Parliament: Conventions

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Monday 2nd March 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I am pleased that the noble Lord is so interested in my party’s manifesto. That suggests he believes it is the only one that really matters. He will not be surprised that I am not going to give him any insight into the content of the manifesto before it is published.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, will my noble friend indicate what the conventions are in respect of the Government’s involvement in private Members’ legislation? In particular, could she explain why the Government have backed a Bill that guarantees 0.7% of GDP for overseas aid, while blocking a Bill that guarantees 2% of our GDP for NATO?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

The noble Lord knows that the 0.7% Bill, which was debated in this House on Friday, is, as he said, a Private Member’s Bill, but it represents a policy that was in the Conservative Party’s manifesto at the most recent election.

House of Lords: Governance

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Tuesday 20th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

The noble Lord is right to highlight in the report from the Commons committee a recommendation for us to explore the prospect of more shared services. I certainly support reviewing the scope for extending shared services between the two Houses when they would deliver greater value for money and lead to more effectiveness.

It would be premature for me to express a view on having a single department. Let us focus on what is possible and what would make sense in terms of us working together on those shared services. As the noble Lord rightly says, in any such arrangement, as exists already on shared services, the House of Lords must be an equal partner with the House of Commons.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

Does my noble friend recall the report from Sir Roy Griffiths in the 1980s on the health service, when he said that if Florence Nightingale were wandering the corridors of the National Health Service with her lamp, she would almost certainly be looking for who was in charge? Would that not also apply if she were wandering the corridors of the Palace of Westminster?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I think that my noble friend is referring to this House specifically. We are a self-regulating House, and we are all responsible for ensuring that we do what we exist to do, fulfil our purpose and serve the public correctly. As for accountability, that is quite clearly shared between me, the Lord Speaker and the Chairman of Committees.

Select Committee Reports: Government Responses

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Tuesday 13th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

As the noble Lord knows from the exchange he and I had last week in the debate about the effectiveness of this House, I acknowledged then his strong point that the work of Select Committees in this House is an incredibly important part of our work here. On the Science and Technology Committee, during this Parliament there has been some action by the Government in response to implementing long-term science capital investment, which was a recommendation that came out of that committee.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, can my noble friend indicate whether she might have a look at the experience of the other place and consider whether the authority of our Select Committees might be greatly enhanced if the chairman were elected.

[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.

Implications of Devolution for England

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Tuesday 16th December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble friend accept that these proposals, together with the proposals for further devolution in Scotland, are regarded by many people outside this place as having been conceived in panic, delivered in haste and furthered by political expediency? Will she not therefore reconsider the Government’s view that there should not be a constitutional convention to look at this matter on the basis of consensus between the parties, which is the basis upon which we should make constitutional changes? The only beneficiaries of this approach have been the nationalists, who are surging in the polls, and this is not a moment to divide the unionists.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I shall try to make this as clear as I can. We are not ruling out a constitutional convention at all. There are clearly matters that some people would like to see addressed in a constitutional convention. We are saying that, in the light of greater devolution to Scotland, there is a need for us to address the issue of English votes for English laws. This is not being rushed into; Parliament has been looking at it for a very long time. We have some clear options, which we are inviting people to debate. We feel that that should happen without delay and that bigger issues beyond that should not be a reason to delay getting on with something that is very important to the people of England.

House of Lords: Procedures and Practices

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Thursday 4th December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I am saying to the noble Lord that we are all responsible for ensuring that people have an opportunity to ask questions at Question Time. It is important to state that this House is usually keen to hear from those who are not frequent askers of questions, if other noble Lords who are more frequent in the asking of their questions are more readily willing to give way to them. That is what the House is usually keen to see.

While we are on the subject of Questions, the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, asked why we have so few Urgent Questions allowed. The Government always consult the Opposition on which Commons UQs to repeat here, and every one that the Opposition want repeated is repeated. If he has any questions on that, I suggest that he raises them with the noble Lord, Lord Bassam. The noble Lord, Lord Bassam, referred to my noble friend the Chief Whip’s decision yesterday to go ahead in any case and repeat the Autumn Statement but I think that that was vindicated, not least because of the contribution made today by my noble friend Lord Forsyth, who was asking for more time for debates on the Autumn Statement. We are here all the time to try to ensure that noble Lords are able to debate and determine the topics that they wish to consider.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

Does my noble friend not think it extraordinary that on a matter as important as the Autumn Statement the Opposition should not want the opportunity to criticise the Government? Or is it that they just had nothing to say?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I could not possibly comment. My noble friend the Chief Whip felt that the House as a whole, regardless of the Opposition, wanted the opportunity to ask questions, so he went ahead as he did. I am sure that many noble Lords, including my noble friend Lord Forsyth, were grateful to him for that decision.

I move on to the category of points raised under the heading, “Arrangement of Business”. As the noble Lord, Lord Butler, acknowledged, we have already changed an awful lot in this Parliament to make our work more relevant and accessible to those who want to engage with it. We have indeed created more opportunities for Back-Bench debates on matters of interest, including the introduction of topical QSDs, which allow time-sensitive issues to be debated quickly, and we have significantly increased the availability of QSDs more generally. We have also devoted more resources to ad hoc Select Committees so that a wide range of cross-cutting topics are able to be scrutinised in detail by noble Lords.

The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, asked about co-ordinating sitting times with the Commons. Where we can, we do. In the main, our sittings are aligned because the two Houses work closely together. However, as my noble friend Lord Strathclyde said, we are a separate Chamber with our own priorities, and it is right that we organise our sittings to meet our overall needs.

The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, also asked about the notification of business. The forthcoming business document produced by the Government Whips’ Office gives a three-week forecast of business in this House, and, clearly, we work hard all the time to ensure that we provide as much information as possible.

The role of the usual channels was raised by several noble Lords, and I was grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, for his comments about how the usual channels work in the interests of the House as a whole, not against them. I dispute the point that the noble Lord, Lord Butler, made. Indeed, we have tried, through the usual channels—whether by ensuring that we schedule business so that we have the right people on the Opposition Front Bench in place to challenge the Government, or by beginning to publish more business calendars on government Bills—to make sure that those who want to engage with our business are able to do so because we provide enough information in advance about what will happen and when.

The noble Baroness, Lady Deech, made an interesting remark about the digitisation of our amendments. That might lead to complications, but on the general point that she makes, a lot of departments are trying to do that now to ensure that there is greater clarity on how amendments affect legislation.

The proposal for a Back-Bench committee was looked at and voted on by this House—I dispute the way in which the noble Lord, Lord Butler, described that process. The point is that everyone in this House is able to table Motions for debate themselves, without anybody else deciding it. Any noble Lord can go into the Table Office and table a debate, and they are now looked at in the order in which they were first scheduled.

Noble Lords raised several other things—

Business of the House

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Thursday 4th December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

That Standing Order 46 (No two stages of a Bill to be taken on one day) be dispensed with on Tuesday 9 December to allow the Childcare Payments Bill to be taken through all its remaining stages that day.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, I do not want to detain the House, but may I ask my noble friend if there will be another opportunity to debate the Autumn Statement? Does she really think that it is acceptable for speeches to be limited to five minutes on such an important subject?

[The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Stowell of Beeston)]

My Lords, yesterday we repeated the Autumn Statement and had an opportunity for questions to my noble friend on that Statement, and now we have the debate today. We have had frequent debates on the economy, and I would expect to see that continue. I am not in a position to confirm when there will be another debate, but I am pleased to see that there is a great deal of enthusiasm for today’s debate. I wish everyone participating in it a very successful debate.

Scotland: Devolution

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Wednesday 29th October 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

I am most grateful to my noble friend. None of these arguments is new. They were gone through in great detail in the 19th century at the time of Irish home rule. The conclusion then was that the way to deal with this fairness was to reduce the number of MPs coming from Ireland. Why can the same not be applied in the case of devolution to Scotland?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

Certainly—and I speak for the leadership of my party—we are clear that the best way in which to deal with this is through English votes for English laws within the House of Commons. That is something that we can tackle and deal with quickly.

EU Council

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Monday 27th October 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I have tried to make it clear, both in the Prime Minister’s Statement that I have repeated and in the responses I have given to points made today, that the Prime Minister has been very active in taking a leading role in Europe, both on the specific agenda items that I have talked about and in saying that we believe, as do others, that the European Union needs to reform. The Prime Minister is absolutely clear that there are real benefits to this country from being in Europe and he has spoken loudly about those benefits.

However, the situation in which we find ourselves with the budget on this occasion cannot be as the noble Lord describes. Why are other European leaders also surprised to find themselves in receipt of a big bill, as the UK was last week? I will see whether there are any specific further data that I can share in response to the noble Lord’s point, but I say to him that people in this country see the benefit of Britain’s place in Europe. They see that it has an important place in achieving some important international objectives, whether about Ebola or climate change. However, those successes and important advances do not come at any price. The way in which the European Union sometimes behaves and operates means that it lets itself down in the eyes of the people who have to fund its membership.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble friend not agree that what the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, describes as a “kerfuffle” is about £1.7 billion? We have not got any money. We are borrowing money in order to pay our bills. Surely the point is that the European Union is spending too much. It simply cannot issue continuing demands as it has and argue that that fits some formula or other. Will my noble friend note that the Opposition have singularly failed to indicate whether they would pay this money or not? The truth is that they are a pushover as far as this is concerned. Is my right honourable friend the Prime Minister not right to try to get the European Union to put its house in order and live within its means, as everyone else has to do?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

My noble friend is absolutely right on every point. I would add that we should remember that it is not clear for what purpose the European Union needs this extra money, and that this is an organisation whose accounts have been qualified for many years.

Leader of the House: Cabinet Membership

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Wednesday 16th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, I beg leave to ask a Question of which I have given private notice.

[The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Baroness Stowell of Beeston)]

My Lords, I will attend Friday’s Cabinet, as my noble friend and predecessor Lord Hill would have done, and will be able to participate fully in Cabinet discussions just as he would have done.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

My Lords, I am sure that I speak for the whole House in congratulating my noble friend on her appointment, and I am sure that she will do a brilliant job as the Leader of the House. The Companion to the Standing Orders, in paragraph 4.03, on page 61, says:

“The Leader of the House is appointed by the Prime Minister, is a member of the Cabinet, and is responsible for the conduct of government business in the Lords”.

It says so because it is vital that the Leader of the House has the authority of a Cabinet Minister, especially given the large volume of legislation that comes from the other place undebated and unconsidered. She needs the authority to be able to say to other Cabinet Ministers, “This will not wash”, and to say to the Prime Minister, “I think you need to think again”.

Can my noble friend reassure me that the Prime Minister will bring the situation into line with our Standing Orders and with the guidance in the Companion? Is she really happy with a situation where, for the first time in the history of this House and of Cabinet government, there is no Cabinet Minister in this House? What sort of signal does that send to the Civil Service and others about the authority of this place in its important duty of revising legislation?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

My Lords, my noble friend raises a number of important points. Clearly he is right to question whether the Leader of the House of Lords is fully equipped to do that job. I am absolutely confident that the Prime Minister has given me the authority I need to represent your Lordships in Cabinet. A few months ago, in answer to a Question on another topic, I said that sometimes I liked to think of myself as an action woman. I like to get things done. I do not need status in order to get things done. I have the authority I need and I shall be judged on the work that I do.

Business Rates

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Wednesday 11th June 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, how does my noble friend think that high street shops can compete when they have the burden of rents and rates, and are competing with online retailers such as Amazon, which pay no corporation tax? Is it not time that we looked at the tax system with a view to the implications of the growth of online shopping?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

As my noble friend knows, the way in which the Government consider the tax regime for businesses as a whole is something that we continue to study. Fundamentally, we are anxious to ensure that we have the best tax system for British business and that we continue to encourage growth in this country.

Rental Properties: Smoke Alarms

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Thursday 8th May 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

The review is wide-ranging. We have consulted a range of stakeholders in this matter. That will clearly include the insurance sector.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, will my noble friend accept my congratulations on the way the Government have striven to increase the supply of safe, quality rented accommodation? Does she agree that one of the ways in which we could prevent further progress would be to introduce a stupid policy such as rent control?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

My noble friend tempts me off the topic of the Question. However, I agree with what he says on that matter.

Housing: New-build Homes

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Thursday 31st October 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

As we made clear yesterday, and as was always the case, we are already reviewing the new homes bonus scheme; that report will be published next Easter. The most important thing to say to the noble Lord is that we are disappointed in the NAO’s report because it seems to miss the point of the new homes bonus. It is there to do what is says on the tin: to reward councils that help to build more new houses. That is what we are trying to do. We want to make sure that those local areas that build more houses attract and receive the benefit of doing so in their area.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, will my noble friend make sure that for those taking part in Help to Buy, particularly young people, strict criteria are applied on the affordability of the mortgages? When interest rates go up to their normal level, there is a chance not only that the value of properties will fall but that payments will rise spectacularly. Is she sure that the scheme is being run in a way that will not force youngsters into negative equity, with mortgages that they cannot pay?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I am very sure, as the arrangements in place are very rigorous. As my noble friend will be aware, the Bank of England will monitor the scheme and, importantly, the criteria used to judge whether somebody can afford their mortgage will be as robust as they need to be. This is an opportunity presented to people who do not have access to the bank of their parents or family and who, if they could have more help putting down a deposit, would be able to own their own homes. That is a good thing.

Equality: EC Policies on Women on Corporate Boards

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Wednesday 17th October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

Just to be absolutely clear, while we do not support the quotas or the European legislation, we feel very strongly about this issue. I think that I am right in saying that we have a target of 50% for appointments to public bodies by 2020. If I am wrong I will write to the noble Baroness, but we are definitely ensuring that as much effort is made in that area as it is in the corporate world.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

My Lords, as two-thirds of the European Commission membership are themselves men, would not the Commission do better to put its own house in order before deciding on other people?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

My Lords, I shall not say anything.

Energy: Tidal Generation

Debate between Baroness Stowell of Beeston and Lord Forsyth of Drumlean

Tuesday 22nd November 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

This Government are absolutely committed to being the greenest Government ever. On the solar feed-in tariffs that the noble Baroness mentioned, the changes that the Government introduced are precisely to ensure that that industry is sustainable and exists into the future. As to tidal stream and what the department is doing to work with the industry, it has put forward innovation funding of £20 million and it is working closely through the UK marine energy programme, which is chaired by the Minister, Greg Barker, and includes representatives of the technology developers, the utilities, the large industrial organisations and financiers. The Government are committed to supporting this new and emerging industry.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

My Lords, would it not be fairer for the consumers of electricity in this country if the costs of these schemes, including the solar power and tidal schemes, were clearly put on their bills so that people would know how much extra they were paying for them? They are subsidised by the consumers. Therefore, this is a subsidy for wealthy people from poor people who are struggling to pay for their energy costs.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I share my noble friend’s concerns about people subsidising others in the way that he has described. If the Government did nothing on the feed-in tariffs for solar power panels, the equivalent of around £9.50 would be added to the average domestic bill. By introducing the changes that we are proposing, that would be reduced by 2014 to around £2.50 or £3. As to his specific proposal of identifying these costs on bills, I will certainly explore that idea with noble friends at the Ministry.