House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill

Debate between Baroness Berridge and Lord Blencathra

Committee stage
Wednesday 12th March 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Lords, if I may mix my metaphors, someone had to put on the suicide vest and poke his head above the parapet by putting down this highly controversial amendment for a drastic reduction in the number of Bishops. It had the desired effect: in a debate of one hour and 10 minutes, we have had some very interesting speeches and suggestions for a possible way forward in looking at other faiths in another amendment.

We have had the benefit of three very powerful speeches. My noble friend Lord Hailsham made a very powerful speech about the removal of all Bishops. That was immediately countermanded by an equally powerful speech by the noble Lord, Lord Moore of Etchingham, who made the finest case for retaining the Bishops that I have ever heard; he mentioned the line—in fact, the truth—that we must not disturb the settlement. The third excellent speech was from the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Sheffield, who made the valid point that having only five Bishops would make it impossible for them to work here. I accept that, but he also said that the Bishops were open to discussion on their possible numbers in any future settlement or change to the House of Lords.

My noble friend Lord Dundee wanted to reduce the number of Bishops from 26 to 20. Forgive me, but I cannot see the big difference that that would make. My noble friend Lady Berridge called for a check on the propriety of Bishops. I have no intention of entering into that detail, but she spoke at length on adding other faiths, which is the subject of my Amendment 34.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

I discussed Christians.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Amendment 34 intends to add representatives of five other faiths, so I accept that our amendments are not exactly the same. She talked about lots of other churches and religions not being represented. That is something I was going to talk about in relation to my next amendment, if I moved it.

When the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, spoke, I asked myself, “What on earth is he doing here at 9.15 pm on his birthday? It certainly can’t be to hear my speech”. I should say that, on my next amendment, a colleague complained that I missed out the Church of Scotland; it was not the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, but the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness. He also made the point about including other faiths.

The noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Llanfaes, quoted the polls. If this House or the Government were to do everything the polls wanted every time they wanted it, they would be changing policy every six months—so I do not necessarily go along with that.

I accept my noble friend Lord Strathclyde’s point that this issue needs further consideration, in the round, with further Lords reform.

I simply do not want to get into the detail of what my noble friend Lord Northbrook said; I hope he will forgive me.

At first, I thought that my noble friend Lord Strathcarron was going to support getting rid of all the Bishops, but his speech was a rather intriguing way of keeping the Bishops by criticising everything they did. But he did make the point that they make a very valuable contribution to this House.

My noble friend Lord True, the shadow Leader, made a very careful and thoughtful speech, mainly arguing for the status quo and making the point that the Bishops may be sitting on the only Benches in this House that will not be appointed by the Prime Minister in future. The Leader also made a thoughtful and wise speech, calling for wider discussion.

I was due to move the next amendment—Amendment 34—which seeks to reduce the number of Bishops to five and add five representatives of other faiths. However, given that we have had some extensive speeches tonight on adding other faiths, I may change my mind on moving that amendment. For the moment, I beg leave to withdraw this amendment.

Education (Guidance about Costs of School Uniforms) Bill

Debate between Baroness Berridge and Lord Blencathra

Friday 16th April 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

I will take the opportunity to write to the noble Lord. It is a matter for local authorities whether they choose to make grants available, but we are not proposing to introduce school uniform grants. As I have outlined many times to noble Lords, there has been an increase in general school funding over these three years to enable some schools that want to assist to do that. If the noble Lord requires any further details, I will write to him.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Lords, naturally I am very grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate on my amendment, especially to the Minister for her response. I first wish to thank the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett, for her kind words to me. I will take some of the credit—indeed, a lot of the credit —for forcing the Government to produce the statutory guidance and the memorandum before this debate, which I think we all found helpful.

I congratulate the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, on being able to put firmly on the record what he thinks on this matter. He was done an enormous disservice in the press a couple of weeks ago, with gross misreporting of what he had said—indeed, what we had all said. I think the headline was, “All Peers call for complete abolition of school uniform and kids to go around scruffily dressed as from tomorrow”. They were appalling headlines. I congratulate the noble Earl on speaking again today.

I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Moynihan for putting on the record that we should pay attention to the comments of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, which—this is nothing to do with me being chair; it is long before my time—has done tremendous service to this House in producing guidance on what it thinks is inappropriate delegation.

I am also grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Watson of Invergowrie, who said the principle of my amendment is right. I think nearly everyone who spoke today agreed that the principle of my amendment is right; the only thing wrong with it is the timing. If we were to go ahead with it, it would sabotage the Bill. I made it clear that I have no intention of doing that.

I am therefore disappointed that the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, for whom I have tremendous respect, has inadvertently done me a disservice today in suggesting that my amendment seeks to block the Bill. All I have done is make four points—the same four points made by the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee. I remind the noble Lord of those wonderful days between 1997 and 2001 when he was in government and my late friend Eric Forth MP and I were in charge of sabotaging every Friday Bill that came up in the Commons, most often with the connivance of the Labour Whips behind the Chair, who were as appalled at some of these measures as we were. My friend Christopher Chope was just one of our protégés. As the football manager says, “The boy done good. He’s coming on well”—but he is not a patch on Eric and me in our prime. If I wanted to block this Bill, there would be 20 amendments on the Order Paper today and I would be filibustering until midnight, but that is not what I intend.

So I shall not detain the House long nor repeat all my earlier arguments, even though I believe that the arguments which I have advanced and those in the Delegated Powers Committee report are superior to the Government’s case. There is no right or wrong answer here; it is a matter of belief in how much scrutiny this Parliament should give to regulations, guidance or circulars from the Executive. I have no particular grievance with the department nor with my noble friend the Minister, who is an excellent Minister; there are far worse offenders as far as inappropriate delegations of ministerial power are concerned, and the Delegated Powers Committee, which I am privileged to chair, constantly draws attention to them.

In the past few years, we have seen extensive abuse of Henry VIII powers, now tacked on to every Bill ad nauseam. Bills use only negative and affirmative procedures, and never are they made or draft affirmatives; we see the test for the Minister making laws reduced from necessity to one of “appropriate”, or, in this Bill, whatever the Secretary of State considers “relevant”. We now see the extraordinary term “protocols” used instead of “regulations” to avoid parliamentary scrutiny, and skeleton Bills are a regular occurrence without any justification for them in the memorandum.

All departments have got into the habit of building in excessive delegated powers and attempting to stop Parliament having a look at them, even through the negative procedure. I am sorry that my noble friend the Minister drew the short straw today to take this general criticism of far too much of our legislation having inappropriate delegations. Having said that the statutory guidance should be introduced by order, this whole Bill is only about making statutory guidance, and it should be judged on its merit and not in comparison to masses of other education legislation.

In conclusion, while my amendment is absolutely right in principle and in practice, and should be passed, I am aware that there is only one argument against it: that this excellent Bill would fall if I went ahead with it. The House should not be in a position to face that unacceptable Hobson’s choice in future, but I beg leave to withdraw my amendment today.

Covid-19: Schools

Debate between Baroness Berridge and Lord Blencathra

Wednesday 3rd June 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Department for International Trade (Baroness Berridge) (Con)]

My Lords, the coronavirus outbreak has caused disruption to young people’s education, as teachers and parents have had to adapt to remote education. We are working at pace with partners to look at what additional measures may be required to ensure that every child has the support they need to deal with the impact of coronavirus on their education. We will do whatever we can to make sure that no child falls behind as a result of coronavirus.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

Has my noble friend the Minister seen Monday’s statement by the Children’s Commissioner that schools should remain open in the summer to enable children to catch up with their studies? In view of the fact that 70% of teachers have not been giving lessons online and hundreds of schools are still refusing to open, will my noble friend take powers to ensure that schools remain open during the usual summer holiday period so that children are not disadvantaged any further?

[Baroness Berridge]

My Lords, the Secretary of State has made clear that schools will not be expected to be open throughout the summer holidays. That is not to say that there will not be specific, targeted interventions to help young people who have lost out due to the interruption of their education.