Strathclyde Review

Baroness Williams of Crosby Excerpts

Wednesday 13th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Crosby (LD)]

My Lords, I ask the indulgence of the House for a moment to say just a word about my friend and colleague who gave her maiden speech a few moments ago. There is no doubt that my noble friend Lady Bowles of Berkhamsted is one of the most remarkable economists, with incredible knowledge of very complex financial matters. She has already been a great asset to the European Parliament, and anybody who follows its work will know that, time and again, she has intervened in order to establish a more sensible, more rational, more thoughtful and less bureaucratic approach by the Commission to many of the things that it does within Europe. I believe that she will make a major contribution to our discussions over the next few weeks and months with regard to the referendum and its outcome, one for which the House will be extremely grateful. She made in her maiden speech a compact, short but extremely wise contribution to what will be a future discussion perhaps even more than to the present discussion today.

One of the subtle things about the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, is that he is very good at hinting at what he wants to say without shouting about it; he just leaves it to sink in so that people understand the complexities of what he is trying to get across. What I am saying in another kind of language is that if one reads his review carefully, one will see that it points to the weaknesses in the whole structure that we have for how we deal with statutory instruments.

Let me take two examples from his compact, well-worded and thoughtful review. In it he points out, as the noble Lord, Lord Jopling, pointed out, that there is a real problem with the sheer scale of statutory instruments. He does not say that in so many words, but he makes it quite clear that in making his own proposals work, he hopes that there would be a much greater recognition by government of the limitations of and obvious flaws in relying on statutory instruments as a way to get across complex legislation. In that context, I have to say that, frankly, I do not think that the tax credit system was one that lent itself to having a statutory instrument explain it rather than the proper procedure of primary legislation. The House has already indicated the ways in which that could have been done.

I believe that the House sometimes sells itself short. It is more than just a revising Chamber. It is a Chamber that, on many occasions, has reiterated the fundamental foundations of what it is to live in a constitutional democracy. In that context, to deal with legislation on issues as sensitive as the level of income of people already hard-pressed as a result of the economic crisis is not appropriate for a statutory instrument. It is much more appropriate for what the Lords does well: to bear in mind the balances and challenges that make it possible for a democracy to survive. Although it is not itself democratic, as my noble friend Lord McNally pointed out, the Lords is often very conscious and sensitive about the constitutional issues that have to be taken into account.

Among those constitutional issues, the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, pointed to what he calls the conventions. Therefore, I think that the acceptability of his third option, which has certain attractions, would be much enhanced if he was able to show that there is a balance, in constitutional terms, for it. That balance needs to be of two things, as he himself has hinted. The first one I have mentioned already: a real study of whether statutory instruments are becoming out of control in terms of the sheer weight and volume of them—over 3,000 a year in years that do not have an election within them.

The second one, as he also made clear in his review, is the deep and profound undesirability of statutory instruments replacing primary legislation. That is why he also very sensibly said that primary legislation must be enriched by being clearer and by spelling out in more detail what the implications of it are; and that the steady retreat of Governments of all kinds from primary legislation which is detailed, sensibly set out and clear into statutory instruments is a substantial threat to the best workings of parliamentary democracy.

I am inclined to agree with my noble friend Lord McNally that we would be unwise to give up at this stage the concept of losing a veto over a statutory instrument, rare though its operation is, because we do not yet have the reassurance that we would need that the Government on their own side would be responsible for changing the ways in which legislation is drawn up in order to enable this House to continue to do its valuable and essential work, not only of scrutiny but, as I have tried to say more widely, a genuine commitment to the principles on which democracies depend.

I wish to say two other things before I conclude. A more appropriate approach would have been for the two Chambers’ Leaders to meet and discuss whether this matter could not have been handled much more responsibly and consensually. That would have been good not only for the House of Lords but immensely good for the House of Commons. It would have enabled us to say what the House of Commons’ responsibilities were in relation to any change in the current actions and powers of this House. To have the reassurance that we need, that means that they would properly respond to the new responsibilities vested upon them. However, some of recent history does not suggest that one can be sure of that.

I have great sympathy with what the noble Lord, Lord Jopling, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, had to say about the way that this issue should have been handled more properly—not by the Government, despite the brave attempts of the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, to find a sensible and thoughtful response, but rather through the parliamentary system and our constitutional structures. I would advocate strongly that we do not in future allow any Government of any colour to determine what should be the powers of this House.