Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Bill

Debate between Baroness Williams of Crosby and Lord Tyler

Tuesday 21st January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Tyler]

My Lords, in response to that, I certainly agree that the Bill is greatly improved and I pay tribute to the noble and right reverend Lord for the amazing amount of work that he and other noble Lords have undertaken to achieve that purpose.

I regret very much the speed with which we have moved from Report to Third Reading and that we did not have a genuine opportunity—we only had a comparatively few hours yesterday—to look at this together. I regret even more that any amendments passed today, whether government amendments or others that are passed by your Lordships’ House, will be considered by the other place within 24 hours. The short period for discussion of any necessary improvements is very unfortunate. Had his amendment simply brought in the point raised by the Minister about leafleting, and therefore stuck rigidly to the simplicity of the first provision in his amendment, I would be much happier about it.

[Baroness Williams of Crosby]

My Lords, I intervene briefly in this debate because I am struck time and again in the exchanges in this House by the endless pursuit of perfection in an area where I do not think that perfection can be achieved. We have to accept that the best compromises that we can get are the best that we can do by this Bill at this late date. I know that it reflects the failure of pre-legislative scrutiny and I know that it reflects the lack of consultation, but given that we are where we are, I think that the recent amendments put forward—not least the ones by my noble friend and those by the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries of Pentregarth—further improve the Bill. We should be pleased with having produced that effect as the matter goes to the other place.

I completely accept what my noble friend has said that it is a great shame, given the lack of pre-legislative scrutiny, that the gap between the deliberations in this House and those that are starting in the other place tomorrow is, frankly, ludicrous. It does not enable the other place to take into account the very careful and deliberate thought that has been given in this House, not least by the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries of Pentregarth, and his very impressive commission, which most people here agree went into this Bill in great detail, produced some excellent amendments and really gave us the opportunity to say that the House of Lords has made a constitutional contribution of the kind for which it is distinguished in a large range of legislation.

I do not want to detain the House, but I share the view that there are certain limitations on the whole issue of dealing with leafleting and all the rest of it. I also recognise that what has come out of this is the best attempt we could make to simplify an extremely complex Bill and to keep as largely as we can the concept of constituency limits.

I have the greatest respect for outstanding intelligence, but I think that, in what the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, said in her defence of the position she would like to see, she went a bit far. I think that she should have been a bit more fair about the extraordinary efforts made by Ministers in this debate to try to meet some of the points that she so forcefully made about the need to protect the freedom of speech and expression of the non-party campaigning groups. She is quite right about that, but I think that she was less than generous in her failure to recognise the extent—by raising the threshold and other ways—to which Ministers have tried to meet some of the arguments that she and some of her colleagues have made.

Having said that, I hope that Ministers will be able to pay particular attention to elements of what has been said in this House and to draw the attention of the other place—which means that they will have to work very hard tonight, I appreciate—to the points that have been made here that have not altogether been carried out. Having said that, in a very constrained situation, I think that this House and the commission can legitimately say that they have made a very substantial contribution to making this complicated Bill as good as it could be made.