Elections Bill

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Lords Hansard - Part 1 & Committee stage
Wednesday 23rd March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Moore of Etchingham (Non-Afl)]

I listened closely to the noble Lord’s speech, and it is perfectly true that he made a very long and important argument about the specifics, but he also expressed a general preference for proportional representation.

I wish to make a very simple point, which I think came across very well in what the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, said. He described how, even under the strict chairmanship of Lord Jenkins, it took 12 months of what he called “immense complication” to look at these issues. That is precisely the problem with all this. It is dangerous to confess to ignorance in this very learned and expert House, but despite covering politics in various ways for 40 years, I have never been able fully to understand or explain all the different voting systems that clever people keep coming up with, and that is an argument against them. If somebody who is paid a salary to try to understand these things still finds them complicated, there is something wrong with them. All right, I am stupid, but I make the point that it is very important for the buy-in of a democracy that people can understand what is being said, what is being offered and how to perform the operation they are invited to perform. They can do so under first past the post, but under proportional representation they cannot, broadly speaking. Therefore, I oppose these amendments and support the Bill.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I used to be a full supporter of first past the post, very much in the spirit of the remarks made by the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, and those of the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, in relation to accountability. However, over recent years I have started to see a problem that I wanted to raise—I am not just doing this as counselling. Because of the whole of Clause 11, we have been invited, in a way, by the Government to discuss electoral systems, and that is one of the problems with the way it has emerged. I would not be discussing it if they had not brought it in, but now that everyone else is discussing it, I will join in.

I was minded to support Amendment 136 until I realised that it was an amendment that would overturn a referendum, which struck me as not a good idea and not likely to fit in with my general position on these things. It is perhaps ironic to those people in this Committee arguing for proportional representation that I was elected using that method in the European elections and came top of the list. I do not know if people think that was a fully democratic system, because a lot of people did not think that I should have been there at all, or elected in that way, when I stood only for very particular reasons, as we know.

These are the problems with first past the post in 2022 that I cannot get my head around. Through this Bill, we want to reassure voters that elections are watertight in terms of fairness and that they represent what they want as voters. In a number of debates, we have discussed our worries about different clauses that might be seen to be disenfranchising voters—sometimes I think these are overwrought worries, but they are worries none the less. It seems to me, however, that first past the post, in lots of ways, makes many people’s votes redundant and represents a frustration with what is happening politically.

I remember that before the 2016 referendum I was invited to a think tank gathering at which most of the people were supporters of remaining in the European Union. They assumed that I was as well, because that is what nice think-tankers did. They said that one problem they had was that the referendum would not be taken seriously if they did not get a big turnout, so what could they do to get a big turnout? The consensus in the room was that it must be emphasised that a vote in the 2016 referendum was a once-in-a-lifetime vote where, for once, every single person’s vote would count. They went out and argued that very successfully and the nation said, “My goodness, for once my vote really will count.” As a consequence, people took it seriously that they were being asked to make a big constitutional decision and that this was one election where every individual vote meant something. In the build-up to the referendum, it led to grass-roots discussion groups being set up around the country, family conferences and people getting together with their research. People took the whole thing extremely seriously and there was an atmosphere of vibrancy and buzz, with people saying, “What should we do?” as they assessed the pros and cons. People rose to the challenge that their vote counted, an idea which I think really resonated.

Elections Bill

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Lords Hansard - Part 1 & Committee stage
Monday 21st March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Woodley (Lab)]

My Lords, I agree that Clause 1 should be struck from the Bill, if the Bill itself is not withdrawn. The clause is a dangerous solution to a problem that, as has been said, does not even exist. Requiring photo ID to vote will not strengthen democracy; it will weaken it. There is no doubt in my mind about that. It will damage the democratic rights of millions, disproportionately disfranchising poorer and ethnic minority voters, who, as we know, tend to lean towards Labour in elections.

There is no evidence that voter personation, which is what the clause is supposed to tackle, is a problem in this country. On the contrary, in 2020 there were just 139 allegations of voter fraud, which led to one conviction and one caution for personation. In 2019, although there were local, European and general elections, there was again just one conviction for personation out of 60 million votes—no problem there, then.

If this was not so serious it would be laughable. I am somewhat sceptical. It is not a coincidence that this Tory scheme for voter ID to suppress working-class voters is a mirror image of what has been done to black, Latino and American workers by the Republicans, as has been said. You would almost think that the ruling class was organising across the Atlantic to change the rules of the game itself. Surely not.

It is important to highlight the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee’s warning that Clause 1

“risks upsetting the balance of our current electoral system, making it more difficult to vote and removing an element of the trust inherent in the current system.”

We should not forget that.

Then, of course, there is the financial cost of compulsory voter ID: £120 million over 10 years according to the Cabinet Office. No election in British history has ever been undermined by mass fraud, so why are the Government spending millions of pounds to fix a problem that does not exist?

I believe the answer may simply be that the Government are worried that many working-class voters are starting to realise they were hoodwinked at the last election. Workers and their families are watching this Government take decision after decision that make the very rich richer while the rest of society is squeezed dry by the escalating cost of living crisis that we are confronted with now.

The Government’s total capitulation to the big energy firms has led to eye-watering bills that are rising higher and higher. The national insurance hike next month is a tax on jobs that will hammer the working poor most of all. Real-terms cuts to social security are driving millions into despair and destitution. All this pain and misery is against a backdrop of rampant inflation and crony Covid contracts for the chums of the Prime Minister, who mostly, in my view, likes to party.

Workers are waking up to the Government’s ideological assault on trade unions, the last line of defence against the bad bosses and a system that has attacked them, including this very Bill, especially Clause 27 on gagging trade unions, which we debated last week. Let us look at the Government’s much-hyped Employment Bill. I repeat: let us look at the Government’s much-hyped Employment Bill—except we cannot. It is nowhere to be seen, despite the manifesto pledge to

“make the UK the best place in the world to work.”

It would be scandalous if this promised legislation was again absent from the forthcoming gracious Address. Perhaps, the Minister would like to share his thoughts with us all on this subject.

Faced with the reality that the Tory party is not on their side, many workers and their families who lent the Prime Minister their vote to get Brexit done now want their vote back. This Bill as a whole, and especially Clause 1, looks like a blatant attempt to limit the damage this will cause the Conservatives at the next election.

In this place, we are privileged to play a key role by helping to improve legislation and holding the Government to account. We would not be doing our job properly if we did not challenge bad Bills, and this is a very bad Bill indeed. The Minister will deny it, but Clause 1 is a key component of a backwards, Trumpian attempt to rig democracy in favour of the Tories. That is why I support the cross-party call by my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti and others to strike it out. I urge the whole House to do exactly the same.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I support this proposal that the clause stand part but I have some caveats. A high-profile Guardian commentator alleged:

“The Tories are introducing voter ID purely because they know the people lacking relevant ID are most likely to vote Labour, and they want to prevent them from voting.”


One Labour MP described it as

“a cynical and ugly attempt to rig the system to disempower the poorest and most marginalised.”

I do not believe that at all. It seems to me those arguments—we have heard some here—are concrete evidence that cranky, conspiratorial thinking is alive and well across left and right. I am not convinced that this is a Trumpian plot, an attempt by the Republican Party to take over the Conservatives or anything else. The view that everything is a sinister international plot—and goodness knows I see a lot of that on social media—is itself in danger of fuelling a cynicism and nihilistic distrust in institutions and politics. We should not necessarily resort to it to oppose voter ID. I do not think we need to.

I am prepared to take at face value that the Conservative Government are trying to fulfil their manifesto pledge to tackle potential voter fraud. There certainly has been concern about it although, as it happens, that has largely been confined to postal votes, which are being dealt with separately. But even if I take it in good faith that they are trying to shore up trust in the electoral system, my big problem is that voter ID is a wrongheaded way of doing it; it is likely to backfire and stoke up mistrust.

Let me explain a few of those points. The voting system in Britain is the outcome of centuries of struggle and civic engagement, and often, indeed, class struggle. The degree of trust that allows us as a country to allow citizens to vote on the basis of just showing up and giving their name—it is as simple as that—is a real success story. That is something that the Government and all of us should be proud of and celebrate; and—guess what—there is no evidence that it has been subverted in any way. We should have the same pride that we do not live in a “produce your papers” society, based on constant official checks by authorities. It is important to maintain that distinction between citizens and the state.

That is why so many of us campaigned against ID cards in general when the Labour Party tried to bring them in, and more recently balked at vaccine passports pushed by the Government and backed by the Opposition. Even fully vaccinated enthusiasts for the jab such as myself worried that saying, “You have to show your papers”, was an egregious, divisive encouragement to look at one’s fellow citizens with suspicion. We are now talking about showing your papers when you go to vote. General ID cards are a barrier to being able to go freely about our business, while voter ID is a barrier to being able to vote freely. In that context, voter ID is not just a technical matter; no matter what method is used, it creates obstacles to voting.

I do not think that it will lead to mass disfranchisement and, to be honest, I find it slightly awkward when people say that poorer people and the marginalised will not be able to cope with filling in the forms or getting the ID; that is potentially rather patronising and is not our objection. Let us imagine what it will do to a bond of trust, however, if you go along to vote and witness numerous people being turned away from polling stations; we know that people will be turned away because we have seen pilot schemes in which that has happened. Surely that would put a question mark over those electors, as though they were somehow a bit dodgy, when in fact they have just got the wrong paperwork.

Then there are other kind of nightmare scenarios that I dread. There just needs to be a handful of officious, jobsworth local officials overzealously treating people as though they are would-be cheats with the paperwork, and chaos will ensue. Anyone who has had to go to a government department and deal with the paperwork will know that that is all completely feasible. What is more, the more the Government double down on this—I do not understand why they are doing so— the more they send the message that the voting system itself is a major problem. It gives the misleading impression that large-scale fraud is going on that needs to be tackled, which is just so negative. In fact, as the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, pointed out, there are positive ways of talking about engaging voters rather than this negative view that somehow we have to stop all those people who are trying to sneak in and cheat.

Democracy is based on trust. At its heart lies the belief that all people should be treated equally at the ballot box regardless of any social or educational inequality. Your status is irrelevant when you get to that polling booth. The most lowly person is equal to the highest person in the land—every vote is equal. That is based on the belief that everyone can be trusted to decide on the future direction of society and to vote in good faith. That is what democracy is all about.

When a very few bad apples—maybe only one, according to the evidence—become the focus for a Government to reorganise the election practice, or when there is a greater problem of distrusting democracy and democratic institutions, which I talked about at Second Reading, it is a bigger problem, but I do not think that this solves it. When that bigger problem of distrust in democratic institutions is narrowed down to take the form of a managerial, bureaucratic solution, I fear that democracy itself will be damaged. I fear that it will fuel only a climate in which future election results will be open to suspicion and in which the integrity of the system is undermined. However, I appeal to those people who agree in principle with this to avoid cheap sectarianism in making their case.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Hayward (Con)]

The noble Lord is misinterpreting the data within those datasets and what the Electoral Commission and an individual research team undertook to do. They were trying to establish the level of concern. Had the noble Lord allowed me to continue for a few more sentences, I would have identified why I am concerned about that. It is not about a particular election; it is about when elections or referendums become close and contentious.

I speak here as a remainer—I was not a Brexiteer. When a referendum, or some form of ballot, becomes both close and contentious, the way in which the ballots have been conducted comes out as a matter of concern. As a result, it is precisely for those reasons that I am concerned that we should have certainty and security in the process.

I do not regard it as a process of voter suppression. President Trump—or Donald Trump, whatever you like to call him—had a basis of foundation for his arguments against the result at the last presidential election because there were uncertainties about the way in which it was conducted. As far as I am concerned, I want to see certainty in this country.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

In my Second Reading speech, I said that I recognised the sense in which we have a problem of people withholding loser’s consent. I made the point that that was one of the problems we had in America with Donald Trump withholding it. Loser’s consent is a fundamental part of democracy. For many years following the referendum result, there was a substantial number of people who wanted to withhold loser’s consent for a majoritarian vote. That is complicated and there is a political issue going on about why people no longer accept that.

My argument—and this is what I want to ask the noble Lord—is that it is not a technical matter. It has absolutely nothing to do with impersonation. Nobody accused anyone of impersonating anyone. All sorts of accusations have flown but not that one in the UK. Therefore, does this technical way of trying to tackle a problem imply that there is a big problem of impersonation when there is not and therefore fuel the very sentiments that we are trying to reassure people around? It just does not make any sense as a way of dealing with a problem that I agree exists.

[Lord Hayward (Con)]

I thank the noble Baroness for her intervention. She and I clearly recognise that there is a problem and there are different problems and you can tackle them in different ways. I happen to believe that photo ID is a way of tackling the issue.

Unfortunately, the noble Lord, Lord Woolley, is not present. I was present on the Select Committee when he gave evidence. The noble Lord, Lord Rennard, was also present but, unfortunately, he clearly is not able to be here today. The noble Lord, Lord Woolley, dealt with issues way beyond the question of voter registration and voter ID when he gave evidence to the Select Committee. It was an incredibly powerful submission then and it was last week in his contribution here. He was essentially talking about alienation from society in a much broader sense, and I recognise that. I live in the ward which I think has the largest proportion of voters of west African origin of any ward in the country—Camberwell Green. In Camberwell Green, if you want to collect a package from the Post Office—and I did last week—you are required to produce one of six items of ID, four of which are photo ID, two of which are not and one of those I do not think anybody would use in this day and age. In terms of general—

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Noakes (Con)]

I do not think the only metric is how satisfied people were. The most important thing is how comfortable people are with the integrity of the voting system. Just being satisfied with the first rollout of something is not going to give you the final answer. It is right to let local authorities, who know about their local electorates, work out how to reach these hard-to-reach communities. It is right to enlist civil society groups to do the same, as well as political parties, which should know their local areas and know how best to do it.

We know there will be some teething problems, and some voters may not bring the right voter ID with them the first time they come. But according to both the Electoral Commission and the Association of Electoral Administrators, this happened to a very small degree during the pilots. As I said earlier, pilots are there to find problems so that they can be overcome. I hope that noble Lords will stand back and look at these reforms—

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords—

[Baroness Noakes (Con)]

I am just about to finish, if the noble Baroness does not mind. I hope that noble Lords will stand back and look at these reforms through 21st-century eyes and see them as sensible and proportionate, and as a reflection of how we live our lives on a daily basis.

Elections Bill

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Lords Hansard - Part 1 & Committee stage
Thursday 10th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

Yes, that is fine. I think there is even a case for deleting these clauses in Committee.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I was not intending to speak on this part but I feel very queasy about the way a number of noble Lords are using the situation in Ukraine to have a go at this part of the Bill. People are indeed dying for democracy, but they are not dying to defend an Electoral Commission—an unelected quango in the UK. I think it is rather unbecoming to use that.

The Electoral Commission is relatively new to the UK’s democratic life and democracy thrived when it did not exist. At the very least, we should stop aggrandising the Electoral Commission as though the electorate depend on it. There are problems with it and there are problems with the way the Government are trying to deal with it. I am not necessarily defending the Government’s way of solving the problem of the Electoral Commission—

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)]

Will the noble Baroness give way?

[Lord Blunkett (Lab)]

Go on, defend it. The noble Baroness used to be in the Communist Party.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

Very good, well done everyone, carry on.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)]

The noble Baroness said that we had a functioning electoral system before we had the Electoral Commission. The commission was a move to improve it, just as votes for women was a very great step forward. I am sure she would not want to go back to the time before that.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

I appreciate that I am surrounded by Labour noble Lords who object to what I am saying. One of the great advantages of votes for women was that occasionally we get to say the odd thing that does not go with the grain.

I am raising the problem that the Electoral Commission is not necessarily all good. I want to say this about it. There was a great deal of dissatisfaction about the Electoral Commission’s lack of independence in its response to the 2016 referendum, which I referred to in my Second Reading speech. Such were the concerns about the bias of the Electoral Commission in that period that it had to apologise for the bias of many of its members. This is not me saying it—I am quoting the Electoral Commission, which we are all told we have to listen to.

The bias led to many voters feeling that the Electoral Commission was not fit for purpose and was in fact biased against their wishes as an electorate in that referendum. Many of those people were not Tory cronies but Labour voters—Labour voters who may no longer be Labour voters because they became disillusioned by the fact that the Labour Party told them they had got it wrong, they were duped and they needed to think again. While the Labour Benches are very keen on democracy, they were less keen on the democratic decisions of many of their voters in 2016 and subsequently.

At the very least, therefore, it is important that we look at the role of the Electoral Commission critically and seriously. I do not think the way the Government have gone about reforming it will clarify or help things. I will make those points another time. But to say, as has just been said by a number of noble Lords, that we have a responsibility to take the Bill and thwart it, scupper it, throw it out and all the rest of it, seems to me rather to fly in the face of democracy. A little humility is maybe needed to remember that the plans for the Elections Bill were in the Conservative Party manifesto—which noble Lords will be delighted to know I did not vote for, before they all start.

Nevertheless, I clocked that they were there. We in this House are unelected legislators and need to take at least a smidgen of note of what the electorate might consider priorities. Not everything is a Conservative Party plot but one reason many people voted for the Conservative Party in 2019 was that they felt abandoned by the opposition parties.

[Baroness D’Souza (CB)]

My Lords, I wonder whether noble Lords are fully aware that this is Committee and not Second Reading.

Peerages: Recommendations

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Thursday 3rd March 2022 Grand Committee

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, for tabling this Question for Short Debate, as it raises some interesting challenges and thorny dilemmas for all of us, eliciting a range of interesting contributions so far. In its own terms, I rather like the intention of making justifications for appointed peerages more transparent, with all that information published in the public realm. As a believer in sunlight being the best disinfectant, I believe that the more the public can see all the aspects of the inner workings of Parliament the better. However, I will raise several caveats about whether this would really lead to greater public trust in this House.

As someone whose appointment here was relatively recent and, to say the least, contentious and elicited widespread media comment and speculation—although I note that conspiratorial misinformation is not just a preserve of trolls on social media but alive and well in the mainstream—I have every interest in a more open system. But as an outsider before I entered this place, I always thought that the opaque way people were offered peerages inevitably fuelled suspicion. It was always far clearer to me why hereditary Peers were here than appointed Peers.

The truth is that none of us is here legitimately in terms of democracy. I appreciate that the main public concern is often the notion of cash for honours. Buying oneself into the legislature is obviously unconscionable, but even this accusation can be a lazy trope in our cynical times. For example, as we speak, plenty of people are saying that my peerage and those of several other recent non-party appointments were paid for by dirty Russian money—because, you know, Brexit was a Putin plot, et cetera. This conspiracy theory nonsense is confined not just to the crackpot fringes but given respectable support by mainstream commentators. I am equally wary of concluding that if someone happens to be wealthy or Russian and ends up in this House they are inevitably dodgy.

In general, I am suspicious when the corruption of democracy is confined narrowly to “follow the money” critiques. Is it any less distorting of the legitimacy of the legislature that many Peers here lost their seats because the electorate rejected them in elections, yet here they are, still making laws?

Will the proposed solutions help clear up this mess? I am certainly not keen on endorsing statutory appointments commissions with enhanced vetting powers. This sounds more like a dystopian bureaucratic HR department. Who would sit on such a commission: unelected Peers or civil servants? I do not see how that is more legitimate than any Prime Minister, who at least notionally is accountable to Parliament and the voters.

I note that one proposal is about establishing a new criteria for individuals to meet: a “copious merit” test—I am definitely sure that I would not pass that. Who decides what is meritorious? Is it a moral purity test? Would it be expertise? In which case, are we advocating a Chamber of philosopher kings, removing even further decision-making from the plebs?

All these proposals skirt round the main problem: that this House stands on shaky, undemocratic foundations, as we cannot be held to account, removed or sacked by the voters. Any appointments system will always be flawed or open to cronyism or patronage accusations when it is removed from the most important scrutineers—the demos. The very basis of any legitimate parliamentarian claim to wield the power of lawmaking should be the electorate, yet the House of Lords stands above it. Until that is resolved, I am afraid every other proposal might end up as PR and spin.

Elections Bill

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 23rd February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

I warmly welcome the noble Lord, Lord Moore of Etchingham. His witty, erudite and insightful speech shows what an asset he will be here.

The Elections Bill is designed to strengthen the integrity of the electoral process and therefore strengthen UK democracy per se. That is a worthy aim that we should all embrace, but I worry that the Bill takes an overly technocratic and legalistic approach that evades deeper problems and cultural trends that undermine democratic norms today, from assaults on free speech to the fashion for casting aspersions on the capacity and motives of voters. When I am lobbied by opponents of the Bill, who say that the legislation “would not look out of place in Hungary, Russia or China”, I fear that hyperbole and partisan paranoia might distort the important public debates we need to have about democratic elections that this Bill should positively kick-start.

Like other noble Lords I have a lot of specific areas I want to ask questions about in Committee. Will restrictions on third party campaigning lead to disengagement of civil society organisations from political activism? Why on earth did the Government table changing the voting system so late in the day? For now, I have some comments on the alleged voter fraud issue. I welcome the Bill tackling the problems of postal voting. The noble Lord, Lord Pickles, described concerns over harvesting votes, which I think many of us have shared for some time. Of course postal voting is necessary, but it should be a narrow, particular form of voting and not a go-to device so open to abuse. Tightening this would help and would shore up the legitimacy of elections, I have no doubt.

The same motivation is used by the Government to justify the controversial voter ID scheme. However, I am less convinced that this illiberal show-us-your-papers measure is either proportionate or necessary when the data shows such minuscule examples of voter fraud, as we have heard. I do not go along with the overblown conspiracy theories that see voter ID as a dastardly Tory plot of “deliberate voter suppression”, as one Guardian editorial called it, or an evil attempt to rig the system to disempower the poorest and most marginalised. No, I think that kind of discussion is unhelpful. My objections are rather those raised by the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, about unintended consequences. Rather than reassuring voters that elections are not being corrupted by fraud, voter ID gives the impression that vote rigging is such a wide-scale problem that we need to change the law. Surely this puts an unnecessary question mark over election results and inadvertently sows suspicion among the public of their fellow voters.

Perhaps one underlying reason for all this focus on fraud is a more worrying problem beyond technical solutions: namely, the increasing disillusion with the democratic decision-making process, as expressed by a greater willingness to refuse to accept the outcome of legitimate votes. We have seen the emergence of the withdrawal of loser’s consent from recent election results. In America, Donald Trump’s “Stop the Steal” assault on the legitimacy of Joe Biden’s election as President is a case in point. Sadly, the precedent for this was set closer to home, in the attempts to frustrate and suppress the democratic result of the 2016 referendum, often led by powerful voices in the establishment, with celebrity QCs turning to the law courts, the People’s Vote campaign, and the likes of John Major—who has been cited by everybody here—and Lib Dem Lords, in fact, calling for a second referendum that demanded going back to the polls until voters gave the correct answer.

While many who oppose voter ID worry about disenfranchising electors now, for me the deeper problem is how widespread it has become to tell millions of voters, many who voted for the first time, that that once-in-a-generation vote should not have counted, with attempts to de-legitimise and tear up their vote by maligning 17.4 million citizens for being duped and not being educated enough to know what they were voting for. So, if the aim of Part 1 of the Bill is to bolster trust in elections, I suggest that far more effective than voter ID would be a robust campaign to restore the value of loser’s consent and to ensure that democratic outcomes are respected, however unpalatable those in power find voters’ choices.

There has also been a lot of disquiet expressed today about proposals to hold the Electoral Commission to account, critiqued as dangerous government interference in the Electoral Commission’s independence. I want to ask how independent the Electoral Commission really is. The commission outed itself as breaking its own impartiality code when the UK had the largest vote in its history. Its chair and commissioners expressed their regret that the electorate voted to leave the EU—in other words, that they voted the wrong way.

These remain sentiments were not just confined to their opinions but were wielded as power, with so much systematic investigation, prosecution, threats of fines and ultimately harassment of leave campaign groups and activists that the present chair of the Electoral Commission, John Pullinger, had to issue a public apology to the likes of Darren Grimes and so on. While leavers have been cleared, there are still those who cite the Electoral Commission investigations as an official stamp of approval to repeat misinformation about the legitimacy of Brexit.

I think it is time we questioned whether democracy benefits at all from a quango set up to adjudicate on and stand above democracy itself. I remind noble Lords that there is already a powerful and fully independent body that can hold politicians and political parties to account. It is called the electorate. I appreciate that my power-to-the-people stance will be dismissed sneerily as populism, but I am rather proud of trusting the people myself.

Downing Street Parties: Police Investigation

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Tuesday 25th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I can only say to my noble friend that the reports of findings will be published in due course. There are investigations under way; those investigations, with great respect, should be allowed to continue and be completed. At that point, obviously, the matter of publication becomes condign.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, we have just done the Third Reading of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, and I wondered whether the Minister would comment on the number of people who have been fined extortionate amounts of money for breaking rules and have been accused of breaking the law. Will they receive an amnesty, as a consequence of realising there was wide-scale rule-breaking?

Secondly, the Minister said the business of government will carry on—needs to carry on—but is there a danger that the Government will be distracted by this police inquiry, and hugely important matters of rebuilding society after lockdown are going to be neglected because of this preoccupation with No. 10 and parties? That is what the country is worried about.

[Lord True (Con)]

I agree with what the noble Baroness has said, and I can certainly give her the assurance that the work of governing is continuing. I do note that people on the Benches opposite are extremely distracted by their perusal of social media. But on the first point, she will understand that I cannot comment on the judgments that are being made in the courts or any individual cases, but obviously, I hear what she is saying.

Retained EU Law

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Thursday 18th November 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, I am not familiar with the detail of the points my noble friend raises. The general point that the EU tends to legislate in a highly risk-averse way, which has economic consequences, is a good one, and we will obviously have it in mind as we take this review forward.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, one of the key tenets of Brexit was the removal of substantive undemocratic layers above sovereign lawmaking to enhance democratic accountability. But does the Minister recognise that this control over laws is not yet a real, live felt experience for voters? If so, does he appreciate that the retained EU law review is an opportunity for a democratic engagement with voters—not stakeholders—about what they believe should be prioritised in the legislation, and that it should not be left to committees?

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness makes an extremely good point, and it is our wish to widen this debate as far as we can. One of the ways of doing it, we hope, will be the standing commission on deregulation, which I referred to in my Statement of 16 September, on which I hope to be able to update the House fairly shortly.

Government: Leadership Training

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Thursday 16th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I have never been a Minister, MP or civil servant, so the noble Lord, Lord Norton, will have to forgive me if I make my remarks as an erstwhile civilian. But I have worked in education and am familiar with the training world. I am afraid that, when I hear the words “advocacy of training” and “leadership skills”, my heart sinks. My dread is that it treats leadership as a technical matter, reduces virtues to techniques and can rip the heart out of what it means to lead. To be honest, if ever there was an example of our soulless technocratic era, it is the proliferation of leadership skills courses over recent years, comparable only to the ever-growing number of organisations that pay consultants to write their mission statements—always to me a worrying sign of an institution’s lack of mission.

Of course, I am all for reform, effective government and professionalising Whitehall. I want new Ministers and staff to be able to upgrade their technical skills, and to understand procedure and how to improve drafting legislation and so on. Any measures that make government more accountable and less opaque and arcane are admirable, but I query whether leadership skills training is the remedy, and worry it might turn leadership into performative competence with too little regard for content.

In introducing this debate, the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, talked of the need for Ministers to have the skills to sign up their teams to their vision. My worry is that they do not have a vision, not that they are not trained in how to share it. It reminds me of Debating Matters, a national debating competition for 16 to 18 year-olds that I set up over 15 years ago but is now a charity in its own right. It reminds me of that because its slogan is “substance over style”, and it was set up as an explicit antidote to traditional schools’ debating, which tends to emphasise clever rhetorical tricks and devices, even employing voice coaches and drama techniques. Pupils’ speeches can be stylistically elegant but, while beautifully delivered, can often be banal cliches; some of the Debating Matters pupils might have stuttered and stammered their way through their speeches, but they were content rich. Leadership requires us to give due regard to content.

This morning, I turned on Sky News to see a representative from Rights for Residents, who was eloquently and forcefully explaining the petition that she and others were handing into No. 10 today, in support of residents and their relatives in care homes, who have been denied visiting rights. The Rights for Residents campaign did not exist before this pandemic, but the awful, cruel treatment of residents forced it to exist. It is led—that is my point—by a group of brilliant women who had no experience of public life before this and who have never been on a media training course. They took a lead because it mattered, and they showed courage, integrity and principles. I sometimes think we do not talk about that enough when we talk about leadership skills.

I also feel anxious when I hear proposals about the creation of a physical campus—a school of public service—which we have heard about. This school would apparently be

“a world leading … executive training programme, equivalent to the leading business school offers”,

in which aspiring civil servants, public sector leaders and politicians would be trained together, based on a redefined set of leadership requirements. I immediately thought about the destructive impact that MBAs and managerialism have had on public life. I am sorry, but I do not think this is the solution: think of all the damage that has been done to our language by the gobbledegook and acronyms of managerialism, the performance management frameworks and so on. Then I noticed that a priority for this new school will be to lead high-quality research to develop better understanding of the relationship between leadership, well-being and productivity. I appeal to people not to waste money on that research, because it should be obvious that there is a connection between those things. If you need to be taught that, what kind of a leader are you?

I am also worried that setting up this kind of campus might end up aping other aspects of campus culture. Think of the debacle of the Valuing Everyone training. It was supposed to make us better leaders, but it was condescending and, if anything, did not make us value others and led to the cancelling of several of our Peers for not doing it, because of the rubric and rules. Then there are the endless stories of civil servants being forced to ape the worst of the divisive aspects of student identity politics, when they are sent on training courses on unconscious bias—which is, by the way, pseudoscience—and how to champion diversity, as defined by organisations such as Stonewall.

I make this point because, rather than just saying that what we need to do is to train Ministers and civil servants, we need sufficiently to scrutinise what that training consists of, because it can actually be dangerous. I was struck by the description of the problems at the heart of government given by the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor. I agree with her and the shocking examples that she gave of the contempt shown to parliamentary accountability of late and the broader disdain for democracy shown across both Houses for popular sovereignty in relation to the Brexit vote—not because they did not know what the mandate was but in defiance of our electors.

That seems to me not something you can train people out of. It is not a skills deficit, but a democratic political deficit. That should be our focus, and we should not get distracted by all going off on training courses.

Covid-19 (Public Services Committee Report)

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Thursday 22nd July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, since coming here 10 months ago, I have read a lot of legislation and reports and to be honest, it has all been a bit of a chore. However, this report sparkled. I know it has had lots of plaudits, but I commend the noble Baroness, Lady Armstrong of Hill Top, and all the members of the Public Services Committee for an accessible, informative and thought-provoking document. There is lots in it I disagree with, but it was just so useful—and unusual for these toxic times, in that it was free from rancour and “gotchas”. As it says itself, it is not about apportioning blame for past failures, but making constructive suggestions for future reforms—a great relief.

One caveat: in general, I am wary of any sphere allowing the normal of the pandemic to automatically become a new normal by default. The call in the report is to lock in innovations, but that makes me nervous. Yes, it is very useful to kickstart debate, but not to institutionalise as a rigid fait accompli. For example, we all know that digital technology may have facilitated everything from working from home to digital health consultations. But as the report itself points out, Zoom teams and the like could never, and should never, replace face-to-face services. I note with concern that too many GPs and, for example, university lecturers and senior managers, seem reluctant to resume real-life interaction, at the expense of service users.

One striking feature of the report that I would like to make explicit is the cost of treating the NHS as almost a sacred cow public service. It is understandable to celebrate and almost sacralise the health service in a health pandemic, but this can be at the expense of other services. Testimony in the report noted that support for the NHS, especially during the initial part of the pandemic, might have been necessary but should not have come at the expense of preventive and public health services. I agree.

The Nuffield Trust is quoted as noting how the Covid crisis highlights the startling inequality between health and social care services. Many of us felt uncomfortable that that initial “clap for the NHS” neglected care workers. Even today, all the focus is on the pay rise for the heroic NHS staff, whereas social care is plagued with poor wages and awful employment conditions; and now we have even singled out social care workers as the only workforce facing mandated vaccines or the sack.

So, it is important that the report highlights that, long before Covid, successive Governments prioritised funding the NHS—especially acute services—and neglected funding social care. The Nuffield Trust notes that the NHS received generous emergency funding from the Treasury in the early stages of the pandemic, which then enabled a dramatic expansion of capacity. Care providers, in contrast, said that extra funding did not reach them. Also, and related, the deputy director of the New Local Government Network contrasted the experience of local government with the NHS. The NHS had its costs met in full and deficits written off unquestioningly, but that was a privilege not afforded to councils or other public services. I do wonder about this hierarchy of priorities.

The consequences go beyond material funding. As ADASS points out, the historical tendency to prioritise the NHS has influenced policy decisions, sometimes with tragic consequences. In the name of saving the NHS, rather than the NHS saving lives or the public, we now face the collateral damage of non-Covid deaths from cancer and heart disease and huge waiting lists for many in dire need of medical interventions, with the terrible news of an increase of 50% of under-20s hospitalised with eating disorders. In a different debate earlier today, we also heard about the use of “do not resuscitate” in hospitals. We cannot ignore these things.

But perhaps the greatest horror associated with the focus on the mantra of protecting the NHS was the scandal of patients being discharged from hospital into care homes without testing—what the Nuffield Trust called, as quoted in the report, a

“rapid clearing of hospital beds in the early stages”,

regardless of the

“lack of preparedness of the care settings”.

The most vulnerable died as a consequence and, at the very least, it is important that we be able to query NHS policies without being shut down as somehow disloyal to NHS staff who, I agree, have been and are heroic and hard workers—but so are other workers. I do not think that you should be called a traitor to the institution if you query it.

Another striking aspect I read from the report is the wasted potential of civil society in helping deal with the pandemic. On a positive note, of course, the report gives lots of examples of innovation happening because bureaucracy was swept away. In fact, sometimes to tear up the red tape is caricatured as a laissez-faire, careless approach, but the removal of overly bureaucratic hurdles allowed public services to work alongside charities and community groups and volunteers, and the private sector stepped up. Altogether, this played a huge role in delivering services.

The surge of civic action, such as the 4,000 Covid-19 mutual aid groups and the local WhatsApp and Facebook groups I am sure we were all in as volunteers, showed a real appetite for providing practical solidarity in the emergency from so many people. We saw the generosity of 750,000 people signing up in four days when NHS England’s Royal Voluntary Service was launched in April 2020, but sadly that was wasted. The Institute for Volunteering’s research rightly notes in the report that overcentralised co-ordination was not aligned to locally organised activities, significant time was taken to respond, enthusiasm dwindled and people became demoralised. I think it was just so sad when volunteers could have helped, for example, relieve the pressure on social care workers, or indeed NHS workers.

In general, the official approach to Covid was to demobilise the public—to squash initiative and volunteerism. The report notes how the German public health service, in contrast, mobilised and seconded public servants from across departments: forestry, museums—

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

I am sorry to interrupt the noble Baroness—

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

Sorry, have I gone on?

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

I am afraid that her time is up.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

I am sorry. I hope that we can mobilise the public in the future. I thank the committee for the report, and I apologise to the House.

Ministerial and other Maternity Allowances Bill

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 25th February 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Morris of Aberavon (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, it is right both that we get the wording in legislation right and that no offence is caused. The problem is that what was acceptable yesterday is not necessarily acceptable today. I very much welcome the helpful stance taken so early in the debate by the noble Lord, Lord True, on behalf of the Government, and I hope that will relieve anxiety.

I once caused offence to a colleague in your Lordships’ House in a short intervention because I used the word “man” on two occasions and she forgot that I had used “persons” on three occasions in the same speech. It was a no-win situation. A distinguished law professor at my first university, long before my time, used to say that according to the Interpretation Act 1889, the word “man” embraced “woman”. I have not looked that up and I do not know how relevant it would be today.

What is important, as the Minister said at Second Reading, is that the Labour Government in 2007 and successive Governments have sought to avoid gender-specific pronouns and usages in drafting legislation. I do not think we should overthrow that legislation. I hope the Minister has met the concerns expressed by the mover of the first amendment. The Committee will not mind my reminding it that when there is a departure from the traditional wording by parliamentary draftsmen, the courts are minded to probe deeply into the possibility of different meanings. Taking on board the observations of the Minister, I venture to advise the Committee of the dangers of departing from traditional drafting. Concern about any particular word or words should be looked at, not in this Bill but rather in a review of drafting practice more generally. That is the right place to ensure that we keep our drafting up to date.

I add that, further to the Minister’s speech at Second Reading, when I introduced the Law Officers Bill in the other place in 1997 there was no restriction whatever on the ability of the Solicitor-General to exercise all the functions of the Attorney-General. He may want to reconsider his remarks to remove any dubiety.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, like others, I would have preferred the unapologetic word “woman” to “mother”, but I warmly commend the Government for listening and especially the noble Lord, Lord True, on his patience in talking to some of us. I am delighted to take this as a win.

As we have heard from colleagues, the most gratifying part of all this has been about opening up a broader debate. Second Reading opened a Pandora’s box. As others have said, our inboxes have been bursting with relief and gratitude that the debate happened at all. People who usually sneer at the House of Lords—a lot of my colleagues are not keen on this place—were cheering, which was disconcerting. The noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, and the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, are now considered national heroes, let me tell you; I am expecting statues to be put up soon. I personally commend the noble Baroness, Lady Nicholson, for showing real leadership on this question.

However, we should be careful about too many congratulations because the truth is that we are in a privileged place. In this House, at least, we cannot be cancelled for raising the issue. It might be an affront to democratic accountability that we are here for life, but I am delighted that we have used that wiggle room to say something that has become unsayable. How extraordinary and sad that saying that women give birth is so contentious, and that we are told we are brave for saying it. I feel a bit queasy when people say they commend our courage for speaking out, because we are safe here. We are not facing the kind of threats that Professor Selina Todd, a history professor at Oxford University, has when she needs security to give her lectures because she is gender-critical.

All those emails that we receive show just how frightened people are to speak out. Mostly it is not physical fear but fear that they will be dubbed bigots because they are progressive people—and who wants that? They are frightened that their defence of sex-specific services and the use of sex-specific language will see them closed down. I disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, when he says that free speech is not under threat. I think it really is.

The noble Baroness, Lady Barker, in some ways associated those of us making these arguments with deploying the same tactics as those who campaigned against immigrants or lesbian and gay rights in the past. That itself becomes a form of demonisation, which has a chilling effect, but I reassure the noble Baroness that this is not an argument for bigotry; it is for women’s rights. She fears that this is stating that trans people are a threat to women, but that is not what I am trying to do at all. What is a threat to women is a particular brand of trans identity ideology. That does threaten women, but that is not the same as trans people.

There is a shocking consequence for service provision that I want to mention. I have spent hours in this House discussing the Domestic Abuse Bill and will carry on doing so. However, as we have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, it is not only free speech that is under attack but services as well. This week, three specialist domestic abuse agencies lost funding due to local government gender-neutral policies and language. The fate of RISE, a mostly women-only refuge and domestic abuse service in Brighton, means that they have lost £5 million in contract work and will likely have to close, after council chiefs set up a tender intentionally non-gendered so that any women-only organisation would fall short of the new demands. When I expressed shock at this, I was told that I was anti-trans women, which I am not.