Deregulation Bill

Lord Bew Excerpts

Monday 7th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bew (CB)]

My Lords, like the noble Lord, Lord Brabazon, I praise the golden words to be found in paragraph 40 of Schedule 20 to the Bill:

“Omit section 13 of the Defamation Act 1996 (which allows an individual litigant in defamation cases to waive the ban in Article IX of the Bill of Rights on proceedings in Parliament being impeached or questioned in court)”.

As the noble Lord said, this was the view of the Joint Committee on Parliamentary Privilege, which he chaired so ably. We are very much indebted to the members of that committee in another place who pushed this matter forward so skilfully, but it was the view not only of our committee, but of the committee chaired by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead, in 1999. What it does is effectively to resolve the ambiguities created by the Neil Hamilton case of 1996. We are indebted to the Government for finally grasping this nettle and I offer my support to this part of the Bill.

However I register a caveat. In the debate occasioned by the Second Reading of the proposed legislation of the noble Lord, Lord Lester of Herne Hill, on this topic on 27 June, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay, made an important point. I also pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Lester, who has played a major role in bringing about the change envisaged in the Bill. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, made a point that must be reflected on, even by those who are extremely enthusiastically in favour of this change, when he said that,

“the question is whether it is right that a Member of Parliament can be defamed by people in respect of something that he or she has said or done in Parliament and that, if that happens, he or she has no remedy”.—[Official Report, 27/6/2014; col. 1522.]

There is a problem here. In my view, the balance is right. The principle of parliamentary privilege cannot be, as it were, individualised. That was the problem with the situation we had from 1996 to the present. It must be placed at the level of Parliament as a whole if it is to be understood and respected by the public. None the less, a difficulty is created. I draw the parties’ attention to the duty of care that they will have, particularly to new Members, in the next Parliament. It is related also to another piece of legislation, which is in the Queen’s Speech, for recall. In both these cases, if they get it wrong the consequences for a new MP could be really dramatic. That is the way we are going.

There is a sense that Parliament understands that the public expects higher standards from Members of Parliament than they do from other public servants and Parliament is trying, through these measures, to address public concerns about honesty in our public life. The impulse that is leading Parliament to act in this way is entirely reasonable, but it does mean that Parliament has a duty to ensure that new Members understand the ways in which legislation is changing. There are vulnerabilities now that did not exist in the past and prices to be paid if we get these things wrong.

It is perfectly reasonable to argue that IPSA has effectively resolved the issue of expenses—that the recent issues have been historical ones that go back to before the time of the new IPSA regime. However, anybody who believes that issues around lobbying, or even cash for questions, have disappeared and are issues of the 1990s simply has not been reading the newspapers in the past three or four years. Therefore, it is all the more important that the induction programme for new MPs should help with these questions.

At the beginning of the previous Parliament, the Hansard Society put on an induction programme that was poorly attended. The ethics section was particularly poorly attended. The parties must have a major role here. They should encourage new Members in the new Parliament, explain where public opinion is and explain the ways in which legislation is changing. They should also explain, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay, pointed out on Friday 27 June in this Chamber, that Members now have a vulnerability they did not have before: they do not have the protection that they previously had over what they say in the Chamber. These are important matters and it is the responsibility of Parliament, and particularly the responsibility of the parties, to take them on board.

I welcome this new legislation. It is absolutely correct in principle but there is a caveat: there is a responsibility on the political parties that are pushing the legislation through to make sure that newly elected Members know exactly where they stand and where the law now stands. It is not, in this matter, where it has stood since 1996.