Abdul Reza SHAHLAI* |
10. Ali Gholam SHAKURI* |
11. Qasem SOLEIMANI* |
12. Jason Theodore WALTERS |
Groups And Entities |
|---|
1. Abu Nidal Organisation (ANO) |
2. Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade |
3. Al-Aqsa e.V. |
4. Al-Takfir and Al-Hijra |
5. Babbar Khalsa |
6. Communist Party of the Philippines, including New People’s Army (NPA), Philippines |
7. Gama’a al-Islamiyya (a.k.a. Al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya) (Islamic Group—IG) |
8. Islami Büyük Dogu Akincilar Cephesi (IBDA-C) (Great Islamic Eastern Warriors Front) |
9. Hamas, including Hamas-Izz al-Din al-Qassem |
10. Hizbul Mujahideen (HM) |
11. Hofstadgroep |
12. Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development* |
13. International Sikh Youth Federation (ISYF) |
14. Khalistan Zindabad Force (KZF) |
15. Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) (a.k.a. KONGRA-GEL) |
16. Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) |
17. Ejército de Liberación Nacional (National Liberation Army)* |
18. Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) |
19. Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP)* |
20. Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine—General Command (PFLP-GC)* |
21. Fuerzas armadas revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC)* |
22. Devrimci Halk Kurtulu Partisi-Cephesi—DHKP/C (Revolutionary People’s Liberation Army/Front/Party) |
23. Sendero Luminoso (SL) (Shining Path)* |
24. Stichting Al Aqsa |
25. Teyrbazen Azadiya Kurdistan (TAK) |
3For full listing details please refer to http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/d/terrorism.htm. * EU listing rests on UK designation under TAFA 2010 |
UK 2012 National Reform Programme
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr Mark Hoban)
The Government have today published the UK 2012 national reform programme. The document has been submitted to the European Commission, as part of the European semester.
National Reform Programme
Under council recommendation 2010/410 of 13 July 2010, member states submit national reform programmes each year, which report to the Commission on their structural reforms and plans.
The UK 2012 national reform programme reports on actions taken by the UK as a whole, including by the Government and by the devolved Administrations where policy responses are of a devolved competence.
The 2012 national reform programme:
puts the UK’s structural reforms in the context of deficit reduction and the 2011 autumn statement and plan for growth;
reports on the broad macro-economic context, which uses the same text as the UK’s convergence programme;
reports on policies to tackle the five country-specific recommendations addressed to the UK by the June 2011 European Council: continuing with fiscal consolidation; reforms to the housing market; improving the employability of young people; reducing worklessness; and increasing access to finance; and
sets out the UK’s approach to national monitoring, in line with the five headline Europe 2020 targets agreed by the European Council in June 2010.
The national reform programme only draws on public information and is based on the announcements and forecasts of Budget 2012, “The Plan for Growth” and the autumn statement 2011. It is, therefore, entirely based on information already presented to Parliament.
Copies of the document will be deposited in the Libraries of both Houses and will be available on the Treasury website at: www.hm-treasury.gov.uk.
Informal Environment and Energy Councils
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change (Charles Hendry)
I represented the United Kingdom at the climate change aspects of the EU informal Environment Council and at the informal Energy Council in Denmark on 19 April 2012.
I attended the lunchtime discussion at the informal Environment Council on the future of the EU emissions trading scheme. There was broad agreement that while the ETS is delivering the required level of carbon emissions to meet the EU’s 2020 target, it is failing to deliver the necessary investment signals in low carbon. The low ETS price means that there is now a much reduced incentive to invest in low-carbon technology and infrastructure, meaning a risk of future lock-in to high carbon. There was almost universal support for Commission action to resolve these issues.
At the informal Energy Council, discussion on the first day focused on the energy efficiency directive. The presidency outlined the state of play of negotiations. Most Ministers expressed support for the latest presidency text and for the presidency in their efforts to secure agreement by the end of June. I and a number of other member states argued that the directive must be ambitious to ensure that it delivers real and additional energy savings.
The second day of the council (when the UK was represented by a DECC official) focused on the “2050 Energy Roadmap”. The presidency outlined the “no regrets” option of greater energy efficiency, more renewable energy and new flexible infrastructure. Commissioner Oettinger outlined the main features of the EU’s transition to a low-carbon economy: the need for regulatory predictability to encourage investment; a decarbonised energy sector; and flexibility for member states within a wider framework. He outlined his plan for a 12 to 18 month debate on the post-2020 regulatory structure for energy. In a wide-ranging discussion, most member states supported the “no regrets” option. The presidency plans to ask for agreement on conclusions on the energy road map at the June Energy Council.
Promoting and Protecting Human Rights (Command Paper)
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr William Hague)
I have today laid before the House a copy of the 2011 Foreign and Commonwealth Office report on human rights and democracy.
The report comprehensively assesses developments in human rights in 2011 and provides information about some important developments in early 2012. It sets out what the Government are doing through the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to promote human rights and democratic values around the world, in three principal areas: it documents the serious concerns we have about a range of countries where we are seeking to influence the human rights situation; it assesses progress on thematic issues that cut across geographic boundaries; and it reports on areas where we believe we have seen positive developments over the last year. We have made some significant changes to the format of the report itself this year, including the introduction of case studies.
I am determined that we will continue to strengthen and develop the Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s work on human rights. With this in mind, I have decided to allocate an additional £1.5 million in 2012 to our human rights programme work, which will be focused in particular on projects to promote freedom of expression online and the implementation of the UN guiding principles on business and human rights.
I have also decided to introduce changes to make the Foreign Office’s human rights reporting even more responsive to rapidly changing situations. An annual report can only look backwards, yet in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office we monitor and respond to change as it happens and our reporting needs to reflect this. It is sometimes the case that a country not regarded as a ‘country of concern’ at the beginning of the reporting period may experience important human rights developments.
Over the current reporting period, and for the first time, we will make quarterly decisions on whether systematic reporting on developments in other countries, not listed in the 2011 report as countries of concern, is required.
This more flexible quarterly reporting will strengthen the assessments we make about which countries should be added to or removed from the list of countries of concern in the 2012 annual report.
On the basis of the first of these assessments, I have decided that we should report quarterly on the situation in Bahrain and Ethiopia, and that we should review the situation in Rwanda and Egypt in depth at the mid-year point. These four countries are covered as case studies in the 2011 report.
Taken together, the report, the additional funding and these changes to our reporting system underline the Government’s determination to continue to place the effective promotion of human rights at the heart of our foreign policy.
Prison Service Pay Review Body
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Crispin Blunt)
I am pleased to announce that the Prime Minister has appointed Ann Jarvis as a member of the Prison Service Pay Review Body for three years commencing April 2012. The appointment has been conducted in accordance with the Office of the Commissioner for Public Appointments code of practice on appointments to public bodies.
Military Medals Review
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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The Prime Minister (Mr David Cameron)
This Government are fully committed to recognising all that our armed forces do to keep us safe. That is why this Government have enshrined the military covenant in law. Today, I am pleased to update the House on the fresh review of the rules and principles governing the award of military campaign medals that Lord Astor announced in the House last October (26 October 2011, Official Report, column 856).
The review will make recommendations where appropriate for any change.
I have appointed Sir John Holmes to carry out this review to ensure that it is fully independent. Sir John is currently director at the Ditchley Foundation, and formerly served as the UN’s Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator and as Her Majesty’s ambassador in Paris and Lisbon.
I have asked Sir John Holmes to report on his review by the summer.
A copy of the terms of reference has been placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
Workplace Pension Reform
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)
Later today the Government will publish the consultation document “Automatic enrolment: Career Average schemes as Qualifying Schemes”. This addresses an issue that could prevent some good quality pension schemes from being used as qualifying schemes under the reforms.
The Government’s policy on career average pension schemes is to allow them to be used as qualifying schemes and for the purposes of automatic enrolment so long as they provide for the benefits to be revalued at, or above, a prescribed minimum rate.
The consultation proposes amendments to those regulations to give more flexibility for schemes over how they provide for revaluation while still ensuring that members’ interests are fully protected. The period of formal consultation will begin today and last for six weeks, ending on 11 June.
I hope that those people and organisations with an interest in this subject will take the time to offer their views and advice.
Draft regulations will be published alongside the consultation document.
A copy of the consultation document and draft regulations will be placed in the Library of the House and will be available later today on the Department’s website: http://www.dwp.gov.uk/consultations/2012/.
House of Lords
House of Lords: Stonework
Lord Flight
To ask the Chairman of Committees whether there are any plans to tidy up and clean the stonework in the inner courtyards of the House of Lords on a similar basis to the work done on the Royal Court, Speaker’s Court, Commons Court and Commons Inner Court.
The Chairman of Committees (Lord Brabazon of Tara)
My Lords, the Parliamentary Estates Directorate is planning to begin trials of stone-cleaning work in Chancellor’s Court and State Officers’ Court in October 2014. It is hoped that work on these courtyards will be completed by October 2015, after which work on Peers’ Court will begin in October 2015 to be completed by October 2016. I should point out that these are only estimated timings at the moment and that the programme of works may change.
Lord Flight
My Lords, this is somewhat of an end-of-term Question but I am delighted for the Chairman of Committees to announce the plans for cleaning the seven internal courtyards of the Palace of Westminster. For 15 years, it has struck me as a great pity that, while two or three had been cleaned, the majority in the middle were a dirty mess. I would just comment that we have had announcements of cleaning, but what about tidying up?
The Chairman of Committees
My Lords, there are a great many other works going on in the palace—principally fire safety, mechanical engineering and cast iron roofs. All those require facilities for contractors on the estate, which on the whole means portacabins. I am afraid that they will be around for as long as is required. As for other bits of tidying up, we obviously do our best to make sure that there is not too much clutter in the courtyards but it probably is an inevitable result of the great deal of work that is going on elsewhere.
Lord Touhig
My Lords, during last week’s heavy rain, much of the new footpath across Abingdon Green was under water, as was the area in front of Old Palace Yard. Can the Chairman of Committees do something about the drainage in those areas? In the mean time, if we have any more warnings of severe rain, could those of us who do not have offices in the palace be issued with waders?
The Chairman of Committees
My Lords, having come from home yesterday, I can say to the noble Lord that there was a great deal of rain around there too. A lot of the roads and pavements were flooded. Until this drought is over, we may have to put up with that. As for the provision of waders to noble Lords, a few years back there was a project of issuing umbrellas. That was not a success as most of them disappeared rather quickly, largely on account of the fact that they had the House of Lords logo on them. I believe that they could be found on eBay relatively inexpensively.
Lord Trefgarne
My Lords, is this not the last occasion on which the noble Lord, Lord Brabazon, will answer Questions in his present capacity? We thank him and congratulate him on what he has done over the past 10 years.
The Chairman of Committees
I am most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, and for the expression from the House. It is indeed the last time on which I shall answer a Question on these sorts of matters. But I can tell noble Lords that the issue of the works going on in the palace will go on for a lot longer and many more of my successors will be dealing with it.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath
My Lords, if Mr Clegg has his way with the House of Lords, does the noble Lord think that the value of those umbrellas on eBay will go up or down?
The Chairman of Committees
I am not certain that I should try to answer that question, mainly because I do not know the answer, but I would have thought that they would go up in value as historic items.
Lord Dixon-Smith
My Lords, I wonder if I might return to the subject of the original Question. Will the noble Lord consider retaining one of our courtyards in an uncleaned state as a permanent reminder to all of us of the casual environmental damage we sometimes cause, which reveals itself only many years after we have caused it?
The Chairman of Committees
That is an interesting suggestion. I am old enough to remember the great London smogs that caused this damage to the building in the first place, and therefore on the face of it the noble Lord’s suggestion is a good one. However, I would resist it because of the damage being done to the building as of now, and therefore it is necessary to get on with cleaning and repairing it.
Abu Qatada
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is the current position regarding the deportation of Abu Qatada.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Henley)
My Lords, we await the decision of the European Court of Human Rights on whether to accept Qatada’s referral request. We wrote to the Strasbourg court to ask that it reject this application both on the merits of the case and on the timing of his request. Qatada, meanwhile, remains in detention.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
My Lords, let us forget the shambles of last week. Will the Minister explain exactly how and when this terrorist is going to be deported?
Lord Henley
My Lords, I cannot give a precise answer on when he will be deported because that matter is in the courts. However, I do not accept what the noble Lord says about there being a shambles last week. It was quite clear from all the advice and all the precedents that the three months for making the referral expired at midnight on 16 April. My right honourable friend made her decision on that basis. We now await to see what the courts are doing.
Lord Faulks
My Lords, on 7 February, the last occasion on which the noble Lord answered Questions about Abu Qatada, he was asked whether the Government could provide a new reassurance that this sort of situation would not recur, and he referred to the fact that the Government were hoping that reform of the Strasbourg court might make it less likely. We have now had the Brighton declaration. Can the Minister tell the House whether the Government think that this is more or less likely to happen again, and if it is less likely to do so, why?
Lord Henley
My Lords, my noble friend is a lawyer and therefore will know that we can never give an absolutely cast-iron guarantee about what the courts or lawyers might or might not do, but I can say to him that the agreement reached at the Brighton conference represents a substantial package of reforms and marks a significant step towards realising the goals that the Prime Minister set out at Strasbourg.
Lord Anderson of Swansea
Will the noble Lord give the best guesstimate he can of how much, over the past decade and under both Governments, the British taxpayer has had to pay to keep this man and his family in this country by way of social security payments and legal aid? When will this end?
Lord Henley
My Lords, I cannot give that figure to the noble Lord, much as I would like to because I think it is one that the public ought to know. If I can make some sort of guesstimate, working with my own department, the Ministry of Justice and the Department for Work and Pensions, I will certainly do so. However, I can give him an assurance that my understanding is that he is not to have his costs paid in the current matter of the referral to the European Court of Human Rights.
Lord Tomlinson
Has not the Minister rather overplayed the importance of this when compared with the Government’s objectives in the Brighton declaration? Will he give an assurance that we will abide totally by the Brighton declaration, that we will cease as a country to suffer the humiliation of having our Government condemn the European Court of Human Rights, and that we will regard it in the way that it always should have been regarded, as the bulwark of our civil liberties?
Lord Henley
My Lords, I do not accept what the noble Lord says at all. All I said was that I thought that the declaration represented a substantial package of reforms. There could be many more reforms to that court. The noble Lord knows perfectly well that it very often exceeds its functions and goes beyond what was ever intended in 1950 when we signed up to the original convention on human rights.
Baroness Hamwee
My Lords, the procedural issues are important but so, too, is the substantive issue. With the Government having reached what they regard as an acceptable memorandum of understanding with the Jordanian Government as to the evidence that will be used in a trial in Jordan, can the Minister tell the House how that process will be monitored to ensure compliance with the memorandum of understanding?
Lord Henley
My Lords, we will maintain very close contact with the Jordanian Government when we manage to extradite this man to Jordan and he faces his trial there. We will make sure that we keep fully cognisant of what goes on in the trial in that country.
Lord West of Spithead
My Lords, when I was the Security Minister I was constantly struck and somewhat surprised by how my opposite numbers in a number of European countries seemed able to return terrorists to the countries to which they belonged. Perhaps we could ask those countries how they manage to circumvent the rules and how they avoid getting into the complete muddle that we seem to have got in.
Lord Henley
My Lords, other countries do things in other ways. The important thing to remember is that this country abides by the rule of law and listens to what the courts say, however unpalatable that might be. I think that what that court has done is unpalatable. We hope that it will see reason on this occasion and accept that his referral is out of time and that there are no merits in the case whatever.
Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville
My Lords, whatever the merits of the 24 hours that were being debated at the beginning of this matter, did my noble friend notice that the infection can spread to the Back Benches opposite? The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, suggested in his supplementary that the dramas had happened last week when in fact they had happened the week before. Seven days is an even longer period to lose.
Lord Henley
My Lords, I would not want to comment on the sense of timing of the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath
My Lords, the Minister has already referred to listening to the court. In terms of lost days, he will know that the Prime Minister told the BBC that his officials had checked with the European court the deadline for the appeal. Will the Minister give the House of Lords chapter and verse as to when the Home Office checked with the European court and what the court said?
Lord Henley
My Lords, the Home Office and other parts of the Government have been in regular contact with the court ever since the judgment back on 17 January. We are absolutely clear, and both precedent and legal advice are clear, that the deadline for the referral was within—I stress “within”—three months, by midnight on 16 April, and that the judgment comes into effect after three months; that is, after midnight on 16 April. That could hardly be clearer and the precedents could hardly be clearer.
Lord Cormack
My Lords, as this is a leap year, does not the Home Secretary have a day in hand?
Lord Hughes of Woodside
My Lords, it appears that all the discussions and advice were handled verbally. Are we to believe that that is the case? Is there nothing in writing or a paper trail to say specifically that these deadlines were properly arrived at? If not, why can that not be published?
Lord Henley
My Lords, I can only repeat the answer that I gave to the noble Lord’s noble friend, Lord Hunt. I said that we have been in constant contact with the court, that all legal advice and legal precedents indicated that this was the case, and that the difference between the timing for the referral, which had to be within three months, and the timing for the judgment—that is, after—made it quite clear that midnight on the 16th was the moment in question.
Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton
My Lords, the Minister has not given the information on exactly when the court advised the Government that that was the date. He referred in his answer to my noble friend Lord Hunt to legal advice and general advice in correspondence with the court. What is the exact date on which the court in Strasbourg gave advice to the Government that the final date was the one which the Government used?
Lord Henley
My Lords, the point I was making, if the noble Baroness would be fair enough to listen to me, was that we had been in regular contact with the court on these matters. It was quite clear from precedent and legal advice that the case that I have put forward is the right one. Therefore we were satisfied that we were right to consider that the last possible moment for referral was 16 April at midnight.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
My Lords, this is a serious question—with respect to those opposite—and the Minister has still not answered the questions about the future. What are the Home Office’s plans for dealing with this man and when can we expect him to be deported? Please can I have an answer?
Lord Henley
My Lords, like the noble Lord, and like the previous Government—who tried to do something about this for 10 years—I and all other noble Lords would like to see this man deported as soon as possible. He represents a very real risk to this country, and this has been going on for 10 years. However, we must abide by the rule of law and we must wait until the court makes its decision. I do not know when the European court will deal with this referral case. As far as I am concerned as a very simple lawyer, this looks like a pretty simple case that the court could deal with pretty quickly, if for no other reason than that it is obvious that he is out of time in his referral.
Police: Race Relations Policies
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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Baroness Howells of St Davids
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they will encourage HM Inspectorate of Constabulary to undertake a thematic review of race relations policies within police forces in the United Kingdom.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Henley)
My Lords, the Government take recent allegations of police racism very seriously. The firm actions taken by the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police are exactly those that we would expect other service leaders to take if faced with similar issues. We do not believe that a thematic inspection by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary is necessary at this stage.
Baroness Howells of St Davids
I thank the noble Lord for his reply. He will recall that on 29 November he assured the House that there was no racism in the police force. Circumstances have shown that he was wrong. Will he consider again encouraging the police force to begin racism awareness training among the constabulary? We need to get rid of the Aryan myth of white superiority once and for all and I believe that it is necessary that we should all understand what that is.
The Commissioner’s statements were very encouraging. Is the Minister able to arrange a meeting between those of us who are very interested in this subject and the commissioner so that we can explain to him what is really meant by institutional racism and the recommendations in Macpherson can be acted on?
Lord Henley
My Lords, I owe the noble Baroness an apology if I suggested that there was no racism within the Metropolitan Police. It is obviously wrong to suggest that any organisation has no racism within it. What I was trying to get over on that occasion, and on the two occasions last week when I dealt with questions of this sort, was that institutional racism within the Met has largely been dealt with. It was encouraging that the most recent cases of racism were reported by the police themselves and therefore this was a strong sign that these matters were being dealt with.
I would be more than happy to assist in arranging a meeting between the noble Baroness and others and either the Commissioner or the Deputy Commissioner, whomever she considers the most appropriate person to deal with these matters. Meanwhile, as I made clear on the Question from my noble friend Lord Sheikh and the Statement that I made on another occasion when I believe the noble Baroness was present, I believe that the Met is making considerable strides in this area.
Lord Condon
My Lords, does the noble Lord agree that the wider police service must show great vigilance and endeavour to respond well to race and diversity issues? They must not become complacent and somehow see race as yesterday's problem or yesterday’s issue. This is an ongoing challenge that the service must respond to well at all times.
Lord Henley
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Condon, with his great experience, is absolutely correct to express those points. I fully agree with him. I remind him and the House that an important part of the regular reviews by HMIC—the inspectorate of the constabulary—is that any force inspections should always include some detail of an assessment of equality, diversity and those matters.
Lord Dholakia
My Lords, at least 27 police officers are under investigation for racist behaviour. The noble Baroness, Lady Howells, is rightly concerned about that. She has done a tremendous amount of work following the death of Stephen Lawrence on the adversarial contact between the black community and the police. While we appreciate the action taken by the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, is it not right that we should have a thematic inspection of racial issue policies, particularly in relation to training, recruitment and retention, bearing in mind that the cuts to police expenditure are likely to impinge on these areas?
Lord Henley
My Lords, I am grateful for the question from my noble friend Lord Dholakia. I stress that I did not rule out a thematic review—I just said that I did not think it necessarily appropriate at this stage. I can assure my noble friend that there have been thematic reviews in the past. If necessary, that could be looked at again. I repeat the important point in the answer I gave to the noble Lord, Lord Condon, that this is already part of any inspection of the police force. Also, on the very unfortunate recent cases that have appeared in the Met, the great thing is that such cases are at least being reported by their fellow police officers. That is a sign that something is being done. It is progress.
Lord Soley
Does the Minister agree that, over the years, training of the police on racism has improved dramatically but there is a real problem when they then finish their training and join forces which are not representative of the diversity of this country? Should we not put all the emphasis on recruitment and retention of people from across the range so that our police forces represent this country? In that way, you would do far more to resist racism in a force than you would simply in the classroom alone.
Lord Henley
My Lords, I fully agree with the noble Lord. Training is very important but it is also important to make sure that recruitment and retention continue so that all police forces can represent the appropriate diversity of their individual areas. That is the important thing: to make sure that they can then continue to police their area with the proper consent of those being policed.
Baroness Afshar
My Lords, in the current atmosphere of Islamophobia, could we have an assurance that race includes religion? It seems to me that Muslims are becoming disproportionately targeted. They are of many races and can come in all colours and shades, but because of their religion they are being singled out.
Lord Henley
My Lords, the noble Baroness makes a very valid point and one that I am sure is taken into account in initial and all further ongoing training.
Lord Elystan-Morgan
My Lords, does the Minister agree that successive Governments, probably over the last 40 years, have found it extremely difficult to recruit the maximum number of officers from among ethnic minorities? Can he assure the House that the greatest effort will be made and the heaviest emphasis placed upon this crucial factor?
Lord Henley
My Lords, I can say that great progress has been made over the last 40, 30, 20 and even 10 years on increasing the diversity of the police force so that it better represents the areas that it covers. That will obviously vary from Wales to the Met. I can also tell the noble Lord—and this is important—that the figures from black and ethnic minority communities on their satisfaction and confidence in our police forces seem very similar to figures from white communities.
Migration: University-sponsored Students
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Clement-Jones
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what consideration they have given to excluding university-sponsored students from the United Kingdom’s net migration statistics.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Henley)
My Lords, the UK uses the internationally agreed definition of a migrant, which is someone coming to or leaving the United Kingdom for a period exceeding 12 months. It is right that students intending to stay for that period should be counted because during their stay they are part of the resident population and contribute to pressure on public services infrastructure. It is not appropriate to discount them from net migration statistics.
Lord Clement-Jones
My Lords, the department makes no distinction between temporary and permanent migration. Many other countries do, and still fall within the UN definitions. That means that the Home Office is targeting net migration figures that include overseas students, which is directly contrary to the policy of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. Surely now that the e-Borders system will be able to track very closely non-EEA students and other citizens coming into this country, it is time to exclude those students from the net migration figures and have a unified government policy.
Lord Henley
My Lords, I am afraid that in terms of migration my noble friend has got it right. I do not think he would want me to adjust the figures purely to achieve the ends that he suggests, as there might be complaints from the House that we were fiddling the figures, and I do not want to be accused of that. We stick by the long-standing international United Nations measure that students who come to the UK for more than a year are counted as migrants.
Lord Bilimoria
My Lords, I have just returned from the annual UK-India round-table meeting, and this very question was raised. Why cannot the Government exclude foreign students from the target? Foreign students bring up to £8 billion of revenue into this country. In fact, the Government should be trying to double the number of foreign students from 440,000 to 800,000, bringing in another £8 billion. Does the Minister agree—I know this from experience, as my family was educated in this country from India for three generations—that by encouraging foreign students you build generation-long links, with huge benefit to this country?
Lord Henley
My Lords, I totally agree with the noble Lord in that I accept that students coming to universities—and I stress that the Question is purely about students coming to universities—provide very great value to this country, and we want to see their numbers increase in many areas. They have increased over the past year or so, as I understand it, but we want to get rid of some of the bogus students who come here not to study but to work—and that is what we are doing.
It is important that we stick to international UN definitions. As I said, there would be considerable criticism of me if I suggested that we should fix those figures purely for our own purposes.
Lord Howarth of Newport
My Lords, if the Government were to accept the proposal put to them by the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, would they not thereby confer a great benefit on UK universities and on bona fide international university students, as well as on our international standing, and at the same time be able to hit their own immigration target figures, which they have otherwise not a hope of achieving?
Lord Henley
The noble Lord is, yet again, another one who wants me to fix the figures. I do not want to do that. We want to do these things in a proper way, and the definition of migrants is that they are people staying for over a year. We welcome students and do what we can to get them, but we are not going to fix the figures in the manner that he suggests.
Baroness Knight of Collingtree
My Lords, is it not the case that the situation has been made very much worse by the numbers of students who have come here from foreign countries and not left but remained here, making great difficulties? Is not that point at the heart of this difficulty?
Lord Henley
My noble friend is right to point out that quite a large number of students stay on, but the other point to make to her is that quite a number of people coming over in the past—not the university students that we are talking about—were coming over to colleges that did not really exist and were there purely as a scam to get around migration statistics. That is what we have been trying to deal with.
Lord Morgan
My Lords, is this policy not the result of a basic intellectual confusion that has very serious and harmful effects? First, it distorts the statistics on immigration, which causes concern. Secondly, as we have heard, it is extremely harmful to universities and deters many would-be bona fide students from overseas countries, with a great loss of revenue. Thirdly, it seriously imperils relations with Commonwealth countries such as Malaysia, Singapore and India. Should we not think again?
Lord Henley
I think that if the noble Lord looks at the statistics he will find that there has actually been an increase in the number of students from Malaysia and Singapore. I appreciate that there has been a decline in the number from India, but there have been increases from elsewhere. Here we are talking about university students, and we have not seen an overall drop in those numbers.
Again I go back to the point that it is quite obvious that the noble Lord seeks to ask me to fiddle the figures. I do not want to do that.
Baroness Brinton
My Lords, if the Government are not happy to change the system of permanent and temporary migration figures, and given that in the past they have said that they cannot always track students leaving the country, will they please consider using the HESA statistics, which record students when they leave the country—or, even better, get the border agency to ask students as they leave whether they have completed their studies rather than just where they are going?
Lord Henley
My noble friend goes on to a somewhat more detailed point, which I will have to look at. I would certainly be more than happy to do that and write to her.
Baroness Afshar
My Lords, as a student who stayed and was educated at school and university here, I have to say that many of us do not come here just to work but to contribute. We have a lot to contribute, and the current limitations mean that students from the Middle East, particularly from countries such as Iran but also elsewhere, cannot get access any more because the limits are so tight that anyone from outside the Commonwealth has enormous difficulty getting in. Some of us do make good.
Lord Henley
My Lords, I think the whole House is grateful that the noble Baroness came and stayed here, and for the contribution that she has made to the House, but she will also recognise that we have a duty to make sure that we have some control over our migration figures. We are trying, as I was trying to make clear earlier, to get some control over some of the more bogus applicants who claim that they were coming in to study, whereas in fact they were coming in for other purposes.
Business of the House
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Strathclyde
That Standing Order 40(1) (Arrangement of the Order Paper) be dispensed with on Tuesday 1 May to enable the resumed debate on the Motion in the name of Lord Richard http://www.parliament.uk/biographies/lords/26702 to be taken as first business, and that no Oral Questions be taken on that day.
Public Bodies (Abolition of Courts Boards) Order 2012
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Henley
That the draft order laid before the House on 31 January be approved.
Relevant documents: 53rd Report from the Merits Committee, 41st Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, considered in Grand Committee on 25 April.
Trusts (Capital and Income) Bill [HL]
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Henley)
My Lords, a Second Reading Committee considered this Bill in the Moses Room on Wednesday 25 April, and I therefore beg to move this Motion formally.
Draft House of Lords Reform Bill
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Richard
That this House takes note of the report from the Joint Committee on the draft House of Lords Reform Bill. (HL Paper 284)
Lord Richard
My Lords, perhaps I might say right at the outset that I am glad this debate is now to extend over two days. The subject deserves proper treatment, and to have to discuss it at two or three o’clock in the morning would be unacceptable. I start by paying tribute to the Clerks of this Joint Committee. From this House we had Mr Rhodri Walters, the Reading Clerk, and from the House of Commons Mr Liam Laurence Smyth, Principal Clerk. They jointly led a group of committee clerks who were, frankly, as powerful and formidable as any group I have ever come across. We are all indebted to them for their skill, determination and commitment to the committee’s deliberations. I am extremely grateful to them and wish to acknowledge this publicly.
It is important, too, at the outset for this House to be clear as to what precisely the Joint Committee was asked to do. Our mandate, in a sentence, was to examine the draft House of Lords Bill. The committee consisted of 13 Members from each House, a total of 26, who I think were carefully chosen to represent as best they could all the views that existed in each House. For the Lords, there were four Conservative Peers—one of whom, the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, is an hereditary Peer—four Labour Peers, two Liberal Democrats, one Cross-Bencher and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leicester. From the Commons, there were six Conservative Members, five Labour, one Liberal Democrat and one Ulster Unionist. On any view of the matter, this was a large committee. While that of course made it more difficult to achieve consensus, it nevertheless meant that almost every variety of view found expression.
We had 15 evidence sessions, stretching from October 2011 to the end of February this year. We heard evidence from 20 witnesses, including the Minister for Political and Constitutional Reform, Mr Mark Harper, who we saw no fewer than four times. The Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Nick Clegg, gave evidence to us in a lengthy session. We also took evidence via videolink from members of the Australian Senate, particularly on the issues of primacy and constituency representation. In addition to all that, we received 227 written submissions of evidence. I would not recommend that people read every word of the evidence, particularly in relation to the scope covered, unless they are extremely enthusiastic, but I urge them at least to glance at it. Taken together, the oral and written evidence represents as full and comprehensive a survey of the current position, and of possible ways of reforming the House, as it is possible to get. I cannot think of any major issue that was not covered and was not therefore firmly before the committee.
May I now say a word about the function of the committee? It was not a royal commission. Had it been, I hope it would have been smaller and its membership less political and more widely drawn, and it would certainly have been more wide-ranging in its terms of reference. We did not start by being presented with a clean sheet of paper. We were not told to produce a plan for a future House of Lords; that was not the purpose of the committee. We had a Bill to consider, which itself had specific provisions. The Bill had 68 clauses and nine schedules, and was accompanied by a detailed White Paper. That had to be our starting point. However, in looking at the Bill we had to examine virtually all the major issues around the central themes of an elected House versus an appointed House, the primacy of the House of Commons, the electoral system, the size of the House and its functions and powers.
That the committee was divided was not, perhaps, surprising. The issue has proved divisive now for well over a century. It would have been remarkable had this not been reflected in the committee itself. There were divisions within parties and within the Houses. There was no clearly visible Labour view versus a Conservative view. There was no clear Lords view versus a Commons view. Opinions inevitably differed. However, we managed to create a genuine atmosphere of what I would call rational discussion. The mood in the committee was, on the whole, equable and tolerant; I pay tribute to its members for that. Thankfully, we avoided a “Lords versus Commons” direct confrontation. Both sides and all members of the committee felt that the issue was a bit too serious for that.
I turn now to some of the specific recommendations that the committee made. First, and perhaps most importantly, it agreed by a majority that the reformed second Chamber should have an electoral mandate. That was agreed after a division in which 13 voted in favour and nine against. Of the 13 in favour, nine were MPs and four were Peers. Of the not-contents, seven were Peers, one was an MP and one was the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leicester. It was a clear vote and a clear majority. In relation to the alternative report, I am somewhat fortified in saying that by the remark on page 31, which says that that a vote of 13 to eight was a considerable and substantive margin.
Secondly, it was agreed that 80 per cent of Members of the reformed House should be elected and 20 per cent should be nominated. In the vote on that, there were 16 contents and six not-contents. Of the contents, nine were MPs, six were Peers and one was the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leicester. Of the six not-contents, two were MPs and four were Peers. Again, it was a clear vote and a clear majority.
One of the most important points that the committee discussed—and discussed, and discussed—was the primacy of the House of Commons. We unanimously agreed that Clause 2 was of little use and should be discarded. It was, in the committee’s view, declaratory only and risked becoming justiciable. Again, there was a vote on primacy of the House of Commons. This was a topic on which we spent a great deal of time. Those arguing in support of the proposition that primacy could not be safeguarded based their case primarily on the belief that once the House of Lords had an electoral mandate it would behave in an unpredictable and confrontational way and would not accept its subordination to the House of Commons. It was argued that that would apply even in the case of finance and taxation.
The other side of the argument pointed out that the Commons would continue to be the House where Governments were made and destroyed; that the Commons had the exclusive right to determine financial and taxation policy; that the House of Lords would be elected on a different electoral system; that 20 per cent of the membership would be appointed not elected; and that the Parliament Acts would continue to apply. The Government’s position was that the current relationship would evolve but that on balance Commons primacy could be maintained. In the end, the committee, by a majority of 12 to 10,
“while acknowledging that the balance of power would shift, consider that the remaining pillars on which Commons primacy rests would suffice to ensure its continuation”.
The vote was 12 in favour and 10 against. Of the 10, one was an MP; of the 12, eight were MPs. I could not help observing at the time, and, indeed, still do, that it is passing strange that if the primacy of the House of Commons is such a burning issue to the House of Commons, only one MP voted against the proposition and eight MPs voted in favour of it. One would expect that Members of the House whose primacy is deemed to be so much under attack would be reluctant to accept that the Bill ensured its continuation, but far from it. The committee agreed with the Government’s proposal for election under the STV system, with the variation to take in the practice currently used in New South Wales, which gives voters the right to express a preference between parties as well as individuals.
The committee agreed that conventions governing the relationship between the Houses cannot be legislated for and that such conventions would evolve further once the House of Lords was reformed. We recommended that any new conventions, or modification to existing conventions, should be promulgated by the adoption of a concordat in the form of parallel identical resolutions prepared by a Joint Committee and adopted by each House. In a sense, this is the daughter of Cunningham, if I can use that phrase. It provides a framework within which the two Houses can operate, work out their relationship and within which primacy can be maintained.
On the size of the House, the committee unanimously agreed that a House of 300 Members was too small and that the size of the House should be 450. We also accepted that Members should serve a 15-year, non-renewable term. The vote on that point was somewhat interesting: the contents were 20; the not-contents were two—the two being the noble Lords, Lord Trefgarne and Lord Trimble. Every other member of the committee then present voted in favour.
One of the most important issues that we discussed was the transition from the existing House to the one proposed in the Bill. I wish to say one or two words about the transitional arrangements because I am very conscious that they are of great importance to Members of this House. Of the three transitional arrangements proposed in the White Paper, the committee agreed with that preferred by the Government and set out in the draft Bill. However, the committee also recommended an alternative option, which makes a bigger cut in the transitional membership in 2015 with no further cut until the end of transition in 2025, so that there would be one cull, so to speak, at the beginning of the process and the remainder would go at the end of it. That proposal has the following three characteristics: first, a transitional membership in 2015 would be equal to a benchmark figure derived from the total number of Members attending two-thirds or more of sitting days in the 2011-12 Session. Those transitional Members would remain in place until the final tranche of elected Members arrived in 2025—at which point all the transitional Members would leave. There would be an allocation of the transitional seats to parties and Cross-Bench Peers in proportion to the current membership. Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, parties and Cross-Bench Peers would determine for themselves the persons to serve as transitional Members. The transitional Members would continue to receive daily allowances rather than salaries. We agreed by 13 to 7 votes that Bishops should continue to have ex-officio seats in the reformed House of Lords, and we agreed by 13 to 5 that that number should remain at 12.
In the course of our deliberations, we dealt with many other issues—all of which are set out in the report. We made recommendations, for example, on the operation of the Appointments Commission, disqualification of Members and the position of Ministers parachuted into the Lords as Ministers. However, I should like to say a word about two of the more prominent issues that troubled the committee.
It became apparent that one of the issues concerning Members of the House of Commons was the relationship between an elected Member of the House of Lords elected, as he would be, by STV on a large constituency basis and an individual Member of Parliament elected by first past the post for a particular constituency. MPs were clearly worried that elected Members of the Lords would involve themselves in personal casework of the kind currently undertaken by MPs on behalf of their constituents. We therefore recommended that IPSA should make no provision for Members of a reformed House to deal with personal casework, as opposed to policy work, or to have offices in their constituencies. We did, however, consider that elected Members would inevitably be concerned and be approached about regional, local and legislative matters.
The possible use of the Parliament Acts was a subject we considered. We had evidence from the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, both written and oral, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith. Their evidence raised two issues. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, told the committee that the Parliament Acts could properly be used to reform the Lords, and that the courts would uphold such a decision. As to whether the Parliament Acts would continue to apply to a reformed second Chamber, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, said that there was at least doubt that the Acts, or all their provisions, would apply. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, said that the better view was that the present Acts would not apply to a reformed second Chamber. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, said that it would, however, be open to Parliament to legislate now—now, my Lords—to make clear that the Parliament Acts should operate in the same way in relation to an elected second Chamber, although the present clause was not acceptable for that purpose. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, said that it was vital that the reform Bill specified clearly whether or not the Acts would continue to apply to a reformed second Chamber, and he agreed that Clause 2 did not adequately address the question. The Joint Committee therefore recommended that if the Government wished to ensure that the Parliament Acts applied to a reformed House, they should make statutory provision for it. Both Peers considered that the issue could be resolved by suitable wording in the Bill. That seemed to me to be persuasive evidence.
I should like to say something about costs. We accepted the recommendation of the Government that the salary of an elected Member should be somewhat below that of an MP but above that of a Member of a devolved Assembly. We also accepted that the sort of constituency allowances that were paid to MPs should not be available to elected Members of the House of Lords. So far as transitional Members were concerned, they should continue to receive a per diem allowance. This was also to be applicable to appointed Members—the 20 per cent. What we could not do was go into the costs of the whole exercise, very simply because although we asked the Government to produce some figures, they did not do so. I regretted that very much because, apart from anything else, it prevented us having a sensible discussion on the issue.
I am sorry to have taken up so much of the House’s time with the details of the report, but in view of some of the comments that have been made, I thought it was important that the House should get a clear picture of what we actually recommended. We undertook a thorough and detailed analysis of the proposals put forward in the Government’s draft Bill. It is now for the Government to consider our proposals before coming forward with the final Bill, which they can present to Parliament for further scrutiny.
Finally, I say one or two words about the alternative report. By the rules of the House, there could not be a minority report. There was, however, nothing to prevent members of the committee issuing their own commentary on the process, and this the alternative 12 have done. I have read the alternative report with great interest and some surprise. I see that the alternative 12 now call for reconsideration of the 15-year term. I cannot help but observe that 10 of the 12 voted for it in the committee. However, the main problem I have with the alternative report is the suggestion of a constitutional convention on further reform of the House of Lords. It would be lengthy, time-consuming, diffuse and, judging from the report, distinctly overpopulated. I will not bore the House by reading out the provision in the report which sets out the dramatis personae of those who are supposed to be eligible to take part in the constitutional convention. I recommend Members of the House to read it and observe the ominous words at the end of the list:
“This list is not exhaustive”.
More important than that is the fact that there is really nothing much left to say about this issue. We have been round this course now year after year after year for more than a century. In the 22 years since I have been in this House, it has been the subject of intense discussion in the course of which the same points are made, remade and re-remade again, again and again. I see no virtue whatever in setting up a convention to reiterate the differences which already exist and which we all know about.
The idea that somehow there is a mechanism whereby all those differences can be fused and that there will then be a general agreement about proposals to reform the House of Lords is fanciful. It is an absurdity. There are divisions in the House as to whether we want an elected House or not, whether we want people to come here as a result of a democratic election or to continue to be appointed. It is high time that people recognised that the time has come for a decision on these issues, not further discussion and then further discussion after that.
I think that the committee has produced a better Bill as a result of our deliberations. I think that that Bill is important constitutionally, indeed, it is important enough that it should be presented to the people in a referendum. That way, we will begin to make some real progress. I beg to move.
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Lord Strathclyde)
My Lords, I begin by paying tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Richard. I know that I do so on behalf of the whole House. I reiterate the Government’s thanks to him and to all noble Lords who served on the Joint Committee. Perhaps the noble Lord feels like a juror who has sat on an especially long, complex and lurid trial, and he may wish to put in a plea to be excused from any further service to the House of this nature; I am sure that we would readily accept it.
With me and a few others, he shares enormously long experience in debating these issues on the Floor of this House. He was right when he said at the end of his speech that the time has surely come for Parliament to decide once and for all what we want to do.
The Joint Committee has produced a detailed and comprehensive report which will undoubtedly leave its mark on the Government’s final proposals. The report is a milestone in a process that began in 1997, shortly after Mr Blair first described this House as an affront to democracy, and which led to the enactment of the House of Lords Bill in 1999. Since then, Labour in government sought to find a policy for the second phase of House of Lords reform, since when the future of this House has been hanging in the balance. During that period we have seen a royal commission in 2000, a first White Paper in 2001, a Joint Committee in 2002-03, a Green Paper in 2003, a second White Paper in 2007, a cross-party working group in 2007-08 and, finally, a third White Paper in July 2008, with, during that time, also votes in the House of Commons. Following the general election in 2010, this coalition Government established a further cross-party committee and went on to publish for the very first time a draft Bill alongside a White Paper in May last year, and that is the Bill which has now been subject to pre-legislative scrutiny by the Joint Committee.
That chronology alone should serve to demonstrate that the search by successive Governments for consensus on a second phase of reform of this House has been very nearly as exhaustive as the Joint Committee’s report. Although it may have proceeded in fits and starts, the broad parameters of those discussions have remained constant for some time. Indeed, the central elements of the Government’s draft Bill—the scaffolding, so to speak—are derived from the accumulated wisdom acquired through cross-party deliberations over the past 13 years. In the end, however, there is only one way to test whether consensus on the second phase of reform of this House exists or can emerge, and that is to introduce a Bill and then to allow Parliament to take a view. By publishing a draft Bill for pre-legislative scrutiny, the Government have taken the first step in that process. If a Bill to change the composition of this House is included in next week’s Queen Speech, it will be in Parliament that we establish whether the consensus which the Government believe exists can be drawn upon to take the Bill forward and on to the statute book. After all, is that not what Parliament is for?
Today is an opportunity for the Lords members of the Joint Committee to elaborate on the conclusions they reached in the course of the pre-legislative scrutiny, and for other Members of the House to comment on those conclusions with a view to informing the Government’s deliberations as we consider how best to adapt our proposals. The noble Lord, Lord Richard, has been frank that his chairmanship was a far from simple task. The issues around reform of your Lordships’ House have been vigorously contested over the years and it is no surprise that there were robust debates and differences of opinion among the members of the committee. Those culminated in an alternative report, to which no doubt some noble Lords will refer.
It is none the less the case that by a majority the Joint Committee agreed a report that lends support to many of the central elements of the Government’s initial proposals, and the Government welcome that. The noble Lord, Lord Richard, has already addressed some of those in his opening speech. Most importantly, the Joint Committee’s report concurs with the Government’s view that a reformed second Chamber should have a strong electoral mandate, that 80 per cent of Members should be elected under the STV system for 15-year non-renewable terms and that 20 per cent of Members should be appointed, with reserved places for the Lords Spiritual. Of course, the devil is in the detail—it always has been—but that is what the parliamentary process, of which the pre-legislative scrutiny is the first stage, is for.
We have a second Chamber in order to keep the Executive in check, and the Government believe that a democratic mandate obtained through direct elections would enhance the House’s ability to perform this function. If anyone has anything to fear from the proposed reforms, it should be the Executive, not least because it is likely that with elections by PR there would never be an overall majority for the Government in a strengthened upper House.
The Joint Committee shares the view that the election of 80 per cent of a reformed House will make the House more assertive. Intriguingly, however, it concludes that a more assertive House would not enhance Parliament’s overall role in relation to the activities of the Executive. I should be interested to hear from the noble Lord, Lord Richard, or from other members of the committee who are due to speak today why they reached that particular view.
The Joint Committee concurs with the Government that the reformed House should be much smaller than the current House of Lords, but recommends a House of 450 Members rather than the 300 proposed in the draft Bill. The committee appears to have been persuaded by witnesses who suggest that 300 Members might be insufficient to carry out the current functions of the House. Some of those who gave evidence also introduced a distinction between full-time and part-time Members. The Joint Committee went on to recommend that appointed Members should not have to attend as frequently as elected Members and appears to justify the 450 figure on that basis. Of course, the Government will consider carefully the committee’s recommendations on the size of a reformed House, but I invite those who served on the committee to elaborate on the arguments for the specific figure of 450, their comparison with today and the expectations that they propose in respect of attendance.
For my part, I am not clear what is meant by full and part-time membership of a reformed House. A significant proportion of Members of the House today attend almost every sitting yet the current House is rightly described as a part-time House, most obviously because the House does not sit for long periods of the year. In other areas of our political system, such as local government, individuals manage to hold down a full-time political office, such as being the leader of a council, alongside other remunerated employment. I am not clear whether the Joint Committee envisages that only appointed Members would be able to maintain professional expertise elsewhere. Elections and expertise are not in themselves incompatible, as some Members of another place continue to remind us.
The Government welcome the Joint Committee’s support for our proposals that Members of a reformed upper House should no longer serve for life but for a single 15-year non-renewable term and that elections should take place in thirds at the same time as general elections. We are also pleased that the Joint Committee endorsed our proposal for elections to be held by a single transferable vote and we will examine its argument in favour of the STV system used in New South Wales as an alternative to the STV system proposed in the draft Bill. The Government and the Joint Committee are also agreed that there should be no change to the powers and functions of the two Houses.
The Joint Committee argue that the election of 80 per cent of Members will make this House more assertive and affect the balance of power between the Houses in favour of the upper House, even if its formal powers remain the same. However, a majority of the committee considered that the existing conventions and other pillars on which Commons primacy rests would suffice to ensure its continuation, and that therefore Clause 2 of the draft Bill may be unnecessary. Clause 2 was included in the draft Bill in order to put beyond doubt our intention that the House of Commons should retain its primacy. We note the committee’s warning that Clause 2 could lay the conventions governing the relationship between the two Houses of Parliament open to judicial intervention, and its insistence that no provisions in the Bill should afford such opportunities in a manner inconsistent with Article 9 of the Bill of Rights. The Government agree with the committee that the conventions governing the relationship between the Houses cannot be legislated for and will, inevitably, continue to evolve.
I observe in passing that some Members of the House, who have been most vociferous in their concern about securing the primacy of the House of Commons, are the very same Members who have recently urged us to break with convention and challenge the financial privilege of another place.
On the Parliament Acts, which the noble Lord, Lord Richard, raised, the Joint Committee received evidence casting doubt on whether the 1911 Act would apply once the House had been reformed. The committee opted to leave that evidence from the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, and from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, to speak for itself. Let me be clear: we produced a draft Bill on the basis that the Parliament Acts will continue to apply to a reformed House. We believe that they are well understood and would provide the backstop guaranteeing the primacy of the House of Commons. None the less, we shall consider carefully the evidence given to the Joint Committee by two distinguished Members of this House.
The Joint Committee’s report concludes by recommending that, in view of the significance of the constitutional change brought forward for an elected House of Lords, the Government should submit the decision to a referendum. The committee argues that otherwise there would be no opportunity for the electorate to provide a mandate for these proposals. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Richard, when he winds up—and if not him then other members of the committee present today—will elaborate on the reasoning for this and set out why they concluded that the reforms to the composition of the House proposed in the Bill merited a referendum, bearing in mind that the 1999 reforms that produced the current composition of the House were not endorsed in that way. It is worth reminding the House that at the last general election, the manifestos from the three main parties were remarkably similar, whereas this was not true in 1997.
I also invite noble Lords to explain how the committee envisaged that a post-legislative referendum might work; what kind of question might be put to the electorate; and when it should take place. I particularly hope that the noble Baroness the Leader of the Opposition will seize the opportunity to set out her party’s approach to these matters, not least because it endorsed the principle of a referendum in its last manifesto. I should also like to hear her objections in detail to the Government’s initial proposals which, as many noble Lords pointed out, bear a passing resemblance to those drawn up by Mr Straw in 2008. To many of us, the Labour Party always appears to be in favour of reform but never quite follows through. I very much look forward to hearing the noble Baroness on this point.
The Joint Committee made valuable observations and recommendations in a number of other areas, notably in proposing an alternative transition arrangement and in recommending a per diem allowance in lieu of a salary for transitional Members, and potentially for appointed Members. I will not set out all those areas now, trusting that other noble Lords will touch on them in the course of the debate.
It will be pointed out rightly that the Joint Committee did not agree with everything that the Government proposed, and that there were considerable differences of opinion within the committee. However, it should be clear from what has been said thus far that there are very considerable areas of agreement between the Government and the majority of the committee. I noted at the outset that we had embarked on this process in order to explore whether a consensus existed on the second phase of reform of the House. The Joint Committee’s report encourages us in the view that it does.
We have not yet reached the final decisions on the Government’s proposals and will therefore consider carefully the Joint Committee’s recommendations, as well as the House’s response to the recommendations expressed in today’s debate. Although we may not in the end agree with all the answers that the Joint Committee and individual noble Lords offer, much of the value of the process will have lain in throwing up the right questions to the Government and, in the course of the debate, to the Joint Committee.
Lord Elton
Will my noble friend tell the House what he means by “consensus”?
Lord Strathclyde
A consensus will be the majority in the House of Commons that passes the Bill. I will add, for noble Lords who need tutoring, that if there is no majority in the House of Commons, no Bill will come to this House.
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon
My Lords, I echo the thanks of the Leader of the House to my noble friend Lord Richard for his speech opening this important debate. I also thank my noble friend and all those who served on the Joint Committee, especially those from all sides of this House, for the enormous amount of work and effort they put into their task. The House has every reason to be grateful.
We are told that further reform of your Lordships’ House might form the centrepiece of the Government’s legislative programme for the forthcoming Session, to be set out in the gracious Speech to this House next week. Even this close to the Queen’s Speech, it seems incredible to those on these Benches—and, I believe, to the whole country—that, given the problems facing the whole country, the coalition Government think that the issue they need to focus on above all is the future reform of this House.
After the Budget there were rows over the granny tax, the pasty tax, the caravan tax, the charities tax, the conservatory tax and the churches tax—virtually every kind of tax. The Government provoked panic petrol buying, there was a cash-for-access row, the embarrassing mishandling of the Abu Qatada case, social cleansing in public housing, attacks in the most dismissive terms from their own Back-Benchers, personal abuse from MPs such as Nadine Dorries, and searching strategic criticism from MPs such as Bernard Jenkin. Then came the entanglement of Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt. Worst of all are the Government’s economic policies: the spending cuts going too far too fast, and the absolute lack of a growth strategy tipping Britain back into recession. All of them are linked by one theme and are driven by what the Government have done. They are all self-generated and self-inflicted.
People across the country are deeply worried. They are worried about their jobs, prices, whether they can afford to put meals on the table, whether they have enough money to fill up their cars, the health service, education and crime. What is this Government’s response to their worries? It is House of Lords reform. It is no wonder that the polls are day by day a disaster for this Government. Yesterday, the Tories’ ratings were below 30 per cent for the first time for eight years. The day before, 67 per cent said they thought that the Prime Minister and the Chancellor were out of touch. Sixty-eight per cent think that the Budget shows that they can no longer even try to claim that we are all in this together. What is the Government’s answer to being thought out of touch? It is Lords reform. When the Government are described as incompetent, what is their answer? It is Lords reform.
The reform of your Lordships’ House is an important issue and one that we need to get right, but the idea that it is the most pressing issue facing the country is risible. We on these Benches will have more to say on these matters and on the Government’s priorities when we begin to debate the Government’s legislative programme next week, but we have in front of us today the report from the Joint Committee on the Government’s draft House of Lords Reform Bill, and alongside it we have the alternative report from the minority group of members of the Joint Committee. Both are important contributions to the debate on the future of your Lordships’ House.
The Joint Committee’s report makes many important points, but I particularly want to highlight just four: first, its conclusion that this House should have an electoral mandate provided it has commensurate powers; secondly, its conclusion that Clause 2 of the Government’s draft Bill, which seeks to preserve the primacy of the House of Commons simply by asserting it, is not in itself capable of preserving the Common’s primacy; thirdly, that work should begin as soon as possible on re-examining the conventions between the two Houses of Parliament as specified in an earlier report by the Joint Committee on Conventions, chaired by my noble friend Lord Cunningham of Felling, which is something that I advocated a long while ago and in doing so was accused by the Deputy Leader of this House of being a reform refusenik; and fourthly, the Joint Committee’s recommendation that,
“in view of the significance of the constitutional change brought forward for an elected House of Lords, the Government should submit the decision to a referendum”.
These are important points, but I accept that they are not points on which every Member of your Lordships’ House will be able to agree. I know, for example, that some Members of this House, on all sides of the House, are not in favour of this House having an electoral mandate, although I am sure that the Joint Committee’s insertion of the important qualification that an elected House of Lords needs to have powers commensurate with that electoral mandate will interest all Members of the House.
I also know that there will be Members of your Lordships’ House who are not convinced of the need for a referendum. In this, I do not mean Members on the Liberal Democrat Benches who are following the bizarre insistence of the Deputy Prime Minister that a referendum is not necessary. No one would suggest for a moment that this opposition to a referendum is anything to do with the outcome of last year’s AV referendum, a referendum that the Deputy Prime Minister embraced with as much enthusiasm as he has in refusing to embrace a referendum on Lords reform. As an aside, I am not a betting woman—well, not often—but I just put the notion to this House that if there is a Bill on Lords reform in next week’s Queen’s Speech, at some stage during what I suspect will be a very difficult parliamentary passage without necessarily a clear conclusion in prospect, proposals for a referendum will go into the Bill.
Far be it from me to offer advice to the Government, but it would be much better for the Government, whether the Tory part or the Lib Dem part, to acknowledge what I believe is the inevitable and accept that a constitutional change of this level of importance requires a referendum. The Government should stop trying to deny the British people a voice on this issue, and that is the position of these Benches.
Labour will make it clear in its response to the Queen’s Speech that it will take a close look at whatever proposals for further Lords reform the Government bring forward. We have seen the Government’s draft Bill but, for instance, we do not believe that the Government can seriously attempt to proceed with Clause 2 of the draft Bill, mentioned by the Leader, given that, as the Joint Committee’s report makes clear, it has no support at all beyond the ministerial opinions of Mr Clegg and Mr Mark Harper.
We do not know what Bill we will get yet, but we on these Benches will test it against three criteria: a referendum, dealing properly with the issues of powers and conventions, and our policy of a fully elected House. I know that there are those around this House, including a number behind me, who would not agree with all those criteria. I acknowledge and accept those differences, which reflect views that are strongly, passionately and legitimately held. I know that we will hear those differences in the two days of debate in front of us, and they are clearly displayed in both the report of the Joint Committee and the alternative report of the minority group. However, I urge that these differences of view are respected, whether they are held by Members of your Lordships’ House or by individuals and organisations beyond. Strong argument on the issue is right and to be welcomed.
Significantly, I believe that what we see in the alternative report from the minority group of the Joint Committee is just a difference of opinion. We see clear disagreement, but I welcome the fact that the minority group has set out with equal clarity the areas and issues on which it agrees. These areas include: the functions of this House; the greater assertiveness that an elected House would unquestionably wield against the House of Commons; the role of the Bishops in your Lordships’ House, the prospect of introducing representatives of other faith groups, and the importance of diversity; the application of the Parliament Acts; and the importance of a referendum. I am sure the whole House will agree that these issues are vital.
Individual Members of your Lordships’ House will make up their own minds and come to their own conclusions on the areas in which the minority group makes clear that it does not agree with the Joint Committee—in most cases because it wanted to go further than the Joint Committee felt it was able to go, given its narrow remit of scrutinising only the Government’s draft Bill. These areas include the importance of the primacy of the House of Commons—and I note the emphasis given in the alternative report to the authoritative view of Erskine May of what the primacy of the House of Commons rests on and why—as well as issues such as accountability, constituency issues in an elected House of Lords, transitional arrangements for Members of the current House, and the cost of an elected House.
We on these Benches support the criticism made by my noble friend Lord Richard earlier today and by the minority group of the Government’s refusal to provide proper costings for an elected House, and I pay tribute to my noble friend Lord Lipsey for the work that he has done. We give notice that we will seek to hold the Government to their commitment, given just last week, that in the wake of the publication of these reports they will now provide accurate figures of what an elected House of Lords will cost so that at a time of national austerity the public can take those important views and facts into account.
The minority group makes a strong case for all these issues to be considered by a constitutional convention. The case made by the minority group is interesting. The reform of your Lordships’ House is important but it suggests that such a convention should also consider what would happen to the House of Lords, the House of Commons and Parliament as a whole, as well as to the union itself if the people of Scotland were to vote in a referendum in favour of independence. The vexed issue of the West Lothian question also remains on the table, and that should not be considered in isolation. A constitutional convention might also be suitable for considering the impact of such issues on the other devolved areas and the Assemblies of Wales and Northern Ireland.
Since 1997, we have seen a significant programme of constitutional reform, which we on this side of the House believe was well considered, well thought through and well grounded, such as devolution in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. This reform was necessary and has the support of the people. However, since 2010 we have seen proposed constitutional reform that has been none of these things: for example, the political gerrymandering of what is now the Parliamentary Voting Systems and Constituencies Act; the political partiality of what is now the Fixed-term Parliaments Act; the decisive outcome of the AV referendum; and, finally, the bad Bill that is the Government’s draft legislative proposal on further House of Lords reform. These issues should have been properly thought through, and they were not. I therefore understand the argument made that the constitutional convention has merit in being a vehicle that could consider these and allied issues.
I am sure that there will be great interest in the recommendation of the consideration given to indirect elections to the House of Lords, including the idea of the secondary mandate. I welcome the proposals put forward in evidence to the Joint Committee by the former Lord Speaker, the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, formerly of these Benches, for what she described as ground-clearing reforms. Of course, I welcome too the advance that the legislation put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Steel of Aikwood, has made and hope that it can be expedited in the coming Session.
There are many constructive proposals that would aid the reform of this House and which I believe many on all sides consider to be necessary. The Joint Committee and the alternative report have raised a plethora of vital issues that have not been properly thought through in the Government’s draft Bill, including the application or otherwise of the Parliament Act to a reformed House. We shall see what comes before us when the Government set out their legislative programme in the gracious Speech next week. The Bill on further reform of this House may be better than the draft Bill considered by the Joint Committee. I certainly hope so.
The reform of this House has a long history. In its most recent incarnation, it has been going on for the past 100 years. For some, such as the Deputy Prime Minister, it is an absolute priority. However, I am doubtful that the public, facing the problems that they are facing, would agree with that priority. Real reform of your Lordships’ House is not a matter for easy slogans. Constitutional reform is a deeply serious matter, the purpose of which cannot be to try to glue the coalition together, albeit at the top. As my right honourable friend Sadiq Khan MP, the Shadow Secretary of State for Justice, has forcefully said:
“Avoiding the promotion of political and constitutional reform on the basis of short-term expediency is imperative”.
Reform is a matter of careful consideration. I am confident that over the next two days, Members of your Lordships’ House will bring precisely that approach of careful consideration to the issues before us. I believe that both reports before us today are an important contribution to that, and I look forward to the debate ahead.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean
Perhaps I may ask the noble Baroness a question. The coalition agreement provided for the Deputy Prime Minister to establish an all-party group, which would come forward in a Motion, I think from memory, by December 2010. The noble Baroness served on that group. My noble friend Lord Strathclyde in his remarks implied that the draft Bill, which has been considered, was somehow connected with the deliberations of that group. Will the noble Baroness tell us what happened to the Deputy Prime Minister’s committee and how its conclusions are in any way related to this Bill?
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon
My Lords, I was proud and privileged to be a member of that group, as the noble Lord said. However, during our deliberations, it became clear that there were various issues on which there was no meeting of minds. Towards the end of our deliberations the group stopped meeting. A draft Bill was published that, it might be fair to say, did not have the full support of all members of that committee.
Baroness Scott of Needham Market
My Lords, I speak as a survivor of the Joint Select Committee. In doing so, I offer my thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Richard, for his very able chairmanship. I should also like to echo his remarks about the work of the clerks and my colleagues on the committee. About a year or so ago, I would have agreed with the consensus in this House that constitutional reform of this nature should be subject to pre-legislative scrutiny. But after six months on this committee, I am much less sure.
It is certainly true that there are advantages in having a committee of both Houses and I think that we benefited from that. We have certainly produced a vast array of material for the delight and delectation of noble Lords even if they do not read every word. But there are problems with pre-legislative scrutiny on topics such as Lords reform because it is always tempting to move on to the broader constitutional questions which, although relevant, are outside the direct scope of the Bill. I would have liked to have spent some time scrutinising the current arrangements with the same rigour used to scrutinise the proposed arrangements, but I believe that the chairman was right to rein us in and to stick to the confines of the draft Bill. It would have been very odd indeed, on a piece of legislation in which one of the key issues was the ability of the Government to get their business, to have spent 18 months or two years doing pre-legislative scrutiny.
The other problem is that constitutional matters cannot really be scrutinised in quite the usual way because all members of the committee are to an extent themselves experts, and often know as much about the topic as the people from whom they are taking evidence, and of course all the members tend to come with views which are pretty well entrenched. It is also difficult in this case because there is a draft Bill that stands on the simple proposition that the second Chamber should be elected. For those who disagree with that view, scrutiny of the rest of the Bill is very difficult. We found that arguments became very circular and at times frustrating, and of course the requirement to reach enough of a consensus to produce a report runs the risk of compromising the work. Perhaps that answers the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, who asked in his opening remarks why we came up with some of our conclusions. So we need to think very hard about the sort of Bills that are put forward for pre-legislative scrutiny.
Two phrases are constantly used in the context of Lords reform. The first is the one about turkeys voting for Christmas. It is an expression I have come to loathe. We supporters of an elected House will have to do better than that in support of our case, and I believe that we will do so. But, equally, those who argue “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”, which is my second hated phrase, will also have to do better. If our system is not broken, it is certainly showing signs of wear and tear, and I do not believe that we can ignore those signs indefinitely.
First, we are the creatures of patronage, either ancient or modern, and we should recognise that that is increasingly anomalous in an age where transparency and open process are the norm. People are entitled to understand how and why those who influence their laws come to arrive in this place. When I do outreach visits, I am always asked if I live in a castle. Many people believe that we are still an aristocratic House, and the titles we hold reinforce that. The real diversity that we have here is not well understood outside. As a Member of the House of Lords Appointments Commission, I know how hard we work to ensure transparency by publishing on the website the processes and our criteria for selection, but we appoint only a small percentage of the people in this House. On the majority—the political appointments—the commission has a more limited role. One of our main concerns is addressing the question of party donors, because whether we like it or not, there is a perception outside that cash for honours is widespread.
My second concern is about the increasingly political nature of this House. I have been here for 12 years and in that time I have seen the House become more confrontational and less courteous. Debate is much more partisan and the majority of votes are cast along party lines. At some point in the future, having a political house with no equivalent electoral mandate is going cause us a problem.
The third and most serious problem is the size of the House. We all believe that this House is too big. It is too big to run efficiently and so big as to risk bringing ourselves into disrepute. The experts in this House find themselves making three-minute contributions to important debates because there are so many of us. But the size of the House is inextricably linked to the power of the Prime Minister’s patronage, and it is a response to the growing politicisation of the House. People say, “Well, the Prime Minister should stop appointing people”. Let us hang on for a minute. Every Prime Minister for the past 50 years has had the right to appoint Members at a time and in the numbers of their choosing. Under the current arrangements, how on earth should we decide when Prime Ministers should stop appointing and when they can start again? We have no constitutional framework for deciding how large this House should be and what its political make-up should be. If you believe in the status quo, that is fine, but you then have to answer for the consequences of it—and the consequences are that every Prime Minister seeks to rebalance the numbers in this House.
Between the election of Margaret Thatcher in 1979 and the formation of the coalition in 2010, there was only one change of Administration, in 1997. If during that 31 years we had had a change of Government at every election, and more Peers were created to make the political balance work, we would have had to face up to this problem much earlier. If we have frequent changes of Administration in the future, this is an issue that we will have to deal with.
Of course, there are ways of addressing this problem other than through election, and I have no doubt that many of them will be put forward genuinely today. The trouble is that I see no evidence that we could ever get agreement to, for example, a single 15-year term, or a retirement age, or a cap on the size of the House. Many of the proposals put forward by the Goodlad committee have been rejected, and despite widespread support throughout this House for the proposals in the Steel Bill, it has been completely filleted.
In the final analysis, even we must rule by consent. There is a danger that if we turn our faces against all reform, those who argue that there is no need for a second Chamber will grow in number. For the opponents of change, there is a danger that we will win this battle but lose the war.
Lord Hennessy of Nympsfield
My Lords, I declare an interest as a member of the Joint Committee and as a signatory to the alternative report. Perhaps I may add my own words of thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Richard. His was not an easy task, as we slogged our way towards a total of 30 meetings—a record, I gather, for a Joint Committee. I am perhaps a touch unusual in getting seriously excited by constitutional matters, but as the tally of our sessions mounted, even I was reminded of that shrewd observer of our country, George Bernard Shaw, who said that the English invented test match cricket in order to give the British people a sense of eternity. The noble Lord, Lord Richard, got us through and on time, and I am grateful to him and to our clerks, though I should point out to the noble Lord that there were two Cross-Bench members of his committee, not one as he suggested.
Every generation or so, we take a crack at the question of Lords reform. We throw the particles in the air and hope that, this time, they will fall in a way that paves a path on the road to consensus. Once again, we have failed, as the voting figures in volume 1 of the Joint Committee’s report show, as does the existence of the alternative report. The noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, spied the outline of a consensus. Over those 30 meetings of the Joint Committee, I have to tell the noble Lord, there was not a flicker of consensus. The noble Lord the Leader of the House is succumbing to an attractive outbreak of Pollyanna-ism, which is always pleasing but in this case is utterly misleading.
So, what next? In the coming Session of Parliament, we could immerse ourselves in the constitutional mire, dissipating copious quantities of parliamentary time and political nervous energy on the Government’s proposed Bill, probably boring the country and ourselves rigid except at moments of showdown and all with no guarantee that the statute will emerge at the end unless the coalition is prepared to reach for the Parliament Acts in what could well be the near twilight of its term. Is it wise to attempt to settle the future of the second Chamber before we know the outcome of another grade 1 listed constitutional question, Scottish independence, which is to be the subject of a referendum in autumn 2014?
There is an organic, incremental alternative to the invasive surgery proposed by the coalition for your Lordships’ House. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, described it with great eloquence in her oral evidence to the Joint Committee, as did Peter Riddell, director of the Institute for Government, in his. Put their thoughts together with the content of the Bill in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Steel of Aikwood, and the proposals under consideration by the usual channels from the Leader’s Group on Working Practices chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Goodlad, and you have in the making a substantial and hugely worthwhile reform which would have the additional benefit of being fuelled by a high level of genuine consensus.
The Joint Committee’s report acknowledges this in paragraph 11, which reads:
“Other approaches to reform are of course possible. A number of our witnesses advocated an incremental approach, focusing on issues on which there exists a large degree of consensus: the mode of appointment, the size of the House, retirement, disqualification and expulsion”.
The paragraph continues:
“Lord Steel of Aikwood's private member's Bill attempted to address some of these issues. The Joint Committee was established to consider the draft Bill, however, and we have kept within our remit”.
The alternative report, on pages 78 and 79, goes further and actively urges the Government to,
“consider including further proposals for immediate reform, including those put forward by Baroness Hayman, the former Lord Speaker, and those contained in the Leader’s Group report of working practices in the House of Lords, chaired by Lord Goodlad”.
Among the candidates for what the alternative report calls “immediate reform” are: reducing the size of the House to about 500, future appointments to carry a fixed term, the Appointments Commission to be made statutory, an end to the link between peerages and the honours system, a retirement scheme for Members, the matter of expulsion and exclusion and the ending of by-elections following the deaths of hereditary Peers. I know that the last will not find consensual support from several noble Lords whom I respect and admire.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
I am listening very carefully to the noble Lord’s interesting proposals. Do any of them relate to the issue of democracy and election?
Lord Hennessy of Nympsfield
In the purest sense, no, but the virtue of our system, as I have always seen it, is that the undisputed primacy of the House of Commons, if I can put it bluntly, takes care of democracy. I know that the noble Lord and I will not agree on this although we agree on so many other things.
The danger is that while anticipating the so-called big-bang answer to the question of the Lords, nothing will happen, needed reforms will be stymied and the planning blight that has afflicted your Lordships' House since the departure of the bulk of the hereditary Peers in 1999 will continue. The ingredients of a substantial reform are lying at our feet. Let us pick them up, fashion them into something coherent, something valuable, and let us implement that bundle of reforms before the next general election.
The Lord Bishop of Leicester
My Lords, as a member of the Joint Committee, I add my tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Richard, as chair for his skill, staying power, stamina and achievement in delivering a report on time. I recollect that the retiring most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury recommended that his successor should have the skin of a rhinoceros and the constitution of an ox, and it occurs to me that after his work on the Joint Committee, the noble Lord, Lord Richard, might consider allowing his name to go forward for that position. In speaking today, I apologise to the House that urgent business in my diocese will make it impossible for me to be in my place when this debate concludes tomorrow. I am grateful to the Leader’s office for making an exceptional concession for me on this occasion.
In the mid-summer’s day debate on the draft Bill in your Lordships' House last year, I reminded the House that on these Benches we recognise along with very many of your Lordships that some reform of this House is long overdue and that the test of any reform is that it helps to serve Parliament and the nation better, not least by resolving the problem of its ever-increasing membership. To measure that, I pointed to four tests that we might apply to any proposal to replace this House with a wholly or largely elected second Chamber. The Joint Committee’s work has in my view made it very clear—to me at least—that these tests have not been met.
The first was whether the proposals flowed from a clear enough definition of the functions of a reformed House. Because of the limits put on the Joint Committee’s work referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market, this matter has been addressed in some detail by the alternative report, which I signed. That report makes it clear that the overwhelming mass of evidence received by the Joint Committee pointed to the difficulties that will arise between the two Houses as a result of the Government’s determination to hold to the position that the primacy of the Commons will be undisturbed by the advent of an elected House of Lords.
The second test is related and is of course about primacy. It rests on the assertion that the Bill contains nothing that will affect the conventions governing the relationship between the two Houses. The unanimity of the witnesses on this point is beyond dispute. It is manifestly unreasonable to argue that you can change one part of a delicately balanced system and leave the other parts unaffected. The noble Lord, Lord Richard, has argued that this appears not to concern Members of Parliament but he knows that at least two MPs on the Joint Committee expressed consistent and vehement concerns on this very issue.
Thirdly, I proposed a test relating to the independence of the upper House from party political control. The Joint Committee explored whether any of the available voting systems offered the possibility of electing people who would take an independent view and speak from time to time with a voice distinctive from that overwhelmingly influenced by party discipline. It is clear that a mainly elected House would become a creature of the party system, whatever mechanism for election was chosen. On this test, too, the proposals fail. I welcome the recommendation for further consideration of a nationally, indirectly elected House.
Fourthly, I sought to apply a test relating to the claims of democratic legitimacy. Would a non-renewable, 15-year term provide this House with a sense of conscious connection to, awareness of and responsiveness to the changing priorities of the electorate? I remain persuaded that this kind of democratic legitimacy is so diluted in the draft Bill as to be almost pointless. Here lies the intellectual incoherence of the draft Bill. On the one hand, the Government want a House that is accountable to the electorate but, on the other, seem to recognise that any such House might assert itself to the point where it radically disturbed the fine balance between the two Houses of Parliament.
We are left with a Bill predicated on the encouragement of greater assertiveness by an elected upper House yet one so circumscribed by the electoral proposals and so dependent on the Parliament Act that a reformed upper House would soon either find itself frustrated in its attempts to behave representatively or assert its determination to test the present conventions to breaking point. Either way, the risks are considerable. I have no doubt that this House will look carefully at those risks today and conclude that the benefits of radical reform as proposed cannot justify them.
In spite of these concerns, on this Bench we are pleased that the Joint Committee was persuaded that in a reformed House there should remain a place for the Lords spiritual. This question was not at the front or centre of the committee’s attention, but I am grateful that the committee found time to hear evidence from the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury, who spoke tellingly about the grounded relationship between the Church of England and the communities in which our parishes and churches are set and drew the committee’s attention to the particular role of the Church of England in supporting, encouraging and convening other faith communities, especially in our great cities. His views were endorsed by significant voices from the Jewish community, the Muslim Council of Britain and others. I am pleased that the Joint Committee has pressed for the increasing presence of leaders of other denominations and faiths. A reduction in the proposed number of Bishops from 26 to 12 will be testing and challenging for the Church of England, but we will work hard to achieve a consistent presence from this Bench. We recognise that this will entail careful consideration of the processes by which members of the Bench of Bishops are selected.
It was a privilege to serve on the Joint Committee, not as a professional politician. I learnt a great deal from my colleagues and my respect for those who spend their lives living a vocation to politics has been substantially enhanced. But if I have brought a particular perspective to the discussions, it may be that I was continually asking myself how these proposals will serve the people of the diocese in which I live and work. With the passing months of the committee’s work, my puzzlement increased. At a time like this, when we need leadership that unifies our country and vision in Parliament that addresses the needs of the people, why are we embarking on proposals for reform which will be manifestly divisive? At a time of continuing recession, these proposals run the risk of setting the two Houses of Parliament against each other, dividing Parliament from the country’s evident needs and suggesting that the political leadership is out of step with the membership. That is why I felt it right to vote for a referendum.
Surely it is partly the responsibility of the Lords spiritual to raise questions about those things that can demonstrate Parliament’s capacity to respond to the mood of the day and raise our sights to the urgent need to address the common good at a time of severe economic risk. My fear is that in three years’ time we may have achieved a reformed Parliament but, in the process, have unintentionally created one that feels even less relevant and responsive to the people’s needs. I hope that the Government will heed the voice of this House today.
Lord Norton of Louth
My Lords, as a supporter of the Government perhaps I may say how encouraging it is to note that on the definition offered by my noble friend Lord Strathclyde, so far in this Parliament the House of Commons has managed to reach a consensus on every measure brought forward by the Government. I was also interested to hear that we will not be having a referendum because all three party manifestos agree, including the Labour Party manifesto, which promised a referendum.
I too served on the Joint Committee and I too pay tribute to my fellow members. As we have heard, the committee devoted considerable time and effort to examining the draft Bill. However, it was fundamentally hampered in two respects. The first was that the Government presented us with a Bill of which we had the detail but for which we had no justification. Assessing the Bill on the Government’s own terms is not possible if the Government make no attempt to say what they are.
If one reads the White Paper, one can extract from the disparate comments two criteria, each of which is asserted rather than justified: that is, that the Bill delivers an elected House—a “fundamental democratic principle”, according to the White Paper—and that it maintains the existing relationship between the two Houses. The report of the Joint Committee demonstrates that the Bill fails by the Government’s own criteria. It may provide for election but the attempt to ring-fence the position of the House of Commons through Clause 2 is inadequate to the task. Indeed, if you read the evidence, it is fairly clear or would suggest that you can have one but not the other. The committee, as we have heard, took evidence on the Parliament Acts. As the report mentions, it would be possible to make statutory provision for them to continue in force. That, though, is to say what could be done, not what should be done. But even if the Acts were maintained, that would not be sufficient to maintain the existing relationship between the two Houses. As one reporter put it to the noble Lord, Lord Richard, at last week’s press conference, how exactly do you prevent an elected House from ignoring conventions? You cannot.
The second limitation was that of time. The committee did the best that it could with the Bill before it. It may, as the noble Lord, Lord Hennessy, said, have set a record for the number of meetings it held. Despite that, there was not time to examine the Bill in depth. Even if the Parliament Acts were maintained, they are blunt weapons for determining outcomes, and to rely on them on a regular basis would likely create significant tensions within the political process. The draft Bill provides no deliberative means for resolving disputes and, given the pressures we were under, the committee did not address how such disputes should be resolved. We dealt with it only in the negative sense of finding that Clause 2 was inadequate for maintaining the present relationship between the two Houses.
I take that as illustrative of what was not considered. The report is as important for what it omits as much as for what it includes. That is not a criticism of the committee but of the limitations under which we operated. I know the response adopted by some—we have already heard it—is that we did not need to address the fundamentals of what was proposed, and that further time was not needed, because the issue of Lords reform has been discussed for the past century. There is, in their view, little more to be said on the merits, and it is a case of agreeing the detail.
That view is not only wrong but dangerous. The case for an elected House and hence for the Bill is based on contested concepts and philosophies. We hear trotted out claims as if they are self-evidently true. There will be other opportunities to address these claims; here, I just wish to focus on the assertion that the issue has already been extensively considered over the course of a century or more.
Consideration of the future of the second Chamber, and its relationship to the first, has been sporadic and very rarely undertaken in terms of first principles. There has been little consideration of the role of Parliament in our constitutional arrangements and the place of the second Chamber within Parliament. The two principal exercises were those of the Bryce commission in 1918 and the Wakeham commission in 2000. Otherwise the debate, though extensive at times, has been at a rather superficial level, essentially of detail rather than principle. Even in 1911, the debate on the Parliament Bill was not a principled debate about the place of the second Chamber in the constitution of the United Kingdom. It was shaped by politicians’ stances on Irish home rule.
We need to address the issue from first principles. We need to consider how the second Chamber, and indeed the first, is composed once we are clear as to what we expect of Parliament. We have not really done that. There is reference to parliamentary reform at times, but that normally refers to procedural and structural change in the Commons. Lords reform usually refers to changes to the composition of this House. There have been few attempts to address change from the perspective of Parliament as Parliament.
That is why I am a signatory of the alternative report. I have previously argued the case in this House for a constitutional convention, to undertake an exercise in constitutional cartography. Significant constitutional change is difficult to reverse. It usually has significant consequences for other parts of our constitutional framework. We need to get this right. Contrary to what some have said, the place of the second Chamber has not been thoroughly thought through. The report of the Joint Committee has demonstrated what is wrong with the Government’s proposals. The report, though, should not be the end of a process of examining the place of the second Chamber, but rather an impetus to look holistically at our constitutional arrangements. We cannot afford to get it wrong.
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean
My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Lord, Lord Richard, for his introduction to the debate and for his chairmanship of the Joint Committee. His stamina and determination were both fully tested in his chairmanship of a very diverse and opinionated group of parliamentarians. I declare an interest not only as a member of that committee but as one of the signatories to the alternative report. There were 12 of us—just one short of half the Joint Committee. Our group of 12 was also diverse, with MPs and Peers from both the Labour and Conservative Parties, and with Cross-Bench and episcopal support. Some of us supported a fully elected second Chamber; others did not.
However, the crucial and fundamental starting point on which we all agreed was that the draft Bill and White Paper offer a misleading prospectus for change. Reading them, that is apparent from the start. The introduction to the White Paper, strongly emphasised by the Deputy Prime Minister in his evidence, says that,
“it is important that those who make the laws of the land should be elected by those to whom those laws apply”.
The House of Lords is of course part of the legislative process—we scrutinise legislation and suggest amendments to the Commons—but every single decision that goes into law is ultimately a Commons decision. When I was a young civil servant, I was told that that is why the Commons votes Aye and No and we in the Lords vote only Content and Not-Content. The lawmakers—the ultimate decision takers—are the Commons, because they are elected.
Another questionable premise is set out in the summary of proposals which deals with powers. The summary says that it is proposed to elect the Lords without changes to the fundamental relationship with the Commons which, it claims, rests partly on the Parliament Acts and on Commons financial privilege. Commons primacy rests on the simple fact that the Commons is elected and we are not. Erskine May makes this absolutely plain in the section that deals with the power and jurisdiction of Parliament. On primacy, Erskine May states:
“The dominant influence enjoyed by the House of Commons within Parliament may be ascribed principally to its status as an elected assembly, the Members of which serve as the chosen representatives of the people”.
On financial privilege, it states:
“As such the House of Commons possesses the most important power vested in any branch of the legislature, the right of imposing taxes upon the people and of voting money for the public service”.
Moreover, the preamble to the Parliament Act 1911 states that the Act was necessary because the Lords was not,
“constituted on a popular … basis”.
That is, it was not elected. Once the Lords is elected, the reasons for the Parliament Act are eroded. Both Houses will be constituted on a popular basis and contain, as Erskine May says,
“the chosen representatives of the people”.
Despite these arguments, it is still possible to argue that, as part of the legislative machinery, Members of this House should indeed be elected. One can mount a logical and sustainable argument to support that. What is not logical or sustainable is to argue that Commons primacy and the current relationship between the two Houses will be unchanged. The Government were obviously aware of the problem and proposed Clause 2 of the draft Bill. We took a great deal of evidence on Clause 2. Only two supporters gave evidence in favour of it—the Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Clegg, and the Minister responsible, Mr Harper. The entire Joint Committee agreed that Clause 2 is a nonsense—unworkable and misconceived. However, many of us believe that there is more to it than that. There is a fundamental flaw in the Bill, which is the unbridgeable gap between the Government’s proposals for electing the House of Lords and the continuation of Commons primacy.
An elected House of Lords may well strengthen democracy. Having campaigned, canvassed and got support, Members would be elected on the basis of a mandate. They would represent their electors and be expected to exercise a mandate on behalf of those electors. The Government seem to think that democracy is solely about elections, but it is about the elected acting on behalf of their electorate. Why should an elected Peer subjugate the wishes of his or her electorate to those of an elected MP? What is the logic of continuing Commons primacy after the Lords is elected?
The Government have one basic answer to that question: do as much as possible to distance the elected Peer from his or her electorate. The supporters of the draft Bill claim that, if enacted, it would strengthen our democracy and the House would be more democratic and legitimate. However, at every point, the draft Bill and the White Paper seek to distance the elected Peer from their electors. They are quite open about this. The 15-year term is designed to ensure that the Commons mandate is always fresher. The non-renewable nature of the Lords’ term and the block on an elected Lord standing for the Commons have nothing to do with democracy and everything to do with protecting MPs from locally elected Peers who may become just a bit too popular.
The huge multi-constituencies of more than 500,000 people will ensure distance between the electors and the elected. These measures will not achieve their ends—that of protecting the Commons. Nor are they anything like as democratic as they should be. Elected Peers with a 15-year term, representing more than 500,000 voters, will be alongside MPs with five-year terms and constituencies of around 76,000. Will a Peer who is entrenched for 15 years, representing 500,000 and possibly elected by thousands more than the local MP, have more or less weight than the local MP?
Secondly, there is self-evidently little or no accountability in this system. At one point in the Joint Committee’s discussions, I was told that this is not about accountability. I may be wrong but I thought accountability was part and parcel of a modern democracy. The noble Baroness, Lady Scott, is quite right: of course, we need reform. I support the sort of reform put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Steel, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman. We could take that forward now, but then we would need to turn to the much bigger and more serious question of House of Lords elections. Electing the Lords would change the political and constitutional landscape of this country and would affect the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh and Northern Irish Assemblies. It demands serious consideration of electoral systems, including indirect elections, but above all it needs an honest and clear determination of what the new relationship between the two Houses will be. To achieve that we need to do two things. First, we need to reconvene the Joint Committee on Conventions originally chaired by my noble friend Lord Cunningham. The Deputy Prime Minister says that the conventions will evolve. We cannot run a country on a “let us see what happens” basis. That would be constitutionally disastrous and utterly irresponsible. No Government worth their salt should even contemplate doing so.
The second thing that we need to do is to set up a properly comprehensive constitutional convention to work through all the questions that need answers. I know opponents of this say that it constitutes kicking the measure into the long grass, but that is a feeble answer to such a serious question. A constitutional convention is the responsible and sensible way to resolve the huge questions that the supporters of the Bill have so conspicuously failed to answer. We did it for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, so why not do it for the United Kingdom as a whole? Why should our constitutional settlement be treated with any less care and respect than those of our constituent parts? Of course, political decisions need to be taken on this matter but we need to do so much more than that. We need to hear from the people of this country what they think.
Therefore, ultimately, we need a referendum. I understand why the Liberal Democrats are so opposed to that; the AV result must have been a terrible shock to them. However, they argue, and the noble Lord the Leader of the House has argued, that there is no need for a referendum because at the 2010 election all three parties supported the election of the House of Lords. However, the noble Lord needs to remember that no one actually won the 2010 election. In fact, like us, the Liberal Democrats lost seats. The only party that won seats was his party, which said that this was a third-term issue. Real democracy means electing the Lords with commensurate powers, as the main report says—a point left out by many who have spoken on this issue this afternoon. We were agreed on the need to have commensurate powers and for the individual to have the power to act on behalf of his or her electorate as a Minister, Secretary of State, even Prime Minister, and to be part of a properly constituted democratic body.
In a speech that he made in December last year, the Deputy Prime Minister accused this House of having only a “veneer of expertise”. I put it to your Lordships that this Bill will not do because it has only a veneer of democracy.
Baroness Knight of Collingtree
Before the noble Baroness sits down, I entirely agree with her remarks about primacy, but is there not also a concern that such a system would rob us completely of the independent Peers in this House?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean
My Lords, of course, the position of the independent Peers is very important. It is addressed in the main report. That is, of course, why so many people want to see the House being elected on a 20:80 basis, which would address the point about the Cross-Bench Peers. However, what it does not address is independence within the parties because, as we all know, the Whip would be cracked a bit more effectively over all of us than it is at the moment, and that would rob us of a degree of our independence.
Lord Tyler
My Lords, would the noble Baroness like to reiterate her support for a 100 per cent elected House?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean
My Lords, I do, if this House is to be elected with commensurate powers. That is my starting point. We did not vote simply on electing the House. The committee agreed that there should be commensurate powers. If there are commensurate powers—that is, doing away with Commons primacy and everything else to which I have just referred—yes, I do support a 100 per cent elected House on that basis, but only on that basis.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
My Lords, I think it was Oscar Wilde who once said that in a democracy the minority is always right. I have to say, as a Liberal Democrat, that it is a saying that has given me much comfort over the years, and I have a suspicion that it will have to give me some comfort today. I rise, of course, to argue the case for a democratically elected second Chamber—a case made by my party for 100 years. The time was ripe for that 100 years ago. It is essential now.
I just ask my noble colleagues in this place whether they find it acceptable, at a time when people are dying for democracy, that we should have in this place somewhere that infringes the fundamental principle of a democratic state, which is that the people’s laws should be made by the people’s representatives.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
They are not. We are not the people’s representatives, but we make and amend laws, and are part of the process of producing the laws of this country. We infringe that principle daily. I was sitting here and listening to the arguments made around the Chamber, many of which were, “Yes of course we are in favour of democracy, but not now, not on these proposals, but at some time in the future”. St Augustine should be living at this hour.
However, the question is this: when we frame the laws of this country—you cannot say that we do not participate in this—we do so because we carry with us a democratic mandate. That is the principle of democracy. I was imagining what kind of a debate we might be having if, instead of debating our institutions today, we were debating the institutions in Brussels. I can imagine the kind of thunderous rage that would be expressed against the fact that those undemocratic commissioners in Brussels are able to make laws imposed upon the people of Britain. But we are undemocratic—we participate in that process.
I was imagining what kind of argument might be made if we were discussing Italy. People would have said, “The present Italian Prime Minister is not directly elected, but is elected only by Parliament”. We are elected by no one. As my noble friend Lady Scott said earlier, we are placemen here—no more and no less. I thought that that went out with the Stuart kings. We are the creatures of patronage. There are only two ways to get into this place. One is because you are a friend of the Prime Minister, or at least he does not object to you, and the other is because your great-grandmother slept with the king. There is no other way of getting into this place and the votes of the people have no hand in this process whatever.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
I will give way, but allow me to make a little more progress.
The truth of the matter is that this place, whether you like it or not, is a creature of the Executive. When the new Prime Minister comes in, the first thing he or she does is help themselves to a replica of what exists in the other place in order to give themselves the power to push through this place the legislation that they require. Are we really content with that?
I recall well, because I was partly involved, that in 2004 the world’s greatest Muslim democracy, Indonesia, went to the polls. The European Union issued a view, a wish—not an instruction, of course—that when those polls were finally counted there would be no placemen to alter the democratic judgment and that there would be no act of patronage to add to the legislatures people such as army officers or even bishops to alter the voice of the democracy. Yet, so we are here today.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
I shall make my point and then I will happily take my noble friend’s point.
On this day, Egypt votes for a new president. The Muslim Brotherhood has recently constructed the Egyptian constitution. Imagine if it had said, “We will have a constitution in which the primary House, which we control, will give us the right to appoint who was in the second Chamber”. Would we not have declared that to be a democratic outrage? Yet we are replicating that precise position here today. I give way to my noble friend.
Lord Phillips of Sudbury
I am most grateful. I always listen with huge attention to what my noble friend Lord Ashdown says, not least because he put me here.
Lord Phillips of Sudbury
I am a placeman, fair enough. My noble friend said, with emphasis, that we are a creature of the Executive. I ask him then, what he makes of the following statistics. In the 13 years of the Blair Government, the Commons defeated the Executive six times. In the same 13 years, this place defeated the Government 528 times. In the coalition period, the Commons has not yet defeated the Government, except on a debate which had no legislative purport; and we have defeated the Government 48 times. It does not sound to me as if it is we who are the creatures of the Executive.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
I will come on to my noble friend’s point in a moment, except to say this. The question is not what we do; the question is how we are created. We are created here with a balance in this place that reflects the balance that the Executive enjoy in the other. I will come on to my noble friend’s point, but time is relatively limited, as we were advised, so allow me to make a bit of progress.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
I hope that the noble Lord will forgive me. We have been advised to speak for seven minutes; I am already at six.
Lord Trefgarne
The noble Lord made a highly offensive remark just now and I would like to challenge it. He said that some of us were here because our ancestors had slept with a queen. I am the second Lord Trefgarne; my father was the first Lord Trefgarne. He was a Liberal MP.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
He came here by an act of patronage, then, which is the point I was seeking to make.
Let me cite some statistics that may illustrate the point. Despite all the arguments made about primacy, et cetera, all the arguments made that we have to work out the new relationship, here are the figures. The House of Lords Library tells me that there are 71 bicameral legislatures around the world of which, leaving aside the micro-nations in the Caribbean whose constitutions were written by us to reflect ours, only seven are not elected second Chambers, seven have no connection with democracy, and seven are appointed, as we are—leaving aside Great Britain. One of them, for reasons that utterly perplex me, is Canada. But the other six may give us cause to pause for a moment. They do not include great democracies. They are Belarus, Bahrain, Yemen, Oman, Jordan and Lesotho. That is the company we keep. Those are not great defenders of democracy. How is it that in every other legislature, all of them with elected second Chambers, issues of primacy, the issues which hold up people’s agreement with democratic reform in this place, are not great problems?
Here is the reason why it is said that we do not have to observe the principles of democracy. My noble friend alluded to it a moment ago. It is because, apparently, it works—in that curious, untidy, rather British way, nevertheless, it works. And if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. It does not work. There are two functions of a second Chamber. The first is to revise and the second is to hold the Executive to account. The first of those we do rather well. We are graciously permitted to follow along with a gilded poop-scoop, clearing up the mess behind the elephant at the other end of the Corridor, but when it comes to stopping the elephant doing things, when it comes to turning it round, when it comes to delaying it on the really big things that matter, we do not succeed. How can we challenge the Executive on big things when we are a creature of the Executive?
I do not believe that if we had had a reformed, democratic second Chamber, we would have had the poll tax, but we did. I do not believe that we would have gone to war in Iraq either, but we did. The last time that I said that, there was much twittering saying, good heavens, should a second Chamber have the right to say whether a nation goes to war? Yes it should. I see no problem with that. There is no problem with the Senate in America. That has not stopped America going to war. There is no problem with the Senate in France, one of our closest and immediate allies in Libya and which put more troops into Bosnia than any other nation and suffered greater casualties.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
I will make the point and then I will take the noble Lord’s intervention. There is one nation in Europe which may be insufficiently able to take decisions about military action when it needs to, and that is Germany. The Bundesrat, the second Chamber in Germany, has no say over going to war. However, there is no reason why a second Chamber should not be asked whether to ratify treaties or whether it is reasonable to go to war. Why is that possible everywhere else in the world but impossible here?
Lord Norton of Louth
My Lords, if a second Chamber can block the nation going to war, what does that tell us about the primacy of the first?
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
Of course the first Chamber is going to have primacy. That is readily established in every other bicameral system in which there is an elected second Chamber. However, on the issue of whether to go to war, in the United States the President has to get the agreement of both Houses of Congress. Has that seriously prevented the United States going to war? Quite the contrary. This is an issue on which this House, as an elected Chamber, should be able to exercise its rights.
The time has arrived to bring this place up to date. The time has arrived when we have to stop what is not only an anachronism but an undemocratic anachronism. We send our young men out to fight and die and, perhaps worse still, to kill others in the name of democracy but we do not have a democratic second Chamber in this country, as is the case with the vast majority of bicameral systems throughout the world. Why can they cope with democracy but not us? Is our democracy so ineffective and immature and are our institutions so weak that we cannot cope with what they can cope with and we have to resort to the kind of principles that operate in Bahrain and Belarus?
This place is an anachronism and an undemocratic anachronism, and I am in favour of a fully elected second Chamber. However, if the proposition put forward by the committee as a compromise is the best one that we can achieve, I shall happily vote for it. By the way, I also believe that it should be supported by a referendum. The reality is that this is a reform that can no longer wait. Our democracy is in danger. We have to start renewing the democratic structures of this country, and the reform and democratisation of the second Chamber is part of that process. We cannot keep this waiting any longer. We have a proposition; we should take it up and do the business now.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, I remind the House that noble Lords are speaking for quite a time. If all noble Lords take as long, we shall be sitting very late indeed.
Lord Stirrup
Before the noble Lord sits down, perhaps he can help me on one extremely important point. I think that he referred to the most important element or principle of democracy as the right of the people to elect those who represent them. Rather, is it not the right of the people to remove those who represent them—something for which I believe there is no provision in this Bill?
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
My Lords, there is a provision in the Bill, although one might argue that a 15-year term is rather long to make that as effective as it should be. I am not claiming that the Bill is perfect—of course I am not. There are things that I would wish to see that are not there, not least that it should be a fully elected second Chamber. I am simply saying that we have an opportunity to reform. You have to choose between keeping this place as it is, which in my view is totally insupportable, or moving towards democratically based reform of the sort proposed by the Bill. The second of those may be a compromise but it is one that I embrace with enthusiasm because it will at least start the process.
The Earl of Sandwich
My Lords, I am a 1660s placeman and I am very proud to have been in this House to represent my family for such a long time. I shall try hard to keep exasperation out of my voice today but, in my view, the coalition is propelling us towards certain constitutional disaster. The draft Bill will run straight into the sand and I can find very little comfort in the Joint Committee’s report—partly because we have read it all before but also because we have seen that it is a clear expression of the spectrum of discontent and confusion about our present situation and the way forward. However, it covers new ground and I know that a lot of serious people have contributed to it.
Like the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, and the noble Lord, Lord Hennessy, I do not see elections to this House as a necessary route to legitimacy or democracy. Indeed, I am among those reformists who value and cherish the traditions of this House and the practices of our revising Chamber as they are now. They just need to be improved. An increasing number of Peers and MPs think that a Bill advocating the abolition of the present House, or even contemplation of it, is nothing less than madness and perhaps political suicide. MPs recognise that. At a recent 1922 Committee meeting, as many as 40 Back-Bench MPs are said to have opposed it; several PPSs are against elections; and perhaps as many as six Cabinet Ministers have expressed severe reservations about the Bill. Oliver Heald MP, former shadow Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs, apparently changed his mind after listening to expert witnesses. That is what we want to hear. The Conservative manifesto speaks only of working towards building a consensus, and it is already clear that there is no consensus on this issue.
As we have heard, there are positive reforms that could be enacted at once, building on the work done by the noble Lord, Lord Steel, the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, and others. They appear in Chapter 5 of the alternative report, on pages 78 to 79, but I have put them in my own order of priority: first, as the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, has already demonstrated, the establishment of a statutory appointments commission well away from Downing Street, which has been recommended for years but patronage still prevails; secondly, ending the hereditary by-elections, the principle having already been removed by the 1999 Act, although the public do not know that we are still electing hereditary Peers; thirdly, cutting the link between the honours system and membership of the House of Lords; fourthly, reducing the size of the House, with a moratorium on new Peers; fifthly, improving the balance of membership with more attention to diversity and the representation of other faiths; and, sixthly, provisions for the retirement and exclusion of Members of the House of Lords. I personally feel that one year’s expenses would be a reasonable offer to older Members of the House who might wish to retire voluntarily.
I do not accept schemes based on attendance because so many of our most valuable independent Peers attend only occasionally. I do not see the point of a constitutional convention proposed in the alternative report, which will only delay reform even further. It cannot be said too often that the coalition still has an opportunity to carry out these reforms now, and it is possible that during the passage of the Bill there may be openings for concessions that would lead to that situation; otherwise we will have an inevitable debacle with the present Bill, which the Joint Committee has shown to be defective, especially on primacy and powers in Clause 2.
When there are already so many urgent matters, as the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, pointed out, why are this Government so keen to squeeze all other legislation into a corner while the juggernaut of reform proceeds over the next two years, dominating time in both Houses? One can foresee colossal blockships ahead, multitudes of amendments, night after night of pure frustration on a greater scale than we have already endured with recent Bills on parliamentary reform. Long before the Parliament Act is invoked, which is still a highly contested issue, there will be havoc and destruction. Morale in this House will sink to its lowest level, as surely it must, if we are talking of the destruction of this Chamber.
Having spoken to one member of the Cabinet last week and indeed attempted to entertain him with teacakes next door, with mixed success, I have tried to read the Government’s mind and have come up with this; Lords reform is the glue that keeps the coalition going. There are enough passionate Liberals to keep it on the list, although many of them disagree. On the Tory side, as we have heard, the 1922 Committee meeting showed that much more trouble is brewing. Public opinion is claimed to be on their side but I have my doubts about that. There has been a surge of opinion in favour of the Lords after amendments to the legal aid, health and other Bills proved to the public that this House is essential to the democratic process.
Abolition would certainly not carry public support in a referendum, and many people will smell a rat if the coalition disguises it as reform. Public attitudes to this House are quite complex and contradictory, as a House of Lords’ Library note makes clear, and a referendum could be very misleading and damaging.
I freely admit that there are some in the Commons who believe that two elected Houses can work together as well as the present ones, and that the existing conventions can endure, but most MPs are thinking about the composition and not the powers of the two Houses, which are bound to collide as they do in the United States. I am not sure that the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, was right about war-making there.
Finally, the Government understandably are avoiding the question of costs. The noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, and others demonstrated conclusively that the transition to an elected House would cost a lot. The Treasury will hardly advertise such a waste of resources now.
There is an excellent group in this House, led by the noble Lords, Lord Cormack and Lord Norton, that genuinely seeks a compromise on reform and would like us to move now towards an effective rather than an elected Chamber. I again urge the Government to listen to the group, as more and more Members of another place are doing, and to take this last opportunity to drop the Bill or to accept amendments that will lead quickly to a solution and avoid the expensive quagmire that otherwise will be inevitable.
Lord Trimble
My Lords, I was a member of the Joint Committee and I begin by echoing the compliments paid by the noble Lord, Lord Hennessy, and the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, to the chairman and the clerks. I also signed the alternative report, and I think that between that and the full committee report one finds a devastating critique of the Bill. However, I will not try to cram all my views on all aspects of the report into seven minutes; instead, I will pick one issue. It was one of the two issues that the noble Lord, Lord Richard, acknowledged as being the primary concerns of the Commons. We have concentrated quite a bit on the first question, which is that of the primacy of the Commons. The other is the way in which Members of another place are very nervous about having other elected persons tramping over their patch; they want their constituencies to remain inviolate.
I will focus on that issue because, as so often happens, when I read the report after we had finished—after it had been printed and it was too late to do anything about it—a paragraph jumped out and hit me, and I thought, “That doesn’t quite reflect the evidence we got”. I went and read the evidence and felt that my initial reaction was right. I confess that when we nodded through the paragraph I did not notice the points that I will make now; that was my error. I am referring to paragraph 213, which summarises the evidence that we received from the Australian Senators.
We made a considerable effort to take evidence from Australia because we felt that it might give us a good comparison with what might happen here if we had an elected upper House. It is a Commonwealth country, it operates within a common-law system, and it has an elected upper as well as lower House. We wanted to speak to Australian Senators to hear their views on a number of issues. That of constituencies is dealt with in paragraph 213.
The paragraph starts off properly by referring to the view of a member of the Government of Australia, Senator Stephens, who stated that the people of Australia regarded Members of the House of Representatives as their local representatives and identified very clearly with their Member. The Senator went on to say:
“I will ask Senator Rhiannon to respond to your question about constituencies. I will just explain the Government’s method of dealing with that. As a Member of the Government in the Senate, I am allocated a number of seats that are not held by the Government in the lower House in my state. I look after those constituents who do not have a government representative. Those people might come to me about issues and legislation”.
We should bear in mind the point about the way in which constituencies are allocated to Senators for them to nurse. The Senator then referred to Senator Rhiannon of the Green party, who said that the issue of working with constituents was very important and took up a lot of their time.
There was then a reference to the views of Senator Ronaldson, a member of the opposition Liberal Party, although he kept describing himself as a conservative—I feel that there must have been a simple explanation for that. The report says that he thought that elected Members of the Lords might engage in constituency-type work if in an area with other elected representatives from other parties. What he said was:
“I do not think that you can make the assumption that you will not be engaged in constituency-type work”.
That is putting things a little more strongly. This may be a nuance, but it is a significant nuance. He is quoted as saying that, in terms of elections:
“Senators do not campaign as Senators. They campaign for one of the lower House Members of their own party in a marginal seat, or … against a marginal lower House Member from another party”.
On this point, it would be good to look at Senator Ronaldson’s comment. He was asked a question by Eleanor Laing from another place:
“I think that I am right in saying, Senator Ronaldson, that you said that we should not assume that Members of the upper House will not be involved in constituency work. Does that also mean that they campaign in constituencies? Could we explore a little further what happens on the ground … Is it normal for Members of both Houses to be campaigning in a constituency all the time?”.
Senator Ronaldson replied:
“The Senators do not campaign as Senators. They campaign for one of the lower House Members of their own party in a marginal seat, or they vigorously campaign against a marginal lower House Member from another party. Senator Stephens talked about arrangements where we, as parties, will look after various seats. They are described by the Conservative Party as patron Senators. I am patron Senator for a number of seats, some of which are winnable, including one that I very much hope we will win and then become the Government. Senator Stephens will be similarly campaigning in Conservative seats to ensure the election of a new Labor Member or to support the incumbent Labor Member”.
The picture that comes from the passages that I have quoted very clearly shows that Senators are heavily involved in political work in areas. They are quite obviously put by their political party into areas where the party does not have a Member and hopes very much to get one, and they are engaged in campaigning not just during elections but all the time throughout the area. I am bringing this out so that Members of another place can get a clearer picture of what might happen when this comes. I am not sure that we should be saying that it ought not to happen.
I must say that the provisions that the report suggests for limiting the finances available to Members of the elected upper House with regard to constituency work are unfair and unworkable. They are unfair because they will mean that a rich elected Lord or Senator will be able to finance an office and have an advantage over those who cannot. A person may not have an allowance for an office, but parties will make offices available, and I am sure that political parties will make sure that newly elected Members of the upper House work just as hard as their Australian counterparts in campaigning all the time, especially to undermine opposition Members holding seats in their patch.
Lord Dubs
My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lord Richard and his committee on the work they have done, even if I dissent from some of their conclusions. We have already reached the point in the debate when everything has been said, but perhaps not yet by everybody.
If we had had reform in 1997 or 2001, I would have been happy to stand for election to this House. In fact, I would have preferred to be an elected Member of this House, although I think it is a privilege to be here anyway, and I appreciate it. I have always believed in an elected second Chamber. When the right reverend Prelate spoke earlier, he said that we do not have too much by way of party politics. Although the Whips may not have many sanctions, and although we have Cross-Benchers who are not subject to discipline, the fact is that we have party politics pouring out of our ears here. We get a Whip every week, we have three-line Whips and anybody who says that there are no party politics here does not understand the way this place works. Without party politics, the Government could not get their business through. So let us be clear, we are talking about a House that is political—party-political in the main—that exists to get the Government’s business through or to dissent and hold the Government in check.
I welcome the fact that the Joint Committee report supported elections. That is the fundamental point about what it did. Of course, the Bill has many flaws, and I want to deal with them in a moment or two. Clause 2 is one of them. I have also read the alternative report with interest; I spent much of yesterday doing that. While I agree with parts of it, there is a fundamental point that is inimical to the thrust of policy. It says:
“We believe there is an unbridgeable gap between an elected House of Lords and the primacy of the House of Commons”.
I contest that absolutely. I do not think there is an unbridgeable gap; I think that gap can be managed and dealt with.
Public opinion is not terribly interested in this debate, except for a small element of the public and the media who will think that we are doing ourselves and the country a disservice if we do not move forward towards reform. However, I have talked at public meetings—mainly Labour Party and Fabian meetings—all over the country over the years, and with one exception they all supported an elected House. I will be honest and admit that I went to speak to some students in Cambridge. I took a straw poll before I started and about 60 per cent wanted an appointed House. By the time I had finished, 90 per cent wanted an appointed House. Well, I did my best. However, the rest of the meetings and indeed most of the people I speak to all think it absurd that we do not have an elected House.
The key issues are clearly accountability, elections and the primacy of the Commons. Yes, I support elections, at least partly because of accountability. Of course, as the alternative report says—and the Joint Committee report disagrees—anybody elected will have to do some constituency casework. I do not see how one can apply to be selected in a local constituency and say, “I am not going to do any work for local voters”. It is untenable; it just cannot be done. None of us would be selected if we applied on that basis. Of course there has to be casework, and I am pleased that the alternative report actually says that. It says:
“Elections are, in themselves, principal methods of accountability. A candidate stands for election, and if elected, is held accountable for the platform and proposals on which they stood”.
I campaigned very hard for the Labour Party in the last elections and I was happy to support the manifesto on which I was door-knocking for Labour candidates, including our commitment to an elected second Chamber.
I am not happy about being elected once for 15 years. It seems to undermine the basic principle of accountability. Accountability is not just how one gets there in the first place; it is also being accountable for the decisions one makes, the votes one casts and the positions one takes. Quite frankly, I sometimes say to my friends and others, “I vote on issues that affect your lives and the lives of other people, yet I am not answerable to anybody”. If anybody asks me why I voted in a particular way, I do not have to justify myself; I can just say, “Because I am here”. Of course, I do not take that attitude, but that is the position we are in.
A point that has not been made so far is that having a basis in a constituency makes a politician a different sort of person. Elected politicians get their sustenance, at least in part, from engaging with their constituency, maybe doing casework, dealing with their local parties and all the other organisations that lobby an elected politician. It seems to me that being under that sort of pressure makes one a different sort of person. Quite a few Members of this House have been elected and they understand that; others have not and make a fist of it. But some do not, and I think it is an important point.
I remember that there was a by-election in south London while the House was sitting and I spent the day tramping the streets knocking on doors. I got an earful on housing, transport, social security, planning, education, the NHS, et cetera. Unless we as individuals go out and canvass in elections, we do not get that earful from voters, and there is nothing healthier in a democracy than hearing what voters have to say—even if they are saying to us, “We will vote you out if we do not like it”.
Of course I believe, as everybody else does, in the primacy of the Commons. Individually elected Members of the second Chamber would be able to assert themselves a bit more. If I were elected, I certainly would have more confidence to go to the Labour Party conference and say my piece; because I am not elected, I feel constrained from doing so.
I worry about the idea of a constitutional convention, unless there is a time limit of about a year. I fear it is a recipe for long delays and there are other ways of achieving such ends—but the point has been made already. One of the strengths of the Joint Committee’s report is the idea of a concordat between the two Houses. Work on that could start quickly. I very much welcome the detailed suggestions in the report on the idea of a concordat as regards the conventions.
I also am advised by people who know more about this than I do that the Parliament Act could be strengthened to deal with secondary legislation. It could work whether legislation starts in this House or in the Commons and would enable the Commons to retain its primacy.
Finally, reference has been made to Erskine May but, for all its strengths as a document and a tome on parliamentary procedure, it is not a constitutional document. It is a treatise on law, privileges, proceedings and usage of Parliament. That is made very clear in the alternative report. Ultimately, I hope that reform will not be based on the views of this House. I hope that it will come from where it should start, the Commons, and that, if the Commons makes that decision, we will give it our support.
Lord Willoughby de Broke
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and members of the committee for their report, but more particularly I am grateful to the members of the committee that produced the excellent alternative report. The noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, said that democracy is in trouble or danger, I think because of the lack of power, or the weaknesses, of this House. I should like to say to him that democracy and Parliament are in trouble because, over the years, we have given away so many powers to the European Union. That is why our democracy is in danger. It is not because of any shortcomings of this House. Perhaps I may remind your Lordships that, over the years I have been here, we have largely neutered Parliament by giving away powers of immigration, employment, social policy, trade, agriculture, fisheries and energy—to name just the most obvious.
I recently asked a Question for Written Answer about the Budget put forward by the Government when they said that they were going to increase the price of alcohol in supermarkets. I asked,
“whether their proposal for minimum pricing on alcohol is compliant with European Union law”.
The Written Answer given by the noble Lord, Lord Henley, was:
“The Government are currently in discussions with the EU Commission on this issue”.—[Official Report, 23/4/12; col. WA 292.]
That is where we have got to. Parliament, whether it is the House of Commons or this House, cannot even decide the price of drink in this country without going to members of the Commission in Brussels to tell us what we can or cannot do.
Before putting my name down to speak, I asked myself why there is all the fuss. Arguing about the reform of the Lords sometimes seems like two bald men arguing over a comb. It is just not worth it. Then I reminded myself that, over the past two years, all recent opinion polls have shown that a great majority of the people of this country want a referendum on our membership of the European Union. I was also encouraged by a poll in the Sun the other day that showed that UKIP has recently overtaken the Liberal Democrats as the third most popular party in the country. After people in this country have been given the right to vote in a referendum on membership of the EU, Parliament will get its powers back. Therefore, discussing the reform of the House of Lords is valuable, and I am delighted that we have the opportunity to do so today.
I am more attracted by the alternative report than by the Joint Committee’s report. I do not think that the alternative report should be spoken of as a minority report. Looking at the figures, it seems that, excluding the chairman, the alternative report was produced by exactly half the members of the committee; so it has, to my mind at least, at least equal validity with that of the main committee. I am quite surprised that some of those who produced the alternative report felt able to sign the committee’s report at all, given the list in the alternative report of the fundamental areas on which they differed from the committee’s report.
On page 33, the report lists:
“Primacy … Electoral mandate … Powers … Electoral democracy … Constituency issues … Funding limits … Ministerial voting … Transition”.
On all these points the alternative report argues persuasively against the conclusions of the committee. I hope very much that we will not have to waste a lot of valuable time vetting the Deputy Prime Minister’s Bill, but if we do, this House owes a vote of thanks to the members of the committee who produced the alternative report—the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, and others—who have given a lot of time to producing this valuable document. I support its conclusions and the recommendations for incremental reform based on the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Steel, and for the establishment of,
“a new Constitutional Convention to consider the next steps”.
In preparing for this debate, I looked back to the 1911 debate in this House on the introduction of the Parliament Act, which was held on 10 August 1911, two days before the beginning of the grouse-shooting season. My grandfather led the opposition to that Bill as leader of the so-called “die-hards” or “last ditchers”. I realise of course that the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, the noble Lord, Lord Norton, and the others who produced the alternative report would baulk or recoil at the thought of being called “last ditchers” or “die-hards”, but I hope the one thing they will share with my grandfather is the conviction to stand up for their beliefs. I will certainly stand with them if the battle is ever joined.
Lord Cormack
My Lords, I am delighted to follow the noble Lord, Lord Willoughby de Broke, for two reasons. One is that he very properly paid a compliment to the alternative report, and—in declaring an interest as the co-chairman of the Campaign for an Effective Second Chamber, to which the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, referred—I can say that, from moneys subscribed by Members of your Lordships’ House and coming from nowhere else, we have been able to fund the publication in a permanent form of this admirable document. There are copies in the Cloakroom, the Library and all the Whips’ offices, and any Member of the House who has difficulty in obtaining one has only to ask me or the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, and it will be presented to them; in her case, it will be autographed.
The other reason I am delighted to follow the noble Lord, Lord Willoughby de Broke, is this. He referred to the part his grandfather played in those momentous days in 1911. That gives me an opportunity to remind your Lordships’ House that we often talk as if nothing has happened since then. How ridiculous that is. This House has altered more during the reign of Her Gracious Majesty Queen Elizabeth II than almost any other institution in this country. When the Queen came to the throne, there were no women in this House, and there were no life Peers. I remind your Lordships that it was a Conservative Government who produced the legislation which led to the advent of women Peers and life Peers.
Then we had that other momentous change at a time when I was privileged to lead on constitutional affairs in another place, when the Government of Mr Blair decided on a mass expulsion of hereditary Peers. I was unhappy about the way that was done, but it has altered your Lordships’ House beyond recognition. I might say in parenthesis that if the noble Baroness, Lady Thatcher, when she was Prime Minister, had only accepted a Bill I introduced in another place in 1984 which would have cut down the number of hereditary Peers—they would have elected so many of their number at the beginning of each Parliament—we might not have had the traumas of 1997 to 1999, but that is another story.
We are now debating the report of the noble Lord, Lord Richard, on the draft Bill that was produced by the Government almost a year ago. We all owe the noble Lord and his colleagues on the committee a great debt of gratitude. However, he very honestly said that his committee was constrained, dealing not with a clean sheet of paper but with a draft Bill. He decreed, quite rightly, that that was what they had to concentrate on, which is one reason why the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, and others decided that they wanted to produce a more far-reaching report, for which we are very much in their debt.
That the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and his committee were very constrained was underlined by my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth, who talked about going back to first principles. The committee had no opportunity to do that. It was dealing with a document and a premise that were essentially flawed—the premise that you could maintain the supremacy of the House of Commons if you had two elected Chambers. The committee of the noble Lord, Lord Richard, drove a coach and horses through Clause 2 and made it quite plain that that just was not the case.
One therefore has to face up to the question of what the relationship between the two Houses is to be. Here again was the flawed premise, because, in constitutional matters, form should follow function. That is why the noble Baroness has suggested in the report that she and her colleagues have produced that there should be a constitutional convention to look at first principles, to look at function and then to determine form. We are asked to agree to form without regard to function, which is wrong. It is illustrated particularly in that—I must choose my words with moderation and care; I would have said “fatuous”—strange proposal that there should be a hybrid House.
What happens in a hybrid House if you have 20 per cent of the Members appointed and the others elected? You have two categories, two classes, of Member. As the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, pointed out at a meeting that I attended only last week—and I made the point in my own evidence to the committee—if you have a situation where the non-elected 20 per cent carry the day, you have the makings of a constitutional crisis if the Bill is important. If you recognised the validity of that proposition and therefore had a 100 per cent elected House, you would do away at a stroke with that valuable ingredient in your Lordships’ House to which the noble Baroness, Lady Knight of Collingtree, referred in her intervention: independence.
I sat at the other end of the corridor for 40 years. During the whole of that time, we had virtually no independent Members elected to the House of Commons. There were those who bore the label, but it was either because there had been some constituency spat—sometimes within the political party concerned, as in one of the Welsh seats; I think that it was Ebbw Vale—or because there had been a local issue such as Wyre Forest and the Kidderminster hospital, but there was no phalanx of independent Members. So even if those who are here because of their illustrious careers in the Foreign Service, the Civil Service and all the rest of it sought to stand for election, which many of them would believe was not the right and proper thing to do in a political contest, they would not get here anyhow.
What if one values a House with an independent group of experts? As I speak now, I look across and see the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris—our experts do not all sit on the Cross Benches. The noble Lord, Lord Winston, informs every debate in which he takes part in this House with his superb knowledge. I may not always agree with what he says, but, by Jove, he enriches the place by his presence. You would not get that in the sort of assembly that would result from a cobbled-together Bill such as we are now threatened with, and I hope that it will not come to pass.
In her speech, the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market, said that we were suffering from wear and tear—some of us more than others perhaps. But she is completely right. This House needs reform. However, as others have pointed out, there is a Bill, the so-called Steel Bill, which addresses most if not all of these issues and on which I believe that it would be possible to have consensus. We could reform this House in a way that would be acceptable and much less expensive than the elected House with which we are now threatened. I urge the Government to consider it very carefully and consider the convention suggested by the noble Baroness, Lady Symons. It merits serious and sympathetic consideration.
We are talking about the British constitution. We are not talking about something that should be the plaything of any particular political personality or something that should be regarded, as someone said, as the glue that holds the coalition together. We are talking about the future of our country and there are other things that could be done in the future. The noble Lord, Lord Low of Dalston, who will address us shortly, has an idea for electoral colleges, which he will explain, which has some merit and is worth serious consideration and debate.
I end on this note. I have two points. When he gave evidence to the Joint Committee, the Clerk of the House of Commons said that at the moment the House of Commons and the House of Lords are complementary to each other. If we had two elected Chambers, they would be in competition with each other. If we are to move to that undesirable state, surely the people must have the ultimate decision. How fatuous to wave the flag of democracy but say, “You can’t have a vote on it”. That is the ultimate insult to the British people, and up with that we should not put.
Lord Grenfell
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Cormack. The congruence of our views on Lords reform are long-standing and determined—and as a long-standing and determined opponent of an elected second Chamber, I have difficulty with many of the conclusions and recommendations in this report. However, that in no way diminishes my admiration for the extraordinary achievement of the Joint Committee and its chairman, my noble friend Lord Richard. The fruits of nine months’ hard work are impressive. As a piece of pre-legislative scrutiny, it fulfils the requirements of rigour, comprehensiveness, focus, careful argument and a clarity that contrasts starkly with the draft Bill and the White Paper into which it inquired. I would not be surprised if the two hefty volumes of oral and written evidence stand for a long time as the best repository of informed opinion on this hugely important constitutional issue.
The immediate conclusion that I draw from reading the report is that the draft Bill as a vehicle for reforming your Lordships' House is not fit for purpose. As the emergence of a well-reasoned alternative report confirms, the conclusions and the recommendations reached by a bare majority of the committee members reflect a glaring lack of consensus. In short, the draft Bill will just not do. It is obvious from the start, as many have pointed out, that it is fatally flawed. The absurdity of the assertions made in Clause 2 relating to the preservation of the primacy of the House of Commons undermines the very premise on which the drafters of this Bill sought to build their case for an all or partially elected Chamber.
To me, the logic is that, in the face of this total lack of consensus on how to proceed, we should not proceed on the basis of the draft Bill, the White Paper or the recommendations of the report before us. Has not the Prime Minister told us more than once that reform of this House must be achieved by consensus? Or has he changed his mind? Am I naive in suggesting that the Government’s threat to use the Parliament Act makes an utter nonsense of his call to reform by consensus? Or—as the noble Lord the Leader of the House intimated earlier—does he intend to exclude the opinion of your Lordships' House from such a consensus? To my mind, that would be outrageous. That said, I could scarcely blame the Prime Minister if he has changed his mind, since it must now be blindingly obvious even to him that consensus is unreachable on any reform remotely resembling that so dear to the heart of his Deputy Prime Minister. He has only to listen to a substantial bloc of his own Commons Back-Benchers to recognise that.
In preparing a necessarily short speech I had difficulty in deciding on which of the report’s many arguments, conclusions, options and recommendations I might focus. So, mindful that there are more debates to come in the new Session, I decided to focus on the overall message that I received from a first reading of this report. I recognise that others will have received a different message, but the message to me is that if the coalition is still hell-bent on abolishing this House and replacing it with an all or partially elected Senate, it will have to go back to the drawing board.
But not just any drawing board. Because the Joint Committee, by its mandate, was restricted to the examination of those subjects covered by the draft Bill and the White Paper, it had insufficient scope for the kind of broad consideration of the functions and powers of both Houses, without which the contribution of a reform of the Lords to the enhancement of government simply cannot be devised. The authors of the alternative report state that while they agree with the findings of the Joint Committee's report as a whole, the content and constitutional significance of the draft Bill needs consideration in a much broader context. That, they claim, is best achieved through a constitutional convention, which would consider the next steps on further Lords reform and any consequential impact on the Commons and on Parliament as a whole. That surely is the right way to go, and I warmly support it.
Of course defenders of the draft Bill, or of a hastily amended version of it, will cry, “Delaying tactics!”. So be it. The Government have had their chance and have blown it with this deeply flawed draft Bill. They now have no right to impede the efforts of those committed to finding, through a truly fit-for-purpose mechanism, a more comprehensive and workable solution.
I end with three short points. First, I deplore the petty-mindedness of the Government in their attitude to the Bill brought forward by the noble Lord, Lord Steel of Aikwood. They cry, “There is really nothing in it”, as if it was not on the Conservative Benches here that the evisceration of the Bill was plotted. How cynical can you get? I hope that rumours that there may be some second thinking on that are well-founded.
My penultimate point: whatever the method used in a further attempt at consensus—through a constitutional convention, as I would plead; or without one, which I would strongly warn against—the resulting agreement, if any, must, imperatively, be put to the people for approval through a referendum. It is far too significant a constitutional matter to be decided otherwise. Let me be blunt about this. The Government are opposing a referendum for short-term political advantage, not for the long-term betterment of government, which is what the people deserve and on which their voice should be heard.
My third and final point: how on earth could the coalition Government get the ordering of their priorities so wrong? Is it not absurd that the Prime Minister should bow to his deputy's insistence that Parliament invite upon itself a lengthy and acrimonious period of legislation on an issue that strikes no chord with a public who are rightly demanding that the Government and Parliament focus urgently on the double-dip recession, on unemployment, on housing, on schools, on health, on welfare, on pensions, on the Scottish question and a host of other life-changing concerns? It is our duty to make the Government think again.
Lord Low of Dalston
My Lords, it is a privilege to follow such a weighty and impressive speech. First, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and his committee on having produced a comprehensive analysis of the issues and arguments in, all things considered, a remarkably short space of time given the amount of work undertaken. It will be an invaluable resource in the debates to come. I also congratulate the authors of the alternative report on having produced a trenchant critique and a number of valuable ideas that represent a constructive contribution to taking the debate forward.
I will make two points. The issues need to be divided into two: elections and the rest. My contention—I think many would agree with it—is that progress on the rest has been hamstrung by the absence of any agreement about elections and the desire in some quarters to get agreement to a comprehensive package that contained them. Indeed, some insist that there cannot be a package that does not contain them. I want to suggest a way forward around which a consensus might be built. As I say, for this to happen, the issues must be divided in two.
First, there is already a lot of consensus around a number of changes that need to be made—short of elections. We have heard about them in a number of speeches this afternoon: reduction in the size of the House, the need for a cost-neutral retirement scheme, an end to hereditary by-elections and a proper statutory basis for the Appointments Commission, as well as the reforms contained in the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Steel of Aikwood. That has already passed this House and simply awaits the imprimatur of the Commons. A package of reforms could be put together around these changes in this Parliament which would attract widespread support. Even if nothing more were done, that would constitute a legacy of House of Lords reform that the coalition could point to as a substantial achievement. I am pleased to see that the alternative report agrees with this. It is only the vain quest for the holy grail of a final solution which has prevented agreement on such a package in the past 10 years. Up to this point, I am on all fours with the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Hennessy.
Secondly, more can be done with a much broader base of support than can be mobilised for elections as currently proposed. That may take a little longer. As regards the final solution, I do not believe that this can be arrived at until the shape of the United Kingdom has been decided. I am against elections, at least of the kind currently proposed. I will not rehearse the arguments. Your Lordships have heard them far too often to make that necessary. Suffice it to say, I am in accord with Professor Sir John Baker, who is cited by the Joint Committee as saying that the House’s essential scrutiny role,
“does not require the sanction of the ballot box to give it legitimacy any more than the judicial role, because the House of Commons can insist on the last word”.
In other words, he drew attention to the House’s complementary but different role as a revising Chamber.
Of course, if you do not have elections there is still the question of patronage to deal with, as the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, reminded us. With acknowledgement to the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, for the trailer, I favour a system of appointments by an Appointments Commission as at present, but greatly strengthened by supporting it with a system of nominations from a series of electoral colleges representing the different branches of civil society. In other words, it would be a form of indirect election. I was pleased to see that both the Joint Committee and the alternative report called for further work to be done on this.
The noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, said that only seven countries do not elect their second Chambers. According to the Joint Committee, 34 second Chambers are indirectly elected and 16 of them wholly so. This would not be election as conceived of by those who favour elections, but it would represent a significant democratisation of the appointments process. It would retain the emphasis on expertise, experience and distinction in their field by which those who do not favour elections set such store.
Of course, indirect election can take a number of forms. Oliver Heald MP, a member of the Joint Committee and chairman of the Society of Conservative Lawyers, issued a pamphlet through that society to coincide with the publication of the Joint Committee’s report. In that, he proposed a secondary mandate system in which each party would publish a list of its candidates and gain seats in the House of Lords in exact proportion to the share of the electorate’s support won in the general election. There were at least four submissions to the Joint Committee proposing a system of indirect election or something like that. I say nothing of my own humble contribution. Dr Alex Reid of Cambridge proposed a system in which the 80 per cent elected element of the House would be indirectly elected via political parties. John Smith of Stamford, Lincolnshire, submitted a well worked out scheme of indirect election from constituencies of expertise with a general college for those not affiliated to any particular constituency and a parliamentary college for politicians. Finally, Mr Martin Wright would have the colleges that represent constituencies of expertise make the nominations but elections would be by members of the general public. They would vote in the college of their choice for the candidates of their choice on the basis of statements or CVs circulated for the purpose.
It seems that there is much merit in the alternative report’s suggestion of a constitutional convention to go into more detail than the Joint Committee possibly could on these different proposals, as well as the multitude of other issues identified by the alternative report. I was sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Richard, poured such scorn on the idea of a constitutional convention. I thought that the alternative report made the case quite well that a good deal more work needed to be done to bottom these issues out.
Lord Lipsey
My Lords, I apologise in advance for lowering the very high tone set just now by the noble Lord, Lord Low, and the speakers who preceded him. I will stick to my special subject, as the House’s resident geek—namely, the cost of what is proposed. Some noble Lords might not think that that is the kind of thing we should debate this afternoon but I can assure the House that it matters a good deal to the people out there who have to bear the cost.
The Joint Committee puts no cost on its proposals, although my noble friend Lord Richard said in presenting them that we will not get a second Chamber for free. That is one thing that he said that we can certainly all agree with. However, the alternative report produced a costing—mine. This is the cost of the Government’s original proposals drawn from my evidence to the Joint Committee, although the alternative report omits the six footnotes and 13 detailed references attached to that evidence which set out the assumptions that underlie it. The headline numbers are that the extra costs of the reforms will be, in year 1, £177 million, and over the five-year Parliament of 2015-20, £433 million. To put that in a more down-to-earth way, it is the equivalent of 80,000 hip replacements—a comparison that should appeal to Members of your Lordships’ House—or a year’s salary for 13,000 nurses.
There has been some confusion over these costings in the press. They are what they were billed to be or what it says on the tin: costings of the Government’s original proposals, given by me in evidence to my noble friend Lord Richard. They are not and could not be costings of my noble friend’s proposals, simply because that report only became available last Monday. As the committee failed to give costings—because the Government failed to give them—someone has to fill the gap, and I will have a go. I am working with the assistance of the Library to do a costing of the Joint Committee’s proposals.
I say two things about that. First, it is likely to come out a little lower than the costings I have already done of the Government’s proposals. Secondly, it will come out lower because some of the Joint Committee’s recommendations seem to be wholly unrealistic. Under them, you would have one lot of new Peers with salaries and support allowances and another lot—the transitional Peers—who would just get our current allowances. Whatever happened to the rate for the job? If you take out that assumption, the Joint Committee proposals will cost more than the Government’s proposals, simply because it proposes more elected and new appointed Peers.
Mark Harper, the constitutional affairs Minister, described my costings as “speculative”. In one sense, Mr Harper is right, as they depend on assumptions about what precisely will be in the Bill when it eventually appears and, indeed, on assumptions as to how the Bill’s proceedings will be implemented in practice. To that extent, the costings are speculative, as indeed will be the Government’s own costings, which he has promised to publish, belatedly, if and when the Government publish a Bill. The costings of every single policy adopted by this House and Parliament are speculative, in the sense that you cannot know exactly what will happen until it has happened. What a convenient brush-off the word “speculative” represents. Anyone who knows the first thing about government will know that cost estimates would have had to be given to the ministerial committee considering the White Paper, to the Deputy Prime Minister and the Prime Minister. Why should we not see them too, as those who have to legislate about those proposals?
Here is a thought for your Lordships. Let us suppose that the costings given to the ministerial committee, the Deputy Prime Minister and the Prime Minister had shown that the new House would cost not more, as it will, but less. Does anyone seriously suppose that that would not have been broadcast from the rooftops, with the Government showing how marvellously they were economising with our politics with their proposal? Of course they would. They have decided not to tell us the cost for one reason and one reason only. The cost of these proposals is an Exocet heading straight for the engine room of their ship. So they hope to manoeuvre, zig and zag, this way and that to avoid the impact, at least until their ship is a bit nearer port than it is today. That is of course why they resist a referendum, as recommended by the Richard committee, as they know that the chances of the public voting yes to reform will melt like a snowball in the midsummer sun once people understand the bill that they will have to pay for this folly. In this age of austerity, does anyone seriously believe that the public will agree to hand huge chunks of their hard-earned money to a whole new gang of second-rate elected politicians?
Let me issue this challenge to the Minister. I have published my costings—let us have yours. Opinion is free, but facts are sacred and, in this day and age, ought to be freely available for all of us to debate. Unless the Minister, in answering this debate, agrees to this, he will confirm what the whole House in its heart knows: this is a cover-up, which disgraces those who have perpetrated it.
Lord Trefgarne
My Lords, I, too, was a member of the Joint Select Committee and I, too, pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Richard, for his chairmanship. As is self-evident from the report, his task was a difficult one, which he fulfilled with skill, courtesy and balance. I pay tribute, too, to the clerks who served our committee, who had an enormously difficult and voluminous task; a huge volume of work was theirs, and they discharged it with skill and efficiency.
Very few members of the Joint Select Committee agreed with everything in the report. Indeed, a number of us, including me, agreed to an alternative report—but, again, views were not unanimous. May I say, in parenthesis, that your Lordships may wish to consider the arrangements for widely held dissident views on a Select Committee to be more easily expressed than is at present the case? But let that be a matter for another day.
I turn to the substance of the issues before your Lordships as considered and reported on. The essential proposition set out in the draft Bill, supported by the White Paper and by the right honourable gentleman, the Deputy Prime Minister, when he gave evidence, is that there should be a fundamental change to how Members of the upper Chamber are selected while the powers and role remain unchanged. The introduction of a process of election is said to be required to meet a perceived democratic deficit. As I shall say later, I do not necessarily disagree with the concept of a properly elected Senate, but I most strongly disagree that that can and should be achieved while the role and powers remain unaltered.
I believe with complete conviction that if we move to a wholly or largely elected second Chamber, the new House will straightaway use its existing powers more aggressively and very soon be agitating for more. The Parliament Act 1949, which reduced allowable delay from two years to one, as originally proposed in 1911, will no doubt be an early target. Indeed, the 1911 Act itself, according to some authorities, may well become inapplicable, given its preamble, with which your Lordships will be familiar, on the temporary nature of its provisions pending a properly elected House of Lords.
Furthermore, the conventions, which are not part of statute law but which form such an important part of the present relationship between our two Houses, are likewise very soon to come under pressure. I see the Salisbury convention, for example, being the first of these to be questioned and, perhaps, abandoned. So I have to say to my noble friend and your Lordships that with the Bill as drafted primacy will move measurably away from the House of Commons to the new Senate, notwithstanding the aspirations of Clause 2 which, in the committee’s view, would be quite ineffective.
I turn to the intervention of the new Senators—the most likely title for these people, it would seem—in constituency affairs. It will be difficult if not impossible to prevent Senators taking up local issues brought to their attention if they so choose. Frankly, it would be wrong to attempt to do so. Perhaps some modus operandi can be found, but this matter will need to be resolved if friction is not to ensue.
Noble Lords will have observed that both the draft Bill and the Joint Select Committee report anticipate that the new Senate will be chosen by PR, probably some variation of STV. Whatever may be the merits of PR—and the British people were pretty unconvinced when they were asked about this issue last year—it will surely mean that one or more of the smaller parties, such as the Lib Dems, the Greens or even UKIP, or maybe a cocktail of all three, will hold the balance of power in the new House. No doubt that is why my right honourable friend Mr Clegg is so keen on the proposals. Other party leaders, not to mention the electorate, may be less sanguine.
I have previously taken the liberty of detaining your Lordships on the question of the 92 hereditary Peers. My position on that remains unchanged. I agree that if this Bill, for all its shortcomings, were to become law, that would mean the end of the by-elections and eventually the departure of the 92 hereditaries along with the life Peers. However, if the proposed Bill does not reach the statute book and some more limited interim measure is proposed, I would wish to reserve judgment for the present of what my view might be with regard to the by-elections.
I was also an adherent to the alternative report now before your Lordships. I do not agree with all of it, but I agree that the constitutional forum that the alternative report proposes would go a long way to meet the undertaking in the Conservative manifesto that we should seek a consensus. That is surely the right way forward, and a referendum would clearly complete that process, and it is supported by the Joint Select Committee and myself.
I dare say that I am seen as some kind of hereditary dinosaur opposed to all change, but that is not so. I am in favour of what I see as proper reform—namely, a fully elected Senate with full powers perhaps along US lines. This Bill seems to be the worst of all possible worlds, and I hope that it will not reach the statute book.
Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe
My Lords, I declare an interest as a supporter of the Campaign for a Democratic Upper House, and as a long-standing member of the Labour Party—a party which, within its DNA, has sought to reform the House of Lords and to move towards an elected second Chamber in this country. That is not to say that I am in agreement with everything that the Campaign for a Democratic Upper House has been saying in this context over the past few weeks and in its submissions, any more than it means that I supported the Government’s White Paper and draft Bill when it first came out. Indeed, when it did I was quite critical in a number of respects, particularly in regard to Clause 2. I was unhappy about the 15-year term and the absence of accountability which I believe this House needs to have introduced.
I have been in this House since 1997, and when I first came in I believed that the House should be reformed. Much as I have come to love the place and the people in it, and to respect the very significant contribution that it makes to society through its work, knowledge and expertise, I have over the years felt the embrace of the House on me to shift my position. The noble Lord, Lord Steel of Aikwood, has left the Chamber, but I have been almost seduced to switch my position by the efforts that he has made with his several Bills. However, I have not shifted it. In that respect, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and his committee for reaffirming my position.
I want first to say that over the past months I have watched people trooping through the Lobbies who for many years were opposed to what they were voting for in regard to health and social care—and that is what the public see, too. They were people who for many years had fought for benefits, particularly for the disabled, but who were voting in a manner quite contrary to anything I had previously seen. I am thus reaffirmed in the view that the public are entitled to have a say on who is in this House.
I express my gratitude to the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and all the members of his committee for the report which has been produced for us. It has not been an easy task, as we all recognise, but they have moved us forward. This momentum has been under way since the 1990s, and it will not stop. In particular, I am pleased that a majority of them embraced the circumstances in which we, as representatives, cannot resolve this issue and find a consensual approach, and have recommended that the people should decide what should be done with the second Chamber. On that there was, fortunately, a very substantial majority in the committee.
I am pleased that my leader in this House has reaffirmed in the Lords today the Labour Party’s position in favour of a referendum. We indicated that in our manifesto. However, I was disappointed earlier to hear the Leader of the House, when speaking on behalf of the coalition, say that the Government saw no case for it. I hope that the Government are going to reflect on that and change their minds, that that will not become a point of dissent between and within the two Chambers, and that we can move forward and let the people have their say. When they have had their say, it should rest with a House of Commons, whose primacy we want to see maintained, to take a decision on the composition and powers of the House of Lords. That was a big change and is a big step forward, and I thank the committee for it very much indeed. In a sense, if the proposal goes through, the committee will have taken it away from the warring factions, which have so far been unable to move forward on it.
Finally, I want to say something on Clause 2, which I have been very unhappy about. I have long been an advocate of the Government working on codifying our conventions. They have resisted doing that so far, and I have looked at the arguments that they have advanced when they have gone before the committee, but I still believe that those issues need addressing—as do other topics that are still left over. We need a dispute resolution procedure beyond that which has been presented by the Government, and further work on codification or addressing the conventions of the House. When we examine the report which the noble Lord has produced, we see that within it there is an answer to most of the problems which have been presented hitherto by those who are opposed to us shifting on this ground: that the primacy of the Commons would be challenged.
I urge noble Lords to re-read the report because it provides us with a foundation on which we can build in moving forward. It also provides for those, perhaps particularly on the Cross Benches, who are fearful about the possible attack on that primacy from the Lords if we had elections. There is a scheme within it to cover that. I suspect that the minority on the Joint Committee have realised that there is quite a lot in this report, sufficient to have moved them to provide an alternative. The noble Lord, Lord Cormack, has done his best today to make sure that everybody reads it. Again, I urge people to read it fully, because it is a very useful document, although in some areas it does not quite represent the full position.
In conclusion, I will pick up a point from the alternative report. In its executive summary it says that the Government’s Bill “purports” to set out a system of an elected second Chamber that will not challenge the primacy of the Commons, but it fails to do so. I asked noble Lords to ask themselves: why should a Government—indeed, why should the previous Labour Government—whose power depends upon their position in the House of Commons set out to do any such thing to undermine their power and primacy? Why should they do it? Nobody has looked at or answered that question. The simple fact is that the Commons will continue to have their power there. Governments will want that, whether they be Labour, Lib Dem, Conservative or coalition. That is the way they will want it, and they will make sure that the laws of the land are structured so that that primacy is retained, even if they have to change it en route.
I look forward with great interest to seeing where we end up with the Bill, when it comes to us. I look forward, too, to the people taking a decision on this. I will be one of those canvassing and fighting hard to make sure that those people who have the right to make the law are there through the votes cast by people who have to live under those laws. We will then see where we end on the primacy issue. If the Commons come out with a majority in favour of change, as seems likely from the way that the voting has gone within the Joint Committee, this House should be willing to accept it.
Lord MacGregor of Pulham Market
My Lords, for those who have the earlier version of the speakers list, perhaps I could explain why I am speaking now. I put my name in last week but, by mistake, it was left out and there is a new version. The noble Lord, Lord Richard, had a difficult task and he has my sympathy. I understand and can see that he approached his chairmanship with thoroughness and sympathy, and he approached it well, but at the end of the day this was clearly a divided committee. As the noble Lords, Lord Willoughby de Broke and Lord Grenfell, pointed out, it is 13 to 12 because one member of the committee, as I understand it, attended hardly any of its sessions. There are therefore almost two versions of the report. I strongly support the alternative report. I commend members of the committee on their impeccable logic, the cogency of their analysis and the conclusions of their report. We have had excellent and convincing speeches today from some of its signatories. I shall make just four points in the time available. Inevitably, I will be somewhat repetitive but there is nothing wrong with that as this debate needs to reflect the overall response of the House.
First, on Clause 2, the committee was unanimous. Indeed, the overwhelming evidence that it received from nearly all the witnesses meant that it could hardly have concluded otherwise. It is pretty devastating. The committee was,
“firmly of the opinion that a wholly or largely elected reformed House will seek to use its powers more assertively, to an extent which cannot be predicted with certainty now”.
It went on:
“We concur with the overwhelming view expressed to us in oral and written evidence that Clause 2 of the draft Bill is not capable in itself of preserving the primacy of the House of Commons”.
It also stated that the possibility of judicial review was “profoundly undesirable” and said:
“The Government’s approach in Clause 2(1)(c) of the Bill … risks judicial intervention”—
which—
“would be a constitutional disaster”.
Those are pretty strong words. Given the unanimous opinion of the Joint Committee, the opinion of most Members of both Houses and all the expert opinion outside Parliament, I cannot see how the Government can bring forward a Bill without a wholesale reconstruction of Clause 2. It would be a travesty of consultation and almost an insult to the parliamentary process to do otherwise. That covers the problem of conflict between the two Houses.
Secondly, I turn to the problem of conflict in the constituencies. Some people have suggested that this would not happen. Here again, the alternative report, half the signatories to which have long experience of elections and being elected, got it right. It says:
“We believe that this is a wholly misplaced notion of the reality of practical politics”.
My noble friend Lord Trimble went into some detail on that today. It is pretty obvious that there will be conflict at the constituency level, not least because in today’s world of the internet and e-mail anyone can put their views forward very quickly, either to their elected MP from the other place or to anyone else that they wish. I simply do not believe that elected Members of this House would not be subjected to large numbers of such e-mails and correspondence.
At the regional level that they will represent—the wider constituency level—there will be many issues that are not related to individual constituency cases but are of great concern to all the constituents, over which there will, frankly, be rivalry between the Members of this House and those of the other House, particularly if they represent different parties. It is obvious that there will be constant conflict then. The Government have attempted to solve this with 15-year terms and no re-election. I cannot emphasise strongly enough that this completely destroys the democratic accountability case on which the Deputy Prime Minister hangs his whole argument. I agree very strongly with the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leicester on this point.
I now turn quickly to two points that have not been covered so far. The first concerns who will stand. I find it very difficult to work out who will stand for the alternative House that is being proposed. It certainly will not be those who wish to seek a proper political career. In the other place, one can be re-elected every five years and, if not re-elected for one constituency, can stand in another. Members thus have the opportunity of a long-term political career. At the age of 37, someone who wants a political career will not be very happy to come to this House for 15 years, with no possibility of being re-elected to the other House. Also, if they have proper ministerial ambitions and want to play a part in the policies of the Government to which they hope to belong, those ministerial ambitions will be best satisfied in the other place. Of course, if they stand for this House in the hope that it will lead to a career in the other House, under the proposals they will be prevented by the case that has been put forward. Therefore, I cannot see why people who want a full political career will wish to stand under the present proposals.
Nor can I see those in other professions and occupations—who it is apparently hoped will bring the expertise and specific experiences that many of the Cross-Benchers here now offer—wishing to stand for this place in mid-career. Neither the salaries offered nor the career prospects are very great. If you are 37 or 40 and thinking of coming to this place for 15 years, taking a complete break from your career, what chance will you have of going back to that career after 15 years?
Therefore, it would tend to be rather an elderly House. Most probably, those who do not have political ambitions would think of standing for this House in the late stages of their other careers. They would seek a further few salaried years and perhaps find them interesting. That would be like the Cross-Bench Peers in the present House. However, it would be a House that challenged the primacy of the House of Commons, which the other place strongly opposes, and at much greater cost than the present House, as the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, pointed out. The electorate will almost certainly dislike that, to put it mildly. I am deeply worried by the thought that this would be an attractive career opportunity for many, and I doubt that any reform would bring the expertise and experience of this House as it stands.
Having listened to the speakers before me, I probably carry most Members with me so far, but in my final point I may have a little more difficulty. While I strongly support the proposals in the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Steel, and have always done so, and strongly support the additional points made so properly by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, which are appropriate for the reform of this House, there is one issue on which I urge a word of caution. I do not think that we have properly addressed it yet. It concerns our most vulnerable point: the size of the House. We have recently adopted proposals for voluntary retirement, which have had a puny—almost minimal—response and will obviously not solve the problem. We need to go further. I do not find at all attractive the suggestion of appointing no more new Members until the grim reaper has played his part and the numbers have come down. It is important that this House is constantly refreshed with new people, new experiences and new expertise. Therefore, we have two options, which we will have to address—that is, retirement on the grounds of either length of service or age, which happens in pretty well every other profession and occupation, including for judges. I believe that we will have to include this in the Steel-Hayman reforms and it is something that we have still to address.
That does not detract at all from my overwhelming view that this House is right to say that the alternative report is the right one, addressing the right issues and making the right point, and that the Government’s proposals therefore remain deeply flawed.
Lord Thomas of Gresford
My Lords, I suppose that, like the noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe, I must declare an interest, as I am the newly elected president of the Lloyd George Society. Your Lordships may recall that Lloyd George did not have much of an opinion of this place. Indeed, he said that it was 500 ordinary men, chosen accidentally from among the unemployed. Your Lordships will gather from that that we do not do deference very well in north Wales. It is part of my DNA; I can tell the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, that.
It will not surprise your Lordships to know that in my first election, in West Flintshire in 1964, I campaigned on three principles. The first was a Parliament for Wales; the second was proportional representation; and the third was abolition of the House of Lords. I found a fellow toiler in my friend, colleague and adversary, the late Lord Williams of Mostyn, who came from 20 or 30 miles from my home town and was educated similarly to me. Although we were in different parties, we shared the same values. On past occasions when we debated House of Lords reform, he and I walked almost alone, together, through the “100 per cent elected second Chamber” Lobby. We continued to do so over all that time.
Some three weeks ago I was invited to speak at a dinner of Flintshire County Council, at which I was told not to be too political. You are not allowed to be political at these events where there are lots of people in chains from all the county councils and local councils around. I indulged in a little fantasy. Since the House of Lords is so perfect in many people’s eyes, what would Flintshire County Council look like if it were composed in the same way? Ten of the councillors would be hereditary. Some of my Liberal friends on that county council have admirable sons and grandsons who could inherit their seats. Some 50 would be appointed for life by the local constituency parties. I am sure that they would be very glad to be relieved of the sort of things they are doing at the moment, such as knocking on doors, giving out leaflets and canvassing. Then we would have to think of the others—perhaps the Bishop of St Asaph; the former commanding officer of the Royal Welsh Fusiliers TA; the former commodore of HMS “Rhyl”, and various other people of a similar variety. The suggestion that drew the sharpest intake of breath was that former chief executives of local authorities should be appointed to this body for life.
It is absurd, is it not? I am entirely with the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, on elections. There is nothing wrong with knocking on doors, meeting people and talking to them about their problems or pushing leaflets through doors, as I have said. We on the Liberal Benches are not “too posh to push”. We would welcome elections if they came along.
It is said that this place works, but only because the other place fails. Noble Lords who were present during the final moments of the passage of the legal aid Bill, as I was, will recall that many on the opposition and Cross Benches complained about the lack of time that had been given to that Bill due to the guillotine and programme Motions that had been applied in the other place, which meant that the issues that we discussed at length had not been taken up in the House of Commons at all. This place works only because there is a void that we have to fill. We are the people who are lobbied and have to make changes to hastily introduced legislation.
What we are facing here in opposition to the Bill are the forces of inertia, however it is described. Lloyd George understood and even sympathised with this notion. After all, he had spent six years in coalition with the Tories. He was the Nick Clegg of his day, you might say. He had the Nick Clegg experience. Speaking at the National Liberal Club in 1924, Lloyd George said:
“Toryism undoubtedly makes an appeal to one essential mood of human nature—that of fundamental inertia; and that is sometimes a real human need … every man tends to become a Tory himself when tired, disinclined for exertion, wishing to be left alone, cross with anyone who proposes new efforts, and, may I add, tempted to view the drink traffic with an unusually friendly eye. Toryism makes an inherent and instinctive appeal to very prevalent moods in human nature—contentment with your own lot; indifference to the lot of others, often through ignorance of the conditions or the imagination to realise them; rooted habits and prejudices”.
However, Toryism, as Lloyd George defined it, is just as active on the opposition Benches as it is on these Benches. “Not now”, says the noble Baroness the former Leader of the House, “Not like this”. “Give us a constitutional convention”, others cry—anything except action. Toryism on all sides of the House, said Lloyd George, would, if left alone, do nothing. Liberals would break the soil with the plough.
Lord Morgan
Will the noble Lord kindly explain to the House why Lloyd George was against an elected House of Lords?
Lord Thomas of Gresford
He was for the abolition of the House of Lords, as I recall.
Baroness Miller of Hendon
My Lords, Lloyd George came here. Perhaps the noble Lord does not know that. Anyway, that is by the by.
The so-called reform of the House of Lords—I use “reform” with a degree of irony—has been an intractable question bedevilling those interested in the constitution for more than 100 years. Despite the distinguished membership of the Joint Committee, I have to say with the greatest of respect that the report does not carry the issue any further forward. The problem that the committee had to face was that its terms of reference did not permit it to reach the conclusion—the only conclusion at this time in my opinion—that doing nothing, or practically nothing, was an option.
It is clear from the majority report and the persuasive alternative report that the committee was divided across the parties, within the parties, and between the Houses. In one case, however, the committee’s report is unanimous. It states that,
“a wholly or largely elected reformed House will seek to use its powers more assertively”,
and that,
“a more assertive House would not enhance Parliament’s overall role in relation to the … executive”.
Is it likely that the Members of the Commons will meekly vote for losing their acknowledged primacy? The report makes it clear that Clause 2 of the draft Bill is defective and fails to preserve the primacy of the Commons, and insists that it will be impossible to legislate to that effect. If we are to have a major constitutional change, it must be by Act of Parliament and not by the nods and winks of an unwritten convention. The committee was unable to agree on such vital issues as the composition and powers of a changed House—I decline, even here, to say “reformed House”—the method of election, the term of office, the running cost of the House, how the Members should be remunerated, whether they should be Peers, and so on. In fact, we are still where we were a century ago.
In the end, the committee abdicated the need for a firm conclusion by proposing a referendum—a classic case of kicking the issues into the long grass. This is not Switzerland. We do not govern by referenda. We expect our legislators to take on the responsibility of making difficult decisions. A referendum is not an exercise in democracy but a way of passing the buck, which this report proposes to do. My final word on referenda is that no matter how many people vote for a bad idea, it is still a bad idea. The alternative report, acknowledging the committee’s failure to provide a conclusive answer, has suggested the setting up of a constitutional convention. How many have there been in the past on the same topic? However, it must be a properly constituted commission with impartial, non-political, non-party members, with expertise in history and constitutional law who must also have knowledge of the workings of other legislatures. Its members must have ample time to take and consider evidence and not be constrained by the social engineering ambitions of professional politicians who are only too well aware of the transient nature of their individual influence, which is subject to the whim of the electorate.
In all the contradictory thinking displayed by the two reports, one thing is clear. This Parliament, with just three years to run at most, has absolutely no authority, despite the coalition agreement, even to attempt to impose a permanent change to our constitution for generations to come. I await to see whether the Government will be rash enough to introduce the defective House of Lords Reform Bill, which has received absolutely no unequivocal support from the committee set up to consider it—nor, it should be said, from most of the media, from many politicians of all parties, and in particular from the public. I predict an exceedingly rough ride in both Houses and outside Parliament if they do so. I was going to say “if they are stupid enough to do so” but I had better not use that word, especially as Members of the House of Commons are present.
Lord Desai
My Lords, the answer to my noble friend’s question to the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, as to why Lloyd George did not support an elected House is very simple. At that time, the unionist opposition was proposing an elected element for the House of Lords precisely to make it more powerful. One thing that Lloyd George did not want was a House of Lords more legitimate and powerful than he already had facing him, which is why the 1911 Act carefully avoided going down the elected path. All the themes that we have discussed—an elected House, the way to reconcile a quarrelling House of Commons, joint sessions and referenda—were rehearsed way back before the Parliament Act 1911 was passed. You have only to read Roy Jenkins’s book, Mr Balfour’s Poodle, to find that out. Again, given where we are, do we want to make the House of Lords more powerful than it is?
I compliment my noble friend Lord Richard on the excellent report of his Joint Committee, but I should say that one of the central contradictions is that the Government have proposed a draft Bill but have been somewhat timid with their reforms. Had they been really bold, they would have said, “We want an elected House of Lords, but it would be difficult to retain the primacy of the House of Commons unless some drastic things are done along with the Bill”. Everyone has agreed—including the Joint Committee’s report, the alternative report and many of the witnesses—that Clause 2 will not do because it will not resolve the issue of the primacy of the House of Commons. The question would then be: is the primacy of the House of Commons there not because it is elected but because we are unelected? If we get elected, will the primacy of the House of Commons make sense any more? That is the question that people ought to pose. The financial privileges of the House of Commons derive from way back in the 17th century, before it was elected in anything like its present form. That had to be reaffirmed and established in statute in the 1911 Act because those privileges were not guaranteed by the conventions of that time. If we are again to assert the primacy of the House of Commons, we have to establish that in statute—perhaps as a separate Parliament Act, not mixed up with the House of Lords Reform Bill. If you do not do that you cannot rely on conventions because, as the balance of power changes, conventions will change—and previous conventions will, no doubt, be challenged. One of the things we therefore have to do is make quite sure that if the two Houses of Parliament want to preserve the primacy of the House of Commons we must spell out what that primacy consists of and establish it by statute, because nothing can be taken for granted in an unwritten constitution whereby one Parliament can change what another Parliament does.
The nub of the problem is the nature of the elections to the House of Lords, which a lot of noble Lords have spoken about. It is clear that if we have elections on whatever territorial basis—either singly or as a group, as we do for the European Parliament—the House of Lords will replicate the House of Commons. If the Lords is elected by PR, that would in at least some people’s eyes be more legitimate than first past the post; and a House of Lords elected on the same territorial basis as the House of Commons, by what some may think is a better method, will no doubt challenge the legitimacy of the House of Commons. One should not be surprised by that. One ought to look at that issue in advance and do something about it.
What I proposed in my submission to the committee somewhat overlaps with what the noble Lord, Lord Low, said earlier. It was that we should have elections to the House of Lords for 80 per cent of its Members—I would prefer 100 per cent, but I pass on that—but the elections should be on a regional basis. Of course, we are not a federation and it is difficult to justify a second Chamber if the country is not a federation, as many experts told the Joint Committee. We already have three devolved Parliaments, and England is supposed to have 10 regions. I know that the regions do not actually want autonomy, but we shall have to impose some autonomy on them. If we elect an equal number of MPs from the 13 regions—quick arithmetic tells me that if we have 20 from each region we would have 260 elected Lords in a House of 300; and the number could be adjusted to 450—and the list is regional and not attached to any constituency, the Members elected will in some sense be representative but will not be rivals to the way that the House of Commons derives its legitimacy.
There is another advantage—a House of Lords elected by regional lists will fill the one big gap in our system. Your Lordships’ House is at present always accused of being too London-biased and that a regional dimension is missing from our Parliament. If we could get a regional dimension into Parliament through elections, either directly or indirectly, it would provide for an elected element to the House of Lords that would not challenge the legitimacy of the House of Commons, which is based on an entirely separate constituency system.
That is one way of reconciling two difficult problems. As for the 20 per cent who would be appointed, I entirely agree with the suggestion of the noble Lord, Lord Low. We have many electoral colleges, including the Royal Society, the BMA and the Law Society. Each could elect one representative, and the appointed element would also have some legitimacy. These sorts of schemes have been proposed for the British constitution over the past 100 years; there is nothing new about that. In that way, we will have an elected element in your Lordships’ House, it will not threaten the legitimacy of the House of Commons, and we will definitely have a better House than at present.
I shall say just one more thing. It is a fallacy to think that elected people do not have expertise. You have only to go to the House of Commons, which over many years has included professors, lawyers and scientists. I recall Dr Jeremy Bray, whom I used to know well; he was a distinguished scientist and a very good MP. Elected people can have expertise. You do not need to be unelected to be an expert.
The Earl of Clancarty
My Lords, as has been pointed out, the noble Lord, Lord Richard, said that the committee did not have a blank sheet. That is fair enough, but it is worth bearing in mind that the draft Bill that the committee looked at is called the House of Lords Reform Bill. It is not called the “Composition of the House of Lords Reform Bill”—important though that area of reform will of course be.
In that spirit, I want to use my intervention to hold a magnifying glass over a specific topic of House of Lords reform that has not yet been mentioned and was not in the report but that would be a significant and timely measure for reasons of transparency, public confidence and modernity. My topic is the official recording of abstentions. This issue also throws up interesting questions about underlying attitudes that reform should address and challenge.
While this matter is not exclusive to the reform of the second House, our continuing refusal to record abstentions in either House is emblematic of the continuing emphasis in Parliament as a whole on a rigid two-party parliamentary system, despite the current reality that we have a coalition as well as renewed public interest in the notion of party politically independent candidates. It is a style that remains primarily confrontational, the very thing that the public do not like and are reacting against, and a style that, it has to be said, was reaffirmed by the decision to keep the first-past-the-post system for election to the Commons. Although tempered in the Lords, this system is nevertheless the foundation on which both Houses are currently built.
This system is of course reflected and reinforced by the very geography of both parliamentary Chambers, where Dispatch Boxes and rows of Benches are set up in opposition to each other. We are not of course the only Parliament in the world to use this layout, but it is a geography that, in relation to other more modern Parliaments that use a more open and often semicircular layout for their Members, can appear inward-looking and hermetic.
In an exchange in the Commons on 3 February last year, Caroline Lucas, on the subject of abstentions, said that people had told her, “If you can’t make up your mind, you shouldn’t be in politics”. That is clearly a view that people still hold. What occasioned that exchange was six Lib Dems voting the previous evening in both Lobbies on the forestry debate. It is possible to vote in both Lobbies in the Commons but not in this House. The Deputy Speaker reiterated that voting twice in the Commons was “unparliamentary”. I agree, and I am sure that if the public were to be asked, they would heartily disapprove of that practice. It is also obviously an inelegant and cumbersome solution if one takes abstention seriously.
A more sophisticated and sensitive system and a more sensitive Parliament would appreciate that there are often shades of opinion on, for example, amendments to Bills. An amendment can sometimes carry within it two principles which Members of the House may feel are both valid but are in conflict. Indeed, there was a prime example of such a case in this House just last week during the Protection of Freedoms Bill when, as noble Lords will recall, the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, in his speech from the opposition Front Bench, asked all opposition Members to abstain on the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, on entry to premises, on the basis that protecting the privacy of occupants and the protection of consumers’ rights were equally important.
The fact is that abstentions happen and will certainly happen even more, with or without recording, particularly if we are to continue to have coalition Governments. Disagreements between partners ought to be acknowledged as a fact of coalition life and are not necessarily something that Parliament needs to be embarrassed about. Hardly a vote has gone by when there have not been abstentions on some of the very complicated Bills that we have discussed recently.
If we introduced recorded abstentions, we would simply be getting up to speed with the more modern, and in my view more progressive, systems of many, if not all, European countries, including Denmark, Sweden, Belgium and Germany—and locally now including the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly.
The main argument is that we need a more transparent Parliament. This is a time when many are concerned about bringing a truer picture of Parliament to the public. If you are in this Chamber at the time of a Division, you know full well who has abstained. Members will often make it very clear when they sit down to be counted—to coin a phrase—often in no uncertain terms, that they are abstaining. That is a significant aspect of the business of this place and could make the difference between whether a vote is won or lost. It is insulting to the public that that information is in effect kept secret and not made available. It might not be the wilful neglect of the public, but it is wrong. That goes hand in hand with the scornful attitude in some quarters to websites such as TheyWorkForYou and the Public Whip, which number-crunch the votes and are all part and parcel of the larger public interest in Parliament.
The possibility of recording abstentions was last considered in 1998, when the Select Committee on Modernisation of the House of Commons produced a consultation paper on voting methods, finding that a majority—slim, but a majority nevertheless—of 54 per cent of Members were in favour of introducing that measure. It is high time, 15 years on, that that was looked at again. My understanding from research by the House of Lords Library, for which I am grateful, is that it might be possible to introduce that through a Standing Order, as another measure considered by the same committee, the practice of deferred Divisions, was introduced in that way in 2004—although an amendment might also be brought to the House of Lords Bill. The measure might well be trialled in the Lords as part of current reform.
I do not think that we should wait for the introduction of electronic voting systems, which is something of an excuse not to introduce this measure. There is no reason why abstentions could not be recorded with the clerk in the Chamber itself. Neither is it a measure that depends on the final composition of this House. It would be a significant improvement in the democratic workings of Parliament as a whole, not only for itself but as a sign of greater transparency and accountability.
Lord Crickhowell
My Lords, Parliament has never before faced a situation in which a draft Bill sent for consideration by a Joint Committee has been totally demolished by the members of that committee. That is the effect of the two reports produced by its members—the Joint Committee report agreed by all and the alternative report signed by 12—which have to be taken together. They create a balance of opinion more significant than the individual votes—on which the noble Lord, Lord Richard, laid much emphasis—a balance of opinion vividly and wonderfully described in a tremendous speech by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leicester.
Clause 2, the keystone of the Bill, supposed to hold up and guarantee the continuing primacy of the House of Commons, was pulled out and discarded as worthless by the whole committee, and the alternative report argued that,
“the proposals represent an unbridgeable gap between the election of the House of Lords and the primacy of the House of Commons”.
It is now clear that what is involved is not just the introduction of elected Members to the Lords but a titanic upheaval with massive implications for the Commons. If the Bill is introduced, Parliament is then confronted with the necessity of trying to bridge the unbridgeable by making fundamental changes that seem bound to include amending the Parliament Acts, a review of codification of conventions by a Joint Committee and the examination of a plethora of vital issues that have not been thought through, to cite the noble Baroness the Leader of the Opposition. They include the future of Scotland and the devolved Administrations, among others.
The report identified other consequences that are almost equally damaging, among them the very large cost of introducing an additional 450 paid politicians to Parliament, 360 elected by a system of PR likely to ensure that a minority party always holds the balance of power. I say to my friends on the Liberal Democrat Benches that they should not optimistically assume that they will be that minority party. They may find that others of whom they strongly disapprove hold the balance in that situation. There is the lack of accountability of those politicians elected for a 15-year term and unable to seek the endorsement of the electors for a second term. There is the absurdity of the proposition that, having been elected, they should not take up constituency issues, with restrictions placed on expenses provided to enable them to do so. The case for the necessity for a referendum has been compellingly made and the arguments against exposed as shallow and unsustainable.
It is abundantly clear that there is now no consensus about the way to reform this House. To cite the noble Lord, Lord Richard, chairman of the Joint Committee, there is division within the parties and within the Houses. I disagree very strongly with his view, supported by my noble friend Lord Strathclyde, that we should just press on ahead with what has been presented to us so far. In this situation, it would be political madness and deeply unsound constitutional practice were the Government, after only the briefest consideration, to commit themselves in the Queen’s Speech to the introduction of the same Bill or one closely similar. For Parliament to attempt on the Floor of both Houses to reconstruct and make sound a Bill that has been so comprehensively demolished is likely to wreck parliamentary business for the whole Session, threaten and perhaps destroy the coalition Government—goodness knows, they are facing enough troubles as it is at present—and produce a deeply flawed and unsustainable reform. To use the Parliament Act to force through a Bill in those circumstances would be a constitutional outrage.
The manifesto commitment of the Conservative Party was to,
“work to build a consensus for a mainly-elected second chamber to replace the current House of Lords”.
The Prime Minister repeatedly made it clear to members of his party that it was not a priority or a task likely to be attempted until after a subsequent election. Now that it is abundantly clear that the work to build a consensus has failed, I hope that he will have the courage and good sense to insist that adequate time is taken carefully to consider the proposals made in the alternative report and the ideas for incremental reform that have been advanced by the noble Lord, Lord Steel, and others.
If Ministers simply press on and attempt to force through Parliament a Bill similar to the draft, I will base my actions on the firm belief that, confronted with a choice between supporting a legislative programme that includes a deeply flawed reform Bill or defending fundamental constitutional principles and an effective Parliament, my clear duty lies with the constitution and Parliament. I will make my speeches and cast my votes accordingly. I am optimistic that I will be just one of a very large number of Members of both Houses who will act in the same way.
Lord Hoyle
My Lords, there has been debate over whether this is a decision that should be made now or in the future. Many want to see it made in the future but I suggest that we have been waiting a very long time for this reform—since 1912—and it is time that it was acted upon. We cannot continue to pretend that this issue does not exist, and pretending that we have a democratic constitution is absolutely ridiculous. Looking back at Labour Party manifestos from 1997 onwards, I see that we called for House of Lords reform in all of them. We were very specific in the last Labour Party manifesto, when we said:
“Further democratic reform to create a fully elected Second Chamber will then be achieved in stages. At the end of the next Parliament one third of the House of Lords will be elected; a further one third of members will be elected at the general election after that. Until the final stage, the representation of all groups should be maintained in equal proportions to now. We will consult widely on these proposals, and on an open-list proportional representation electoral system for the Second Chamber, before putting them to the people in a referendum”.
It has been interesting to hear the views expressed today. Some have been in favour of reform, and I think that I speak for the minority when I say that I am very much in favour, although I would prefer to see a 100 per cent elected House. However, I can see the argument that has been made for 80 per cent of Members to be elected, with 20 per cent being appointed. We have had a long debate about the primacy of the House of Commons and the Bill will be going to the Commons. As my noble friend Lord Richard made clear, of the MPs on the committee, only one opposed the proposition. Therefore, primacy will be an issue and it will be discussed, but I do not believe that it is an obstacle that cannot be overcome. As I said, after the Bill has been considered, we shall make a decision on that matter and it will evolve as time goes on. Both Houses, as well the people, will have a say on how it comes about.
The other point I should like to make is that about 400 people, give or take a few, regularly sit in this House. It is not always the same 400 people, so I think it is right that the number of Members envisaged in the Bill is increased to about 450.
Of course, people have been talking about this matter for a long time. When proposals for reform have been put before us in the past, they have failed because there has not been time to carry them out. However, that will not be the case if such a Bill is put forward in the Queen’s Speech. It can be delayed but at the end of the day there are going to be changes, and this House should address itself to the kind of change that it wants to see. It is no longer good enough to say that staying as we are will do for the future. The question may be asked—it has been asked today—whether this is a measure that should be raised. That sort of question is always asked. The big thing at the moment is obviously the economic situation, but nobody is suggesting that only the economic situation should be dealt with; other things should be looked at as well.
As I said, the need for us to look at this matter is long overdue and I look forward very much to the Bill being introduced. I hope that account will be taken of the report of the committee led by my noble friend before the final Bill is put before us. It will be very sensible to look at the views expressed in the committee. However, one thing that we should realise is that the current composition of this Chamber cannot remain in the future. The future lies with a predominantly elected Chamber. As I said, I should like to see 100 per cent of its Members elected.
I have no doubt that we shall return to this matter time and again before legislation is passed, but I wish to put myself firmly on the side of reform and an elected House. My noble friend Lord Dubs said very eloquently that he would feel far happier speaking as an elected Member of a second Chamber. He said that he had found universal support from all sections of the Labour Party wherever he had been, apart from Cambridge University, where unfortunately I do not think they listened carefully enough to the eloquence with which he expressed his views.
I am conscious that many other noble Lords wish to speak, so I shall not go on any longer other than to say that not only is this decision due now but it is long overdue. It is a decision that this House will have to face up to. Whatever the method of election, we have to face up to the fact that the second Chamber of this country will be largely elected in the future.
Lord Williamson of Horton
My Lords, I join other Members in thanking the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and the Joint Committee for their report. It seems to deal well with the issues directly covered in the draft Bill, as was the role of the committee, and to avoid becoming too deeply enmeshed in questions that are not covered in the Bill and which are clearly not subject to any consensus. I also thank the members of the committee who have made their alternative report available.
However, it is our duty to look a little beyond the terms of the draft Bill when we consider that some of the consequences that would follow from a move to a largely elected second Chamber are not dealt with, or are dealt with only cursorily, in the draft Bill. That is particularly true in relation to the future powers of the proposed largely elected second Chamber and the likely effect on the operation of Parliament as a whole—that is, a new sharing of power between the two Houses. These matters are dealt with in recommendations 2 to 16 of the conclusions and recommendations of the Joint Committee. They are also dealt with more trenchantly in points one and two of the executive summary in the alternative report.
There are hundreds of points in the draft Bill that will need discussion, and there are 87 conclusions and recommendations in the Joint Committee’s report, but the House will be glad to know that I shall not deal with them all today. There will no doubt be opportunities to do so in the weeks, months, probably years and possibly decades ahead. Today, I shall deal only with the question of the powers of the two Houses if there were a largely elected second Chamber.
I start with the simple proposition that the draft Bill would have one tremendously important consequence: it would bring to an end the House of Commons’ monopoly in democratic legitimacy. That is just about the most fundamental change that could happen to the first Chamber of a Parliament. It is difficult to detect in the draft Bill a full comprehension of the consequences of that change for Parliament as a whole. However, the Joint Committee has understood it and I would like to pick out and approve what it says on a number of points. First, the Joint Committee imposes an important condition where it records that a majority of its members consider that a reformed second Chamber should have an electoral mandate, and that condition is,
“provided it has commensurate powers”.
Of course, an electoral mandate is not an abstract concept; it is thousands of citizens trooping into a polling station and electing their Member of the second Chamber and, as a direct consequence, looking to him or her to respond to their wishes and deliver the goods. I am absolutely certain that a reformed House in respect of its elected Members would have a representative function, because the electors would demand it and the second Chamber would evidently be more assertive, not to say aggressive, in using its powers.
The events of last week on the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill provided a good example of what happens now and what would be likely to happen if Parliament were to consist not of one but of two democratically elected Chambers. Representative organisations and many members of the public already recognise that in draft legislation the House of Lords is now the principal revising Chamber. I had 256 e-mails last week from such organisations and others mostly recommending or pressing for specific changes in draft legislation—and I have not even been elected yet. I am amazed that a press that reports on the House of Commons gives little or no publicity to the fact that important parts of draft legislation are not discussed or debated in the House of Commons or are dealt with only cursorily in a very short time because a guillotine is almost universally applied.
Currently, the House of Lords scrutinises thoroughly and proposes amendments, where appropriate, but we are quite reticent about pressing them if the House of Commons cursorily rejects them. Evidently, that situation would not prevail between two democratically elected Houses. Some mechanism for conciliation between the two Houses in such cases would be needed. I do not think that it would have to be statutory because we would run into judicial interference, some sort of mechanism for conciliation would be an inevitable consequence of two democratically elected Houses.
Secondly, there is the specific question of the conventions between the two Houses. Clearly, those would need to be reviewed, and where necessary changed, to reflect the role of the two democratically elected Houses. I strongly agree with the Joint Committee that the current text of the Bill in Clause 2 risks making judicial intervention possible, contrary to Article 9 of the Bill of Rights, and is to be rejected. The conventions themselves will almost certainly need to be redefined, and that could be done in a concordat between the two Houses.
In my view, that should apply to all legislation, including secondary legislation, which has hardly been mentioned today. The House of Lords has shown almost complete restraint in dealing with secondary legislation, despite the fact that 10,662 pages of almost wholly home-grown—not Brussels—secondary legislation went through this House in a recent year. In the new circumstances, the second Chamber would clearly be more ready to strike off secondary legislation of which it disapproved.
Thirdly, and finally, like many other Members I shall say a word about the primacy of the House of Commons, which is central to the Bill, although the Bill does not deal with it adequately. The Joint Committee points out that Clause 2 is not capable of preserving the primacy of the House of Commons, so if it comes forward in that or a similar form, I am sure we shall have serious problems when the Bill itself comes before us.
I believe that the issue of financial privilege is more complicated than it has appeared to be in the discussion today, because we cannot have a situation in which we have two completely free tax-raising Chambers of Parliament. On the other hand, a democratically elected second Chamber would need a way of dealing with issues that are important but that had some financial consequences. I saw the south-west news at the weekend, which showed many people holding up banners that said, “The pasty tax is a nasty tax”. I am sure that that would be thought about by a Senator who came from Cornwall if we had change in the structure of this House.
I also believe that we need to maintain the structure under which there is a weapon of last resort, which is currently the Parliament Acts. I have noted the views of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, and of the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, in the report, but if the new circumstances come about it would be necessary to make statutory provision for some form of last resort—yes, more time and perhaps more controversy.
News Corporation: Conduct of Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
(12 years, 7 months ago)
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The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Lord Strathclyde)
My Lords, perhaps this is an appropriate time to take a short break from the debate on the report of the committee chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Richard. With the leave of the House, I shall repeat in the form of a Statement the Answer given by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister earlier this afternoon in response to an Urgent Question from the Leader of the Opposition. The Statement is as follows:
“Last Wednesday I answered questions on this issue at PMQs and the Culture Secretary made a full statement. But let me set out the position again. I set up the Leveson inquiry last summer to investigate the culture, ethics and practices of the media and the relations between the media and the police, and the media and politicians. It is a full judge-led inquiry, with evidence given under oath and full access to papers and records. No Government before have ever taken such comprehensive action. It is this Government who are putting these issues properly on the table and getting them dealt with. Let me deal with the three issues in this question: the conduct of the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport; the nature of the inquiry needed to get to the bottom of these issues; and the wider issues over the relationship between politicians and the media.
First, on the Culture Secretary, as was made clear in his Statement last Wednesday, in every respect with regard to the News Corporation bid, the Culture Secretary asked for independent advice and acted on it. He was not required to ask or to follow such advice, but he did so. He acted fairly and impartially and in line with the advice of his Permanent Secretary. Indeed, as he set out in his Statement to this House last Wednesday, he acted against the interests of News Corporation on four key decisions: on being minded to refer the bid to the Competition Commission; on refusing to accept News Corporation’s undertakings without advice first from the OFT and Ofcom; on extending the consultation; and on going back to Ofcom for further advice about the impact of phone hacking. I have seen no evidence to suggest that in handling this issue the Secretary of State acted at any stage in a way that was contrary to the Ministerial Code.
In terms of the Secretary of State’s responsibilities towards his department let me say this. The Permanent Secretary of the department approved the approach his department took to the quasi-judicial process, which included a small number of people acting as contact points with News Corporation, as is required and normal in such a process; and the Permanent Secretary of the department has stated that he was ‘aware’ and ‘content’ for contact to be made between the Culture Secretary’s special adviser and News Corporation. However, it is quite clear that this contact became improper and inappropriate and went beyond the requirements set out by the Secretary of State or the Permanent Secretary. That is why the special adviser resigned and he was right to do so.
There are correct procedures to follow in this regard and they need to be followed scrupulously. That is why last week I asked the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Jeremy Heywood, and the head of the Civil Service, Sir Bob Kerslake, to write to all departments clarifying the rigorous procedures that they should have in place for handling cases of this nature.
This leads to the second issue: the nature of the inquiry or inquiries best suited to get to the bottom of this issue. I consulted the Cabinet Secretary and decided it was right to allow Lord Justice Leveson to conduct his inquiry and not to commission a parallel process to establish the facts. Let me repeat; what we have is a judge-led inquiry, with witnesses required to give evidence under oath, full access to papers and records, and cross-examination by barristers—all live on television. There is nothing this tough or rigorous that the Civil Service or independent adviser could provide.
Of course, it is not for Lord Justice Leveson to determine whether a Minister has broken the Ministerial Code. That is an issue for me and I will deal with it properly. I will not wait until the end of the Leveson inquiry to take action if action is needed. If new evidence emerges from the Leveson inquiry that the Ministerial Code has been broken, I will either seek the advice of Sir Alex Allan or take action directly. But the key point is this: in order to do this, it is neither necessary nor right to have a parallel investigation that could duplicate, cut across or possibly pre-empt what Lord Justice Leveson is doing. Lord Justice Leveson offered his own view on Wednesday when he said that,
‘although I have seen requests for other inquiries and other investigations … it seems to me that the better course is to allow this inquiry to proceed’.
I agree with him entirely.
Let me briefly turn to the bigger picture. I am and always will be a fierce defender of the freedom of the press in this country; it is one of the central pillars of our democracy. But the relationship between politicians and the media has been too close for decades. The Leveson inquiry—which this Government set up—gives Parliament and politicians of all parties the opportunity to get this right for the future. Already we have introduced transparency about the meetings we have with the media. Everyone can see which proprietors or editors I meet, whether publicly or privately.
Let me just say this: like other party leaders in our country for decades, I have tried to convince media outlets to support the policies of my party and now my Government. But let me be clear: there was not and never has been a grand bargain between the Conservative Party and Rupert Murdoch or James Murdoch. Indeed, look for one moment at the number of meetings that Tony Blair and Gordon Brown had with Rupert Murdoch when they were Prime Minister. Blair had seven, Brown had 13 and I have had four. The idea that there was some agreement that in return for their support we would somehow allow this merger to go through is simply not true. I have to say if that was the case, and while I respect him deeply, what on earth was I doing making the right honourable Member for Twickenham the Business Secretary responsible for this? The proprietors of News Corporation have denied under oath at the Leveson inquiry any type of deal, and I will do the same.
Let me just make this last point. Unlike the party opposite, we were not trying to convince a centre-right proprietor of a set of newspapers with solidly centre-right views to change the position of a lifetime. We were arguing a simple proposition: that the last Government were irresponsible, exhausted and bad for our country, and that they ought to go.
While I have said that the relationship between politicians and the media has been too close, I note that none of the people opposite has disclosed any of the meetings they had with News International or other newspaper executives while they were in office. Instead of endlessly trying to use the Leveson inquiry for party-political purposes, is it not time that they were honest about what they did in government? While the country wants to hear about jobs, investment, living standards and the great challenges we face—such as debt—they just play one-sided party politics. Instead of endlessly trying to use the Leveson inquiry for party-political purposes, is it not time that they were honest about what they did in government—and face up to the real mess that they left this country in?”.
My Lords, that concludes the Statement of the Prime Minister, which we will now deal with in the usual way.
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon
My Lords, I thank the Leader of the House for repeating as a Statement in your Lordships’ House the remarks made by the Prime Minister earlier today in the other place in relation to the position of the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, and to his, his office’s and his department’s connections with News Corporation over its failed bid last year to take over BSkyB.
When the allegations against the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, Jeremy Hunt MP, emerged last week, arising from material released by the inquiry into relations between the press, politicians and the police, headed by Lord Justice Leveson, my party called for the Secretary of State to resign or be sacked. We do not as a party make such calls lightly. We have a right to do so; the Secretary of State should have resigned then. Having failed to do so, he should resign now.
The release by the Leveson inquiry of material relating to the Secretary of State and to News Corporation’s bid led directly to two events: first, the resignation of Mr Hunt’s special adviser, Mr Adam Smith, over the e-mails and other communications that he had with News Corporation in connection with its BSkyB bid; and secondly, in the wake and as a result of that resignation, calls for the Secretary of State to be investigated for potential breaches of the Ministerial Code, the Cabinet Office rules that govern the conduct and behaviour of government Ministers.
The Government, led by the Prime Minister, sought to avoid such an investigation, arguing that the correct procedure for inquiring into these matters is the already extant inquiry led by Mr Justice Leveson, and that a second, parallel inquiry would be confusing and inappropriate. The Prime Minister and the Government also sought to insist that in their view the Secretary of State had not breached the Ministerial Code. That was the burden of the Statement by the Prime Minister that the Leader of the House of Lords repeated today.
This simply will not do. Judges tend not to welcome what they regard as interference by politicians. Judicial independence is a central element in the justice system and the constitution of our country. Rightly, therefore, Lord Justice Leveson both rejected the misguided attempt by the Secretary of State to use the inquiry for his own personal and political ends by seeking to reschedule his appearance before it, and made it clear that the inquiry was not the correct or appropriate mechanism to resolve matters relating to the Ministerial Code.
I looked again today at the terms of reference for the Leveson inquiry. It is transparently clear that there is nothing in the terms of reference that could possibly give it any locus in matters relating to issues covered by the Ministerial Code. For the Prime Minister or other Ministers, including the Secretary of State, to do so was wrong. The Prime Minister told the BBC yesterday that he would investigate the Secretary of State under the Ministerial Code if there were evidence of wrongdoing, or if any material came from the Leveson inquiry that warranted such an investigation.
The purpose of such an investigation under the Ministerial Code is to determine whether there has been any breach of the code, not to mount an inquiry after the fact of the wrongdoing has become clear. The e-mails and other matter released by the Leveson inquiry last week precisely constitute, under the code, material that warrants further investigation. The code is clear and explicit on the point. Paragraph 1.3 sets out the matter. After stating that it is not the role of the Cabinet Secretary or other officials to enforce the code, it states:
“If there is an allegation about a breach of the Code, and the Prime Minister, having consulted the Cabinet Secretary, feels that it warrants further investigation, he will refer the matter to the independent adviser on Ministers’ interests”.
Let us look more closely at that paragraph. It specifies an allegation. Is there an allegation in this case? There is indeed: a serious allegation that the Secretary of State kept informed one of the parties to a bid that he was considering in a quasi-judicial manner of the progress of that bid in a way that was wholly inappropriate to that role; an allegation that the Secretary of State was in breach of paragraph 1 of the Ministerial Code, which requires Ministers to act in a way that upholds the highest standards of propriety; a serious allegation that as part of the information that was incorrectly and inappropriately supplied, details of the announcements to be made to Parliament and to the Stock Exchange were made to the bidder in the case, days before such announcements were made public; an allegation that the Secretary of State was in breach of paragraph 9.1 of the code, which stipulates that announcements by Ministers must be made in the first instance to Parliament; and an allegation that the Secretary of State is currently in breach of paragraph 3.3 of the code, which focuses on the activities and operations of special advisers, and the responsibilities of both special advisers and the Ministers for whom they work. Again, the code is clear, stating:
“The responsibility for the management and conduct of special advisers, including discipline, rests with the Minister who made the appointment”.
In this case, that is clearly the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport.
“Individual Ministers will be accountable to the Prime Minister, Parliament and the public for their actions and decisions in respect of their special advisers”,
says the code, and clearly, in this case, it is the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. The role of the Minister is clear.
In this case, the conduct of the special adviser, Mr Adam Smith, was such as to warrant his resignation from his post within government the day after the Leveson inquiry released the material last week. Mr Smith took responsibility for his actions, but the code makes it quite clear that the Minister is ultimately responsible for the actions and conduct of his special adviser. If in this case Mr Smith believed that his actions warranted his resignation and that in this case, as in all others, the Minister is responsible and accountable for the actions and conduct of his special adviser, then it clearly follows that it is for the Secretary of State or, if he will not do so, the Prime Minister on his behalf, to act in the way that the special adviser has done. That is why we call for his resignation. We believe that it is transparently clear that the Secretary of State is in breach of the Ministerial Code and that, like his special adviser, he should go.
There are clear, specific allegations. Paragraph 1.3 of the code, on investigations under the code, stipulates that the Prime Minister must consult the Cabinet Secretary on any allegations. Has the Prime Minister consulted the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Jeremy Heywood? We are told that he has. We do not, of course, know the nature of any such consultations between the Prime Minister and his Cabinet Secretary, who is an official of high ability, high repute and high integrity. Having consulted, does the Prime Minister feel that the matter warrants further investigation? Clearly, from his public statements, and from the Statement repeated today by the Leader of the House, he does not. We on these Benches argue that he is wrong in that opinion. The matter clearly warrants further investigation.
Support for this position has come from a number of sources, but among the most notable have been three former Cabinet Secretaries, all Members of your Lordships’ House: the noble Lords, Lord Armstrong of Ilminster, Lord Butler of Brockwell and Lord Turnbull. All three noble Lords were men standing in precisely the position of the current Cabinet Secretary. With slightly differing emphases, all three believe that there has indeed been a breach of the Ministerial Code in this case. Accordingly, we on these Benches believe that the Prime Minister should refer the matter to Sir Alex Allan, the current independent adviser.
Do the Government accept that there has been in this case an allegation—indeed, a number of allegations—about the conduct of the Secretary of State? Do the Government accept that the resignation of the special adviser to the Secretary of State supports irrefutably that there are such allegations? Do the Government accept in the light of the opinion expressed by MPs, Peers, academics, commentators and, indeed, three former Cabinet Secretaries, all distinguished and senior Members of your Lordships’ House, that the allegations warrant investigation under the terms of the Ministerial Code? Do the Government therefore accept that the Prime Minister accordingly must refer the matter to the independent adviser on Ministers’ interests for investigation? If the Government do not accept these questions, will the Leader of the House set out, bearing in mind the entirely appropriate insistence by Lord Justice Leveson that his inquiry is not the correct method of examining these matters, on what possible basis the Government do not accept them?
A Minister’s actions, a Minister’s integrity and a Minister’s career are not matters to be considered lightly, let alone dismissed lightly. We on these Benches do not do so, but even if it is not accepted that there is wrong here—and we believe there is wrong here—it must be accepted that there are serious matters here that warrant proper investigation. We believe that the Government should act, and act today.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, I do not say this very often, but I think there are very few times when a prime ministerial Statement is more suited to the House of Commons than it is here, and I think this is one of those occasions. Notwithstanding that, the noble Baroness the Leader of the Opposition says that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State should resign at once, yet she admits that she has not heard all the facts of the case. That is what she started off with. In fact, that repeats something that Harriet Harman said. Within 23 minutes of the evidence being made clear, she called for the resignation of my right honourable friend. That is a ridiculous way to go about business. My right honourable friend is entirely entitled to give his evidence in the same way as those who have accused him of wrongdoing, and that is what he is going to do.
There is no point praying in aid all these former great Cabinet Secretaries who distinguish themselves in this House. The former Cabinet Secretary the noble Lord, Lord Turnbull, made it clear that following the process that the Prime Minister has chosen:
“Much more will be made public than if it is done by a nominated retired civil servant”.
The noble Lord is someone of tremendous eminence.
What is going on here, and what is going on with Labour’s position? The people opposite are those who defended Charlie Whelan and Damian McBride who, I gather, were special advisers in the previous Government. Did any Ministers resign as a result of their appalling wrongdoing?
The noble Baroness said that the Secretary of State should be investigated for breaking the Ministerial Code. The Prime Minister has never said that he will not launch an investigation into whether the Ministerial Code has been broken. All he has said is that there should be a proper process and that it should start when the Secretary of State gives his evidence to the Leveson inquiry. Lord Justice Leveson himself has accepted and agreed that there should not be a parallel process so, as far as I can see, it is all about timing.
What about the specific allegations? Did the Culture Secretary mislead Parliament by saying he was publishing all the exchanges between his department and News Corporation? He certainly did not mislead Parliament. He has laid out clearly in the House of Commons what he is going to do, and he will do it. He has said that he will make available all relevant communications, including texts and e-mails, to the Leveson inquiry and, at that stage, he will be judged upon them.
Was the Ministerial Code breached when the special adviser Adam Smith leaked the content of a Written Ministerial Statement to News Corp the day before it was given to the House? We have to turn to the words of Adam Smith himself in his resignation letter. He said that the extent and nature of the contact between himself and News Corporation was not authorised or known about by either the Culture Secretary or the Permanent Secretary. I think that absolves the Secretary of State, but I am not going to rush to judgment in the way that the noble Baroness has done, although I am sure that he behaved impeccably in everything that he did. There is a process led by Lord Justice Leveson and at that stage I think it is up to the Prime Minister to make up his mind what he wishes to do.
Lord Fowler
My Lords, surely it would be absurd to have two inquiries going on at the same time. The order that the Prime Minister has announced seems entirely sensible, given that the parliamentary inquiry can then follow the evidence that is given to Leveson. However, is there not a wider issue here? Does the Leader of the House recall that last week, when we debated this issue, the Minister who replied, who is now sitting next to him, said that there was all-party consensus on my proposal that politicians of any party should be taken out of the role of deciding on media bids? Then on the “Today” programme on Tuesday morning, the leader of the Opposition specifically rejected that proposal and said that he intended to continue with the discredited system. Can we urge Mr Miliband to think again on this issue, for is it not the case that there will always be a suspicion of conflict of interest if politicians take decisions about media companies which they—we—have done so much to woo? It is a clear conflict of interest, and it should be stopped.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, I thank my noble friend for very much supporting the position of the Prime Minister. Many others have taken on this question of having two parallel inquiries going on at the same time. Like him, I am convinced that we have made the right decision.
As for his specific question, the House will know that my noble friend Lord Fowler is pretty much pre-eminent in this House and elsewhere with his expert knowledge on this subject. I cannot speak for the Leader of the Opposition, but my advice to the noble Baroness is that she ought to bring to his attention the words of my noble friend Lord Fowler, and he might change his mind.
Lord Richard
My Lords, perhaps the Leader of the House can help me. I do not understand the Statement that he has just made. He says that there is a process and the process should be followed. What is the process? The process is that evidence was given to Lord Justice Leveson; Lord Justice Leveson has said he is not going to decide the issue as far as Mr Hunt is concerned. It is astonishing for the Leader of the House to say that it should go in front of Lord Justice Leveson when Lord Justice Leveson has just said that he does not want it to come in front of him.
What is the object of the exercise? Is it that Mr Hunt should give his evidence to Lord Justice Leveson, and the Prime Minister should look at it and say, “I am satisfied with that so we will not do anything else”, or alternatively say, “Something may be wrong here”, and then perhaps he will refer it to somebody else? The fact of the matter is that Lord Justice Leveson cannot resolve the issue. For the noble Lord to come here and say, “There is a proper process and the process is Leveson”—as indeed the Prime Minister did in the House of Commons—is wrong. There is a process and the process is to use Sir Alex Allan: that is what he is there for; that is what he is set up to try to do. With great respect to the Leader of the House, I do not understand what the Government are playing at.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Richard, is quite deliberately misunderstanding the position and misunderstanding what the Prime Minister has said. An allegation was made at the Leveson inquiry. It is entirely right and proper that the Secretary of State should be able to go and give evidence on the same terms and by the same method as those who have accused him of wrongdoing.
Incidentally, the decision on whether to refer the case to Sir Alex Allan is a decision for the Prime Minister. He can make that decision whenever he wants. He has suggested that he will make that decision—or take action, if he believes there was any wrongdoing—following the evidence being made public in the Leveson inquiry. The Leveson inquiry is a proper inquiry where, as I pointed out, evidence will be taken under oath and there will be cross-examination of the witnesses by barristers; in other words, the evidence that has been given already will be properly tested. That is entirely appropriate and there is no confusion at all between the two issues.
Lord Elystan-Morgan
My Lords, the Prime Minister has said that he will await the evidence given by Mr Secretary Hunt to the Leveson inquiry. That may or may not be a rational stance to take. I take very much on board what the noble Lord, Lord Richard, says. It is outside the remit of the Leveson inquiry to adjudicate upon that matter. Putting that aside, perhaps I may ask this pertinent question of the Leader of the House. When the time comes for the Prime Minister to decide whether or not to refer this matter to Sir Alex Allan as a matter of ministerial discipline, will the Prime Minister be acting in a political capacity or a quasi-judicial capacity? If I may be allowed the luxury of a supplementary question, will the Prime Minister be regarding himself as acting in a judicial or a political capacity?
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, in that event, the Prime Minister will be acting as Prime Minister. He will decide whether to take action directly himself—or not to, because he believes there is no evidence—or to refer the matter to Sir Alex Allan.
Lord Gilbert
My Lords, is it not clear from the Prime Minister’s Statement that the Government have now abandoned the Secretary of State’s claim that the Permanent Secretary authorised what was going on? The word “authorised” did not appear once in the Prime Minister’s Statement—and I was listening very carefully. The Leader of the House cannot hope to slither away and say, “What is the difference because the Permanent Secretary is supposed to have said that he was content?”. There is a difference between authorising something and being content with it. Authorising has to do with things ex ante; content has to do with things ex post. When was the Permanent Secretary first made aware of these activities?
My second question is about Sir Alex Allan, who seems to have one of the best sinecures going—in fact, I might put in for it myself. Has it ever occurred to this Government to ask Sir Alex Allan whether he considered it appropriate for him to consider this matter and, if so, what response did they get?
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, on the latter part of that question, I am not aware of any conversations having taken place. Incidentally, there is no way that I could slither away from anything in this House, particularly when asked by the noble Lord, Lord Gilbert. The Permanent Secretary has said that the content and extent of Adam Smith’s contact with News Corp were,
“without authorisation, and were contrary to the clear requirements set out”,
by both himself and the Secretary of State. He has said that he was “aware” of and “content” with the arrangements that were made initially.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames
My Lords, whatever the outcome of the present episode, does my noble friend the Leader agree that in future it must be absolutely clear that when a Secretary of State and his department are considering such a bid, all contact between the department and an interested party must first be through permanent civil servants; secondly, it must be properly authorised; thirdly, it must be properly recorded; and fourthly, it must be of a formal nature only? Does he also agree that it must be clear that political advisers should not be involved in such contacts in any circumstances, nor should such contacts be marked by the informality and appearance of partiality that marked the e-mails that have recently been released, and that guidance to that effect should be issued formally as quickly as possible?
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, my noble friend makes a very helpful intervention. Of course, we can all use the benefit of hindsight and see that things were not done in an appropriate way. That is why the Prime Minister, as early as last week, asked the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Jeremy Heywood, and the Head of the Civil Service, Sir Bob Kerslake, to write to all departments and Ministers,
“clarifying the rigorous procedures that departments should have in place for handling cases of this nature”,
so that suspicion does not fall on departments, Ministers and their special advisers.
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean
My Lords, when the Leader of the House was replying to my noble friend Lady Royall, he kept asking—I have to say, in a slightly excitable way—“What is going on? What is going on?”. It is very simple. It is the enforcement of the Ministerial Code. That is what we on this side of the House—and, I think, many Cross-Benchers—are very concerned about. The fact is that the Prime Minister tried to refer this to Lord Leveson. Does the Leader of the House agree with Lord Leveson that it was inappropriate for the Prime Minister to try to refer this matter of ministerial discipline and the Ministerial Code to Lord Leveson, which is not within his remit, as the original Statement clearly showed? That is the first point.
The second point is that the special adviser says that the Secretary of State knew nothing about his contacts. That may be so and no doubt an investigation will show whether or not that is correct. Notwithstanding that, paragraph 3.3 of the Ministerial Code—which is what we are talking about—is clear. It states:
“The responsibility for the management and conduct of special advisers, including discipline, rests with the Minister who made the appointment”.
Mr Hunt made the appointment. The special adviser’s contraventions were so serious that he has had to resign. Should the Secretary of State not have had mechanisms in place for discharging his very specific responsibility for the “management and conduct” of his special adviser and, if he did, what were they?
Lord Strathclyde
I will tell the noble Baroness exactly what is going on here. These are the cheapest and most vulgar political attacks on my right honourable friend the Secretary of State, whose evidence has not been heard at all. The noble Baroness asked about Lord Leveson’s statement. What did Lord Leveson say? He said:
“I have seen requests for other inquiries and investigations and, of course, I do not seek to constrain Parliament, it seems to me that the better course is to allow this Inquiry”—
that is, his inquiry—“to proceed”. That was done, and the Secretary of State will be able to give evidence to that inquiry in due course. When we have all heard the evidence, it may be that many noble Lords who have spoken today will be eating their words. As to the possible lack of oversight of the special adviser, the special adviser has resigned, having made a fulsome apology and explaining that the action that he took was way beyond the authority given to him by the Secretary of State.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
My Lords, the Prime Minister has used this rather particular phrase, that there has been no “grand bargain”, twice now—once at the weekend in his press comments and once in the Statement. Will my noble friend assure us that when the Prime Minister says that there has been no grand bargain, he includes that there have been no small bargains either?
Lord Wills
Can the Minister explain what he understands by the extent of the responsibility of a Minister for his special advisers?
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, how can I possibly answer that at this stage? I have not seen any of the evidence any more than the noble Lord has.
Lord Wills
I was not asking specifically in relation to this case; I was asking generally. What does the Minister understand by the extent of a Minister’s responsibility for his special advisers?
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, that is clearly set out in the Ministerial Code. In this instance, one would expect a special adviser to stick to the agreements and instructions they had been given by their Secretary of State.
Lord Armstrong of Ilminster
My Lords, as the Leader of the Opposition has referred to what I said about this matter, I should like to clarify that if I may, and ask the Leader of the House whether he agrees with it. I have said that the Prime Minister is responsible for decisions about ministerial conduct and for deciding whether a Minister has or has not breached the code. If he has, or thinks he has, sufficient evidence to justify a decision not to refer the matter to Sir Alex Allan, or to confirm the Minister in his position, he is entitled to do that. If he has doubt, he can ask Sir Alex Allan for advice. He is not obliged to take that advice, but clearly the advice will be very important.
In this case, as I understand it, the Prime Minister takes the view that the evidence that comes before Lord Justice Leveson will be more pervasive, extensive and comprehensive than anything that Sir Alex Allan could get. Lord Justice Leveson is not being asked to take the decision about the Ministerial Code. As I understand it, it is being suggested that the evidence given to his inquiry, elicited by questions from counsel and by all the other procedures, is likely to be more comprehensive and more reliable, since it will be evidence taken on oath, than anything that Sir Alex could achieve. However, Lord Justice Leveson is quite right in saying that he cannot take the decision or give advice about the Ministerial Code. The only person who can take a decision is the Prime Minister, and if he wants advice, he will have to ask Sir Alex Allan.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, it is good to hear the noble Lord, Lord Armstrong of Ilminster, put his question, and the tone in which he did so will no doubt calm the atmosphere of the House. He described the situation entirely correctly. This is a decision for the Prime Minister. When it comes to disciplining Ministers, the Prime Minister is entitled to make that decision in any way that he wants. Equally, the decision that he has taken, as the noble Lord has laid out, is that the evidence laid before Leveson—in the manner and way in which it will be laid—will be more authoritative and ultimately gain more public acceptance if it is done publicly at the Leveson inquiry rather than secretly by Sir Alex Allan, although I have no doubt that he would do it extremely well. Finally, I agree that Lord Justice Leveson himself cannot make the decision under the Ministerial Code; he has no locus to do so. The Prime Minister will no doubt be able to make a decision once the evidence has been given, and that decision is entirely up to him.
Lord Borrie
My Lords, following the very helpful intervention by the noble Lord, Lord Armstrong, is it not the case that there is no way—as and when the Minister makes his appearance at Lord Justice Leveson’s inquiry—that the Prime Minister can ensure that the questioning by counsel will bring out all the vital matters that relate specifically to the question of whether the Ministerial Code has been broken? The Leveson inquiry is a general inquiry into the relationship between the media, politicians, the police and so on and does not specifically address the question of whether the Ministerial Code has been broken. Are the Government therefore not relying on the matter coming out incidentally at the inquiry? The Prime Minister is not even prepared to wait until Lord Justice Leveson gives his report. Like the rest of us, he is simply going to watch what is said on television and so on, which may or may not reveal very much. What is really needed is a specific inquiry on whether the Ministerial Code has been broken.
Lord Strathclyde
I reiterate that Lord Justice Leveson is not being asked to take a view on whether the Ministerial Code has been broken. We started all this because allegations have been made in the Leveson inquiry. Surely it is only right and proper for my right honourable friend the Secretary of State to be given the opportunity to deal with those allegations by providing whatever evidence he wants. He has laid out the kind of evidence that he will provide, and I believe that it will entirely restore his reputation. During the course of that evidence-taking—and let us remember that this is all about the relationship between politicians and the media—the Prime Minister can take a decision on whether he believes that the Ministerial Code has been broken, and whether to instruct or invite Sir Alex Allan to look into it, or whether to believe that no further action needs to take place. I very much hope that it will be the latter.
Lord Low of Dalston
My Lords, if the leader of the Opposition was playing party politics with his question, what on earth was the Prime Minister doing with his Statement? I have three questions for the noble Lord. First, how does he reconcile what he said about the Leveson inquiry with Lord Justice Leveson’s refusal to get drawn into the Hunt affair? Is it not the case that the Statement that the noble Lord has quoted came at a rather earlier stage of the proceedings? Secondly, the noble Lord has said that the Secretary of State took independent advice when he did not need to, and acted upon it. However, is it not the case that Ofcom advised him to refer the matter to the Competition Commission, which he did not do? Finally, the noble Lord has said that the Permanent Secretary approved the special adviser’s role as a conduit between the Secretary of State and the Murdoch organisation. However, he was decidedly shifty about this when questioned on it by the Public Accounts Committee. The noble Lord said that the Permanent Secretary was aware of the special adviser’s role and was content. Does the noble Lord agree that that is not the same as giving approval?
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, the Prime Minister was invited to make a Statement by the leader of the Opposition, who was clearly trying to play politics. I do not want to offend the noble Lord, who is a distinguished Cross Bencher, but those of us better versed in the means of politics can see what is going on utterly clearly; it is as clear as daylight. I am under the impression that everything the Secretary of State was required to do during the bid process, he did. He accepted an offer of undertakings by BSkyB, but he referred them as well; and of course when the undertakings were themselves withdrawn, the full referral then took place. As for the role of the Permanent Secretary, I think that I have said everything I can possibly say about that.
Lord De Mauley
My Lords, the time has come for us to move back into the other debate.
Draft House of Lords Reform Bill
Lord Elton
My Lords, your Lordships can now return to an equally controversial matter, on which I think the camera has somehow got too close to the subject. I know that there is a general impression outside this House, although probably not inside it, that we are observing the early to middle stages of a power struggle between the two Houses, whereas we are actually in the closing stages of a power struggle between the Crown and Parliament.
The Crown and Parliament are the protagonists on whom we should keep our eye. By “the Crown”, I would have said “the Government”, but when one talks about the Government, one tends to think of what is only a thin veneer of ambitious politicians laid over a vast machine with a collective memory that goes back for centuries and which understandably regards Parliament as something of an obstacle to its objectives. As a Minister, one can detect this in individual civil servants, although I should say at this stage that I am commenting not on individuals but on human nature. However, you find that there is surprise and resentment that some proposal that appears to be eminently sensible to people who are not in touch with the mood of public, which as a Minister one has to be, can be obstructed by the parliamentary machine. The combined apparatus of ambitious politicians and career civil servants has a momentum of its own. The Crown as such has been trying to retrieve the power that it lost to Parliament in the 13th century, and it has retrieved a great deal of it.
One cannot survey the history in seven minutes, but I can give a good illustration of the state of play in more or less contemporary times by asking noble Lords to look at the year of 2005, and in particular to what happened between noon on Thursday 10 March of that year and 7.31 pm on the following Friday evening, which if I have calculated the period correctly is a total of 31 hours. Many noble Lords who took part will remember that the then Government had brought in a Bill with a clause that would have empowered the Home Secretary—in the legislation I think it is the “Secretary of State”—having consulted a single senior police officer, to sign a bit of paper that would consign a British citizen to what was called “derogated detention” for up to 90 days without the intervention of any legal force whatever.
Anything less consonant with British liberty or standards of democracy is difficult to imagine. It was got through the House with a government majority of 131 and was carried by a majority of only 14. We removed the clause and sent it back. Commons messages arrived and then we started on a round of ping-pong. As a result, that draconian measure was subject to very thorough judicial supervision and did not resemble what had been sent to us to start with.
Why was the House of Commons not able to control the Government? I remind noble Lords that Parliament was invented to control the Government. What was the difference between that House and this place? There are four differences. The first is that Members of the other place receive a substantial salary and are in what we would regard as career jobs. As has been alluded to, if you lose your seat you can move on to another, but if you lose your seat you lose your job and your salary. It is certainly true that the Whips have the power to deselect a Member so that he actually loses his job and perhaps cannot pay his mortgage, the school fees and so on. That is it, really. Members of Parliament have to be re-elected to hold on to their jobs, so they have to toe the party line; and if a Government have a substantial majority they actually hold those jobs and livelihoods in their hands. In this House, we are not elected and we do not have a salary. Although I benefit from it, I regret the fact that we now have a certain incentive and an interest that we ought to declare in this debate: if we claim it, we are in receipt of £300 a day for attendance. To that extent our continuance in office is a matter of personal concern, but of course we cannot be turned out, as the others can.
The present Government proposal entails the introduction of a majority of elected people who inevitably will have to be paid large sums of money in the form of salaries, and in effect those salaries will be in the gift of the Whips, if they have to be elected Parliament by Parliament. If we are going to move to something along the lines of what is being suggested, it is essential that the term of office, the tenure, should be for at least 15 years, although I would rather see it set at 20 years.
Perhaps your Lordships would pause to reflect for a moment that it was actually the undemocratically produced House that in March 2005 defended the electorate from a democratically elected Government when the elected House was unable to do so. Therefore, I see no need for election. Further, on appointing Members, I would remind noble Lords that more than 50 per cent of this House was appointed during the prime ministership of the then Prime Minister, and I believe I am right in saying that the Government suffered the largest defeat of any Government since the war. So I am here merely to say: please remember that we are trying to preserve the power of Parliament in the face of the Government, and to do that you need at least one House of Parliament with what the Americans call “tenure”. As it is not available in the other place, we ought to have it here.
Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws
My Lords, this issue has engaged me since the launch back in the 1980s of Charter 88, which called for House of Lords reform as part of a serious rethink of our constitutional architecture. I chaired Charter 88 from 1992 to 1997 and played a role in putting constitutional reform on the Labour Party manifesto prior to the 1997 election.
More recently, I chaired with the Conservative politician, Ferdinand Mount, the Power inquiry, which also recommended the reform of this Chamber. However, I reinforce the point that those recommendations for a change to this House were set against a backdrop of holistic constitutional reform, a recognition that if you want to reform this House that reform will have knock-on effects and therefore should be seen in the wider context of the checks and balances that are needed to make our system work well. You have to ask questions: what is the second Chamber for, and what are its powers?
For that reason, Charter 88 in its manifestation argued for a written constitution, something that I still believe is necessary, particularly as we become a more mature and sophisticated democracy. We continued to argue in the Power inquiry report that there had to be a written declaration of what the powers of this House would be in relation to the House of Commons. If the primacy of the House of Commons was to be maintained, there would have to be some kind of statutory document or concordat setting down the nature of the respective powers.
We also suggested that there should be a regional basis on which this House might be elected. Parliament is at the heart of our democracy and it is vital that it has the confidence of the people. When the Power inquiry went around the country and asked the public what they felt about the House of Lords, they said that they wanted it to be elected. Interestingly, when the follow-up questions were asked as to what kind of membership they wanted, they said that they wanted it to be expert; they wanted Members to have a hinterland and to have experience in many different walks of life; and they wanted to see independence. They wanted in a strange way to square a very difficult circle, because finding an electoral system to produce that is the real challenge. I am not satisfied that the recommendations in the recent reports meet the requirement.
People repeatedly told us that they wanted independence of mind and a distance from party diktat. They were very clear that they did not want any extension of dominance and control by the main political parties. They did not want any reform that brought an increase in the writ and power of the Executive—that is, Downing Street— whichever party was in power. This was not in relation to any specific distrust of any particular political party. They liked the idea that people had a lifetime’s experience in different walks of life and that that would provide a different kind of Chamber from the other. It is here that I take issue with the noble Lord, Lord MacGregor, who asked what kind of person would want to be in this new Chamber if they could not see a progression in their career. What people really like about this Chamber is that it is filled with people who are not professional politicians as we see in the other House.
What people did not want—we should concentrate a little on what is not liked about this House as we congratulate ourselves on our successes—is for the Lords to be used to reward party donations or as payback for services rendered to a political party or Prime Minister in some form or other or as a place of refuge for persons being removed from the House of Commons. They did not want it to be seen as a place to bump someone into to provide a safe seat for a party favourite. I am afraid that those suspicions are regularly reiterated by critics of this House.
There is wide agreement, therefore, about the need for reform. We are too large, and it is clear that there has to be a review of our size and our purpose, but we have to reflect for a moment on how you achieve that. It really is not becoming for us to congratulate ourselves on how terrific we are and on the quality of our debates. It is for others to say whether that is what they think. It is not enough for us to say that we should be allowed to stay here for ever. It is for others to decide on that. We cannot therefore talk about reforming this House without giving the public their say in how it should be done. It is for that reason that I urge that we consider taking a step similar that to that being recommended by the alternative report, which is that there should be some kind of constitutional convention but not in the form that is being suggested, with the great and the grand and the academic researcher being put on it.
The people doing that should come from among the general public. This is not something that has not been considered in other nations. Recently Canada, which looked at whether it should renew its electoral system and change it from first past the post to a proportional system, created a convention made up of a cross-section of its public. There is a clear methodology for doing that. It had proper and full debates, with evidence gathered from a properly drawn cross-section of the public, who in fact all decided that they preferred first past the post to the proportional representation that had been proposed. It is the public who should decide on this and not parliamentarians, who may have vested interests.
The person to whom we should turn is a very distinguished professor of political science at Stanford University, James Fishkin, who with a whole team of people there has developed this deliberative polling system. He has done it for Canada, and he has done it for other parts of the world when presented with constitutional issues of importance. I would advise this House to embark on having his team conduct such a thing here over the next period and advise our political leaders.
The complementary relationship between the two Houses should be at the forefront of our minds, but it is not acceptable in the 21st century for this House to be created through patronage. Power has to be given to the people. We have been enriched, no doubt, by the many people on the Cross Benches who have come here independently and not as part of the party system, but that could still be done under an electoral system. I am happy for it to be 80:20 per cent hybrid House if that is the consensus, but it is the public who should decide and not us.
Lord Steel of Aikwood
My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness in debate, especially on constitutional matters, where she has such expertise and knowledge. I want to begin with a personal apology to the noble Lord, Lord Richard. Due to transport problems from Scotland today, I am afraid that I caught only the tail end of his speech, which I very much regret, because I say genuinely that the report that he and his colleagues have produced is a most valuable document for the House, as indeed was the alternative report.
In my seven minutes, I want to say just three things. The first is about what was my own Private Member’s Bill. I say “was”, because once it had been passed by this House, I regarded it as a House of Lords measure, which unfortunately lay unattended in the other place for some seven weeks. However, having registered my fury and the disappointment of the House, I am happy to report that sweetness and light have broken out and that it has been agreed that if a Bill identical to the one that left this House is reintroduced early in the new Session, it will be proposed to be put through the House by expedited procedure so that we do not have to go through all the stages again. When it is sent to the other place, it will be given a fair wind by the Government. I am very pleased to report that. It is important to disentangle that from the wider issues from the wider issues of reform, because it is a measure that we all want now, this year, and not between 2015 and 2025. I look forward to progress on that issue.
My second point is on the Leader of the House’s suggestion that the manifestos of the three parties were remarkably similar at the last election. Well, up to a point, yes; they were also remarkably dissimilar. Of the three, I have to say that I prefer the Liberal Democrat one, because it was unambiguous in saying that we should have a fully elected Chamber. The words “fully elected” are very important because I keep pointing out, especially to my colleagues, that Mr Asquith and the preamble to the 1911 Act never used the words “universal suffrage” or “elected”; they talked about replacing the hereditary House by one based on a popular mandate. I believe that that could be achieved through the alternative report’s suggestion of a constitutional convention and the fact that the committee’s report and the alternative report both gave a nod in the direction of an indirectly elected Chamber merits further consideration.
I have read with interest the pamphlet of the Society of Conservative Lawyers, by Oliver Heald. It does not feature among my regular reading, I must admit, but I thought that it was a very good report. I understand that similar evidence was given to the committee by Mr Billy Bragg, who I think would claim to be on the left of the Labour Party.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath
My Lords, I am interested in the noble Lord’s support for what has come to be known as the secondary mandate. Should he not go back to Viscount Bryce’s conference of 1917, which essentially proposed that?
Lord Steel of Aikwood
I am all for digging up older conventions in order for them to be considered by the new one.
I was going on to say that I have looked further at the work of the Cambridge Liberal Democrat, Dr Alex Reid, whom the noble Lord, Lord Low, mentioned, who also came to this conclusion. There is a measure of support across parties for looking again at the possibility of indirect elections. Dr Meg Russell, in her evidence to the noble Lord’s committee, pointed out that 34 countries used this as their method of obtaining a second Chamber. What I did not know until recently was that there is a precedent for that in the United Kingdom. Precedent is terribly important in this House, I know that, and the precedent existed in Stormont. In the old Stormont, the Senate was elected by the lower House, so there is a precedent for doing that here.
There are certain advantages of the indirect election system as against universal suffrage. First, there is a good chance that if the electorate were existing MPs, MEPs and Members of the devolved Parliaments—a confined electorate—we would retain some of the expertise that appointments brings which we are afraid of losing. It would prevent conflict between the two Houses because the upper House would not be elected by universal suffrage. There would be no territorial conflict between senators and MPs because there would be no territorial definitions. The costs would be much less, both of the election and of running the House. Most important of all, the fundamental difference is that it would be possible, if such an election were held every five years after a general election, for the House to be adjusted proportionately without increasing the numbers, which is the way it is already constantly adjusted.
The last thing I want to say is that I disagree with the main report in its recommendation that there should be a referendum. Here I rather agree with what the Leader of the House was saying. To coin a phrase that has not been heard much recently, I agree with Nick. The question of a referendum is dangerous. We have to remind ourselves that the coalition came together for the specific purpose of putting right the nation's finances—full stop. We have not yet succeeded in doing that. We may not have succeeded in doing that by 2014-15 if the present economic situation continues. If we go to the electorate and say, “Okay we have not quite succeeded in putting the country right as we had hoped to do but would you mind voting for a more expensive new upper Chamber?”, they will say to us, “But you've already asked us about a slightly obscure form of proportional representation. You've already messed about with constituency boundaries and tinkered with the National Health Service. You’ve spent months in both Houses reforming the House of Lords and what we want is to get the nation's finances back on a proper footing”. They might say no. They are very likely to say no.
I end with the recollection that I was involved in the referendum in 1979 in Scotland. The late John Smith was a very good personal friend of mine from student debating days, despite our political differences. I remember that the one time we fell out was during that referendum because I said, “You’re daft to have pictures of Jim Callaghan, after the winter of discontent, on posters with the word ‘yes’ underneath. The public are minded to say no to the Government whatever the question”. I that fear the same will happen again and we could end up with nothing at all.
Lord Quirk
My Lords, I join the many, blessedly without even attempting to repeat the views of the many, who have grave misgivings about the draft Bill and would favour only modest, provenly necessary, incremental reform of the kind that the noble Lord, Lord Steel, introduced in his Bill, which we are glad to know is back on course.
Of course, everyone here has benefited from reading the report of the noble Lord, Lord Richard. I was for example reinforced in my support for our bicameral Parliament that we have enjoyed for so long, at least until such time that the House of Commons can be trusted to scrutinise the Bills that it passes upwards. I welcome the idea of reducing the size of the House of Lords to something under 500. I welcome bringing in a term limit, and 15 years sounds just about right to me although I would prefer this to be done in three five-year bites, which could be manipulated to give the Appointments Commission a bit more room for manoeuvre. I share the strong feelings over Clause 2, as one who welcomes and would go on supporting the primacy of the House of Commons. I note with alarm the words in House of Lords Reform: An Alternative Way Forward that the draft Bill reveals an,
“unbridgeable gap between the election of the House of Lords and the primacy of the House of Commons”.
What I miss in the report is any convincing argument that the proposed massive change would mean that a new second Chamber would be any better than our present Chamber at what the present Chamber does best, which is revising and advising. Just think of the legislation that has passed through this House this year on health, welfare and legal aid. Bills were not only in need of root and branch revision, but they got it and, let us be fair, they got it above all through the intervention of the Cross-Benchers.
Obviously I would say that. I grant that not all the House’s expertise, for which we are famed up and down the land, resides on these Cross Benches. But most of it does. I am astonished at the way in which we have come to expect something like a reduction to 20 per cent of a reduced total House as sufficient to get the kind of expertise that we have at the moment. The hybrid House that we are threatened with would be a very poor exchange for an alternatively revised House in which the independents in fact would form the core, serving and served by a political architecture like at present but smaller, representing the structures of government and opposition. My sense of the national mood is that our people would happily settle for such a House of Lords. I do not think that the people at large are so enamoured of what they currently get in the House of Commons as the result of their democratic vote as to be anything other than perfectly happy to forego the privilege of something similar but of paler complexion in the House of Lords.
Lord Morris of Aberavon
My Lords, when the House debated its proposed reform on 21 June last year, I commented on a single issue: the Parliament Acts. I will do the same today. There are now two issues. The first is whether the Parliament Acts can be used to drive through a House of Lords reform Bill without its consent—the antithesis of a consensual approach. Secondly, there is whether the Parliament Acts will continue to be effective once the second Chamber has an elected element in it.
I proposed to the House and later suggested to the committee that the Attorney-General’s advice be sought. The Attorney-General declined, in the main on the grounds that it would not be,
“appropriate for the Law Officers to advise Parliament on issues relating to the Government’s legislative programme”.
The Attorney-General was not asked to advise on the programme but on a particular draft Bill. I would have thought it highly desirable for the law officers, who can call on the widest possible resources upon which to formulate their views, to assist Parliament as requested. The committee quite bluntly states that it,
“regrets that the Attorney General felt unable to assist the Committee to understand his reasoning in respect of such an important matter”.
If I was Attorney-General, I would be very unhappy to have such a weighty Joint Committee of both Houses pass such strictures. Perhaps the Attorney-General would think again if a specific Bill were brought to his attention. His interpretation, in addition to the weighty legal opinions that he points out exist within this House, would be extremely beneficial to our proceedings.
I set out in my earlier speech the caveats entered into in the opinions of Law Lords in the fox-hunter case, Jackson v Attorney-General, on possible limitations to the use of the Parliament Acts. Despite the caveats, I concluded that,
“the weight of opinion … may well lead towards recognising a considerable supremacy for Parliament”.—[Official Report, 21/6/11; col. 1188].
By “Parliament”, I mean the House of Commons. This preliminary view is reinforced by the more deeply researched and persuasive views of the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith.
That aspect in itself was not my main concern, as I said in my letter to the committee. Since the issue is justiciable, courts at different levels have been known to disagree with each other and, in the words of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Steyn,
“the courts have a part to play in defining the limits of Parliament's legislative sovereignty”,
does Parliament wish to run the risk in such litigation of the possibility of at least the perception of politicising the courts? I leave it at that.
The second issue, which is more germane, is whether there is any reason why the Parliament Acts could not be used if we had an elected House of Lords. Both the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, and the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, commented on that and raised their concerns, to put it mildly. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, said in his evidence that,
“the better view is that the 1911 Act would not apply in the event that the upper Chamber were wholly or mainly elected”.
As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, says,
“the vague and general provisions of the proposed Section 2 … do not seem … adequate for that purpose”.
The committee, having considered the matter, concludes:
“If the Government wish to ensure that the Parliament Acts apply to a reformed House, they should make statutory provision for it”.
The alternative report reaches a similar conclusion, and I agree with it. The Joint Committee reports that,
“the Government … placed great reliance on the fact that the Acts will continue in force, and may be used with more frequency, even after the reform is in place”.
This is one of the important building bricks to underpin the thesis that, despite this House being elected, the primacy of the Commons will prevail. If so, why on earth are the Acts not referred to in the draft Bill? This is a startling omission and either the Government do not mean what they claim as regards primacy or it is sheer incompetence. I strongly suspect that the Attorney-General was not consulted on this. I commend the overwhelming view that the Bill should be specific and state that the Acts will continue to play their part as the committee maintains if the reforms proposed ever come about.
Viscount Astor
My Lords, it is worth repeating that this Chamber is the second largest political Chamber in the world, second only to the Chinese National People’s Congress. It is the only second Chamber in the Commonwealth that is larger than the first. It needs reform. But the commendable report from the noble Lord, Lord Richard, has shown up the problems of the Government’s planned reform. It is not really the Government’s plan, of course, but a Lib Dem plan as part of the coalition agreement. The Lib Dems want, implemented in three stages, the House of Lords to represent the popular share of the vote, and have never given up on AV despite losing the referendum. But if one looks at it closely, one can see that the law of unintended consequences takes over. A Chamber of 450, on the basis of some of last week’s opinion polls, would have about 45 UKIP and about 10 BNP Members. In fact, UKIP could have more Peers than the Lib Dems. Of course, it depends on what system of STV is used, but the fact is that UKIP stands to gain most, and there is the rather frightening thought that the BNP might for the first time be represented at Westminster. One would have thought that was the very last thing that the coalition would want, but it is difficult to argue that only the main parties should legitimately benefit from PR.
Everyone agrees that this House needs reform, but no one agrees how—elected, appointed, half and half or the many variations of all three. The last Labour Government managed stage 1 reform, getting rid of the majority of hereditary Peers, but never managed to go any further. Labour realised that the sensible solution was to talk the talk of further reform, but do nothing. As we have heard today, that is still their policy. Some in the House of Commons do not see the point of a second Chamber at all, but most agree that the power of the Executive should be controlled by more than just the House of Commons.
The key questions that have to be answered on any proposal for reform of this House are on what its role is going to be and, if it is largely the same, will the new Lords work better or least as well as it does now? The current membership is diverse. Some Members hardly ever speak, which is made up for by the Members who speak all the time. But they represent a wide range of views, with expertise and ethnic, gender and social diversity, and it is difficult to see how an elected House would have the same diversity. The Lords cannot be an absolute mirror of the House of Commons, as then we have an elected dictatorship, with absolutely no check on the Executive. The likelihood is of course that a new elected Chamber will want to exert more power—to block Bills, challenge the concept of financial privilege of the House of Commons, and amend secondary legislation. We would then find ourselves veering toward the American system, which is often gridlocked between the Executive, Congress and the Senate. Some may say, “No bad thing”, as there would be less legislation, but it would be a profound change for this country. The break-up of the union is another complication, as explained by the noble Baroness, Lady Symons.
The Government have argued that the people who make the rules should be accountable, but this House does not make rules—we amend. You do not have to be elected to be accountable. This reform is disliked by almost everybody. It offers an elected transition—a hybrid House. The only real defence I have heard in this debate is that if we go on without doing anything, this House will get even larger. There is a simple remedy to that, as my noble friend Lord MacGregor pointed out: a retirement age. As for the elections for a 15-year term, those who have sat in another place tell me that what sharpens up Members of Parliament is not their first election, when neither they nor the electorate know each other, but their second election when they have to defend their record.
Viscount Astor
And, indeed, subsequently.
The supporters of this draft Bill cry popular democracy, but what we need is popular legitimacy rather than popular democracy. This can be by either an appointed or elected House of Lords but if it were to be under the current proposal, with 80 per cent being elected, the pressure would be to have 100 per cent elected. I very much doubt that the 20 per cent appointed would last more than one Parliament. Following its endorsement in the report, it certainly looks as if the referendum clause will be added in another place. That must be a good idea.
The question the Government have to answer is whether Lords reform, in their current Bill, is worth taking up hours and days of sittings in the House of Commons and in this House, while having the Government’s other Bills blocked in the process. Of course the problem is that if there is a deal to be done, who do they deal with? Neither side in this House controls their Back Benches when it comes to Lords reform but it is clear that constitutional reform should be well thought-out, not cobbled together in some back room—albeit, perhaps, smoke-free this time—as part of an agreement between two political parties. This House should—and does—bring a range of perspectives to bear on the development of public policy, be broadly representative of British society and play a vital role as one of the main checks and balances within our constitution. We provide a voice for the nations and the regions of the United Kingdom at the centre of national politics. More by accident than design, we have managed to achieve that.
The proposed Lords reform is heading for an almighty train crash. I wonder whether sensible voices will be heard down the other end, or whether the train will have to crash before a sensible plan appears. One result of the Labour reform of 1999 is that the House of Lords has become more authoritative and self-confident. We see ourselves as more legitimate than prior to 1999, while maintaining that the House of Commons is the pre-eminent Chamber of Parliament. The result is that this House is not going to allow itself to be dictated to by a lower House if it thinks it is wrong. We will fight to preserve what is best and what works well. When one looks at the current offer, one has to say that an appointed House still comes out on top. In the last Parliament, the majority of another place voted for a fully elected Chamber. Equally, a large majority in this House voted against. We know now that many in another place are having second thoughts. Indeed, there are many new Members there.
When I last spoke on House of Lords reform, I followed the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, and as I respectfully disagreed with almost everything that he said I described his speech, slightly tongue in cheek, as a virtuoso performance. I certainly paid the price for that, as I received lots of e-mails from Lib Dems congratulating me on supporting him. Perhaps I can apologise to him for that and say that in case there is any doubt of where my sympathies lie, we should turn our energies not to looking at the Bill in this House but to persuading those in another place to throw out this Bill.
Lord Campbell-Savours
My Lords, I am in favour of an elected House—a position I made clear on my appointment. I strongly support the thrust of the excellent Richard report, which we have before us today. I have no intention of using this occasion to argue the case for reform; I shall do that in Committee when we are finally presented with a Bill. I want to concentrate today on the referendum and Clause 2.
I favour a referendum due to what I believe to be a growing resistance to a Bill in the Commons. There is a fundamental dishonesty and artificiality about the debate there. Conservative Members argue publicly for reform in tune with their manifesto, while privately they are strongly hostile. Liberal Democrats are unsettled by the prospect of their coalition partners reneging on the coalition agreement in this area. My own colleagues in the Commons are increasingly uneasy over the emergence of a competing institution. The danger for reformers is that a coalition of the concerned will, for a combination of diverse reasons, set out to block the Bill in the Commons.
Some MPs who have historically supported an elected House on public platforms—in the media, during general elections and even in Parliament—will use any excuse in a desperate attempt to block the Bill. Some will claim to be unicameralists. Some will argue that they oppose an open-list STV system, which they say is the wrong PR system. There are those who will quibble over the 15-year term. Others will argue over the cost of the whole project. Some object to the extended transition period. Many will oppose the hybrid House in an all-or-nothing argument. Quite a few will argue that the Bishops should be excluded. Some have expressed concern about overlapping parliamentary mandates, and there are those whose motives are far more cynical. They want to come here in due course, either because they wish to retire or are to be displaced under the Government’s ill considered proposed reduction in constituencies. That is the real world in which we live. All sorts of excuses are now being deployed in the campaign to block an elected House.
That is why I want a referendum. While I recognise that there are those who support a referendum because they believe that the public will kill the Bill, that is not my view. I believe that supporters of an elected House can win and I am confident in that judgment, as I was in my belief that the AV referendum would be lost. Furthermore, a yes vote would lock Parliament into a position of reform. Parliament cannot reject the judgment of the people in a referendum. The alternative report proposes delaying a national vote, pending a report from a “long grass” constitutional convention. I reject that approach. The talking must come to an end; it has gone on for too long.
The problem is that if the referendum is in the Bill, it will be impossible to secure passage of the legislation prior to the next general election. We cannot allow provision for a referendum to be held up in the logjam of delay over the Parliament Acts. We all know that the Parliament Act will inevitably be used to delay implementation. Indeed, I presume that the government Whips have already factored calculations on extended debate in the Lords and delay under the Parliament Act into their legislative timetable. In my view, we need two Bills running coterminously. I cannot conceive of circumstances in which the Lords would seek to block a referendum of the people; it would be seen as nothing short of self-serving.
Moving to Clause 2, I strongly believe that a constitutional settlement on powers between the Houses is attainable, although I recognise that an elected House will inevitably seek to increase its powers and will probably, in time, succeed. We cannot be naive by failing to consider the possibility of gridlock—that is, unless some constitutional lock can be deployed which impeded that development, allowing the Commons some flexibility to concede greater responsibilities to the Lords over time.
I propose that we turn to the oath and the signing of the undertaking to abide by the Code of Conduct which we take when we enter this House. I have raised this idea with a number of colleagues. It has found little support among colleagues in the Lords but has received a sympathetic hearing among some colleagues in the Commons. We enter the House only after taking the oath under the Parliamentary Oaths Act 1866. The form of the oath is prescribed by Section 2 of the Promissory Oaths Act 1868 and Section 1 of the Oaths Act 1978. Alternatively, we can affirm. No oath means no entry. The refusal of elected Sinn Fein MPs to take the oath meant that they could not take up their seats. I argue that the oath could be amended to include an obligation to accept the constitutional settlement between the two Houses as underpinned in legislation—both an amended 1866 Act and the proposed 2014 Act—the settlement to include the limitations on the statutory and non-statutory powers as set out in paragraphs 39 and 40 of the committee’s report. The oath could then provide us with a constitutional lock. I am not advocating that an elected Lords could not debate the case for increased powers. However, I am advocating an arrangement under which the Lords would be unable to threaten to delay, or to delay, legislation with a view to securing greater powers. Nor would the Lords be able to initiate an amendment to the constitutional settlement. The process of amending the settlement would be initiated only by the Commons deploying its primacy.
I know that some have written off the proposal as a constitutional nonsense. They argue that it could be challenged in the courts and that Parliament cannot bind its successors, which, of course, would not be the case if the Commons had the powers to amend. However, there is a division of opinion on these matters. I ask only that the idea be considered.
Lord Higgins
My Lords, I join those who have congratulated the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and his committee on all the hard work that they have done and, more particularly, those who have worked even harder and more extensively on the committee that is supplementing the work of the Richard committee.
My problem is that the Richard committee was asked to undertake pre-legislative scrutiny of a Bill that is fundamentally flawed. The argument is very simple and is put forward by the Liberal Democrats and others: namely, if we have an elected House, Britain will be more democratic. I do not believe that that will be the case. We are already 100 per cent democratic and that democratic legitimacy rests in the House of Commons. If both Chambers were elected, that legitimacy would inevitably be divided and, I believe, would be less effective.
Therefore, there is a very real problem here. The committee faced up to it and decided as follows. The report states:
“The Committee, on a majority”—
I stress “on a majority”—
“agrees that the reformed second chamber of legislature should have an electoral mandate provided it has commensurate powers”.
It seems to me clear that “commensurate” is the wrong word. If both Chambers are elected, the wording ought to be “equal powers”. More particularly in that context, if the upper Chamber is elected on proportional representation, which Mr Clegg tells us is more legitimate than first past the post, we would end up with an upper Chamber that is more legitimate, and ought to have more powers, than the House of Commons. This, clearly, would be a pretty absurd position in which to get ourselves.
I must say that, after the events of the past 10 days, I am more and more convinced that the priority is not reform of this end of the building but reform of the other end. We have had the appalling use of programming at the other end, not only in the initial stages of a Bill, where major issues are not debated at all, but the effective guillotining—not in the old efficient way, but by programming—of amendments from this House, whereby the time allocated for consideration of four amendments was barely as much as the time that this House had spent voting on them. We therefore clearly need reform as far as that end of the building is concerned.
However, it is not true to say, as the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown said, that we are creatures of the Executive. We have certainly not been so in recent days, but if we were an elected Chamber we would be much more likely to be heavily whipped, to be creatures of the Executive and to lose the technical expertise that we have at present. I hope that those who were so anxious that we should hear their views on many subjects in the past few days will realise that electing this Chamber is not in their interests and that they will campaign on it, whether or not it be done in a referendum or more generally. They are the kind of interest groups that we have been defending and I hope that they will campaign.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon
I intervene because the noble Lord mentioned me by name. I want to ask him a question, because the issue genuinely puzzles me. If it is the case that having an elected second Chamber produces the kind of dire consequences that he and everyone else in this place—or at least most people who have spoken—predict, how come about 60 of the other 71 bicameral Parliaments across the world do not suffer these problems when they have elected second Chambers? Is he really saying that our democracy is so weak that we cannot cope with what everyone else can cope with?
Lord Higgins
No, on the contrary, I recognise that what is fit for other countries is fit for them, but we have here a unique institution—a highly expert and unbelievably cost-effective second Chamber. Therefore, the reasons that we are putting forward in its defence are the right ones.
I want to come to the crucial point raised by the committee of the noble Lord, Lord Richard, relating to primacy. The committee certainly rejects—not out of hand but after careful consideration—the idea that Clause 2 will carry out the purpose of preserving the primacy of the other place. I am glad to see the noble Lord indicating his assent. I certainly do not believe that it would, but it would be very strange if next week something in the Queen’s Speech said, “Measures for reforming the House of Lords will be laid before you, and we regret the fact that Clause 2 will not carry out the intention of the Government”. We shall have to wait and see what, if anything, is proposed, but it would seem rather odd if the Government were to include anything without having resolved this absolutely crucial question.
My other point relates to the issue raised by the noble Lord, Lord MacGregor—the utterly absurd idea that election without accountability is democracy. The whole basis of democracy must be accountability and, if we have a system whereby a Member can remain here for 15 years without election, there is no accountability whatever. That cannot increase the amount of democracy in this country.
I want to spend just a moment or two on the question of referendums. Throughout my 33 years in the House of Commons, I was strongly opposed to referendums. I take a strong Burkean view that Members of the House of Commons are representatives not delegates. A referendum is the antithesis of that. However, it is the case that on a major constitutional issue it is less appropriate for the House of Commons to act in that way, so a referendum may indeed be more appropriate. My problem is that, unlike the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, I am not optimistic that a referendum will produce the right result.
The reality is that the public are unbelievably ignorant about this House and are not likely to understand the way in which we work or the good work that we do. Certainly if you had an opinion poll asking how Members of the House of Lords normally dress, they would reply very simply by a large majority, “They all look like Father Christmas”. There is a real problem here. The press time and again publish pictures of the State Opening, which is composed not of the House of Lords but of many other people who are not in the House. Therefore, if such a referendum takes place, we will have to engage very strongly, despite the splendid efforts already made by the Lord Speaker and her predecessor, to try to publicise the work that this House does.
I am out of time. I end by saying that I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Steel, on what he just said, but the Bill that has gone to the Commons from this place is much less than his original Bill. We still need to do far more and we certainly must do something greatly to reduce the size of this House. I hope that we will manage to do that.
Baroness Morgan of Ely
My Lords, I start by stating clearly that I think that this is a bizarre priority at the moment, when we have an economic crisis and massive levels of unemployment and when people are suffering from poverty. However, we are where we are, so I start by thanking my noble friend Lord Richard and his team for the considerable work that they have done on their report.
I say from the outset that I am in principle very much in favour of a fully elected House of Lords. I want to stand by the manifesto commitments to reform put to the electorate by my party and others at the general election. It is right and proper that the people who are able to initiate and amend legislation should be accountable to the people to whom it will apply. The Chamber as currently constituted, whatever its considerable merits, is a complete anachronism. It is undemocratic in the 21st century. It is only through elections that we will preserve and enhance this Chamber’s vital constitutional role.
Arguments that suggest, “If it’s not broke, don’t fix it”, simply do not wash. That is a recipe for preserving this institution in aspic. It assumes that it is not broken. Even Winston Churchill suggested:
“If we are to leave the venerable if somewhat crumbled rock on which the House of Lords now stands, there is no safe foothold until we come to an elected chamber”.
Several areas of Lords reform are desperately needed. It is broken. In no way can we argue that the current set-up reflects the country as a whole. The underrepresentation of women is not unique to this Chamber, but it needs to be addressed. Likewise, the number of people from an ethnic minority background needs to be increased. The age profile of the Chamber does not reflect society, with an average age of 69 and more than 82 per cent of the membership over 60. Although I accept that with that comes a whole host of knowledge and expertise, it would be very difficult to make the case that we here represent the disparate voices of the whole country.
The south-east is hugely overrepresented, with 70 per cent of Members with a London base. When we have seen a considerable shift in the constitutional arrangements of the UK to reflect growing devolution to the nations of the UK, it is time to revisit our arrangements to ensure that all areas of the country are adequately represented. The suggestion that Members should be elected on a regional basis I would welcome wholeheartedly.
If we are serious about keeping the integrity of the UK as a nation, we need to be serious not just about respecting devolution in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland but about moving towards increasing regionalisation in England. Electing Members to the Lords regionally on a basis similar to the European regional constituency boundaries would allow a more balanced picture of our country to emerge in this Chamber. My preferred option would be for the regions to be equally represented, as my noble friend Lord Desai suggested earlier, so that this place really would look and feel different from the other House. In that way, we would be able to respect devolution but take into account the fact that we were seeing an asymmetric development of regionalism in the UK.
The ongoing debate in Scotland on further devolution, and perhaps even independence, is something that we should not duck. Let us not be naive in thinking that the outcome of the referendum north of the border will not have a dramatic influence on the way we are governed across the whole of the UK. The West Lothian question must also be put into the mix—a fact that has probably not been adequately dealt with in the Richard report, given the committee’s tight remit.
Questions are already being raised in Wales and Scotland about the need for second Chambers to scrutinise primary legislation going through those parliaments. Although I would resist calls for new second Chambers to be established in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, we have to be able to say why there is a need for a second Chamber at Westminster if there is no need for such scrutiny in those institutions, which also deal with primary legislation. Therefore, I could foresee the possibility of the elected Members of the new Lords Chamber being given the broader remit of being a scrutiny body for primary legislative powers in devolved bodies.
Plenty of people will be asking for this debate to be set in the broader context of trying to establish a grand constitutional convention. However, do we really believe that this will help to move the debate on? If we cannot build a consensus on one aspect of our constitution, what hope is there if we broaden the debate? All parties recently and historically have been guilty of snatching and reforming bits of our policy development and decision-making framework, watching how it goes and then moving on. Despite the shortcomings of this approach, I have no doubt that this is how we will continue to work. That is why I believe that we should use this unique opportunity with all three main political parties making a commitment to further reform the institutions. I would not want to see us pushing this reform into the long grass.
What kind of people would be attracted to sit in the second Chamber? What kind of Members do we want? To a large extent, the make-up of the new Chamber will be determined by the political parties, but I have real concerns that the pool from which parties can choose candidates is particularly small. It will be incumbent on parties to try to be more creative in the way that they select candidates. Political parties should be encouraged to seek out experts and attempt to place them high on their party lists, as happens in continental parties. This is one reason why I would be in favour of a closed list system. The Government should be allowed to draft in experts as Ministers, who should be given a temporary seat in this Chamber.
One question that I have been asking myself is: what would it take for me to put my name forward to stand for this Chamber? There are, I am afraid, some serious shortcomings in the proposition as it stands. For me, one of the key problems is the length of the mandate. I guess that that probably sounds a bit odd, as I have accepted a life peerage, but let us be clear: an elected mandate would put Lords representatives in a very different position. The implication is that they would have a full-time role and that it would be possible to hold an additional job only if they were appointed Peers. I am afraid that the practicalities of that if you are not based in London just demonstrate once again the London-centric approach to the reforms.
I believe that people of my generation who are talented and ambitious would be extremely reluctant to accept a 15-year mandate. My generation has not been brought up in a job-for-life culture and I believe that many would feel too restricted by a 15-year tenure. The longest legislative term among elected legislative Chambers today is eight years. If we wanted to attract people of my generation to stand, we would need to ensure the introduction of a closed party list system so that, if someone were to step down, that person would automatically be replaced. However, that would cause all kinds of problems for any independents who stood and would send out the bizarre message, “This is a 15-year mandate—unless you want to break it”.
The second point is that it is very difficult to envisage why someone would want to put their name forward for a reformed Chamber that did not have decision-making powers. Surely the most talented would be attracted to the House of Commons, so we would probably end up, once again, with an older Chamber that does not reflect society.
Clause 2 of the Bill needs to be amended. Enough experts have stated the position on that. I believe that, at the point when we insist on Peers being elected, that would represent a significant shift in our constitutional arrangements and as such would require a referendum. The public should be the arbiters of how they are to be governed. I have confidence that the British public would support such a move.
It is fair to say that none of us believes that any of this is going to happen quickly. Indeed, even if the current proposed timetable were respected and the first new elected representatives of the second Chamber were elected in 2015, it would be 13 years before we would see the 80 per cent elected Peers in place as proposed. In the mean time, I believe that there is an urgent need to follow the advice of the Constitution Unit in its recommendations for immediate action: an immediate moratorium on Lords appointments, to be lifted only when the number of Members has dropped below 750; allowing retirement from the Lords, as proposed by the House of Lords Leader’s Group chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt; and any future appointments to be put on a more transparent and sustainable basis, with the independent House of Lords Appointments Commission determining how many vacancies exist and inviting nominations from the parties.
I thank the members of the Joint Committee for their considerable work and I look forward to a long debate on this issue.
Baroness Brinton
My Lords, like most of my colleagues in the Liberal Democrat Party, I am a strong advocate of a fully elected second Chamber and constitutional reform was one of the reasons I joined the Liberals in 1974. I share the frustrations of those who have gone before us, in the preceding 150 years, in finding it almost impossible to make this Chamber directly accountable and transparent to the people of the United Kingdom to whom it is answerable.
Walter Bagehot, in 1867, in his seminal book, The English Constitution, on the nature of constitution and the functioning of Parliament, reported:
“A severe though not unfriendly critic of our institutions said that the cure for admiring the House of Lords was to go and look at it”.
In those days, the Lords were noted for their opposition to any kind of reform such as the great Reform Bill earlier that century, and 100 years ago your Lordships’ House was certainly not in favour of women’s suffrage, a point noted by my noble kinswoman Baroness Stocks of Kensington and Chelsea, a suffragist who marched on Parliament during those turbulent years. Indeed, I remember her description of your Lordships’ House in her autobiography, My Commonplace Book, when she joined it 50 years later: she called it her “eventide home”.
The House of Lords has no age of retirement and it has already been pointed out that the average age is 69, with more Members over 90 than under 40. When I was introduced last year, my family was told that I would be called “young Brinton”, something that my children still find hilarious. More worryingly, Peers may be removed only by an Act of Parliament and those convicted of serious crimes may return after serving their jail sentence, subject, as we know, to specific votes of the House, but that is only ever a temporary measure.
That brings me back to the issue of perception. Like my noble friend Lady Scott of Needham Market, I have faced sixth forms and public meetings with questions that demonstrate that many, probably the majority, have no real idea how we arrive here, or even what we do. Lords of the Blog, tweeting and other more modern methods of communication are beginning to help. However, when it is explained to them, most people are clear that they want reform, because they cannot understand why, in the 21st century, we have a House of Parliament that is not elected. This was confirmed in a number of polls, most recently a couple of weeks ago in a BBC poll for “World at One” that showed that nearly seven out of 10 people wanted an elected House of Lords and a referendum of the people. Given that all three major parties supported reform of your Lordships’ House at the last general election, the case is unassailable. As for a referendum—if it is the will of Parliament, bring it on.
I recognise that it will be impossible in this House to reach consensus on reform. Despite my preference for a 100 per cent elected Senate, I believe that the report of the Joint Committee presents Parliament with the best available option to move forward. It would be better to achieve significant reform now and move on to the final stages of reform in the future. Now is as good a time as any—otherwise, no time, ever, will be good.
The core issues in the report that Parliament will have to tackle concern primacy and the nature of the work that a reformed House would undertake. We heard much earlier today about the need for clear conventions to ensure clarity about primacy. The proposals in the report do that. The regional constituency basis of election will create a very different Member to the traditional Commons MP. A regionally elected House of Lords—even without a specific embargo on individual casework—would be unlikely to draw casework to its Members; but with that rubric written in, it would be straightforward. I also draw noble Lords’ attention to the relationship between MPs and MEPs on casework. MEPs, too, are elected on the proposed regional system. There are no great fights over casework. In fact, most people automatically go to their local MP on local issues and their MEP on wider, strategic issues.
Secondly, the single term of office means that Members of a reformed House will not be worried about their own re-election; and election by thirds once every five years will ensure that the Commons will always have the most up-to-date mandate. Revisions to the Parliament Act might be necessary, but people speak as if that is an impossible thing, which is not the case. It has to be possible to adjust all the parts of the constitution that we need to while undertaking major constitutional reform.
Your Lordships’ House is rightly regarded as having considerable expertise in reviewing and scrutinising draft legislation. Indeed, if there were no second Chamber, the Commons would need to rethink how it operates because, given time constraints, it cannot provide the level of detailed scrutiny that this House undertakes. This must remain a key function of a reformed House, and I see no reason why an elected House could not carry this out as effectively as the present one.
I conclude by returning to the argument for reform. Once inside the Westminster bubble, it becomes comfortable to argue for the status quo because we can see the benefits of the present system. However, as a fairly recent arrival to your Lordships’ House, I say that the quaintness of the traditions, no matter how well grounded they are in our history, makes us seem part of the problem of politicians being distant from the people. To be placed here through patronage starts to build an invisible wall around us. Title and deference quietly reinforce the construction, and a lack of accountability bangs the door shut.
As a Liberal Democrat, I believe that we must break down those walls. No matter how excellent is your Lordships’ House, I am with Henry Campbell-Bannerman, who in 1905 said:
“Good government could never be a substitute for government by the people themselves”.
Let this report and the draft Bill move forward so that we can, 107 years after that statement, take the firm steps towards accountability and transparency that are the bywords of any good, modern democracy.
Lord Howard of Rising
My Lords, like many of your Lordships, I find it amazing that the other place could even consider making this House an elected or indeed partially elected Chamber. This would only increase this House’s legitimacy to the point where it would have the right to challenge the power of the other place. I do not know whether reform of this House is, yet again, a piece of red meat thrown to the wolves to distract them or whether this urge by the House of Commons to pursue a course of action which will do it so much harm is the same urge for self-destruction which has led it to surrender so much of its authority to the European Union or is a wish to introduce more democracy into the government of this country.
If it is a wish to improve democracy, then I suggest the other place starts by taking a good look at itself. I shall quote from a distinguished Member of the other place.
“Every bill now has a ‘programme motion’ setting out how much time can be spent scrutinising and debating each part. These are automatic guillotines, and the time allowed for scrutiny is set in advance, before anyone can see whether or not a particular issue is contentious or complex. Watching a Minister in the Commons drawing out one point for an hour to fill the time, to an audience of dozing backbenchers—this is not accountability. How has the mother of all Parliaments turned itself into such a pliant child? If we’re serious about redistributing power from the powerful to the powerless, it’s time to strengthen Parliament so it can properly hold the government to account on behalf of voter. The House of Commons should have more control over its own timetable, so there is time for proper scrutiny and debate”.
Those words were written by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister. May I respectfully suggest that parliamentary time would be better spent restoring the ability of the House of Commons to hold the Executive to account than in messing about with this House, a matter for which there is no public desire or interest?
Time is the chief weapon of opposition. For an example of how effectively this weapon can be used, we need only look back to the Parliament (No. 2) Bill in 1969, an occasion when a proposed reform of this House was seen off by talking the Bill out.
As my noble friend Lord Higgins commented earlier, constantly programming Motions and imposing timetables increases the power of the Executive to the point where, in practical terms, the role of the other place is reduced to that of a cipher.
My message to this unelected Government comes from the Bible:
“How canst thou say to thy brother, Brother, let me pull out the mote that is in thine eye, when thou thyself beholdest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, cast out first the beam out of thine own eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to pull out the mote that is in thy brother’s eye”.
Lord Whitty
My Lords, I have not come with a text this evening. I think we owe the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and his crew—if I can put it that way—a great debt of gratitude for clarifying the issues. However, I am rather afraid that the debate tonight has shown that, as a whole, this House is no further forward. Veterans of this debate will know that I am a pretty unreconstructed supporter of the democratisation of this House and of the process of election to it, and I am so for the reasons expounded by my noble friend Lady Morgan just now, although she alarmed me somewhat by reminding me that I am nearly the average age of the House now; earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, and the noble Baroness, Lady Scott; and by colleagues on these Benches.
At the beginning of this debate, the noble Lord, Lord Hennessy, who is still in his place, said that not a flicker of consensus was revealed by the Joint Committee report and the alternative report. The debate tonight shows that there is not even an empty matchbox of consensus here. We are where we have been for many years: gridlocked on the options. The majority opinion in this House is obviously against democratisation. Some of it is now being justified on the grounds that we should legislate for function before form, and to some extent I agree. Perhaps slightly strangely, I find myself agreeing with the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, to some extent, although he starts from a different position and comes to a different conclusion.
Almost all the arguments seem to be about the relationship between this House and another place, and the composition of this place, when the real constitutional issue ought to be about the relations between the legislature and the Executive. This gets confused partly because in the media people often talk about the House of Commons when they actually mean the Government. Within the clear roles of legislature and Executive, there needs to be some differentiation between the roles of these two Chambers.
As far as the relationship with the Executive is concerned, I am a strong believer in a strong state—unlike some members of the coalition—but a strong state requires an ability to deliver effective, high-quality legislation, good administration and general good governance. To do that, I am afraid that it needs a stronger legislature to challenge it than we have had in recent years. I have been here under four Prime Ministers and the same applies in all cases.
If we are moving to election for this House, there is a very clear and differentiated role for this House compared with the House of Commons. An elected House of Lords that is engaged in heavy scrutiny and that has a revising role and the general ability to hold the Government to account—through, I hope, more powerful Select Committees—performs a different role from the House of Commons, which provides the Government and decides on the broad structure of policy. Of course, an elected House of Lords would not have power over financial matters. Here I disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown; I do not think it would have a veto over a declaration of war, for example. However, it is possible to define what powers this elected House would have, and its role and function, and to differentiate those from the role of the House of Commons.
I think we all agree that, frankly, the Government have their head in the sand if they deny that election of this House will not change the nature of the relationship between this House and another place. It is also a gross exaggeration to say that the primacy of the House of Commons is not compatible with an elected House of Lords. This is not an unbridgeable conflict. A clear and new definition of relations between the Houses, once both are elected, is vital. I accept that it is difficult, but it is hardly impossible. After all, over two-thirds of all other bicameral jurisdictions find a way of doing it, although not all in the same way and not without periodic difficulties, and have done so for many decades and, in some cases, centuries.
I think we are also all agreed that the attempt in Clause 2 to redefine this relationship is completely insufficient and rather pathetic. Relations at present are defined in statute—to a limited extent, in relation to the Parliament Act—in conventions, in understandings, in procedural mysteries via the usual channels, and in various other ways that are pretty much unknown to the general public. Codifying the Cunningham conventions and cross-referring to them in statute is not a solution; nor is it a concordat, which is itself only a codified convention.
We have to define the different roles and functions here in primary legislation. At present the Parliament Acts statutorily define and limit the Lords’ powers, and they need to be explicitly reiterated in this Act or modified to meet the new situation—I agree with my noble and learned friend Lord Morris of Aberavon on that. Even the financial privilege is not reflected in those Acts and by statute. In view of recent events, that would require further definition as well. Removing the inhibition of the House of Lords because of its non-elected status would indeed make us a more assertive Chamber, but only in the areas that the statute would then define as us being responsible for.
The argument against putting all that in the statute book is limited. It seems that if you did so it would be justiciable—in other words, judges could challenge the operation under that part—but that is also true if you cross-refer to conventions and concordats in primary legislation. In any case, we are not in the United States. We would not have a Supreme Court that struck out actions by the Government or that struck out legislation on the grounds that they are unjustifiable. I know that even the present statutory base is challengeable in court; I, after all, had a major role in the Hunting Act, and the use of the Parliament Act in that respect was challenged by several people. Luckily, the judges saw sense in that respect, although others may disagree. Nevertheless, in general the judges would not override the clear will of the House of Commons and the House of Lords. We would also need to set out a clearer pattern of dispute resolution. Again, institutionalising ping-pong is not impossible.
I have other concerns about what is in the Bill and the report. I have concerns about the electoral system and the length and non-renewable nature of the proposed term, as well as concerns about the means of culling—I apologise, I mean the running down of—the current membership of this House. I have opinions about the survival of the Lords spiritual, which I will not go into because they have all disappeared tonight.
My central point, and the central point about how we proceed from here, must be that, as far as the public are concerned, a lot of these esoteric arguments about the role of the House of Lords and the House of Commons are not relevant. From change, the public want to see improvement in government. If they do not, or they are not convinced that the change that we have proposed will bring about improvement in government, we will not get a vote for it in a referendum. Inevitably, whether we want it or not, we will go for a referendum. Whatever we do with this Bill when it emerges after the Queen’s Speech, we must ensure that the final outcome is better governance and that we are not quite so esoteric and inward-looking within this Palace of Westminster.
Lord Haskel
My Lords, my noble friend Lord Whitty has just spoken about what the public expect. The noble Lord, Lord Higgins, spoke about the importance of telling the public what we do. They are both right. Outreach is one way in which your Lordships’ House communicates with the public. I have participated in the outreach schemes since they started several years ago. I have spoken about this House, and taken questions, not only at many schools but also at regional WI conferences, Rotary meetings, business conferences and political meetings. Rarely am I asked about legitimacy and reform, although I am asked about diversity and experience.
However, if there is one threat running through all these meetings, it is that people have high expectations of us. They have such expectations because we are appointed. It is to satisfy those expectations that we need to be very careful about the reform of your Lordships’ House. I am in favour of reform and, eventually, an elected House, if that is what our powers, duties and functions, as my noble friend Lord Whitty spoke about, require. But I also agree with my noble friend Lady Royall. I am in favour of taking the steps when they have been properly thought through. It is then that we will satisfy the high expectations that the public have of us.
Sadly, the draft Bill presented to your Lordships and considered by the Richard committee does not satisfy these expectations. It speaks of objectives but rarely speaks on how to achieve them. The call for evidence listed in appendix 2 of the Richard report is, in effect, a list of these shortcomings and, quite rightly, the committee is asking people to help them to do the Government’s thinking for them. Both reports point to many inadequacies, about which noble Lords have spoken. In particular, they have spoken about the primacy of the House of Commons in Clause 2. As regards appendix 7, in the supplementary written evidence on Clause 2 from Mr Mark Harper, he agrees that the Government have not thought matters through and asks the committee to do it for them.
The Richard report and the alternative report point to many other areas where the objectives have not been properly thought through: the relationship with the other United Kingdom assemblies; necessary changes in the House of Commons; the honours system, separate from membership of the House; differences over numbers; conflicts in the constituencies; and the accountability of elected Members. Many noble Lords have added to this list and, as a result, the suspicion must be that it is political expediency which is driving this reform, not wisdom—a suspicion that both reports attempt to rectify, but something which the public do not expect from this House.
I am in favour of reform but, because of the difficulties we are debating, I am in favour of dealing with it incrementally through a series of small steps. They should be steps which have been properly thought through, such as the proposals from the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, about reducing numbers, and from the noble Lord, Lord Steel, on discipline and reforms to our procedures. When these small steps have been taken satisfactorily and the other matters properly thought through, that is the time for a referendum. Of course there should be a referendum on such a major constitutional change, but only when the smaller steps have been taken and shown to work, and when the other more major changes have been properly considered and decided. Otherwise, a referendum will be a fiasco because it would be seen as a way of covering up for inadequate thought and preparation.
I join my noble friend Lord Lipsey and other noble Lords in their concern about costs. We all know that making changes without a budget ensures not only that costs will rocket, but that the intended changes will suffer. Yet the costs are not spelt out—and this from an austerity Government. The alternative report tries to deal with it. An analysis on the fullfact.org website raises a number of serious queries, and using the Freedom of Information Act it is trying to get the Government’s costings. I look forward to the Government providing the House with a proper budget by which we can hold them to account so that we can judge the value and appropriateness of the expenditure.
I add my thanks to those given to my noble friend Lord Richard and his committee for the report, and to those who have written the alternative report. Both are valuable contributions. However, neither really settles the old arguments about our duties and whether election equals the legitimacy to carry them out. A recent Hansard Society report tells us that the public have become less engaged in politics and more suspicious of politicians, which is hardly the right climate in which to devote our attention to an elected House. So let us take the small steps, think through the big steps and explore whether there is a consensus. We will then carry the public with us because, after all, we are here to serve them.
The Earl of Listowel
My Lords, it is an honour to follow the noble Lord, Lord Haskel, and his considered words. I am very much of his view that we should seek more incremental change. He reminds me of an occasion when I sat next to a colleague of his over tea one afternoon. She told me that my father had visited her primary school many years ago, and how important an experience it was to have a Member of the House of Lords come to her school, take an interest in what the children were doing, and talk about the Lords. One of my concerns is that with the publication of a Bill of this kind, we may be forced to look inwards and so do less of that kind of outreach work. Indeed, I have the honour to be a co-chair of an inquiry into the issue of children who run away from local authority care. We have heard from some good witnesses. However, unfortunately I was not able to attend a meeting today because I felt that I had to take part in this debate. Noble Lords have only so much time. I share the concern expressed by others about the current austerity.
I thank, as many others have done, the members of the Joint Committee and its chair, and particularly my noble friends Lord Hennessy and the noble Baroness, Lady Young, for their work on the report. I am grateful also to the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, and her colleagues for their alternative report.
As many Peers have said, we are in a time of extreme austerity. We are hearing of ever more of our citizens having to depend on food packages. We hear that further significant cuts in welfare payments are possible. It is a difficult time. We know that we need more growth in the economy if people are going to find employment, yet we also need to secure the confidence of the investment markets to avoid having to pay higher interest rates. Those are huge challenges for us. Is this the right time to take on this huge challenge in this House and to devote so much of our time and energy to this area?
I shall concentrate on the powers of your Lordships and the primacy of the other place. Two things in particular come to my mind. The first is the example of bickering parents—parents who are so busy getting at each other, trying to assert their own will against another person, that they neglect their children or allow the strongest child to bully the other ones. I am also reminded of an old story about an old king who decides to divide his power among his three daughters, which seems to him a very good idea at the time. However, he comes to realise that he has given up something which leads to great pain for him and his family and great conflict within the nation that he runs. A comment is made upon him: he only ever slenderly knew himself. The suggestion of the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, and others of a conventional assembly to dig down further into these issues is important, because I would hate us to enter into something which might undermine our ability to make the changes that we are in a good position to make to the benefit of our nation.
My father took his seat in this House back in the 1930s, during the time of the depression. He was immensely privileged, being an Etonian and Cambridge and Oxford-educated. He wanted to use those privileges to help people without those sorts of leads, much in defiance of his family. I share with him the thought that we are extremely privileged, particularly in this place, and we can make a huge difference to the most vulnerable in society. However, if we lock ourselves into constant conflict with the other place, we are in danger of losing that capacity. Let us think about children’s homes. In the evidence to the inquiry in which I am involved on children who run away from care, we hear from the police a familiar story: that there are a few poorly run children’s homes from which children run away again and again. I am afraid that there are possibly gangs of men who are looking at those homes and thinking about what they can do with some of those children. This is such an old story; it needs to be sorted out. I know that the Government are thinking about instituting an inquiry into such children’s homes and trying to do some good work in that area, but if we become so engrossed in this discussion about what we do and who we are, we are less likely to be able to give time to such work. This Government and the previous Government have done a huge amount of good work in improving the status of social work, which has involved many different measures. To pursue programmes of that kind is challenging when we may be involved in such self-obsessed expenditure of energy.
Let us think of the benefit to lobbyists of seeing two Houses that are about equally strong. I have in mind tobacco lobbyists, who have been so effective when they have wished to oppose tobacco legislation going through this House on a number of occasions. They had deep pockets. A former Secretary of State had been on the board of directors of British American Tobacco, for instance. They used all sorts of means to lobby very effectively. If the upper House is as strong as the lower House, we give them a second bite at the cherry in which they can frustrate such legislation as putting plain packaging on cigarettes or preventing children seeing cigarettes in newsagents.
I think also of examples in the United States. President Carter won a mandate from the public to pass laws to restrict energy consumption at the time of the oil crisis, but that was frustrated. There were so many checks and balances to which that legislation was subjected that he could not make it work and he could not win his way. Again, President Clinton’s health reforms were frustrated even though he had a mandate from the public.
I encourage noble Lords to look at the oral evidence from Dr Meg Russell to which the noble Lord, Lord Steel, referred. There are some important points there. In particular, she notes that nobody expected the authority of this House to be as strong as it is now, following the removal of the hereditary Peers. We are a far more assertive House than anyone expected, according to her. We need to think very carefully how much more assertive we might be if we were an elected House and not simply an appointed House as we are today.
Lord Marlesford
My Lords, we have in front of us today two very fine reports. They are both very well written, which makes them easy to read and understand. However, I have one secret wish: I hope that perhaps they will be the last reports on this subject for a decade or two.
The more closely one looks at these coalition proposals for House of Lords reform, the more they seem to resemble the eurozone. First, the design of both contains the seeds of their own destruction. Secondly, they both look as if they may result in the humiliation, or worse, of their architects. Thirdly, the most enthusiastic supporters of both have been among the Liberal Democrats.
I focus on only two of those seeds of destruction. The first is the use of the guillotine as a parliamentary instrument, which has already been referred to by others. In my years as a parliamentary lobby correspondent, the use of the guillotine was a media story. It was usually a story of political conflict and the inability of the Government of the day to resolve important legislation and disputes by debate. The guillotine was an instrument of last resort. It was not there to prevent or inhibit parliamentary debate but to limit and contain the use of parliamentary obstruction.
I am afraid that it was Mr Blair, for whom I have much respect, who introduced the guillotine as routine for virtually all legislation. It was not long before the effects on this House became obvious. An avalanche of ill-digested legislation, much of which had been subjected to little or no scrutiny, descended upon us. Of course, the production rate of the House of Commons was hugely increased, but the quality of the output fell.
I had assumed that the lesson had been learnt and that a new Government would scrap the routine timetabling of Bills. To my disappointment, and not to his credit, Mr Cameron has perpetuated this bad practice. Far from improving the presentation and quality of the legislation, it has got even worse. Our efforts have been even more needed to knock it into shape. How long would it be before an elected senate was subjected to a guillotine? It would then be another stepping stone towards the elective dictatorship that the great Lord Hailsham warned us against. We will watch with fascination to see whether the House of Commons allows the Government to timetable this Bill if it is introduced.
The second seed of self-destruction is the anti-elitist argument so widely used by advocates of the replacement of the House with an elected senate. Provided that elites derive from open opportunity, ability, achievement and merit, they are an essential ingredient for all organisations, including Parliament. If there were a criticism, it is perhaps that we are not sufficiently elite. In my view, the anti-elitist culture of recent decades has done much to erode the quality of our Civil Service. To insist that it is more important for Civil Service recruitment to reflect the diversity of Britain rather than be drawn from the ablest of Britain is counterproductive to what it is there for. The superb quality of the 20th century British Civil Service stemmed from the 1855 Northcote-Trevelyan reforms which substituted competitive examination for patronage.
I doubt whether France, with its politicians, would have survived as well had it not been for the unashamed elitism introduced by de Gaulle through ENA. I remember that years ago, in order to write about ENA, I went to interview its director, Monsieur Pierre Racine. He was remarkable man. I said finally to him, “How is it that you get such marvellous people all wanting to come to ENA?”. His answer was, “Well, because they end up running France et ça c’est amusant”.
One problem is that MPs are so inadequately remunerated. In my view, they should get a salary of about £100,000—about what a GP gets. They should be freed from the arrogant and insulting invigilation of IPSA. IPSA behaves incredibly badly and will quite soon have a serious effect on people wanting to be subjected to that sort of treatment. To invite people to give up 15 years of their lives for £50,000 a year, and subject to IPSA, is hardly going to entice the ablest young people to divert from other careers or enterprises to service in the new second Chamber. Nor are many of those approaching, or who have reached, the pinnacle of their careers likely to be tempted to stand for most of the remainder of their lives as virtually full-time Members of an elected House. I say “virtually full-time” because, even with 450 members, 90 appointed places would not provide anything like the depth or width of expertise and experience which the present House provides.
This really is a potential disaster. In the history of doomed enterprises, it brings to mind the advances of Napoleon and Hitler on Moscow, and the recent repeated attempts to subdue Afghanistan. Fortunately, even if there is reference to the Government’s draft Bill in the Queen’s Speech, it will not be too late to pull the plug on this ill-conceived and rather sordid coalition deal, and perhaps revert to the sort of package of reform referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Hennessy. Of course the House of Lords is anachronistic, as is much of our constitution, but it is none the worse for that. I was very surprised when my noble friend Lord Ashdown kept telling us about the strange collection of countries—Belarus and other places like that—that we should emulate. I would suggest that they have not quite got to where we have. Our constitution has evolved over at least 1,000 years since the days of the Witan—that body of notables which advised the Anglo-Saxon kings. What an honour it is to be a Member of a descendant of such a body. I believe that, far from being undemocratic, the present House of Lords underpins our democracy, which is and I hope always will be in the House of Commons.
Baroness Whitaker
My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow my friend the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, but I shall take a different line. Like my noble friend Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe, I am a member of the Campaign for a Democratic Upper House, and I very much follow his analysis.
I mainly want to record my support for the Joint Committee’s endorsement of a democratic second Chamber, with an electoral mandate and commensurate powers, so ably navigated by my noble friend Lord Richard, and a lingering degree of surprise that the principle should still be so contentious. I have quite often found myself advocating causes not shared by others, but I would never have dreamed that the election of even part of one Chamber of a modern democratic state legislature might become one. I think that future centuries will look back at proposals to cling to an entirely appointed Chamber as an extraordinary aberration. Opinion polls confirm this. Some may even find it a betrayal of all those who fought in the struggles for emancipation over our history.
It is also the case that I quite often do not agree with the Government, so I am also surprised to find that to a degree I may, with reservations, somewhat agree with them over the Bill. But then, I am not sure that the Government agree with the Government, so I await with interest the Minister’s reply. Of course, constitutional change needs fundamental thought; the preservation of the primacy of the House of Commons needs to be worked out with great care. But evidence to the Joint Committee has laid out sensible and authoritative ways to do that. There is also the idea of a binding oath suggested by my noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours. The nature of the mandate also needs thought, but the report provides a good starting point, and I do not doubt that our native capacity for innovative and practical constitutional thinking will be equal to this task. But the timidity evinced by some at the prospect of reform will need reassurance at various levels.
I would like to say a word about the alternative report. I find it slightly misleading. On primacy, for example, the alternative report says that it cannot be maintained with an elected Chamber. A majority of the committee felt that the remaining pillars on which Commons primacy rested would be sufficient to ensure its continuation. None the less, it is agreed that a means should be established to define and agree the conventions governing the relationship between the two Houses by means of the adoption of a concordat. The alternative report calls for the same outcome in the light of the Cunningham committee as the Joint Committee proposes, but it simply ignores the principal mechanism recommended for securing agreement. It therefore adds nothing to the committee’s recommendations while ignoring the solution that it proposes.
On costs, the Joint Committee rejected salaries for transitional Peers and for office and staffing costs for personal case work. The effect of that is to remove £264 million from salaries for the transitional Peers and considerably cut down the £186 million estimate for office costs. So it is not quite as it seems in the alternative report.
Finally, the alternative report claims that the Joint Committee gave no material consideration to alternative means of dispute resolution—clearly, a very important point. The Bill does not give any material consideration to that but the report does, in paragraphs 369 and 370.
There is just one other aspect which the Joint Committee might have looked at. It is a second-order question, but I am concerned that the term Senate will have different associations from what the committee recommends. Could we not have a term of our own, such as a state council? I thank the Joint Committee and I hope that, when we come to the Bill, we can move forward on its conclusions.
Lord Rodgers of Quarry Bank
My Lords, I, too, congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Richard, on his labour of love in chairing this demanding committee. I also thank my colleagues, my noble friends Lady Scott of Needham Market and Lord Tyler, who were members of the committee and worked long and hard. It is a very useful report as far as it goes, but that is not very far. We might have anticipated this, given the purpose and terms of reference of the committee, and its membership. In the introduction to the report, we are reminded of the principal milestones in the long march since the 1998 White Paper and my noble friend Lord Wakeham’s royal commission. The 15 divisions tell the story of substantial failure. Instead of a consensus on a matter of the highest constitutional significance, the committee was often seriously divided.
Since the royal commission, opinion has, however, moved on the primacy of the House of Commons. At least, my own perception of it has. What is much clearer now, given the report and today’s debate, is the inescapable challenge of an elected or partially elected House of Lords to the Commons. I share what other speakers have said on the importance of paragraph 34 of the report, which states:
“The Committee is firmly of the opinion that a wholly or largely elected reformed House will seek to use its powers more assertively”.
It adds, in paragraph 35, that:
“The Committee considers that a more assertive House would not enhance Parliament’s overall role in relation to the activities of the executive”,
and, in paragraph 55, that:
“We concur with the overwhelming view expressed … in oral and written evidence that Clause 2”—
the crucial clause—
“of the draft Bill is not capable in itself of preserving the primacy of the House of Commons”.
I also note that David Howarth, my Liberal Democrat former colleague in the Commons and now a reader of law in Cambridge, said in evidence on Clause 2 that it “is just silly”.
In a previous debate on 22 June, I said that the House of Lords and the House of Commons were,
“joined together in a single Parliament. The balance of powers … works very well despite some rough edges. After scrutiny, debate and negotiation in Committee, including … ping-pong, the elected House of Commons … wins, and so it should be”.—[Official Report, 22/6/11; col. 1267.]
Despite the report and the valuable evidence, and what we have heard in today’s debate, I remain firmly opposed to a wholly or partially elected House. That was my view when I joined this House 20 years ago, and since then it has been broadly the same. Perhaps I may say again, especially to my colleagues on these Benches, that 13 years ago I wanted to end then the hereditary principle in the House—quite a different matter from election, but a major reform. Alas, my then leader in the Commons, my noble friend Lord Ashdown, did not see it that way.
At no time have I justified the status quo. Given a non-elected House, I could be happily persuaded by a number of important further changes, given a relaxed open choice in details across the parties. I would be content to have 400, 450 or 500 parliamentary Peers. They could serve for 15 or 20 years and retire at 75 or 80. As for the Lords spiritual, having read 24 paragraphs and seven recommendations in the report, I could support 12 Bishops, only two—such as the two we have seen here today—or none at all. I would not be upset if those who remained in the second House became Senators. For me, these are all tolerable options.
What should happen as 22 or more men and women sit around the Cabinet table and try to agree the final draft of the Bill to reform the Lords? Perhaps they should push the Bill through both Houses, through thick and thin, in a clean sweep. Perhaps they will be attracted by the alternative way forward, which was drafted as a minority report, of setting up another committee to examine the conventions between the two Houses. Perhaps they should split the Bill, proposing important changes but stopping short of an elected House, with a further legislative stage some time ahead in the next Parliament or beyond, as I would prefer. Above all, as Cabinet Ministers sit there, they should have at their elbow that enjoyable autobiography of Rab Butler, The Art of the Possible. The coalition, which I strongly support, is passing through hard times, as are my Liberal Democrat friends. It should remember that politics is the art of the possible and think of priorities for the nation and the voters in these difficult economic and social years.
Lord Naseby
My Lords, we are told that all three manifestos claimed that the reform of the Lords was a priority. However, no one voted for the coalition. Were you a voter, which none of us is, you could not have found a party that thought differently. Then I ask myself, “What did we in the Conservative Party say in our manifesto?”. I had a quick look at it and I see that we committed ourselves to,
“work to build a consensus for a mainly-elected second chamber”.
I congratulate my noble friend the Leader on the Front Bench. He has worked tirelessly to find such a consensus. When challenged this afternoon, he tried to define a consensus—not very convincingly, I have to say. The fact is that there is no consensus, but we can give him 10 out of 10 for hard work, and he has met the manifesto commitment.
When I look at the team promoting the Bill, I note the depth of experience of the leading voice and the Minister of State. Both have served for seven years in the House of Commons. One of them has never done anything outside other than politics; the other had a career in the world of finance. However, I do not think that the commitment of two colleagues from the other place with 14 years’ experience—experience that was never without guillotines, incidentally—is something in which to have much faith in terms of leadership.
Perhaps I am being too party political, but it seems that the hidden agenda behind part of the drive, particularly, dare I say it, from our Liberal Democrat colleagues in the coalition, is to have proportional representation to ensure that there is a lock on what this House does from the Liberal Benches. Frankly, I do not want that to happen. The country voiced its view in the referendum on the alternative vote. It was not at all in favour of it, by a majority of more than two to one, so we already broadly know what the public’s view of the electoral system that is being considered for the Bill is.
I looked at the report in some depth. I will not repeat the passages from which my noble friend Lord Rodgers quoted, but I will pick on just two paragraphs. Paragraph 40 is the original statement of the primacy of the Commons. As it states, that goes back to the resolutions of 1671 and 1678 that:
“all aids and supplies, and aids to his Majesty in Parliament, are the sole gift of the Commons; and … ought not to be changed or altered by the House of Lords”.
After all, in case we forget, that was what the civil war was about. That was the whole purpose of Parliament’s rebellion against the king. Dare I mention that Parliament reigned supreme at the battle of Naseby? That was the catalyst for democracy. That is the fundamental reason why the Commons has supremacy. Why did the Commons decide to have a Chairman of Ways and Means? It did so simply because it did not trust the Speaker to deal with financial matters. That role has continued—I had the privilege of being the 58th holder of that office—and should and must continue. A Member of the Commons should continue to exercise that control over money matters.
The other paragraph that I think is of great importance is paragraph 45, which concerns Clause 2. The noble Lord, Lord Richard, referred to that this afternoon. It is pretty damning that the Government wanted this Joint Committee and set it up, but the committee records that:
“The Minister declined to share the Government’s Drafting Instructions for Clause 2 with the Joint Committee, on the grounds that such Instructions were subject to legal professional privilege”.
Frankly, that is amazing. I had the privilege of chairing the body that took the Maastricht treaty through the other place. The process took 25 days and there was no guillotine on that Bill. It became law in the end, although it was duly amended. I have searched through my notes on that procedure and there was no problem then with the so-called legal professional privilege. Therefore, I wonder why legal professional privilege has suddenly appeared as an excuse for not providing data to the important Joint Committee.
As several Members have said, we are in the depths of probably the worst recession that we have ever experienced. There is turmoil in the Middle East, threats from Iran, North Korea, Argentina and al-Qaeda and the very real danger of the euro collapsing. Frankly, the coalition lacks confidence at the moment and certainly the public have no confidence in our Government. Yet the priority, apparently, has to be the reform of your Lordships’ House. You only have to open any paper of any sort to pick up the public’s feeling on this issue. A headline in the Times states:
“Kick this shambolic reform into the jungle”.
Another headline in the Sunday Telegraph states:
“The House of Lords is working fine—don’t fix it”.
A letter to the Evening Standard has the headline, “Keep Lords unelected”. Another letter to the Evening Standard has the headline:
“Should we have to elect Lords?”.
The “Letters to the Editor” section of the Telegraph bears the headline:
“A reformed House of Lords would gobble up power and pick a fight with constituency MPs”.
We do not want that, do we? At least, I certainly do not want it. Frankly, this Bill is a real test of the leadership of the Commons and, by definition, of the Prime Minister. He and his colleagues must decide where their priorities lie.
Furthermore, the Bill must not be guillotined or subjected to any timetable Motion. I hope that the Commons will ensure that we go back to the old system that a constitutional Bill is held on the Floor of the House and that every single Member of Parliament who wishes to do so can take part. I say to my former colleagues in the other place that they need to think long and hard about safeguarding the primacy of the Commons against the very real threat that would come from elected Peers. I am afraid that it will also be a test of the leader of the Opposition, Mr Miliband. If he is a leader, he will act in the national interest and vote down the Second Reading and get on with rebuilding his party and providing good alternative government leadership. However, if the Bill should get a Second Reading in the other place, I would see it as my duty to try to defeat it. If necessary, I will support a referendum.
The Leader asked this afternoon: what on earth could the referendum question be? Just as a suggestion, it might be: “Is it a priority for you”—by implication the elector—“that the House of Lords becomes mainly elected at a cost of at least £200 million a year?”.
Lord Gordon of Strathblane
My Lords, that seems to be an excellent question. I open by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and everyone on his committee for a thorough report. It was narrow in its remit, but it therefore focused on the issue. The committee did as good a job as anyone could in such a short space of time.
It would also be churlish not to acknowledge the part played by the Government in this. I genuinely congratulate the coalition Government on bringing a draft Bill before the House. I recall an exchange between the noble Lord, Lord McNally, and, I think, my noble friend Lord Grocott, on this side. The noble Lord taunted my noble friend with the fact that Labour had failed to bring forward a Bill, and that the coalition Government were going to do so. He was as good as his word. They have done that, and it was a courageous decision to do so. I mean that sincerely, but also in the sense in which Sir Humphrey means “courageous” when addressing Ministers in “Yes Minister”, because the fact is, when you look at the Bill, you can understand Jack Straw’s reluctance to bring one forward. It is a shambles of a Bill. One cannot think that the Government will proceed with it. After all, they set up a Joint Committee of both Houses to look at the Bill, and it has shot it to pieces—at least on its principal conclusions. It would therefore be wholly inappropriate simply to ignore the findings of the Joint Committee and proceed with the Bill.
The problem is that it is very easy to have one White Paper after another, one consultation after another, cabals of Front Benchers, and everyone thinks elections are a great idea. “Elections” is a banner that is easy to march behind, but when you get to the destination and someone delivers a speech on the draft Bill, you find that that support disaggregates at an alarming rate. Take the first decision: in an effort to try and avoid competition with MPs if people were to be elected to this place for five years, the proposal is, “Right; make it one term only for 15 years”. You immediately destroy any accountability whatever. One of the points that the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, was crying for was that this place must be made accountable. A term of 15 years would not make us one whit more accountable than we were previously.
The great problem is that that will not achieve even the purpose of preserving the primacy of MPs, simply because of the democratic dynamic. If I were to stand for this new House, how would I differentiate myself from the other candidates to secure election. What will my manifesto contain? What am I going to promise to do? If I promised to do anything, then forget seeking re-election, I would want—even to preserve my reputation—to achieve what I had promised to do. If I needed powers to do so, I would horse-trade my way to get them. You cannot have an election without people demanding more powers to fulfil the promises they make to the electorate. You cannot square the circle, as the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy, put it earlier.
I think that one of the reasons why the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, found his colleagues in the House of Commons getting rather alarmed about this Bill was precisely the finding of the Joint Committee that Clause 2 was wholly inadequate in protecting the primacy of the House of Commons. That is not going to do much for MPs in the House who, in the case of Scottish MPs, already feel threatened by the devolved powers that MSPs have, and possibly the total loss of their raison d’être if Scotland goes fully independent. It will not allay the fears of MPs who, facing perhaps prominent elected mayors, can see their own importance as city MPs dwindling slightly. No wonder that there are alarm bells in the House of Commons.
Do not mistake me; there is a good case for an elected House of Lords. It is just that it will not be an elected House that is anything like the present one in its relationship with the House of Commons. There is nothing that would stop it being at least equal—if it is elected by a different system, possibly superior—to the House of Commons
As somebody who is against election, I fear the results of a referendum. I think that a lot of the public, for an entirely wrong reason, will say, “We want a House of Lords that is more powerful than the House of Commons. We will vote for an elected House of Lords”. That is very unfair to MPs, because what is wrong with House of Commons is not the individual MPs but the system. It starts with their election. Are people elected to control the Executive or to become part of them? With a payroll vote of more than 100, no wonder there is no scrutiny of legislation. At least another 100 want to be part of the payroll vote, so they are bought off as well. Nothing is properly scrutinised in the Commons.
Somebody mentioned costs. I do not want to go into great detail on costs but just to add a few points. Whatever the figures are, they will be 50 per cent more if the recommendation of the Joint Committee is accepted by the Government, as I think it should be. One presumes that the Government have done some costings—if they have not, they are guilty, because they should have done—so they are not telling us, possibly because they are scared. In my view, the costs have just gone up by 50 per cent.
There is the inequity point, which my noble friend Lord Lipsey mentioned. Transitional Peers will still get an allowance while the newly elected Peers will receive a salary. The comparison is worse than the one he suggested. Apart from the fact that the transitional Peer will get an allowance only on the days on which he attends, the elected Peer will receive a salary for 15 years whether or not he turns up. If somebody says to me, “Ah, but if he doesn’t turn up, we will recall him”, that is fine, but please put that in the Bill. Watch how many MPs love the idea of being recalled by constituencies every now and again.
There is a further point which your Lordships will forgive me if I make as a Scot. Will an elected Peer receive an allowance to cover the cost of living in London, as I understand that the Joint Committee recommends? That is a novel idea that would certainly appeal to those of us who come from Scotland and who bear the cost from our own pocket at the moment. Will that disparity remain?
There are two more important points about cost. First, the electorate will think, “Hold on. This House of Lords used to get an allowance. Now we are making them salaried they must be more important than they were or doing different things”. The House of Lords will appear to the electorate to be more important than it was. That might be a welcome thing, but I am not sure that the House of Commons would welcome it.
I invite my noble friend Lord Richard to reflect on a further point—this apparently clever idea that we will not give allowances for doing constituency work. You cannot stop an elected Peer doing constituency work. All it means is that the rich Senator will be able to do it and the poor Senator will not—hardly a great democratic option.
Generally, I think that this is close to a Eureka moment. We cannot square the circle of election and subservience to the House of Commons. I do not think that we will see a Bill in anything like its current form before us. That is because I hope that the Government, who presumably set up the Joint Committee to listen to its findings, will genuinely take account of what they hear and realise that they should ditch the fundamental points of the Bill and instead proceed with some meaningful reforms which are in it and are adumbrated in the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Steel, and the evidence submitted by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman.
That is what I hope will happen. If it does not, I do not think that the Bill will get through the House of Commons. People do not remember that a majority of Labour MPs, even in 2007, at the height of the “cash for peerages” scandal, voted against 80 per cent election. A bigger majority of Conservative MPs voted against, despite the fact that it was in the Conservative manifesto. Since then, what have they seen? They have seen the growth of power elsewhere. One can only presume that the Government gave Clause 2 their best shot but they have also seen a Joint Committee of both Houses say that the protection is meaningless, despite any assurances that may be given, and I am sure that the Whips will say, “Oh, we’ll fix it; don’t worry”. Incidentally, I really did not like the idea put forward by my noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours of dealing with the issue of primacy in the oath. Why not put a provision to support the Government in the oath and then we could really get to a police state rather more quickly? Anyway, I do not see Peers going for it. The position has become slightly rockier since 2007 for various reasons, and I think that the House of Commons will defeat the Bill.
I do not want this matter kicked into the long grass. I want somebody to get out a lawnmower, clear a plot of ground and give the idea of an elected second Chamber a decent burial.
Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve
My Lords, I do not think that I can add much to that, so I shall go off in a different direction. I think that we are now galloping towards the Becher’s Brook of constitutional reform, and matters are, unsurprisingly, pretty confused. Perhaps this is inevitable. The confusion and discomfort arise because many noble Lords and many others want an elected House of Lords because it will have greater legitimacy. However, they do not want it to have too much legitimacy because that might challenge the primacy of the Commons. This ambivalence, to which there is no very easy solution—perhaps no solution—has been with us for a century, and it is manifest in the fact that we have not one but two illuminating reports on the draft Bill, with a near even split of members of the scrutiny committee supporting each.
Of course, we are not alone in this confusion; I fear that the public are with us. I have often asked members of the public whether they would prefer an elected House of Lords. Typically—although a good deal less often recently—the answer has been, “Yes, it would be more democratic”. I then ask, “So more like the House of Commons?”, to which I get the answer, “Oh, no. Not like that!”.
A point that I do not think has received sufficient attention in the discussion of reform of your Lordships’ House is that, as party-political loyalties and affiliations have waned in the country, people have increasing ambivalence about the parliamentary results of democracy. I think we need to pay much more attention to the reality that the public may want more democracy in the abstract but they do not want more party politics—certainly not as they see it on television.
From that perspective, the fact that this House actually discusses legislation, with some courtesy and some care for the most part, is pretty important. Scrutiny is, after all, about reasoning, challenging, listening and keeping an open mind, and, whatever else we do, we need to make sure that a future House is genuinely designed to continue and to carry these tasks. However, the draft Bill concentrates on the process by which people arrive as Members of your Lordships’ House but not on the powers and functions for which they are responsible when they get here. It deals with the abstract question of the process of arrival but says little about how changing that process is likely to alter the membership.
It is less than clear that there would be as wide a range of experience and expertise on the party-political Benches of an elected House. Campaigning for election places great strains on any career, and I expect that a number of distinguished noble Lords on the political Benches might not have taken the electoral route to your Lordships’ House if it had been available. At this moment, I catch the eye of the noble Lord, Lord Winston. I think that he might be one of them, together with many other distinguished medical colleagues. If we come to debate the Bill, we must therefore try to gauge whether future elected Members will in fact still be eager to engage in scrutiny in the way that the process of this House demands, assuming that its role is unchanged.
It may be said that the draft Bill takes account of these demands in considering the retention of a proportion of appointed but non-party-political Peers, selected, it is often said, for their expertise—in effect, supposedly successors to the independent Cross-Bench Peers. No doubt like other noble Lords, current Cross Benchers bring such experience and expertise as we can muster to the task. However, our role depends fundamentally on something different—not on experience and expertise but on the fact that we are unwhipped. There is plenty of experience and expertise on the party-political Benches but they are in a different position because they are whipped, and although they do not always vote the party line, that is nevertheless the default position. While there are sufficient numbers of unwhipped Members Governments obviously have to attend to the reality that they might lose an amendment. They have genuinely to engage and to think, and scrutiny then is possible.
So I think that the unwhipped Members will remain important, if there are any. However, it will be said, “The problem is that they will not be elected”. Again, that is not obvious to me. It is not obvious to me that it is impossible to have independents who are elected. Would it not be possible—it is not considered by either report from the scrutiny committee, but I think that it has some parallels perhaps with suggestions made earlier today by the noble Lord, Lord Low of Dalston—for a statutory independent commission, and I do not say Appointments Commission for a reason, to nominate a list of potential independent Peers which was then presented to the electorate? Of course such Peers would not be elected for constituencies; and their election would be on a closed list basis, which the scrutiny committee—rightly, I think—rejected as a basis for constituency elections.
Election of independents would, however, have to meet two conditions. Those nominated would—this is the easy condition—have to be demonstrably free of party-political connections, and have been free for a considerable period, using the criteria currently used to distinguish independent Cross-Bench Peers—as noble Lords know, not all who sit on the Cross Benches are independent Cross-Bench Peers—or perhaps stronger versions of those criteria. Secondly, it would have to be open to the public to cast a vote for any political candidates who were candidates in their constituencies or for the independent list. The electorate would have to have a choice. This would have the effect that the proportion of independents elected could vary, and it would have the effect that the House could be wholly elected.
I hope that those noble Lords who are keen on an all-elected House might take up this thought, and that they will not let themselves be deterred by fears that the party-political proportion of the membership of the House might fall below 80 per cent if the electorate were so minded. That would surely be the proper test of commitment to democracy, rather than to party politicisation. A test of this proposition: would those noble Lords who are campaigning for a wholly elected second Chamber balk if it does not guarantee a party-politicised Chamber?
Baroness Stowell of Beeston
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Northbrook, for allowing me to intervene before he starts his speech. Noble Lords may find it helpful if I remind the House of the guidance time of seven minutes. If all noble Lords were able to stick to that time, we should be able to conclude the speakers list well before 1 o’clock this morning.
Lord Northbrook
My Lords, I welcome the opportunity to discuss the report of the Joint Committee chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Richard, on the draft House of Lords Reform Bill. I will also examine the alternative report, produced by 12 out of the 26 members of the committee, which I particularly welcome. I noted the very important comment from the noble Lord, Lord Richard, earlier, that he and his committee were not starting with a clean sheet of paper. The draft Bill had to be the starting point. He also carefully emphasised that certain paragraphs were only passed by a majority, which in some cases was very small. Even the proposal for an elected House was passed by only 13 votes to nine.
I am not in favour of an elected House, unlike the majority on the committee. An elected House would undoubtedly want more powers than the current House. I agree with paragraph 4 of the report’s conclusion that this would not benefit Parliament’s overall role. There would be more scope for gridlock in legislation. An elected House would want more powers, for instance with regard to financial matters, and this should be borne in mind by the other place. Financial privilege, too, would be a much more contentious matter. I support the alternative report’s very sensible conclusion that if there is an elected House, as per the Cunningham report, the conventions between the two Houses would have to be examined again.
I move on to the subject of the primacy of the House of Commons. The inclusion of conventions in Clause 2 of the draft Bill could mean the courts deciding what these were. The committee, as many noble Lords said, also stated that Clause 2 of the draft Bill alone was not capable of preserving the primacy of the House of Commons. I agree with the committee’s view.
The size of the House was the next topic brought up by the committee. Its proposal of 450 Members was more sensible than the draft Bill’s number of 300, but I would rather see it achieved by the elapsing of time than by this radical reform. The idea that appointed Members should not have to attend as often as elected Members seems wrong.
The electoral system recommended is a form of proportional representation. It allows voters to cast a simple party vote or express preferences among individual candidates across parties as well as within them. The report prefers the version of STV used in New South Wales to the one in the Bill. As I understand it, that means compulsory voting. STV is also complicated. In addition, as the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, explained so well, the 500,000 size per constituency is ridiculous. Non-renewable terms of 15 years are proposed by the report, but how will MPs feel when they face an elected parliamentarian with a 15-year term rather than their own five-year one? Not very happy, I imagine.
I move on to the paragraphs on the Appointments Commission. I cannot understand why the commission has been so long in coming, given that we first encountered it in the House of Lords Bill 1999. However, I have two criticisms of the report. First, in paragraph 248 there is not enough detail of the areas of expertise needed: in particular, of areas such as manufacturing, finance and other professions. Secondly, it appears bizarre that paragraph 257 of the report states that appointed Peers should serve for an initial period of only five years, although with the ability to be reappointed up to the maximum limit of the elected term. Why should we not have the confidence to give them a full 15 years?
On the role of the bishops, I agree with paragraph 62 of the conclusion to the report that there should be no reserved places for bishops in an elected House. I also agree that their numbers should be cut to 12. I concur with paragraph 65, which states that the Appointments Commission should consider faith as part of the diversity criteria that it has recommended. The disqualification criteria in the report give different rules for appointed and elected Peers. It seems strange to treat Members of the same House in different ways.
I move on to the Parliament Act section in paragraphs 83 and 84 of the conclusion. It is very interesting that the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, believe that a court might rule that the Parliament Acts did not apply once the House of Lords was reformed. This would be a serious change to the balance of power between the two Houses. I agree with paragraph 368 of the main report, which states:
“In spite of the Government’s confidence, distinguished lawyers have some doubts as to whether the Parliament Acts would continue to be effective once the second chamber was elected or largely elected”.
The last main issue of the report that I will cover is paragraph 385, in which the majority of the committee agreed that the Government should submit the decision to a referendum. I was very supportive of this happening in the case of the House of Lords Act 1999—although the amendment did not succeed—and I support it now.
The alternative report has an extremely sensible conclusion not covered in the main report. It is that the Government should establish a new constitutional convention to consider the next steps on further reform of the House of Lords and any consequential impact on the House of Commons and on Parliament as a whole. While the draft Bill is faulty, the Steel Bill, as amended, could be brought to the statute book.
Overall, I am not in favour of an elected House of Lords. The noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, has produced some very interesting figures on the extra costs of a reformed House, and we have to rely on them because the coalition has refused to produce its own figures, which is a disgrace. On page 61 of the alternative report we can see an estimate of the total extra cost in year 1 of £177 million, and from 2015-2020 of no less than £433 million. Can the Minister break new ground and give the coalition’s estimate? Is this a wise use of taxpayer’s money at this very difficult time? Indeed, is this a wise piece of legislation when there are so many more important issues affecting people’s lives in these difficult economic times?
Lord Stevenson of Balmacara
My Lords, the late noble and learned Lord Bingham said in his 2009 Jan Grodecki lecture,
“for over a century the future of the House of Lords has been regarded as a problem. Our belief in the power of reason generally leads us to believe that all problems are amenable to a rational solution if sufficient thought is devoted to them. But there is in truth a small category of problems which are not amenable to a rational solution, and the problem of reforming the House of Lords while preserving its present form is one of them. That is why, despite an immense outpouring of time and talent, no solution has been found”.
A few years ago, I had some responsibility for this policy area. When I met Lord Bingham after his lecture, we had a lively discussion that left a very deep impression on me. Although I will be supporting my party on this issue, I am very pessimistic that it will ever happen, as there is clearly no consensus, so I want to make sure that although, tragically, the noble and learned Lord is no longer with us, his thoughts are represented in the record of our debate today in case we have to return to this issue, as I fear we will, in future years.
In my contribution tonight, I will follow Lord Bingham and his lateral thinking about this issue. I am going to suggest two things: we should use this opportunity for a constitutional moment of reform to make the House of Commons more effective as a legislating Chamber and, since the Lords does invaluable work as a revising Chamber and in the work of its specialist committees, seek to enhance that contribution by creating what Lord Bingham called the “Council of the Realm”.
It is clear from the huge number of discussions and debates we have had on this topic that the main issues which bedevil any discussion of how to reform your Lordships’ House are the reform of its composition and the interrelated but different reform of the powers of the Lords. On composition, we are not the only country to be having problems about how to organise our second Chamber. A recent report has suggested that,
“few democracies were content with their second Chambers, and that many were engaged ‘in an apparently incessant dialogue about how they should be reformed’”.
That sounds familiar. It continued:
“The reason why so many countries are unhappy with their second chambers is that there is a problem of a very fundamental kind in creating a second chamber in a modern democracy, especially in a non-federal state. A second chamber needs to be based upon an alternative principle of representation to that embodied in the first chamber. But what is that principle to be? How can the same electorate be represented in two different ways in two different chambers?”.
Our House of Commons,
“represents the principle of individual representation. What alternative principle should the second Chamber represent?”.
As Lord Bingham was quick to point out, the irony is that the current composition of your Lordships’ House enables it to evade the conundrum of finding an alternative principle of representation to that used for electing the House of Commons. This is a point I want to return to.
On powers, it is arguable that, for most practical purposes, one of the main consequences of the Parliament Acts has been to produce unicameral government in Britain. I say that because it is patently clear that the Lords cannot effectively resist the legislation of a determined Government. This effect is magnified by the coalition, and we have seen this Session that the Government can whip their legislation through both Houses without much difficulty. The truth, as Professor Vernon Bogdanor has said, is that the Parliament Acts have, in effect, ensured that Britain has not developed a strong bicameral legislature. What we have is a unicameral system with two Chambers. The consequence is that this unelected, and hence undemocratic, House spends a great deal of time doing what the House of Commons does not do well enough: ensuring that the Government’s legislation is fit for purpose, making government more efficient, but, in essence, within a unicameral system, albeit across two Houses. Surely we should try to sort that out first.
In 1975, a former Conservative Leader of this House, Lord Windlesham, wrote that,
“the House of Lords should not attempt to rival the Commons. Whenever it has done so in the past it has failed, and usually made itself look ridiculous in the process”.
He goes on to argue:
“In any well-tuned parliamentary system there is a need and a place for a third element besides efficient government and the operation of representative democracy. This third element is the bringing to bear of informed or expert public opinion”.
In other words, was Lord Bingham right to suggest that if one could make the House of Commons do its job more effectively, one possible future role for your Lordships’ House would be to provide a forum in which “informed public opinion” can take shape, and that we should do more of what we are already good at: providing a space for the deployment of special knowledge and the representation of interests not otherwise present in the House of Commons?
In his lecture, Lord Bingham suggested that since it was not possible to come up with a rational reform of the House of Lords, what should happen is that the House of Commons should do what it is elected to do and the House of Lords should become what he called the “Council of the Realm”. I would prefer pinching the ancient title of the Privy Council, but whatever it was called, the council,
“would differ from the House of Lords superficially in that membership would involve no outdated pretence of nobility, and it would differ fundamentally in having no legislative power. It could not make law. It could not … obstruct the will of the Commons”.
Its power would be to recommend amendments, which the Commons would have a statutory responsibility to consider.
According to Lord Bingham:
“The Council would, however, resemble the House of Lords in crucial respects. Its members, appointed not elected, would be very much the same people, and the same sorts of people, as now make up the house. It would perform, but in an advisory and not a lawmaking way, the revising function it now performs. Its expert committees could function much as they do now. It could debate issues of public moment”.
Future recruitment would be by appointment, by a statutory appointments commission, with a remit to ensure wide experience, broad representation of interests, and gender and diversity balance. Lord Bingham suggested that,
“the number of members would be governed by the need of the Council to be able to call on members with knowledge and experience in politics but also, and particularly, in the multifarious fields which fall to be considered in a complex modern state … In this way, the most valuable functions of the existing house could be preserved”.
but the clever point is that what was referred to as,
“the features of the house which fuel calls for reform could be eliminated”.
Of course, more detail is required to flesh out this proposal, but as it neatly sidesteps many of the difficulties likely to be faced by the Government’s draft Bill, I hope that Lord Bingham’s thoughts may at some future point be considered worthy of consideration by your Lordships’ House. At the very least, we should keep in mind his view that there is,
“a small category of problems which are not amenable to a rational solution”,
and recognise that neither of the two excellent reports, nor the Bill likely to be before us shortly, provide that elusive solution.
Lord Shipley
My Lords, I am privileged to have been a Member of your Lordships’ House for almost two years now. In that time, I have lost count of the number of times people have urged that the House of Lords should prevent Bills passing and that, despite being an unelected Chamber, we should prevent the elected Chamber from delivering its programme. As we know, this reflects in part a lack of understanding of the role of this Chamber. We exist, and must continue to exist, to revise and to scrutinise legislation, not to challenge the primacy of the House of Commons.
Too much legislation reaches us without proper scrutiny having been undertaken. It would be unthinkable for there not to be a second Chamber in which such revisions can be made. The role of this Chamber must remain to revise legislation for consideration and confirmation by the elected Chamber, but it does not follow that a wholly or partly elected second Chamber would inevitably end up competing for primacy with the House of Commons, as has been claimed.
I was impressed by the submission of the Hansard Society on this matter. It argued:
“The different electoral system, term lengths and limits proposed for the reformed Lords, coupled with the constitutional reality that it is the Commons from which the government is formed and where it must sustain confidence, should underpin the primacy of the Commons”.
I concur with its thinking and, with an agreed concordat and the codifying of Lords powers and conventions as proposed by the Electoral Reform Society, it is entirely possible to prevent the potential for conflict.
I believe instinctively in a 100 per cent elected second Chamber. It is hard to see on what basis it can be democratic for this Chamber to be unelected. When we revise Bills we are inevitably legislating and, in so doing, we should have a clear democratic mandate for what we do. I do not accept the argument that House of Commons primacy takes care of democracy, because the House of Commons cannot do everything. The House of Lords influences and amends Bills significantly. In so doing, it should derive its power from its own democratic mandate.
However, I am very conscious of the independence of thought and the expertise that comes from the system of nomination to this House. In particular, the Cross Benches provide an essential antidote to domination by party politics. For that reason, I would be very content with a House in which 80 per cent of its Members are elected and 20 per cent are nominated by an independent appointments commission. With 450 Members altogether, the present culture of this House could continue with no party in majority control.
To prevent domination by one political party requires a system of proportional representation, as recommended rightly by the Joint Committee. But the use of proportional representation is vital for another reason. In 2000, the royal commission concluded that there was a need to ensure greater representation from some of the constituent parts of the United Kingdom. In the 12 years since then, little seems to have changed. Of the 614 Members of this House who have registered an address as their main residence, only 74 are in the north-west, Yorkshire and the north-east. The north-east has 16 Members, Yorkshire has 27 and the north-west has 31. If we add the 15 Members from the East Midlands and the 23 from the West Midlands to the 74 from the north of England, just 112 Members of this House are from those five English regions. That amounts to just 18 per cent of the total when they have a population of 24 million, which is almost 40 per cent of the UK. These figures compare with 273 Members from London and the south-east—some 44 per cent of the total membership, but with a population that is seven million fewer. An electoral system for 80 per cent of the membership of this House based on proportional representation would go a long way to putting right this serious anomaly and would ensure that this Chamber reflects the nations and regions of the UK.
Finally, public opinion is strongly behind reform. A recent YouGov poll showed 69 per cent in favour of reform of the House, with 33 per cent wanting a fully elected second Chamber and only 5 per cent wanting the status quo. The British Social Attitudes Survey has found that one-fifth of people would prefer to close this House down altogether. Therefore, we need to think very carefully about what the public feel because I do not think that trying to maintain the status quo, as some would like to do, will work. Parliament needs to listen to the general public on this issue and to act accordingly, which is why any proposed constitutional change simply must be backed by a positive vote in a referendum. It will not be enough to rely solely on three party manifestos.
Lord Dobbs
My Lords, one can wait for years for a report to come along, then two arrive at the same time. I should like to add my thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and all those concerned with the Joint Committee report and the alternative report. The default position for supporters of the draft Bill is that it is needed because of our democratic deficit. I think that it was the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, who compared us earlier today to Belarus—or was it Baluchistan or Bahrainistan? Anyway, he was very angry about it and proclaimed that our country’s democracy is in terrible danger, so why not let us give this democracy thing a go and wander down the path to see where it leads?
The first thing to be said about democracy is that it is not simply about voting. Lots of countries have voting, but that does not make them democracies, and if voting were the answer we would already be in Camelot. Over the past 20 years we have elected more politicians than at any time in our history, yet the other day Hansard Society reported that political disengagement and disillusion in Britain has reached record levels. But, we are told, we have got to have more of the miracle cure—more elected politicians because the people want them, including an elected Lords. The noble Lord, Lord Shipley, has just told us that opinion polls prove the point. But that leaves me wondering, if opinion polls are so meaningful, why, for instance, do we not bring back hanging or get out of the European Union? Democracy can be a funny old game and we should kick it around with care.
Rather like the committee, I wonder why those who speak loudly about the merits of democracy are so often the same voices raised to deny the people their say in a referendum. I seem to recall spending much of last year being whipped through the Lobbies to vote for dozens of different referenda for every new EU post from dog catcher to crèche convener. We have the money to spend on all that, but we have neither the time nor, it seems, the will to ask the people about one of the most significant constitutional changes in a century. The committee saw this as being profoundly inconsistent, and it was right.
As so many noble Lords have pointed out, we are in the midst of a double-dip recession, yet here we are with a Bill that proposes to shove still more taxpayers’ money down the throats of politicians. Is that really what democracy is about? Ask the Government how much more money and they come over all coy and refuse to answer. They have not worked out the sums, so they say, perhaps because the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, has got there first and exposed just how costly this Bill would be. But let us not argue too much right now about the odd few hundred million; I am sure the people will understand what good value an elected second Chamber would be. However, my suspicion is that high up the list of democracy’s demands is for a Parliament that is above board and honest, or at least reasonably so. I am long enough in the tooth to know that no Parliament is ever painted pure white, but if you were to ask the people which of this country’s Houses of Parliament has a reputation for scandal and sleaze and self-interest, they would not be pointing the finger at this end of the building.
There is another awkward little thing. Democracy demands a Parliament that makes sound laws: government for the people. But what the people seem to get as a matter of course nowadays is something totally different: legislation that starts off being ill-conceived then goes on to be ill-considered as guillotines chop their way through debate and sensible discussion—at least until it gets to this, unelected, Chamber of Parliament. If there is a democratic deficit in our system, it is not at this end of the building. Yet the cry goes up: let us have elections, more elections. Where will it stop? Should we elect our judges too? There is just as much logic in that. Or should we even elect our monarch? Suddenly, voting does not seem as much fun or so necessary.
There is one final argument that gets used to establish this Bill’s democratic credentials, which is that it was in all three party manifestoes. I have an admission to make: I am a Conservative. In the 18 or so words with which this matter was set out in my party’s manifesto—widely read from end to end of this country, I am sure—it called for consensus. That is what I feel bound to and that is what, over the coming months, I will do my best to achieve. The noble Lord, Lord Richard, and his committee have spelt out just how difficult that will be, but we must live in hope. And while we are struggling to achieve consensus, we can leave the Government to concentrate on their own noble struggle to dig us out of our economic mess.
The hour is late, so let me conclude. I am very keen on the reform of this House, but this misbegotten draft Bill is not it. The Bill will not do, and it is so demonstrably flawed that it will not go through. The people will not understand, nor will they forgive, if the Government waste months of parliamentary time on this self-indulgence when they should be putting their interests and future first.
Lord Morris of Handsworth
My Lords, to be listed at 53 in the batting order is not just a new experience but a promotion for me. However, if the exercise was a cricket match, I would by now appeal against the light.
I am sure that the House is grateful to the Joint Committee and its contributors, particularly the noble Lord, Lord Richard, who led their work. Unlike other attempts at Lords reform, this debate is informed also by what is described as the alternative report. I have to disclose that, on balance, my preference goes to the latter for reasons that I shall explain later.
The authors of both reports will have recognised that some of these issues were last explored by the Royal Commission on the Reform of the House of Lords led by the noble Lord, Lord Wakeham—here I declare an interest as a member of that commission. The issues were as clear then as they are now: the need for a democratic revising Chamber which holds the Government to account without challenging the supremacy of the elected House and the existing conventions.
The question posed by the draft Bill is how we get to that dual destination. There are only three routes: direct election, appointment or a combination of both—the 20:80 formula. Common sense tells us that a direct-elections system does not necessarily deliver the required expertise for the task of scrutiny and accountability.
Before I joined the royal commission, I was quite clear about the need for a fully elected second Chamber. At face value, that need seems very clear: those who make the laws that govern the people should enjoy the mandate of the people. But how would we guarantee the broad range of experience that I see before me when I come into your Lordships’ Chamber, and the expert opinions which inform our debates and bring experience to our scrutiny in our committees and in our Chamber?
I have yet to hear a debate in this Chamber during which there has not been at least one Member, and often many more, able to offer real-life experience of the subject under discussion. We hear from those who have spent years working and building expertise in many professions—in the sciences, medicine, commerce, the private and public sectors and, yes, trade unions.
In many instances, it is not a question of getting elected. I doubt whether many here would even stand as candidates. That is why I see the report of the Joint Committee as work in progress and why, as I have already declared, my preference goes to the alternative report as the guiding rails for future travel.
I have come to this conclusion because it is clear that, save for the Joint Committee on Conventions led by the noble Lord, Lord Cunningham, which reported in 2006, no serious effort on Lords reform has been made since the Wakeham commission reported in 2000. It is therefore an opportunity missed, as it appears that the Joint Committee restricted its consideration to matters exclusive to the draft Bill and the White Paper.
We pride ourselves on being an open democracy with public interest in our work, but our working hours and working practices are not exactly public-friendly. We end up debating to an empty Public Gallery because of the way that business in our House is organised. It is little wonder that the alternative report declared the Bill and the White Paper to be a flawed example of delivering a stated objective.
However, my key reason for supporting the alternative report is the proposal for a constitutional convention. As we know, constitutional conventions are a political tool used here at home and abroad. At home they are used to pursue and co-ordinate opinion, as we have seen in respect of the Scottish Parliament and devolution in 1999. Therefore, I stand four-square behind the proposals in the alternative report for a Westminster-led constitutional convention with broad representation and a wide agenda that will include a root and branch review of the conventions that underpin the relationship of our two Houses of Parliament.
While I welcome the recognition for pluralism in the alternative report, I see no specific commitment to diversity, which I believe to be an important component in a plural democracy. On that point, I conclude with some words and actions by President Clinton. In his first term of office, he rejected a number of nominees for office in his Administration. When challenged to explain his reasons for rejection, he said simply that he wanted his Government to look like America. I want the House of Lords and our public institutions to look like the United Kingdom.
Lord Bilimoria
My Lords, I remember that soon after David Cameron took over as leader of the Official Opposition, he came to meet the Cross-Bench Peers and was asked what he thought of House of Lords reform. He said, “Of course we believe in a mainly elected House of Lords, don’t we, Tom?”, referring to the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, who is not in his place. The noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, looked up at the ceiling and rolled his eyes. David Cameron continued, “But of course, Tom, that is something I will deal with in my third term”. Mind you, Mr Cameron said that back in 2006 when Britain’s economy was booming, as was the rest of the world’s. As the Nobel laureate, Paul Krugman, pointed out last week:
“Britain is officially in double-dip recession, and has achieved the remarkable feat of doing worse this time around than it did in the 1930s”.
On top of that, we have a Government in crisis in so many areas with many issues that have upset many people, such as the recent Budget. So many of the Government’s austerity measures have been rushed through and not thought through—the strategic defence and security review in 2010, for example. On top of all that, we have the eurozone crisis, which in all probability is about to blow up, and as the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, said, what are we debating today, tomorrow and for days on end following the gracious Speech is not a plan for growth and recovery in the economy but a plan for House of Lords reform. Yes, it has been pointed out that this was in the manifestos of all three parties and that evolutionary reform was called for in the shape of the reforms originally outlined by the noble Lord, Lord Steel, in his Bill. But this is not the time to force on us revolutionary reform of the House of Lords, which will turn our constitution upside down.
The Prime Minister who most radically reformed the House of Lords in the previous century was Tony Blair and even he said that,
“the key question … is whether we want a revising Chamber or a rival Chamber. My view is that we want a revising Chamber”.—[Official Report, Commons, 29/1/03; col. 877.]
One of the main reasons that we are going through this unfortunate distraction is because of the will of one my Cambridge contemporaries, the Deputy Prime Minister. He holds a utopian, ideological view that elected equals democratic equals legitimate. Mr Clegg and his allies have also tried to use the argument that other bicameral Parliaments have democratically elected upper Houses so why should we not? There are other Parliaments that do not even have upper Houses and countries whose upper Houses do not work properly, do not have the talent that we do or are in constant gridlock with their lower Houses. The ultimate, democratically elected upper House with real power and the resources to use that power is the United States Senate. The drawback, of course, is that the Senate does not have the depth or diversity of expertise that we have. Some 54 per cent of Senators in the United States are lawyers and powers are divided between the two Houses. In many cases, the Senate has more power than the lower House. That is not on the table in this country. Why do the Government not have the guts to go all the way, the whole hog, and propose a US-style Senate for Britain?
No, like the other hasty proposals that this Government have put forward affecting our economy, education, healthcare and defence, this draft Bill has not been thought through. A hastily put together Joint Committee has come up with a report that half its members do not agree with, to the extent that, for the first time that I can recall, they have broken away and published their own alternative report. The noble Lord, Lord Richard, is not in his place, yet this was not a Joint Committee but a disjointed committee. Instead of reforming our House, we are making laughing stocks of ourselves.
As the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, said on the argument that polls show that people want an elected House of Lords, that is only because, as other polls show, there is a huge lack of understanding of the working of the House of Lords by the public. I have seen this time and again in speeches that I have given around the country. When I ask the public if the House of Lords should be elected, they initially all say yes, but when I explain to them the function and working of the House of Lords, they change their minds and say it should stay appointed.
There are two key issues here. First, what is the role of the House of Lords, does it have the right people in its make-up to carry out that role, are they effective in that job, and, as a result, is the House of Lords effective? The second issue is constitutional. We decided in 1911 that the House of Commons should have supremacy as a democratically elected Chamber, so there could never be a prolonged deadlock between the two Houses. On both these issues, the House of Lords as it stands today fulfils its role as the guardian of this nation, as a check and balance, scrutinising, questioning and challenging the Government and the Commons each and every day through its legislation, debates and questions, and through its Select Committees. It does this in a way that the House of Commons could not even dream of imagining.
I challenge people regularly to name me a renowned world expert in any field in the House of Commons. They cannot name one. I am proud that in the House of Lords we have a sense of independence and objectivity that the other place simply could not match. This credible and incredible wisdom is unique in the world. Our method of debating through the self-regulating system is also unique. We do not need to be like or copy anyone else. After all, Westminster is the mother of all Parliaments. We do all this for a fraction of the cost of the House of Commons. What the Government propose will cost us at least half a billion pounds more per Parliament, if not much more. Unsurprisingly, the Joint Committee report does not even attempt a costing. It says that that is because the Government refuse to give a costing. Would you start a new business without doing a proper business plan? This is pathetic.
Whatever the Government say about the current conventions remaining in place, they are living in a dreamland. There is no way that an elected or partially elected House of Lords would for long accept subservience to the House of Commons. What is more, I cannot see how, by making people stand for elections, we could possibly maintain the amazing depth and breadth of knowledge we currently have in this House. We would end up with a House full of second-raters compared to the one we have today. Even today, the public holds very little respect for politicians. How will they feel if the House of Lords was filled with career politicians rather than the experts with real-world knowledge that it has today? Is this the way we increase the legitimacy of the House of Lords? It would have exactly the opposite effect.
Mark my words: if we go down the route of an elected House of Lords, we are moving to a written constitution. If we are moving one step closer to a written constitution, we are moving one step closer to a republic. Not only are we wasting precious time here, we are playing with fire. By pushing through this reform, the Government will throw the baby out with the bath-water. We have a delicate yet robust, a very ancient but tried and tested, a very complex but yet crystal clear unwritten constitution, one that has stood the test of time. By putting means before ends this Government are endangering, destabilising and wrecking all this by wrecking this precious House. As I have said before, the fundamental lesson in home improvement is that you can move the walls and raise the levels, but when you play around with the foundations you risk bringing the whole House down.
Lord Framlingham
My Lords, our country is facing a perilous economic situation, which is likely to last for some time to come. For any Government, coalition or otherwise, to attempt to drive through major disruptive and potentially disastrous changes to our long-established and proven parliamentary structure in this situation strikes me as utter folly.
The structure of our two Houses that make up Parliament is not responsible for any shortcomings in government that there may be. It is how we, the Members of both Houses, use the structures that really matters. Some people seek to change things in the name of democracy, and we have heard much about that in today’s debate, in the mistaken belief that the changes will improve government. The truth is that the way in which we behave is often more important than the structures themselves. Certainly, change for change’s sake solves nothing; it can do more harm than good and, as in this case, could damage beyond repair a unique institution that, although far from perfect, by and large does the task asked of it very well indeed.
The only justifiable reason for change is to produce better government, but that can be achieved without destroying existing structures. I suggest that the Government and its Ministers should concentrate not on legislation but on sound administration. I was for 27 years a Member in the other place, from 1983 to 2010. I ask your Lordships how many education Acts were passed in those years. The answer is 33. Most grammar schools were abolished and the whole educational system deteriorated. How many health Acts were passed in that time? The answer is 35. We got rid of matrons from our hospitals and everybody knows what a mess the NHS was reduced to. How many Acts in that period were on criminal justice? There were 100—a veritable torrent of legislation that produced little or no benefit to anyone. The answer must surely be better administration and less legislation.
I would like to add to less legislation two things—pre-legislative scrutiny of all Bills and the abolition of the guillotine, or programming as it is currently called. If we could stem the torrent of legislation and persuade Ministers and their departments to concentrate their energies on sound administration, if we could subject every Bill to detailed all-party scrutiny before it was even published and if we could abolish the guillotine to prevent this House from having to deal with wagon-loads of undigested legislation that comes down the Corridor, perhaps your Lordships’ House, with its wealth of experience and wisdom, could be allowed to carry out its traditional role of revising, fine-tuning and, yes, occasionally rejecting legislation brought before it, which it is uniquely qualified to do. These measures, coupled with the modest reforms that the House is already prepared to accept, would deliver better government without the need for the drastic and dangerous experiment that is this draft Bill.
Lord Lea of Crondall
My Lords, to say that this Bill is half-baked is to put it politely, and the idea of pushing it forward in the next Session, even with the guillotine, is offensive. That would be a procedure which would be admired in a banana republic. Indeed, it is perhaps not untimely to go right back to the fundamental question: what is the problem? I must conclude that the only instrument that the Government had to hand was a sledgehammer. One would not otherwise use a sledgehammer to crack a nut. The whole point about that metaphor, which we use every day of the week without perhaps stopping to think about it, is that you do not use a sledgehammer to crack a nut.
The sledgehammer in this case is, to use the demotic, to deal with some deficiencies in the procedures and method of appointment to this Chamber. Indeed, I am reminded a bit of that other great example of overreaction which took place during the Second World War, when a leading admiral in the United States Navy went to see President Roosevelt and said, “Mr President, Sir, I’ve got the solution to the U-boat problem”. “Well”, asked the President, “what’s that”? “Drain the north Atlantic”, said the admiral. That did not go down all that well, but there are a few jokes in this. Anyway, there you go: you win some and you lose some.
However, there are many practical things that many of us have advocated for many years. Indeed, the Labour group wrote unanimously to Tony Blair five years ago in answer to his request, “Have you got any ideas?”. I had a hand in writing the letter, as a matter of fact, along with Robin Corbett. We had a whole string of things, including a statutory appointments commission which would entail the Labour Party, as well as the other parties, looking seriously at reducing prime ministerial patronage and finding out about the different constituent parts. This is in the same spirit in which my noble friend Lord Morris of Handsworth was speaking: to find some new formula—whether regionally, industrially or in any other way—to give more confidence within the constituency parties that this was a House of Lords of which they had some ownership. The Labour Party constitution could certainly be easily adjusted to provide it. That is a practical answer to a practical problem, without overreacting in this totally dramatic way.
We have some very sober committee reports on the record. I, too, recall what I think was the unanimous report of the Cunningham committee, that one could not simply state that the conventions would remain. Yet here we are, and as far as I can see the Richard report has more or less said, “Yes you can”, when clearly the answer is, “No you can’t”. We cannot just look at the next Session and expect to get the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, or some equally brilliant draftsman, to rewrite Clause 2 to remove the problem. This is not that sort of problem. Perhaps noble Lords will correct me in a few minutes.
The report sees there being no change in the powers and functions of the two Houses. How? This leads to the committee struggling with the corset that it wants to put around the new Senate to make sure that these conflicts with the House of Commons do not arise. I think I am right in saying that there is some reference to the fact that IPSA should make no provision for casework by the Senate. Surely, that is struggling a long way to make sure that the corset still holds the Senate in check.
This relates to a point made in a most interesting way in one of the most interesting contributions, by my noble friend Lord Whitty. He said, “After all, we are not America. We don’t have a Supreme Court that arbitrates between the House of Representatives and the Senate”. I have been thinking about that in the past half-hour. One could put up a plausible—if not even more convincing—case to say the opposite. Are there not members of the Supreme Court right now, on the other side of Parliament Square, licking their lips because that is exactly the function that they will have? They are servants of the people; they work 24/7.
If there is a historian of the American Senate and House of Representatives here, I am sure I will be corrected but I do not think I have got this wrong. We are celebrating the centenary of the 17th amendment of the American constitution, which was made in 1912. It effectively meant that, instead of the states doing their own thing through their own indirect methods to appoint the Senate, they moved to direct elections. Many historians would say that this was when the Senate started to become the more important of the two Houses. I think it would happen here for all the reasons that made it happen in the United States. There is every reason to say that we are not like America, from the monarchy downwards. However, in this respect there would be that opening, which we might regret, for a role for the Supreme Court.
On the role of MPs, when somebody says that we do not hear MPs say openly that they are worried about their relationship, that is true, but the reason is the one that would have been given by Mandy Rice-Davies: they wouldn’t say that, would they?
I conclude from the same position as my noble friend Lord Morris of Handsworth. I vote for the alternative report and, from doing my sums this evening, I think that I am alongside at least three-quarters of this House.
Lord Phillips of Sudbury
My Lords, I thank those who compiled this report and those who compiled the alternative report. I find myself much more in sympathy with the alternative report. Tonight I speak against my instincts. My instincts are for democratic elections to be held wherever they are practical and worth while. I know that some of my noble friends, if not all of them, agree with that. However, I am not at all persuaded that the proposed reforms of this House will achieve their aims, irrespective of whether it is wholly or partly elected. Indeed, I think that a partly elected House would be more of a dog’s dinner than a wholly elected one. I am much more committed to the reforms proposed in the original Steel Bill, with others besides—in particular the reform of the appointments system, which is lacking. I believe that criteria for appointments should be agreed between both Houses of Parliament.
Having said that, I am very concerned that we are throwing the baby out with the bath water and not recognising sufficiently the very considerable benefits that accrue from the status quo: namely, that this House adds value to the other place in two ways that I am convinced will not survive election. Everyone has referred to those two principal virtues: namely, that we in this place are experience-rich and relatively independent. Those virtues stand in increasingly strong contrast with what happens in the other place, which I have no wish to disparage. It is made up of good, true and well intentioned young men and women. However, they are young and inexperienced, as others have said. They come mainly from a professional flight path and are ever more susceptible to the regimentation and partisanship that have made the other place into a wholly ineffective control on the Government of the day.
You only have to look at the number of guillotines that are applied and the number of Bills that arrive in this House having been only partially considered. You only have to look at the quantity of legislation that is enabled by this production line, to which the noble Lord, Lord Framlingham, referred. We are now legislating between 12,000 and 15,000 pages of new statute law a year and we repeal only about 2,000, 3,000 or 4,000 pages. We are legislating more than any respectable democracy in the western world by far. Dire consequences arise from having this excessive quantity of legislation, much of which is half baked and not implemented, or implemented unevenly; and we know it. I believe that the election of this House would worsen that state of affairs. The notion that this place, when elected, will somehow be a better check on the Executive is laughable. I will say a word or two more about that in a second.
We spend more time dealing with the legislation here and we deal with it in a more open-minded fashion. Above all, we do not take the Government’s word for it, as they constantly do in the other place. I repeat the statistic that I put to my noble friend Lord Ashdown: in the 13 years in which the previous Labour Government were in power, they suffered less than one defeat in the House of Commons every two years. That made a total of six over 13 years. What sort of control on the Executive does that represent? By contrast, in this House—it is hard to believe it—the Labour Government were defeated not six times but 528 times. In the nearly two years of the coalition’s term in office, there have been no defeats in the other place but 48 in this House. Noble Lords may say that those defeats do not stick and are overturned in the other place. However, that is not the case. A great deal of hard work has been done on this by the Constitution Unit at UCL. It is not an easy calculation to make, but Meg Russell and her colleague, Maria Sciara, reckon that 40 per cent of the amendments that we win through the Lobbies in the Lords stick in whole or in part, although there are compromises, of course, and that we make a major impact on legislation. We are doing the job that the primary, the only democratic, Chamber does not do. What does that tell us about our state of affairs and the health of our democracy? Not much, I suggest.
Public disenchantment with politics has been referred to by one or two noble Peers. We have to be very careful indeed about giving way to reforms that could, I believe, worsen that state of affairs. I refer to one particular poll that noble Lords may have seen referred to in the useful Library Note on public attitudes towards the reform of this place, published in March this year. The final poll in the report deals with general attitudes and was conducted by Ipsos MORI in 2009. It found that in 2001 the proportion of the public satisfied with the work of Parliament as a whole was 45 per cent. By 2009 it had dropped to 20 per cent. The dissatisfaction level had risen from 30 per cent in 2001 to 63 per cent in 2009. More tellingly, when the figures between the Commons and Lords were broken down, the poll found that in 2009 15 per cent were satisfied with the performance of the House of Commons, while 71 per cent were dissatisfied. We did not do too well, but we did a heck of a lot better—23 per cent were satisfied and 50 per cent were dissatisfied. That is scarcely a case for the major reform of this place, and is more likely to be a case for reform of the other place.
The level of disenchantment is important, and the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy, referred to the Power inquiry. The public want less party control, more independence, more life experience and less legislation. Moreover, there is no public agitation for election to this House. If there were people on the streets with petitions and rest of it, I would take a different view, but there is no sign of them. Anecdotally, I find very few people who do other than come up to me and say, “Thank God for the House of Lords”. When I held a public meeting in Sudbury to consider the matter of electing this House or not, a poll at the beginning of the meeting found quite a number in favour, but at the end of the meeting—and all points of view were fairly represented—there was a complete switch. Again and again, this is the experience.
I am sorry; I should sit down and shut up. However, there is a paradox at the heart of all this. I am content for the Commons to be the democratic Chamber and for us, as the inferior House, to retain the virtues of complementariness.
Baroness Wheatcroft
My Lords, the duck-billed platypus is a remarkable creature but is evidence that evolution does not always go as planned, so when I read in the committee’s report that,
“We agree with the weight of the evidence we have received which suggests that the conventions governing the relationship between the two Houses will evolve further once the House of Lords is reformed and would need to be re-defined”,
I am fearful.
An elected second Chamber, whether 80 per cent or 100 per cent elected, would very quickly evolve into a challenger to the House of Commons’ primacy. I cannot claim to have been the first to have made that observation today, but when you come on at number 58, it is very difficult. However, it is for that reason that I cannot support the idea of the drastic constitutional change that is now being proposed. Clause 2 of the draft Bill would not guarantee primacy to the Commons.
Under the previous Government, we saw unprecedented constitutional change: a Supreme Court, devolved Assemblies with new electoral systems, and statutory human rights. The changes came fast, and problems such as the unsolved West Lothian question followed closely behind. If the implications appeared to be unconsidered, it is perhaps because they were. A senior Cabinet Minister of that period has since said:
“Although I don’t think we necessarily meant to do this, we did effect a very fundamental change in the way government is run. We deprived the Executive of a lot more power than we ever intended”.
If we are to effect fundamental change in the relationship between the two Houses of Parliament, we should at least mean to do it. It would be unforgivable to have what the noble Baroness, Lady Symons of Vernham Dean, criticised as a “give it a try and see what happens” approach.
The Government seem determined to alter our constitution drastically, with little idea of where it will end. The PR involved here is not proportional representation but public relations with the Liberal Democrats. At the very least, such a far-reaching change should be put to a referendum, as the Joint Committee recommends, but the Deputy Prime Minister would deny us that. His response to the idea of a vote was to ask:
“Why is it that we should spend a great deal of money asking the British people a question that frankly most people don't worry about very much?”—
a good question. Most people have other things to worry about at the moment. As the country faces a double-dip recession, the essential hunt for economic growth is not being obstructed by the House of Lords. On the contrary, this Chamber is working hard to come up with ideas that might help. However, extended parliamentary debate on the future of this House may well be a dangerous distraction from the most important issue: “It’s the economy, stupid”.
That is not to say that there is no need for reform. As a relative newcomer to your Lordships’ House, I have been hugely impressed by the extent of the work that goes on here, both in the Chamber and in committees, but we could and should be more streamlined and efficient. The Steel Bill is an obvious starting point. It could be quickly activated. I was also interested in the proposal of the noble Lord, Lord Low of Dalston. The House of Lords Appointments Commission might be receptive to nominations from colleges of experts. It might even hold a certain number of seats for them.
However, there are other ways to make us look relevant and counter criticisms that we are a talking shop. Too often, maximum speaking times are interpreted as minimum speaking times. We could speed up our proceedings by embracing the view that less is sometimes more, so I will sit down.
Lord Winston
My Lords, looking around the Chamber, I see a great deal of shellshocked people, so I will try not to detain your Lordships for long. I was rather surprised at the cricket analogy, given that your Lordships have been good enough to miss the Manchester derby, which is a far more important occasion. I hope that you all realise that Manchester City are now heading the table.
When I came into your Lordships’ House 17 years ago, there was a notice in the Prince’s Chamber which said that your Lordships should not indulge in vexatious argument, which was from an Act of Parliament of 1623. I think that the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, remembers the notice; it has now gone. That is important to me because, when you turn on the television and watch Prime Minister’s Questions on Wednesday, you think how appalling Parliament is in its complete lack of rational argument, with people simply slavishly following a stupid political line. There is a serious risk that that brings our politics into disrepute. When you add the guillotine and people walking through the Lobby without having listened to the arguments, there are serious questions which also affect your Lordships’ House. I have found it very dispiriting in recent weeks when we have felt that we have to do that out of loyalty to our side. I feel that this House works best when it is not too political—although it has to be political to some extent.
I remember sitting at the top of the table when I chaired the Science and Technology Select Committee 10 years ago and I could not say who was Labour, who was Conservative, who was independent and who was a hereditary Peer, because everybody there had an important point to make which was worth looking at. At my first meeting of that committee, nuclear waste was the issue and there was a risk of our decision being split. I was told by my clerk, “Whatever you do, please try to avoid a vote”. Looking at the report of my noble friend Lord Richard, one has to say that it is constantly split with votes. Is this democracy at work? I am not sure that it is.
At this late hour, I shall not go into great detail. I noticed a frown on the face of the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, and I saw his wise comment in the Times last week about my being here by patronage. Perhaps he knew more than I did. When I came into this House and met my noble friend Lord Richard, he asked whether I might consider taking the Labour Whip. I said, “Actually, I’m a member of the Labour Party”, to which he replied, “Are you sure?”. It is a pity that he is not in his place to confirm that this evening. I am not sure what “by patronage” means but a large number of us on both sides of the House will try whenever we can to vote according to our beliefs. With the health Bill, for example, there were at least two amendments on which I was seriously at odds with my own side. It was one of the most horrible Bills that I have dealt with and I felt very strongly about it, but I could not vote with my own side on two occasions because I thought that occasionally we, too, are wrong.
Finally—I shall reserve most of my comments for later, because this issue is going to come back again and again—there are no easy solutions to what is proposed. The idea of an electoral college sounds good but there are so many problems associated with sorting out an electoral college that I am not sure it would work. I think that a referendum ought to be seriously on the cards but your Lordships should remember that they may not get what they anticipate when it happens.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard
It is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Winston. When I was his chairman at Imperial, the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, was also on the college council, and I do not think that she or I managed to catch up with him, so following him is quite easy—I am used to it.
I do not agree at all with the noble Lord’s strictures on the report; nor do I agree with the stronger strictures from the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria. As I understand it, it is an agreed report with a supplementary alternative. To call the report disjointed is unfair but I think it is more unfair to criticise it for the defects of the Bill. The terms of reference to which the noble Lord, Lord Richard, worked—and we owe him and his committee a great deal of thanks—were to report on the Bill, not on Lords reform. Therefore, there are a number of matters that the committee has not touched on in detail because the Bill does not do so. In particular, it is a pity that indirect elections have not been more explored. Both the report and the alternative report make it clear that their authors believe that the issue should be explored further but it just does not happen to be in the Bill.
I also think it is a pity that the potential future role of the Lords as the cement of the United Kingdom is not discussed. My noble friend Lord Hennessy spoke of this as the grade one issue. The noble Lord, Lord Steel, also spoke of it, and I agree with both of them. I think that there is a very important role for the Lords. I suspect that we will have further devolution that will make the West Lothian question still more significant, and part of the answer may be found in this House.
I have been very polite about the report, but there is one point which is touched on only obliquely and briefly in one paragraph—paragraph 104. The noble Lords, Lord Cunningham of Felling and Lord Cormack, are quoted as talking about the difficulties that could arise if the non-elected Members were decisive in a vote on a constitutional issue. The noble Lord, Lord Cormack, referred to it today as a point that I have made. I have made the point and it is very nice of him to attribute it to me but in the report it is attributed to him.
I am very concerned about hybridity, which seems to me to mean instability—hybridity without a rationale. There is no rationale in the Government’s White Paper or in the Government’s Bill or in the Richard report. If democratic legitimacy is to be the determinant or the touchstone—I see the argument for that—then by definition the non-elected, the non-democratically legitimate are illegitimate.
The House was good enough to vote for a couple of amendments that I tabled on the EU Bill, but I found it very difficult to vote for them when they came back after they were rejected by the House of Commons. My difficulty would be greatly enhanced if I were in the small, unelected minority in an 80 per cent elected House of Lords. That would be a two-tier House. The Richard report talks about differential arrangements for remuneration and differential arrangements for disqualification procedures for the elected and non-elected Members. I think it is probably right but I am not talking about that; I am talking about something much more fundamental. If you think the Cross Benches are worth preserving, I do not think that you can preserve them in that way. It would be very difficult or disastrous to be a Cross-Bencher if your vote were decisive in an important question on which the two Houses came into conflict.
I also think that it is very odd to produce numbers with no rationale. Why is it 80:20? Why is it not 75:25? There has to be a basis for the figures. If you are writing a constitutional settlement, it has to be capable of being taught in schools; you have to know why the figures are 80:20. It is not enough to say,
“it delivers a little democracy—but not too much”,
in the words of the alternative report. You have to know why those are the right numbers. The noble Lord, Lord Winston, is a scientist and there must be some scientific rule that explains why the figures are 80:20. I think this is a fudge and I think that fudges come unstuck. Hybridity means instability. Constitutional settlements should be premised on stability.
Lord Tyler
Perhaps I can help the noble Lord with a little bit of information. The two options of 80:20 or 100 per cent have been placed before Parliament because that is what the House of Commons voted for. I pay tribute to the noble Lord for introducing such an interesting contribution at a quarter to midnight. The reason why it is a fudge is because the House of Commons voted for a fudge.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard
That is fine, but in 15 years’ time how will you explain that in schools? You cannot have a fudge; you have to have a rule, a principle, a rationale, otherwise it will be unstable. When it starts to go wrong, when there is a showdown between the two Houses and the independents, and the unelected have played some role in that, the numbers will get changed. People will decide on a different number.
When we voted on possible compositions, I voted for an all-elected Chamber or an all-nominated Chamber. I could not vote for any of the numerical compromises. If we go for a compromise, we ought to look either in the area to which the noble Lord, Lord Low of Dalston, was pointing us or in the area to which the noble Lord, Lord Steel of Aikwood, was pointing us: the area of indirect election. There are good arguments for indirect election and by choosing indirect election constituencies or interest groups, you could achieve possibly the degree of expertise that you are looking for, which you were kind enough to say that you get at present at least partly from the Cross Benches.
Lord Bates
My Lords, probably one of the most frequently used phrases in the speeches that I have heard in the debate has been that this issue is “not a priority”; it was repeated time and again. We also heard of opinion poll evidence that seems to back that up. Nadhim Zahawi, the Member in the other place who was formerly the chief executive of YouGov, cited his opinion poll that showed that Lords reform was proposed as an important issue for the Government to tackle by exactly 0 per cent of the population.
That is very interesting, but the reality is that we are where we are and in all likelihood a Bill will come before us next week. It may not be the greatest priority. I suspect—although I have no knowledge of this—that it is not the greatest priority of the Prime Minister or the Chancellor of the Exchequer at the present time. I am sure that they would subscribe very much to those arguments. However, it is in the nature of their commitment to the coalition, and of their honouring of agreements, that even while they do not agree that this is necessarily the best way for both Houses to spend their time over the next year, none the less they signed up to a deal in 2010 and therefore will see it through and honour it. That is to their credit.
Some noble Lords in the debate talked about references to reform being in all three manifestos. I dusted down my copy of the manifesto—of course I should say that it has no dust on it, because it is so frequently reread—and eventually found the reference, in paragraph 6 on page 67 out of 85. It was not exactly a rampant endorsement, but merely stated:
“We will work to build a consensus for a mainly-elected second chamber to replace the current House of Lords, recognising that an efficient and effective second chamber should play an important role in our democracy and requires both legitimacy and public confidence”.
Most noble Lords and Members in the other place will recognise the realities of how we have got to where we are. However, we are where we are and we have to deal with it.
The architecture of the building in which we are debating these matters is incredibly grand, astonishing and humbling to walk into each day. However, nobody suggests that if it were knocked down we would rebuild it with the Pugin and Barry designs for this great building being replicated by the noble Lords, Lord Rogers or Lord Foster, should they be commissioned with the task. The building would be different; it would reflect the culture, ideals and drives of the time in which we live. Therefore, even if this question is not a priority, if it is put the only credible answer in present times is to have a wholly elected House.
We extend our work around the world through organisations such as the Westminster Foundation for Democracy. I cannot believe for one minute that we would dispatch people around the world, to the Arab world or anywhere else, to argue that they ought to have an entirely appointed House with our present composition, or indeed one with an 80:20 ratio; they would argue in favour of a fully elected House.
In many ways, the position that we find ourselves in is made more difficult by the piecemeal reforms that were embarked on by the Blair Government. They embarked on the great task of rebuilding and reshaping this constitutional building and then, half way through, lost interest and walked off the job. It is in that sense that I worry about the sustainability of an 80:20 solution, because that would be to ensure that in five, 10 or 15 years’ time—or perhaps even in one year’s time—people would be coming back to have further reports about how we tackle this issue. It has been going on long enough. The view is there, and we need to settle this once and for all.
I shall make two very brief points that perhaps have not been touched on as much before. The first is to stress the importance of the House being representative. One of the great strengths of the House of Commons system and the fact that our Executive are drawn from the legislature is the linkage that even the Prime Minister has. In the midst of all that he is dealing with, at some stage he has to answer questions and letters from his constituents. He has to go back to his constituents and listen to their concerns in a constituency surgery. That grounding of the debate is very important in the grounding of politics and a sense of accountability.
I was quite persuaded in the debate. The noble Viscount, Lord Astor, said—I am paraphrasing him—that it is not the first election that instils accountability but the second. Therefore, rather than thinking of single 15-year terms, we ought to be thinking of some mechanism to introduce re-election to the system.
I am aware that my time is going, but my final point is that I think that a change of this magnitude requires us to have a referendum. If we are going to have referendums for local mayors, which we are campaigning for at present, something as major as this needs to be put to the people for them to express an opinion. That is very much in keeping with the founding fathers of Parliament. On 13 November 1295, Edward I summoned Parliament and said in his Writ of Summons:
“What touches all should be approved of all”.
That is the case for the referendum.
Lord Howarth of Newport
My Lords, what are the failures and problems in our political system that most need attention? Are they in the House of Lords? Many of us might agree that relations between the media and politics, the financing of our politics, the debilitated condition of local government and the relation between Scotland and the United Kingdom and its implications for Parliament are major and urgent issues to which reformers should soon apply themselves. There are problems about the lack of public trust in Parliament and the domination of the House of Commons by the Executive, but would an elected second Chamber make a useful contribution to the solution of either of those problems? What is the problem that the proponents of the draft Bill purport to solve? The Government tell us that it is a flaw in our democracy. In their foreword to the White Paper, the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister said:
“In a modern democracy it is important that those who make the laws of the land should be elected by those to whom those laws apply”.
The Prime Minister has added that the Bill would strengthen Parliament. The first of these propositions is based on a misrepresentation of fact, and the second is a rhetorical and unsubstantiated assertion to which the Joint Committee gave short shrift. As a matter of fact, the House of Lords does not make the laws of the land. The House of Commons decides what is to be the law. The House of Lords advises and influences, but in the event of disagreement between the two Houses, ultimately the appointed House defers to the elected House. Our parliamentary system is, after all, democratic.
What if the second Chamber were to be elected? The Government say that we should not worry because the Parliament Acts, perhaps revised in consequence of the advice on this matter received by the Joint Committee, and financial privilege guarantee the primacy of the House of Commons. If so, what gain would there be in an elected second Chamber expressly designed to be powerless? What candidates of quality would stand for election to it? Why would voters bother to vote in elections to it? I anticipate that there would be low turnout and that rather a lot of voters would cast their votes frivolously and in protest. I fear that we would see BNP and Respect senators elected, who would then be in the reformed second Chamber for 15 years. I do not know whether noble Lords on the other side of the House would contemplate with equanimity a state of affairs in which a UKIP block vote were to determine the outcome of votes in the second Chamber for 15 years to come.
What would be lost in such a change? As the alternative report grasped clearly, we would lose the representativeness that the present House has of the diversity of the professional, cultural and ethnic make-up of our country, and we would lose the gender balance that we have, which is at least better than that of the elected House of Commons. We would lose the eminent professional ability that this House contains. Above all, we would lose the experience of Members of this House. I prefer not to make the case for an appointed House in terms of expertise, because expertise falls away but experience grows. Whether or not your Lordships are posh, you are not boys. You have seen a good deal of life and a very great deal of government, and it is for those reasons that you are qualified to advise Ministers and the other place.
I believe that the quality of our debates would be poorer, that there would be less shrewdness and persistence in scrutiny, and less candour in the advice offered by a House that was more tightly controlled politically. Whatever the quality proved to be of an elected second Chamber, the Joint Committee and the alternative report are as one in agreeing that it would challenge the House of Commons in new ways, and that Clause 2 of the draft Bill is wishful thinking. The Joint Committee anticipates that a new assertiveness would lead to clashes between the two Houses becoming routine, and I fear that the public would find that frustrating and distasteful and that their disaffection from politics at Westminster would be compounded.
As Professor Bogdanor put it in his evidence, the revising Chamber would become “an opposing Chamber”. If we have impasse and an inability to legislate, it would be a disaster. The courts would have to intervene to resolve the conflicts between the two Houses, as we see at the moment with the Supreme Court in the United States of America determining the legitimacy of legislation produced by the two elected Houses of the American Congress. Replicating such a situation in this country would be a constitutional disaster.
I fear that we would see a deterioration of our democracy, and the erroneous propositions of the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister should not be the foundation for massive constitutional change. Instead, we should address the modest reforms that are really needed and which have been put off for so long. We should improve the functioning of the existing Chambers. The House of Commons should remember itself and resume the practice of thorough scrutiny of legislation. The House of Lords should be allowed to pursue the agenda of reforms set out by the noble Lord, Lord Steel, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman: the establishment of a statutory appointments commission tasked by Parliament, and provisions for disqualification, limitation of tenure and the end of the hereditary by-elections.
Constitutional change and reform in our country have been continuous, but the British tradition has been to be cautious, pragmatic, respectful of the inherited constitution and conscious of the distinctive history of United Kingdom; to address significant problems in due time to build the maximum consensus; to pause at each stage to see what the effects of reform prove to be; and to proceed incrementally.
The authors of the alternative report propose a constitutional convention on the future of the House of Lords. I rather think that this is a sensible proposal in all the circumstances. Certainly, if the membership as they recommend is broadly drawn, their terms of reference enable them to consider all the relevant issues because so many constitutional issues are inter-related and the work is not rushed. Most valuably, as the alternative report recommends, the convention could consider the implications for the Parliament at Westminster of the Scottish referendum on independence.
There is no sense in undertaking radical reform of the House of Lords at a time when the Scots are about to force huge constitutional issues affecting the role and the structure of Parliament upon us. The political developments that have occurred in Scotland are a complete game changer and they have happened while the enthusiasts for an elected second Chamber were not looking. It would be particularly valuable if a convention was therefore able to head the parties off from leaping into the dark with ill-considered manifesto commitments for devo-max with incalculable consequences.
Finally, the proposal from the alternative report is that the recommendations that emerge from the constitutional convention should be put to the people in a referendum. Reluctantly, I accept the principle that major constitutional change should be subject to a referendum. But let us be careful: let the debate run; let the issues clarify; and let understanding mature first.
Lord Lucas
My Lords, I am in favour of an elected House, so I hope that the Government will have the courage to come forward with a Bill. However, I do not envy their prospects. On the one hand, if they go down the route proposed by my right honourable friend Nick Clegg, they will be faced with a rebellion in the other House and in this House. On the other hand, if they pull up short of that, they look like causing some severe fractures internally in the Government. It will be a hard choice and I do not suppose that they will have gained anything from the debate today, which has to my mind been pretty polarised.
I will concentrate on a bit of ground between the opposing parties, which no one else likes but for which I happen to have an affection; namely, the list system. Those who favour an elected House say, “It’s appointment by another name”, and so it is. We could preserve all the virtues of the current House under a list system. Those who have argued that we must preserve the House as it is say that the list system would be an election. But it is not an election to fear. At the moment, the Government create the list of Peers they want in the dark after the election and all sorts of odds and sods come through. My peerage comes from buggery and bribery, although things are better these days. None the less, to expose the people proposed for peerages to an election would be a positive step forward. It would not interfere with the process and would tend to result in a better selection of Peers in this place.
There is a lot to be said for my right honourable friends bringing forward a Bill based on a list system. To our surprise, I think that we would find that we could agree on it.
Lord Rennard
My Lords, at the end of a long day—indeed, it is a different day from the day on which we began this debate—which is before another morning of debate on this subject, one week before another two days of debate on constitutional reform and 101 years after the passage of the Parliament Act 1911 that promised to replace the hereditary basis on which men came to this House with a popular principle in its place, I shall be brief. But I want to address the issue that has again been contested today as to whether these proposals are best described as evolutionary or revolutionary.
First, I want to respond to the alternative report and to those noble Lords who have so far argued that there has been insufficient debate about proposals for reform of your Lordships’ House in order to proceed with a Bill along the lines proposed by the Joint Committee, which was so well chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Richard.
It seems to me that it is only in the House of Lords that the argument could be advanced that 101 years is insufficient time properly to consider the merits of a proposal, especially when the proposal is as basic as the principle of democracy, which many of us so easily advocate for other countries. I would also like to correct a mistake I made in a recent article I wrote for a public sector magazine about Lords reform. I said that our country was in a league of two with Lesotho in maintaining the hereditary principle in the legislature. I now understand that I was wrong. I am told that Belgium preserves the right for the children of the king to be members of its upper House, but by convention they do not vote. So in fact we are, in this country, alone with Lesotho in maintaining voting rights in Parliament that are inherited. I believe that the changes now proposed by the Joint Committee are logical and evolutionary because they build on previous legislation such as the Life Peerages Act 1959, which enabled men and, for the first time, women to come here without committing their descendants, and the House of Lords Act 1999, which ended the hereditary principle save for 92 seats, and known then as stage 1 reform.
The proposals now follow more than a decade of cross-party work which has seen proposals similar to these from a royal commission, a Joint Committee of both Houses, the Public Administration Select Committee, a cross-party group of MPs convened by my noble friend Lord Tyler, and two Labour government White Papers. After another decade of discussion, it must be time for stage 2 reform. The Joint Committee’s report states that:
“It is readily apparent that many of the principal elements of the current draft Bill have been proposed before”.
It is time to decide and not just to debate.
I also agree with the committee proposal that the appropriate size for the House in the future, especially in the absence of serious devolution within England, is 450. That is a number big enough for the House to do its work, and big enough for elections under a proportional system to be proportional within large constituencies or regions. It would improve diversity, but not include extremes. Of course, and despite the references made by many noble Lords earlier in the debate, a proportional system is very different from the alternative vote system which was rejected by voters last year and which is in fact only a small modification to first past the post. In practice, we should be electing 120 Members of this House in three years’ time. That would be an appropriate time, in my view, to complete the promise of the 1999 legislation and that of 1911, and bring an end to the principle of inheriting a right to vote in the legislature.
Lord Cobbold
My Lords, given the late hour, I shall be brief. I am one of those who feel strongly that the proposal to turn the present House of Lords into a wholly or partly elected Senate is not reform but abolition, the abolition of an institution that has a unique history and which performs a valuable function in the scrutiny of new legislation. It does not create legislation, and where there is disagreement, it always recognises the supremacy of the House of Commons.
The strength of the House of Lords is the experience and expertise of its Members in most walks of life. Its Members have made a mark in life and will be reluctant to stand for election. The new Senate would be more party political and considerably more expensive. Most important, there can be little doubt that the newly elected Senate would sooner or later challenge the primacy of the House of Commons, and for this reason alone I am surprised that any Member of the House of Commons supports the idea of an elected Senate.
To argue that the proposed Bill should be rejected is not to say that this House is not in need of some reform. I join others in this debate who have recommended that the Bill before us today should be rejected and that, in its place, the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Steel, preferably in its original form, should become the basis of further debate on Lords reform.
Viscount Younger of Leckie
My Lords, I have clearly drawn the short straw for the last of the graveyard slots today. At this late hour, I hope that my remarks will not hasten your Lordships into repose, because I will focus on a proposal that so far today has not been aired. It bears a passing resemblance in substance to the constructive speeches of the noble Lords, Lord Low of Dalston and Lord Stevenson of Balmacara.
It is of great concern to me, and to so many Members of this House and the other place, that there is no compelling argument in the Joint Committee report behind the main tenet for reform, which is election over appointment. It is no more than an easy and populist mantra for the Deputy Prime Minister to say that a largely elected House will bring “a smidgeon of democracy” to the House of Lords. In my view, the idea has arisen simply because it sounds good. I believe that it is baseless, wholly wrong and dangerous. It will lead to the undoing of the successful and enduring balance of power that forms the bedrock of our much-admired constitution.
I welcome the alternative report which 50 per cent of members of the Joint Committee felt compelled to write. The report highlights the abject failure of Clause 2 in arguing a case for preserving the primacy of the Commons by abolishing the Lords and introducing 80 per cent elected Senators.
The arguments against election have strength and some clarity: the challenge to the primacy of the Commons; the quality of Senators in an elected House would be restricted and reduced only to those who wished to fight an election campaign to gain their seat; elected Senators will be costly to the taxpayer; and elected Senators, with larger constituencies than MPs, will be much diverted from their primary function of scrutiny to manage their mailbags and hold surgeries.
However, I am convinced that some reform is required. To that end, I welcome the proposals to reduce the number of Members in the House. In my submission to the Joint Committee I recommended an upper House of around 400 Peers, and the Joint Committee recommends 450. I commend the idea of a sensible retirement policy for Peers as well as a provision for the exclusion of Peers with serious criminal convictions. Both of these are contained in the Steel Bill. This Bill has been like a rugby ball, available in a ruck of unresolved conflicting views, and I am pleased to hear this evening from my noble friend Lord Steel that the coalition is now scooping up the Bill and heading for the baseline, hopefully to make it law.
In my submission to the Joint Committee, I also made some suggestions to improve the system of appointments to the House, a process on which I would like to focus my remarks today. The alternative report states that the starting point for reform should be to determine how Parliament best serves the needs of the British people—I think that we would all agree with that. However, the reason that we are all debating this issue is that the British people need to trust that the Lords fulfils its role in this country as effectively as possible and that there is transparency and accountability around the process of appointing Members to it, a point made by my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth.
To achieve this, there must be some basic premises: the system must be meritocratic and not be perceived as elitist; Members should be highly regarded in their field of work, across a broad range of sectors, taking account of their background, skills and reputation; their knowledge and skills should be current and relevant and remain so; and Members should be committed and active in this House.
A proactive, transparent and open appointments system is the only way to secure the optimum quality of Members in this House. So I suggest a 100 per cent appointed House and not a 20 per cent appointed one.
I welcome the recommendation in the Joint Committee report to have a statutory Appointments Commission. From this base, I suggest a more rigorous appointments process to mirror that practised by leading executive search consultancies, a sector in which Britain excels.
Your Lordships’ appointments panel is currently somewhat opaque and shrouded in mystery. The executive search process should be adopted to extend the scope for more applications from society. It would work in the following way. A small number of sector panels would be set up, headed by appointed luminaries in each sector. Its sole purpose would be to find suitable candidates to represent sectors such as agriculture, tourism and the Armed Forces, for example, to sit in the Lords. Positions in the Lords would be open to all eligible British citizens. The process would include the review of all CVs received.
Additionally, a proactive headhunt would ensure that suitable and recommended individuals were approached, thereby finding people who otherwise might not have considered entering the Lords. Each sector panel would draw up the candidate list to present to the statutory Appointments Commission which would finally appoint, with successful candidates filling vacancies in those sectors under-represented in the Lords. Consideration would be given to party or no party affiliation.
As an example, if an exceptional head teacher based anywhere in the country wished to apply for a position in the Lords, he or she could send an application to the education sector panel, or he or she could be approached so to do. With luck, the application would be submitted up to the statutory Appointments Commission. Following assessment and interview, he or she could be appointed.
The sector panels and Appointments Commission would be wise to utilise the services of the executive search sector to expedite the process and to take advantage of its sophisticated IT systems and databases. After all, the executive search professionals already research, approach and appoint our most senior leaders in this country across the public and private sectors. The appointments process should be regularly reviewed by an independent body to ensure transparency and rigour for selection. It should provide regular feedback, published for public scrutiny.
It may be wishful thinking, but I suggest that this provides a basis for consensus. The proposed constitutional convention should give serious consideration to these proposals. They are proposals that would provide for the necessary continuation of the breadth and depth of experience in our House. It would also add some credibility to a “smidgen of democracy”.