House of Lords: Procedures and Practices

Baroness Deech Excerpts

Thursday 4th December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Deech (CB)]

My Lords, on a point of order, I used to worry about the impression that women do not participate—

[Noble Lords]

Order!

[Lord Lipsey]

I am happy to allow the noble Baroness to intervene so long as it is not on a point of order.

[Baroness Deech]

I just wanted to give another impression to the noble Lord, who is concerned about women being shouted down at Question Time. I carried out a statistical survey over four weeks and discovered that proportionally there were more interventions by women at Question Time than would be expected from their number in the House. In other words, they are not shouted down; they are managing quite nicely and the noble Lord ought not to worry.

[Lord Lipsey]

I am delighted that there are some bullying women as well as some bullying men.

I come to my final comment, which reflects a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde. It is true that the forces of conservatism that I have described have this House in a strong grip, but they need not be allowed to have that grip. Down in the Commons, people said, “We’ll never get a business committee here”, but they have. People said, “We’ll never get to elect Select Committee chiefs here”, but they have. Back-Benchers have fought for their roles and rights and they have won their roles and rights. If I am right that in this House there is now a new spirit—particularly among the new arrivals, although there are many distinguished older Members who share it—we simply have to stop knuckling under out of a false politeness towards the official leaders of the House and force change through.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Deech]

My Lords, when I joined this House, I inquired how long it would take me to master the way it worked. I was told that 10 years was about the length. I have now had the privilege of being a Member for nine years, so I hope your Lordships will forgive me if I am only 9/10ths right in my conjectures about procedure.

I have two suggestions. One relates to the way in which we consider and debate amendments. In my estimation, it is unnecessarily hard—indeed, confusing—to express and debate amendments in the way that we do. Take, for example, the piece of paper headed, “Amendments to be Moved [Supplementary to the Marshalled List]”—opaque enough in itself, and as each amendment is tabled, the numbers change, so that those who have drafted them originally or are involved in moving them have to keep track of what number they have become when they are planning to be in the House or discussing them prior to the debate.

Another example of difficulty is from the Assisted Dying Bill list of amendments:

“Page 2, line 27, leave out ‘an’ and insert ‘a fully’”.

On its own this is almost incomprehensible and involves much shuffling of paper, whispered consultations and, in the case of a Division, last-minute consultation of the Bill papers and the seeking of advice as to what it is about. In fact, what that amendment sought to do was to change the wording from “an informed basis” to “a fully informed basis”—a state of mind much more difficult to judge. The subsection concerned—Clause 3(3)(c)—is about what the doctors must be satisfied of in acceding to a person’s desire to bring his life to an end. That amendment would make a significant alteration.

The obvious clarification and assistance for noble Lords in this digital age would be for amendments to be produced in tracked form in the text of the Bill. Each proposed amendment would be presented as if inserted in the Bill. It ought to be possible, if each noble Lord is equipped with an iPad, to see the entire text of the Bill that is being debated on that day with amendments inserted. I stand to be corrected, but arranging that cannot be more onerous for our wonderful staff than printing overnight the amendments in the form in which they are now presented. This House is going to be refurbished in coming years and it will be essential and indisputably an improvement to arrange digital screens in front of every seat, in the way that some Committee Rooms already provide, or to have many more annunciator screens in large print around the Chamber showing the amendment in its actual setting. This House should take full advantage of the very considerable amounts of money that have been spent on bringing us into the digital age.

My second point relates to the comprehensiveness and evenness of our discussions about foreign affairs. Because it is fairly rare for a debate to be arranged by the Government on an aspect of foreign affairs, our discussions are dominated by the Questions tabled by individual noble Lords with their individual interests. I looked at the Oral Questions tabled for the last two weeks before Christmas as an example. There are Questions about Afghanistan, Kuwait, Iran, Ireland and Sudan. Questions for Short Debate may never find time to be debated at all, but currently refer to Bosnia, Sri Lanka, Eritrea, Israel, the Philippines, Russia and North Korea. On the day I checked, Questions for Written Answer, which are guaranteed an Answer, included references to Palestine, Ukraine, Iraq, the Caribbean, Burma, Guinea Bissau, Colombia, the UAE, the Congo, Zimbabwe and Sudan. There are some very significant omissions and no particular programming according to topicality or importance, or failure to address for a number of years. There was nothing about China; nothing about Europe, the Far East or Australasia; and nothing about the United Nations or the USA. Can it be right that in one calendar year there were 308 Questions and debates about Israel/Palestine but 27 about Russia and 24 about China? I suggest that an overwhelming number about one country alone does not suggest expertise but obsession. It is a situation that does not improve the standing of this House and its involvement with foreign affairs in the eyes of observers. Should it not be for consideration that there should be a survey of the areas of the world that need periodic attention in this House, and that either the Government should ensure that there is time to debate them or that noble Lords be invited to table Questions on areas in an even way, without concentration on one at the expense of others?

I complained about this myself in early 2012 when the unfortunately named Arab spring was at its height. I said then that 300 Questions had been tabled in that Session on Israel and only one relating to the Arab spring. The Government responded by scheduling, albeit belatedly, a debate on the Arab spring. I am afraid that our coverage two years later continues to be erratic in relation to the areas of the world to which our attention should be turning.

Ukraine (Shooting Down of MH17) and Gaza

Baroness Deech Excerpts

Monday 21st July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

It is important for me to say that this conflict is taking a terrible toll. Along with the rest of the Government, I am deeply concerned at the high number of civilian casualties and the humanitarian impact of the conflict. The people of Israel have the right to live without constant fear for their security and the people of Gaza have the right to live safely and in peace. The most important thing is that we bring this current conflict to an end and that steps are taken to make this ceasefire durable so that it is not repeated. That is the only way in which we can ensure the safety and security of all people in the region and make steps towards a longer two-state solution.

[Baroness Deech (CB)]

Does the noble Baroness agree that there is something distasteful about this concentration on numbers and proportionality? In recent months, some 2,000 Palestinians have been killed in Syria without, I gather, much notice being taken in this House. The reason for the civilian casualties in Gaza appears to be that Hamas hides its weapons and rockets in schools, mosques and hospitals and is prepared to use civilians as a shield. One simply cannot therefore make a parallel between the two. If a country has to defend itself, I cannot imagine what the answer is to proportionality when the entire population of Israel is only 6 million, including 1 million Arabs. I hope that the noble Baroness will encourage the Government to complain to UNWRA about the rockets hidden in schools and to the Red Cross about the use of civilians as human shields.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

As I said when I repeated the Statement made by the Prime Minister in another place, we have been absolutely clear in our remarks to Israel about the needs for its response to be proportionate and to minimise any civilian casualties. The most important thing that we are trying to encourage is an end to this bloodshed on all sides, and we continue to press for an urgent agreement to that end.

House of Lords: Question Time

Baroness Deech Excerpts

Monday 7th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

I agree—and long may that continue.

[Baroness Deech (CB)]

Does the Minister share the concern that perhaps women Members of this House do not get their fair share of questions? However, I carried out a little survey in which I calculated the number of interventions by noble Baronesses and discovered that they asked proportionately rather more questions than one would expect from their number in the House.

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

This House is full of all sorts of Members who are not shy of coming forward and I welcome that.

Business of the House

Baroness Deech Excerpts

Thursday 31st January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Tyler]

My Lords, has my noble friend the Leader of the House noted that it is possible now for Members of this House to retire permanently? Indeed, two Members have done so. That would solve the problem of the large and increasing population of the House and the difficulties that have resulted. Indeed, I wonder whether my noble friends Lord Forsyth and Lord Steel might like to take advantage of that opportunity.

[Baroness Deech]

My Lords, does the Minister appreciate the illogicality of the proposition that has been put forward? There are nearly 200 Cross-Bench Peers in this House who are independent minded, as the Minister will know, who may vote one way or the other. It would make more sense for the parties to try to win over, by logical arguments, the votes of the Cross-Bench Peers rather than striving to pack the House with Members already committed to one side or the other.

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

My Lords, I believe in deferred gratification, and I am prepared to defer some more gratification until next week when we have the debate. In the past nine minutes, we have had a good illustration of the range of views on retirement in this House. I would not want to personalise the very fair general point made by my noble friend Lord Tyler in the way that he did. However, it is true that that scheme is available for any Member of Your Lordships’ House who would like to take a permanent leave of absence. I can refer any noble Lords who might be interested in looking at it to page 22 of the new Companion. In the conversations that I have had about retirement, the views expressed to me in the Corridors and around the place have tended to be affected by the age of the noble Lord to whom I have been speaking—and the age of retirement suggested is normally a couple of years above the age of the particular noble Lord to whom I am speaking.

The point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, about membership representation on particular Benches was a slight case of pots and kettles, if I may say so. I think that he conveniently forgot the important contribution made in this House by Cross-Benchers when he looked at his percentages. The noble Baroness, Lady Deech, rightly reminds us of the extremely important contribution that the Cross-Benchers make at all times.

On the specific point of numbers, the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, knows probably better than I—since he is a great expert on all these matters—the form of words that the coalition Government set out. No precise figure has been set but the general intention is clear.

Hereditary Peers

Baroness Deech Excerpts

Thursday 20th October 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, without having to consult my colleagues, I am pretty clear that that would not be the case.

[Baroness Deech]

My Lords,—