Census (Return Particulars and Removal of Penalties) Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town and Baroness Barker

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 4th June 2019 Grand Committee

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, it is good to be back on this small but none the less important Bill. After Second Reading, I found myself reflecting on the importance of the census. I listened carefully to what the noble Baroness, Lady Finn, said about the fact that these days there are many more sources of data that the Government can call on to establish various aspects of citizens’ identities. She, largely I think on economic grounds, questioned whether there needed to be a census at all. That is a legitimate debate to have, and no doubt we will have it at some later stage. However, from talking to people who watched our debate, there is agreement that the simple process of the Government engaging in an exercise to establish information about their citizens is in itself important. It is an aspect and example of citizenship that has quite a lot of meaning for individuals. However we may come to do this in future, and in whatever mode, for the moment it is important to recognise that, for all citizens, having the right to engage in a meaningful exercise of registering the details of one’s existence with the state is important. That is why, for the very small group of people we are talking about today, it is important to take great care.

In the Bill we are primarily talking about making whether one registers one’s gender identity voluntary and making sure that anyone who wishes not to do so will not face a penalty, as they would for failing to answer mandatory parts of the census. However, we are going into this new area for the census of questioning people about their gender identity, which is a sensitive matter, so we need to do so with great care.

The purpose of the amendment in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Wallace of Saltaire is, in essence, to get to the heart of what is important about the Bill—not the legislation but the guidance that will accompany it and will inform or assist people when they make their return. I should tell the Minister at this stage that I have no intention of pressing my amendment, the purpose of which is to enable us to clarify one or two points on which there may not have been sufficient understanding from our debate at Second Reading.

The first thing I want to establish is whether the question asking a person to say what their sex is will remain binary, as it has been since 1801, and whether it will be the case in 2021—as it has been for the two censuses in the past 20 years, if not before—that people answer on the basis of their lived identity: that which they present to the world. I have to say that I hope that is the case. If not, and we go for a far more limited definition, we run the risk of requiring people to give answers that would contradict those given in good faith in the censuses of 10 or 20 years ago because they have changed their gender and recognise their new gender. If we were to require them to go back to an earlier iteration of their existence, we would confuse the matter. Can the Minister confirm these things?

As I have just demonstrated that these are enormously complicated matters in practice, the second thing to ask is whether the officials testing the questions on sex and gender identity—who have, I believe, consulted civil servants in Scotland engaged in a parallel exercise—might engage quite widely with a number of different groups who have been working on these sorts of issues for some considerable time. There are questions for officials about what they have discovered during the extensive testing already done, and perhaps about the further testing that will need to be done leading up to 2021. That is the basis of my amendment; I hope the Minister will be able to clarify. I beg to move.

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)]

I have very little to add. I concur absolutely and reinforce the importance of the census, not just as a purely numerical thing but as rather more. I am sure the Minister will not have heeded too much the pleas of one of his predecessors, the noble Lord, Lord Maude, or the noble Baroness, Lady Finn. We should question whether we have this.

As was clear at Second Reading, we support the census and the initiative in this Bill. However, everyone agrees—this is not new—that it will be key for it to be done correctly with everyone’s confidence, particularly the populations who will now be able to answer questions deeply relevant to them. I also think it means that there should be no surprises when the census appears, either for the relevant groups, for whom this will be a welcome move forward, or for the rest of the form-fillers. There should be no surprise—or, if you like, antagonism—and I do not think there will be from the non-involved groups when these questions appear.

While we need to have the questions tested on those with a particular interest in answering them, we also need to test that they are understandable to those to whom they do not particularly apply. I am sure that the consultation on the questions will take account of this so that even those not interested in answering these questions will understand why they are there. We should not confuse people so we need to test the questions with all those who will fill in the forms.

My second point goes beyond my amendment in this group. We need to make sure that we see a very high completion rate of the census as a whole as well as on these additional questions. A lot of good PR will be needed to achieve that. Explanations and preparations need to be made well before the census form arrives, whether online or through people’s letterboxes. While I realise that this is beyond the scope of the amendment before the Committee, it would be useful if the Minister could say a little about the publicity covering the questions once they have been agreed.

I want to raise only one other point, perhaps a little cheekily because again it is not part of the amendment. At Second Reading we asked about the additional question on military service. Is there any update on how the consultation on that issue is taking place?

Charities (Protection and Social Investment) Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town and Baroness Barker

Wednesday 1st July 2015 Grand Committee

[Baroness Barker]

My Lords, I too thank the noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley. The funding of the Charity Commission is a subject which anyone who has met its current chair for longer than about five minutes will have had raised. It is quite a complex issue. One of the most interesting points to arise from the investigation into the Cup Trust was the extent to which the Charity Commission was not, at that stage, aware of the cost of its own operation. At a time when every charity in the land has ruthlessly to look at the cost of its operation, it is only fair that the commission should do so, too.

I want to make three points. Clearly, the matter will not be resolved today but it is a useful contribution to the debate. First, the exercise of the commission’s powers is not in any way related to the number of charities which it has to regulate. In fact, it is rather disproportionate: a very small number of charities cause the most costs to the Charity Commission. Increasingly because of digitisation, most charities are dealt with in a low-cost and volume operation—there are just a few which are bigger.

Secondly, the noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley, was quite right when she said that it is the commission’s advice that is most valued. That is an area of work for which it receives no revenue at all. It is rather strange that this country has the most advanced charity legislation and regulation in the world, so much so that one would think we might be able to export it around the world to generate income. If I were setting up a charitable foundation in Russia, I would not want to register it there; I would want to do it here. Much as the previous Government set up an international commercial court in London, might the Charity Commission at some point look towards increasing its income by internationalising and commoditising what it does?

Finally, until the Charity Commission is willing to look to other regulators, such as the FCA, and to appreciate that it has common interests with them and to be less isolated in the way it pursues its function, it will inevitably always be running back to government asking for funding. As the commission has seen in the last few years, government funding is finite. The noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley, has raised some really interesting questions which the sector needs to think about but which the commission needs to start thinking about much more creatively than it has done before.

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town]

My Lords, all those who have spoken have made the case for the amendment moved by my noble friend Lady Pitkeathley: this review is clearly needed. The Charity Commission has itself published some interesting research, either this week or last week, which gives an interesting insight into the views of the public and charities themselves on the concept of charging for charity regulation. A significant proportion of charities do not presume that the costs of charity regulation should continue to be met entirely from public funds. The wider findings of the study indicate a public appetite for charities to be regulated effectively. This leads one to question whether the Charity Commission can do that without sufficient funding. However, the report also shows that charities and the public are rather split on how to fund regulation. As my noble friend has indicated and as the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, referred to, it is unusual for a regulator to be funded by taxpayers rather than the regulated community. We have the example of the FCA, but the Legal Services Board, the accountancy regime and the CQC are funded by their regulated communities.

The noble Baroness, Lady Barker, made the point about a regulator feeling part of the regulators’ community, sharing benchmarks and the whole of that attitude. She also drew on the point about user involvement. I have been a member of some regulators, and I chaired a consumer body of one of them. We benchmarked the different ombudsmen in various sectors. The Charity Commission is an ombudsman in that sense but this was a different issue. There was a feeling that it was a useful exercise not only in how they could compare themselves with each other, but also in how as their users we could influence how they were working for us. It would be nice if the commission could see itself in that environment.

Charities (Protection and Social Investment) Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town and Baroness Barker

Monday 29th June 2015 Grand Committee

[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts]

The danger about moving as the noble Baroness says is that when in two years from now there is a charge from the Government for regulating the sector, there will be an enormous outcry, so what looks attractive to begin with will be inflexible, expensive and even more unpopular than the present system. It would be better from every point of view, accepting all the points about vulnerable people, if the sector could be persuaded to take up the challenge, find the will, find the money and make it happen, because it will make it happen in an effective way. The problem at the moment is that it has not really accepted that there is a fundamental problem and thinks that if there is a problem, it is not its problem but somebody else’s.

[Baroness Barker]

My Lords, I would like to follow that up by saying that I think that the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, is absolutely right that one of the big issues—in this field in particular, but it is a big issue right across our society that we have not got to grips with—is how we will include people with dementia in all sorts of aspects of our life. This is true in terms of the NHS, and social care, and here.

The voluntary sector ought to be the one place in our society where we can go and talk to the Alzheimer’s Society and ask what a proper code of conduct and practice might look like. It is self-evident from what the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, said, that the commercial sector has not got this right yet. Organisations such as banks are the bodies in our society that should be at the forefront of dealing with transactions with individuals, even more than government. Banks have millions of transactions every day with millions of individuals, including older people. They clearly have not got it right. We should have one go in our sector at getting it right for everybody else. If that does not work, then by all means go down the route that the noble Baroness wants to go.

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town]

It is clear that the distance between us is very small. My worry concerns the idea that we will not have another charity Bill in this Parliament. If I had an absolute commitment that we would have another Bill in two years’ time, so that if we had not done it we could do it then, that would be fine, but my fear is that this will be the only such Bill and this is the chance that we should take.

Having said that, I agree with a lot of what the Minister said. In terms of his plea—or threat; I do not know—to trustees to take a more active interest in this, his words were well chosen. The words from the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, on a single point of entry were very good, too. However, there must be some way of overseeing that it happens. Even if the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, does not want to come back with a suggestion on Report, we will try to see whether there is a way that puts an extra little voomph—sorry, Hansard—behind this, so that we do not have to wait. The real problem is that we had to wait for Olive to know that this was going on. That showed the Fundraising Standards Board that it was not just a matter of standards but a matter of enforcement. One disagreement that I have with the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, is when he says that it will be very expensive. I think that some money must be spent on this, because the Fundraising Standards Board, even if it is still self-regulated, must do some monitoring, and that always costs money. If we do not do that, the long-term problem will be that we no longer have this very precious sector, which I think all of us agree is one of the great prides of this country.

Having said that, we will seek a way to come back that gets maximum support. For the moment, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Charities (Protection and Social Investment) Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town and Baroness Barker

Tuesday 23rd June 2015 Grand Committee

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town]

I believe we are still on Amendment 7. I will deal with that when we come to Amendment 11.

[Baroness Barker]

I am sorry; I thought that they had been grouped together. I apologise to the noble Baroness.