Cabinet Manual: Revision (Constitution Committee Report)
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The Lord Privy Seal (Lord True) (Con)
My Lords, it has been a fascinating debate. I am glad—well, not glad—that I gave the elbow to my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe. I was going to relieve her from doing two debates in succession, but then I find that the noble Lords, Lord Collins and Lord Wallace, are such Stakhanovites and polymaths that they have been doing continuous debates.
I start by saying that the Cabinet Manual is a document of fundamental importance and the report by the Constitution Committee is one of significance and importance, which this Government take extremely seriously.
I will say one other thing in preamble. I think it was the noble Lord, Lord O’Donnell, who said that this had to be shared across all parties. The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, was also very strong on that point, rightly. These are principles that we should all share and, in a sense, politics should come into it less. I was particularly fascinated by the speech of my noble friend Lord Howell of Guildford, who, from a perspective of enormous experience, spoke of some of the difficulties in codifying matters and some of the problems that can arise from that.
There is this idea that government of good chaps, chapesses or whatever they are has gone and that this era can never return. In my personal belief, most people in Parliament, whatever we say about each other, stand on their honour and are honourable people. Whatever defences, additions or props we put into place, the principle of being good and honourable should not be gone and forgotten. It remains.
I remind noble Lords, some of whom sometimes think there was a Garden of Eden before my right honourable friend Mr Johnson became Prime Minister, that there was a serpent in the Garden of Eden. My Christmas reading will include the latest biography of Sir Charles Dilke, as I must remind the noble Lord, Lord Wallace.
Let me get on to the matter at hand. A number of specific suggestions and points that should be taken up were made in this debate. The speeches of the noble Viscount, Lord Stansgate, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, raised some specific issues. Detailed points were made and that has been one of the more precise values of this debate. Given the variety and number of specific suggestions made, today and in various committee reports since the manual was last published—although I know the House appreciates that time is needed to consider the right approach on each detail of the manual, outside the normal convention that one may sometimes write in response to noble Lords—I assure the House that the officials responsible will review the debate in Hansard and consider the specific suggestions put forward to inform the drafting approach and content.
I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Drake, for tabling this Motion in her role as chair of the Constitution Committee. I also extend my gratitude to the other members and clerks of that committee for the report, and to the former chair of the committee, the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Bolton, for guiding this work. It is clear, concise and comprehensive, and the evidence-taking was also fascinating and brought insightful thoughts to bear on the problem and contents of the Cabinet Manual.
I repeat what I said at the start: it is an important document for Ministers and officials, and the single reference document that sets out the rules, conventions and practice that affect the operation of government. In opening the debate, brilliantly and lucidly, the noble Baroness, Lady Drake, said it is a work of reference and therein lies its value. That was the general feeling of all who spoke.
I greatly commend the noble Lord, Lord O’Donnell, for enduring his tenure as Cabinet Secretary and for leading the charge. As Geoffrey Chaucer was to English poetry, so the noble Lord is that process. He himself said that it is primarily a guide for those working in government. In his first preface, he talked about
“recording the current position rather than driving change”.
However, the current position today is not the position that was current in 2011; therefore, an update is clearly needed. The Government have committed to producing an update of the Cabinet Manual before the end of the Parliament—I am conscious that some of that was in either my pen or my words, or probably both—and work is ongoing to achieve that objective.
I apologise for the delay in some respects; but, in other respects, there has been a very great deal of change, as noble Lords have said, including very fast change in recent times. There was an aspiration, as has been referred to in the debate, to share updates with the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee in the other place before the end of June. Since then, there have been two changes in Prime Minister and a demise of the Crown, followed by a period of national mourning, which Cabinet Office officials played a key role in co-ordinating. So there is some pretext for the delay, but I repeat what the Government have said: we will provide an update to the Constitution Committee in the new year and we will provide further details on timelines. Work is going on to identify what needs to be done and where updates need to be. There will be very small amendments on some chapters, whereas some other chapters, as has been referred to, will require major changes and indeed total rewriting on subjects such as the duration of Parliament, relations with the EU and so on.
The original intention was to update routinely and periodically, as the noble Lord, Lord O’Donnell, reminded us. There is a case for doing so. Over time, it has historically been a matter for the Prime Minister of the day, acting on the advice of officials, to judge when best to undertake a change. So I am loath to commit future Governments to a decision on their approach; that would be a decision for the Government of the day when assessing their priorities. However, this Government will produce an update of the manual according to timelines which, I have said, will be shared shortly.
In November, my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster wrote to the chair of PACAC in the other place to confirm that the Government will provide an update on that work to the Select Committee in 2023. That will include detailed arrangements on consultation, because I agree with noble Lords that there has to be some opportunity for consultation on such an important document. I can tell your Lordships that it is the Government’s intention to ensure that a similar update is provided to the Constitution Committee in this House so that it is aware of the upcoming stages and timings of that very important project.
The noble Baroness, Lady Drake, the noble Lords, Lord Wallace and Lord Collins, and others asked about the extent to which the Government plan to consult Parliament on the draft that is being produced. Obviously, there was a consultation on the first edition. I mentioned in correspondence with the noble Baroness, Lady Drake, and it is worth repeating today, that there are differences between the project in 2010-11 and today. One was ab initio—sorry, I am not allowed to use Latin in Parliament any more; one was starting off—and this one is updating. Any engagement on the updates will reflect the extent to which significant changes are required or whether the updates are more limited in nature. I very much take the point and will take it back to colleagues. The Government will also clarify this, including which sections of the manual will be shared in draft form, in the new year.
The Government share the view of the Cabinet Secretaries who gave evidence to the Constitution Committee for this report that Parliament should be consulted, although not invited to endorse the updates. The Government also recognise the value of developing a degree of consensus—a word that the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, referred to—in the language used in the manual, so that it continues to be an accepted and authoritative source on conventions and practices of government that should be widely shared.
The work to update the manual began in February 2022, when I confirmed to the Constitution Committee that an update would be published before the end of this Parliament. Officials then undertook a scoping exercise to determine where the manual had become out of date, as well as drafting initial updates to address factual inaccuracies. As I implied earlier, the updates will clearly be more substantive in some areas than others—for example, chapter 2 on government formation, chapter 8 on devolution and chapter 9 on relations with the EU and other institutions. A number of government departments and bodies have been involved in identifying and drafting updates. As I said, I hope we will be able to issue more information on progress shortly.
I was asked about the duty of Ministers and Prime Ministers to uphold the manual. The duties on Ministers are laid in the Ministerial Code, which is reflected in the manual. It is something of a circular argument to take one, which is an advisory and descriptive document, and make that the source of discipline. The duty on Ministers flows from the Ministerial Code; the manual is a guidance document rather than a code. When the first edition was published, it was endorsed by the Cabinet and the then Prime Minister made it clear that he would expect everyone working in government to be mindful of the guidance it contains. This remains the case.
The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, and others inquired about the role the Prime Minister has in the manual. As a document owned by the Executive, the next edition of the manual will be approved by the Prime Minister before it is published. The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, went to wider questions about the accountability of the Prime Minister, also touched on in a slightly more pacific vein by the noble Lord, Lord Hennessy of Nympsfield. I also am so delighted to see him in his place.
I rebuke nobody, but in our zeal to condemn Mr Johnson, who I still count as a friend, we should sometimes remember—we talk of convention—section 4.50 of the Companion, which says that no MP should be referred to
“for the purpose of criticism of a personal, rather than a political, nature.”
Many noble Lords will feel that there is huge scope for criticising Mr Johnson politically, but in the context of how we behave we sometimes need to think very carefully about those words. By the way, I totally acquit the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, on this point today.
The noble Lord, Lord Hennessy of Nympsfield, raised the idea of an oath. I will not give an extemporary response on this because I might get into trouble, but it is initially unclear to me that taking an oath in itself would go beyond the high levels of accountability—to reply to the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley—that the Prime Minister has. He is accountable to Parliament and the electorate, and can be brought down by Parliament and the electorate. Like any other of us, the Prime Minister also takes an oath to bear faithful and true allegiance to the monarch, and therein lies a high duty incumbent on the Prime Minister, above all, to act properly as the sovereign’s principal adviser.
It was suggested that the Cabinet Manual might be placed on a statutory footing, but only in passing, I think, in one intervention, which I have forgotten to note—I apologise. The Government do not believe that the manual should be placed on a statutory basis for the reasons that go along with the point that it is not the source of discipline. Also, we are, for the reasons asserted by my noble friend Lord Howell of Guildford, nervous about moving towards a codification of principles.
I thought that a very important strand referred to by the noble Viscount, Lord Stansgate, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Warwick and Lady Drake, is that the manual has an important role to play in being a useful and informative guide for the public. That includes schools, as some noble Lords said. I believe, as the conclusion to your Lordships’ committee’s report put it, that documents such as the Cabinet Manual are
“crucial to the wider national wellbeing as well as to the public’s trust in government.”
I agree with those sentiments, which were taken up by others. The manual can and should have a role in educating the public on the operation of government. The Government have noted the idea of producing a more accessible online version and understand the value of having updates available promptly online, while also producing a formal update as a new edition. We are committed to ensuring that it should be accessible to a wider public and that it should be drafted with the wider public in mind as a reader. The Government will therefore consider how best to make the manual acceptable to all.
I was asked by the noble Baroness about the devolved legislatures’ role in reviewing the manual. It was a recommendation in your Lordships’ committee’s report that the Government should formally consult the relevant committees in the devolved legislatures, as well as Parliament, when they produce an update. I know that the noble Baroness, Lady Drake, raised that matter in a letter to the Prime Minister earlier this year; indeed, she referred to it in her excellent speech. Much of the Cabinet Manual is on matters specific to the UK Government and on reserved matters. It is a UK document signed off by UK Ministers accountable to the UK Parliament. We always seek to work constructively with the devolved Administrations, but how the Scottish Government, the Senedd and Northern Ireland Assembly—the devolved Governments—will be engaged in the process will be taken nearer the time on the basis of the nature of the proposed changes in particular chapters.
It is time that I closed. I apologise for replying at some length, but that should reflect the importance of this document—it is an important document. If I am allowed to venture an opinion, since I have been a Minister only for a couple of years, I think it is a great pity that it was not revised before. However, I have every confidence because I have now served under three Prime Ministers, and they have all been interested in getting this job done. We will get it done.
This document is important, and I hope that its successor will be equally important in describing our country’s complex and rich constitutional arrangements for the benefit of all. It should not be treated as an optional extra that an Executive might ignore. I agree with the assessment of the Constitution Committee. The manual is a central guide for the operation of government and the Government are committed to ensuring that that remains the case for the next decade. We have been, and remain, committed to producing an updated edition before the end of this Parliament, but I hope to have some updates in the new year on timelines, which may be able to improve on that.
I thank again all those involved in the drafting of your Lordships’ committee’s report, and in the arrangement of this debate. I have seven seconds left—but can I briefly say as Leader that I am conscious that Select Committees have often found it difficult to get debates on the Floor of the House? I am glad that we are debating three today, although I am sorry that it is a Friday, but I hope that with the usual channels we can improve on that. I am sorry about it.
I get my seven seconds back now by saying that I hope that the Government will be able to cement the manual’s place in future as a useful guide for Ministers, officials and the general public. That is our common aspiration, and I believe the common aspiration of all of us across all parties who have spoken in this debate.