School Curriculum: Creative Subjects

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Thursday 14th July 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

Between 2011 and 2015, the number of entries in arts subjects did rise, and the percentage of pupils in state-funded schools with at least one GCSE entry in arts subjects rose as well. The noble Earl is right that creative subjects are extremely important. Indeed, our new Progress 8 measure will provide more scope for creative subjects, as it includes eight qualifications rather than five.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

I declare my interest as a governor and a member of the board of the Royal Shakespeare Company, to which the noble Baroness has referred. She is clearly aware—I certainly hope she is—of the good work that the Royal Shakespeare Company education department does. She may also be aware that that department and others are very anxious about the decline in the take-up of arts and cultural subjects at GCSE, and the pressure that the emphasis on the EBacc is having on schools trying to push themselves up the league tables. Will she therefore acknowledge that there is more than just the research to which my noble friend referred that points to the value of arts subjects? Will she ensure that Ofsted gives proper attention and due credit to schools that properly invest in arts and cultural subjects?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

I am certainly happy to acknowledge the importance of creative and arts subjects. As I said, we have been doing a lot of work in providing funding to encourage arts and music programmes for schools. Schools themselves are leading the way in valuing these subjects and making sure that their young people have access to a whole range of activities. The new Progress 8 measure will give more scope to include creative subjects within it, which we hope will also reinforce the importance of creative subjects.

House of Lords: Domestic Committees

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Monday 9th May 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

My Lords, it has been my experience in this House that the further down the speakers list one is placed, the less there is left to say and the danger of repetition therefore increases. Unfortunately, on this occasion the opposite appears to be the case. I have rarely been this high up the speakers list and found myself with so little left to say. That is because, of course, everything that needs to be said in respect of the Leader’s Group, of which I was privileged to be a member, has been put most eloquently, first, by the Leader of the House herself, to whom I add my thanks for allowing this debate to take place, and of course by the person to whom I should refer as the noble Baroness but who I would like to refer to as my noble friend, the noble Baroness, Lady Shephard. She has just set out the work of the group so comprehensively.

It was a huge privilege to be a member of the group and to work under the excellent chairmanship of the noble Baroness, Lady Shephard. Her qualities are well known in the House and so it will not be a surprise to anyone that she led our work with a winning combination of forensic thoroughness and absolutely irresistible charm. She has presented the report this afternoon with characteristic clarity. We were also lucky, as the noble Baroness, Lady Shephard, has already said, to have Judith Brooke as our clerk. Without her diligence and, I have to say, her elegant prose style, our task would have been a good deal harder.

I should say at the outset that I have served on several of the committees whose role we were charged with examining, including the House Committee, and I have a very high regard for the work that they do. However, as has been said, the need for review became clear as soon as we started taking evidence—which, as indeed has also already been said, we did over a number of months and in considerable detail. Everyone we spoke to, including representatives from almost every aspect of the work of the House, expressed significant concerns about current arrangements, albeit in a variety of ways—some of them quite pungent.

The recurring themes, as set out in our report, have been explained already by our chairman, so I shall not repeat them, but it really is hard to overemphasise the consistency of the messages that we received. It is always easier—and very human—to leave things as they are, particularly when there is no apparent crisis. Things get done: why meddle? But this is a critical time for Parliament—not just for the House of Lords but for the whole of Parliament. Trust is low, reputations are vulnerable. There are significant challenges ahead, not least the looming prospect of a major and extremely costly refurbishment of these buildings.

On the face of it, internal governance is not much on the minds of those who comment on what we do. But it has the potential to become much more so, especially if anything goes wrong. At present our arrangements are opaque and confusing, even to those actively involved. It is not easy to explain the governance systems clearly or to understand the lines of accountability.

The recommendations in the report are intended to provide clarity and coherence. They are not perfect; there are downsides—fewer committee places and challenges with the structuring and managing of the workloads of the new committees. As we say in the report, there is detail to be worked out and, of course, the noble Baroness the Leader has already told us that it is her intention, should the broad thrust of these recommendations be accepted, that that detail should be examined after this debate has concluded.

On balance, however, we in the Leader’s Group felt that the possible disbenefits of our proposals were outweighed by the potential for a more streamlined, transparent and functional system within which the vital need for mutual trust and respect between what we might call, though somewhat inaccurately, the Executive, or the Administration, and what might be called, though equally inaccurately, the non-Executive, or the Members, which is addressed directly in recommendations 102 to 106, has a better chance of being met. This must be a goal worth seeking, limited as it may seem to some whose hearts and minds are set on more radical reform of the workings of your Lordships’ House.

This report is significant but not revolutionary. I say this with all due respect to my colleagues—and indeed to myself—and not in any way to undervalue what it represents. Rather, I want to make the point that the changes it proposes are modest, incremental and intended to improve the working lives of all of us—Members of the House and the staff who support us so ably. It may not be perfect but it represents a bit of progress. I very much hope that the House will support it.

Select Committee Reports: Government Responses

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Tuesday 13th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

My noble friend raises an interesting point, but I do not think that it has been raised particularly extensively by other noble Lords. Probably, one of the reasons for that is because we are all very clear in this House that all the chairmen of our Select Committees, regardless of which part of the House they are from, act very independently.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

My Lords, does the noble Baroness agree that the debate around this Question has been slightly confused? We appear to be discussing, on the one hand, whether the Government have responded to a Select Committee report and, on the other, whether that committee report and the response have been debated in this House. For the benefit of those of us who have forgotten, can the noble Baroness explain to the House the procedure whereby, once the Government have responded, a Select Committee report comes forward for debate?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

The decision on when to hold a debate about a Select Committee report is taken very much as part of a discussion between the Whips’ Office and the Committee Office. Some Select Committees decide to hold their debates before they have had a response from the Government and some decide that they want to wait until after the Government have responded. There is no hard and fast rule on that.

House of Lords: Question Time

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Monday 7th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

I agree very much with my noble friend that brief questions are to be encouraged: brief questions tend to elicit brief answers. I think that it is incumbent on everyone in the House to make sure that they understand the rules set out in the Companion. I think that over time behaviour sometimes slips. This is a good opportunity to remind ourselves of those principles to which we all say, “Hear, hear,” but which we need to put into action.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

My Lords, I am sure that the Leader agrees that question time is both the best of this House and, sometimes, the worst. Does he also agree, as I think he does, that occasionally the transgressions come from the Dispatch Box? On statements of opinion, does he agree that from time to time opinion is expressed about the conduct of the Opposition, which is perhaps not always relevant to the Question being asked? Will he consider stressing to his colleagues how important these rules are?

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

I will certainly stress the rules to all Members of the House, both Front Bench and Back Bench.

House of Lords: Working Practices

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Thursday 1st November 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall]

My Lords, it is quite rare to participate in a debate and find that you agree with practically everything that everyone has said. That being the case, it is tempting to do the generous thing and sit down immediately, but I am not going to do that. I am sorry. I added my name to the list of speakers mainly in order to support my noble friend Lord Filkin. He has now been compared to a terrier and to an engineer, which suggests a sort of particularly enthusiastic Jack Russell, digging away furiously. However, I think his approach to these issues is a little more sophisticated than that suggests and I want to express my personal gratitude to him for the huge amount of time and energy he has put into keeping alive the issue of how we improve our working practices. He has set out our agenda today with admirable clarity and so much better than I could that I certainly do not intend to try to emulate that.

I have had the privilege over a decade or so of being a Member of this House of looking at its work from a number of different standpoints. I have been a member of several Select Committees, of domestic committees, of pre-legislative scrutiny committees and of Private Bill Committees. I am a Deputy Speaker and I hope that I have participated to the best of my ability in the Chamber in terms of Questions and debates. What I see is a House that is, in depth, formidably strong. It is particularly so, as has been said by many other speakers, in the cross-party work that goes on in our widely respected Select Committees. However, at present there are two issues. The first is that there is not enough of this work to satisfy the ambitions of Members to participate and to make proper use of the expertise that is available. Secondly, this kind of work is woefully underreported, which allows a false impression to perpetuate of what Members of this House actually do. For example, that much-used website theyworkforyou.com completely ignores all the work in committee and only gives as metrics the appearances that noble Lords make in the Chamber. You can literally stand up and say, “My Lords”, sit down again—because you do not get in on a Question for example—and that gets recorded as participation in a debate. That is a bit bonkers. It unfortunately gives a very misleading impression. We need to address this and many other issues.

I share the disappointment expressed by a number of other noble Lords about why so much of the admirable Goodlad report, which did just that and is nearly two years old, has yet to be brought forward to the whole House. I hope we can hear from the Leader of the House, whose excellent initiative it was, whether he intends to give us a chance to talk about some of the issues in the report, now that the issue of wholesale reform has, for the moment, been set aside.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, said, the fact that it has been set aside is both a threat and an opportunity. We can do something to reform ourselves using our own mechanisms and without legislation. If we do not, the pressures that are built into our current system will inevitably result in further damage to our effectiveness and reputation. We have the opportunity to be active and creative about our future, and to look at refining our contribution to political life, not only in the interests of Parliament but in the interests of the nation as a whole. We are repeatedly reminded that we are self-regulating. I hope that this debate will be a first step towards using that strength to do for ourselves what we know we can do, and what needs to be done, rather than allowing the initiative to be taken from us.

Arrangement of Business

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Wednesday 31st October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I do not really know all the ins and outs of the genesis of this amendment. I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Hart, was acting in good faith and encouraged others to support him. As regards my noble friend, I have complete faith in his abilities to take this Bill through.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall]

My Lords, can the Leader of the House assist the House by explaining how the business will proceed on Monday—and, indeed, how it would have proceeded had we taken it today—in respect of the relationship between the question of admissibility and the substantive issue to which the amendment relates? It is my impression, and he will no doubt correct me if I am wrong, that it would be very difficult to discuss the admissibility of the amendment without discussing its substance. I do not see how that can be done. Can the Leader of the House explain the likely nature of the debate on Monday when we come to it?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, there would be two questions before the House. The first would be a question on admissibility. I suspect that the noble Baroness is entirely correct that, during the course of that debate, there would be discussions on the substance of the amendment. It would be difficult to see how one could progress without that taking place. When that is settled, if the House agrees to support the view of the clerks, then the amendment would not be taken; if the House decided to continue with the amendment, there would be a second, alternative debate in the normal manner on the amendment and the House would need to take a decision on how to dispose of that.

HSBC: Lord Green of Hurstpierpoint

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Monday 23rd July 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall]

My Lords, I personally—along with most of the House, I feel—am in no position and would not wish to challenge the integrity of the noble Lord, Lord Green. However, does the Leader of the House agree that perhaps there would be less question about his conduct over the issue of HSBC were the House to see him more often answering questions that relate to his ministerial responsibilities? It may have something to do with his relative unfamiliarity to Members of the House that they are perhaps more sceptical than they should be.

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, as a Minister for trade, my noble friend of course spends a great deal of time overseas. Since he was appointed, he has travelled to 42 countries and visited 73 cities. In his role as Minister of State for Trade and Investment, he has answered a total of 72 Parliamentary Questions, including two Oral Questions out of three that he could have answered. The response to the point raised by the noble Baroness is that if more Questions on trade and investment were put down, I am sure that my noble friend would be very happy to come and answer them.

Financial Services Bill

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Monday 18th June 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall]

Will the Leader of the House clarify that? I have to confess my ignorance on this matter, but I understand that the Grand Committee sits for much shorter sessions in Committee than when a Bill is on the Floor of the House. Therefore, I am not entirely sure why he is suggesting that it will take fewer days to get this Bill through in Grand Committee than on the Floor of the House.

Draft House of Lords Reform Bill

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Tuesday 7th June 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, what I am saying is that, first, it is unnecessary, and secondly, everything in the noble Lord’s amendment will, I am sure, be taken into account by the Joint Committee.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall]

Will the noble Lord tell the House how many times the committee led by the Deputy Prime Minister met in order to arrive at the conclusions that are now represented in the White Paper and the draft Bill?

[Lord Strathclyde]

The Clegg committee met nine times between May and December last year before the draft Bill and the White Paper were brought forward last month.

I hope that, having heard this, the noble Lord, Lord Cunningham, will feel that he has had a good outing on the subject and that he is confident, as I am, that the Joint Committee will look at these matters. We can leave it up to the Joint Committee to decide whether it can meet the deadline of the end of February next year.

Financial Provision for Members

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Monday 28th June 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, my noble friend is entirely correct to point out that the reason why we are even discussing this is because trust has been dented, not just in this House but substantially in another place. Both Houses are, in their own way, trying to find their way through this to come out at the other end with a greater understanding between the public and Parliament, so that we can try to rebuild that trust. My noble friend is also entirely correct to say that this is a move away from the expenses regime. We are not asking Peers to demonstrate what they have spent. In fact, we are not hugely interested in what Peers spend their money on, in where they stay or, indeed, in whom they stay with. What we are interested in is: have they turned up? Have they made a contribution? What should the value of that be?

The SSRB suggested in its report that in due course the expenses regime that it proposed should be taxed. I take no particular view on that. I am not an accountant and it is not a decision for me. It may well be a decision for HMRC and the Treasury to take in due course. My further understanding is that, if tax were payable, that would require legislation and that, if tax were taken off, no doubt many Peers would make the case for some sort of rerating to make an allowance for taxation. These are all issues for another day.

There is another view, which I laid out a few minutes ago. We hope that there will be legislation on a reformed House. If there is a reformed, elected House, those Peers—or senators, or whatever they are—will be paid. There is then the prospect in that legislation for another independent body—perhaps IPSA itself—to look at what the recommendations should be.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall]

My Lords, does the Leader accept that there are people around the House, including me, who may be significantly worse off under the new regime but who none the less welcome the proposal that has come from the noble Lord this afternoon? I agree substantially with the noble Lord, Lord Phillips of Sudbury. If we go ahead with this, we cannot expect to retain all the advantages of both the previous system and the new system and to suffer no change in how our tax status is viewed. The main benefit of the new proposal is that it ensures that the way in which your Lordships may be supported or remunerated—the noble Lord, Lord Phillips, suggested that it might amount to remuneration in future—bears some clear relationship to how people outside this House are paid for their services. As well as transparency and accountability, it feels at this moment as though we should be demonstrating not that we are so different from the rest of the world that we cannot be treated in the same way as other people, but that our work bears a distinct and reasonable relationship to what is done elsewhere and therefore we should be treated very similarly to people outside this House.