Scotland Bill

Debate between Lord Cormack and Lord McCluskey

Monday 29th February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, following my noble friend Lord Higgins, I add my support for my noble friend Lord Forsyth. We are in danger of forgetting that this is, as the noble Lord, Lord Empey, said, a treaty between the sovereign Government of the United Kingdom and the Government of Scotland, who, we must recognise, are composed of a party whose sole raison d’être is the destruction of the United Kingdom. That is a perfectly legitimate view to hold, but that is the view it holds. We have here a document that, as my noble friend Lord Higgins has just said, is of enormous, far-reaching significance, and it has to be debated in Parliament in some detail.

In another context, a few weeks ago some of us remarked that Governments are accountable to Parliament and not Parliament to Governments. Here, the Government have come to an agreement and are expecting us to more or less put it through on the nod. It has very far-reaching implications. My noble friends Lord Lang and Lord MacGregor of Pulham Market have both made powerful, brief speeches indicating how vital it is that this matter be properly discussed.

It is the fault of no one in this Chamber that we have had to wait so late for this document. We have not had the chance properly to analyse it. It is full of extraordinarily vague statements and, at the end of the day, a review which will be entirely at the whim of the Government of Scotland, rather than the Government of the United Kingdom. I believe passionately in the United Kingdom, and equally passionately in parliamentary democracy. Neither is being served by debating this far-reaching document in such an unsatisfactory manner. I very much hope that, even at this late stage, my noble friend the Minister will acknowledge that each House of Parliament should have the opportunity to debate this document at some length. At the end of the day, it will probably be endorsed. But then, as my noble friend Lord MacGregor said, it will have been endorsed by Parliament and we will have a degree of responsibility for it.

This is a mess. It is a wholly unsatisfactory situation. We are deeply indebted to my noble friend Lord Forsyth for the calm and analytical way in which he spoke in moving his amendment, which deserves considerable sympathy and support.

[Lord McCluskey (CB)]

My Amendment 67A is in a different group but, with respect, because it deals with the Barnett formula it ought to be considered at this stage. It raises the general question of the formula, as did its predecessor, which contained a reference to the Government’s obligation to publish the Scottish fiscal framework.

The Barnett formula runs through the whole document—rather like dry rot in a south Edinburgh house I used to live in. It cost an awful lot to put that right, and I dare say it will cost an awful lot to get this right.

The noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, referred to getting the briefing. I saw the document on Friday, and I came to today’s very useful briefing with, like President Wilson, 14 points. However, I did not dare raise the 14 points because many people were anxious to speak and we had very limited time. I do not propose to raise them all now, and I am happy to note that many have been dealt with by others, but there remains one rather important one.

This Scottish fiscal framework is recognised by everyone as being fundamental to the whole Bill. The entire Bill rests upon the Smith agreement, which was reached in nine weeks. It took nine months to frame the fiscal framework. The Smith agreement was reached by 10 elected Scottish politicians—Members of the Scottish Parliament. They included representatives of the Labour Party, the Liberal party and the Greens, none of whom, as far as I can see, have been consulted at all about the Scottish fiscal framework, and certainly not in the formal consultations. It is a very odd situation. This document has been produced between the two Governments, after nine months, and it contains things that are simply not in the Smith agreement.

For example, we talk about “no detriment”. I never knew what it meant, and I am happy to say that I was not alone in my failure to understand. The committee of the House of Lords that looked at it could not understand the second detriment, and even the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, for whom one has the highest regard, was not able to understand it. He asked in vain if anybody would explain it to him, and we are still waiting for an explanation. Now, the paper has come up with something that was not considered by the Labour Party, the Liberals or the Greens: division of detriment into direct detriment and behavioural detriment. Last week, we were told about not behavioural detriment, but indirect detriment. All those concepts have come up to fill out the notion of no detriment, which no one has yet been able to explain.

I want to pick up one or two of the points that have been made, just to show my support for the approach of the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth. Paragraph 7 of the document states that,

“the … block grant will continue to be determined via the operation of the Barnett Formula”.

That seems to fly in the face of what the noble Lord, Lord Lang, said, but that is what the document says. House of Lords paper No. 55, A Fracturing Union?, states:

“The Formula contains no mechanism to correct any unintended consequences being built permanently into the baseline”.

That surely means that Scotland continues to get the benefit of built-in unintended consequences for at least five years, and perhaps in perpetuity, given the remarks made by others about the arrangements at the end of the five years.

The document continues:

“For welfare … and … other spending”—

nothing to do with the Barnett formula, at the moment—

“the chosen method will be the Barnett formula”.

Does that mean that, in respect of the devolution of welfare payments, the block grant will be adjusted to give Scotland the benefit of the unintended consequences of the operation of the Barnett formula?

We talk about the unintended consequences, but it is entirely foreseeable—

Scotland Bill

Debate between Lord Cormack and Lord McCluskey

Wednesday 24th February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, I hope the occupant of the Woolsack will not to have to do that because I very much hope that the Minister will accept the irrefutable logic of the amendment moved by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope. My amendment 8 is very simple. I am most grateful to the noble and learned Lord, Lord McCluskey, for adding his name to it. When we debated similar issues in Committee the noble Lord, Lord Stephen, indicated that he supported this amendment. He has now got a rather ingenious substitute; he just puts quotation marks around “normally”.

It is very important that the Minister should heed the wise words of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope. We want clarity in this measure. In the previous debate, the noble Lord, Lord Empey, made an extraordinarily effective but rather cynical speech. I was tempted to get up, as my noble friend Lord Forsyth of Drumlean did, and say we are wasting our time. It really is a very unsatisfactory way to legislate that an extra-parliamentary body, with a prior commitment from leaders of parties to give it a blank cheque, then in effect tells Parliament what to do. From a constitutional point of view, it is an outrage that that should happen. In saying that, I am not making any personal political criticism of the noble Lord who presided over the commission or of any members of it, but for it to be given that unfettered power and then to come to Parliament with a Bill that is not really going to be changed at all is deeply unsatisfactory.

If the Minister cannot accept the admirable amendment from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, I hope that at the very least he will accept that the word “normally” is fraught with all sorts of dangers. The question of what is normal and what is abnormal is justiciable and will be taken to the courts, so why have it in at all? Taking out that word and perhaps coming back at Third Reading with a slight extra clarification—even to substitute such words as “in the most exceptional circumstances”—would be better than just having “normally”. I honestly do not think that by accepting this amendment, or undertaking to come back at Third Reading with something similar, the Minister would be selling anyone down the river at all. It would not alter the thrust or the purpose of the Bill. Many of us find the Bill troubling and unsatisfactory but we in your Lordships’ House have a duty to try to improve, and this would be a very modest improvement. I commend it to the Minister.

[Lord McCluskey]

My Lords, I need not repeat the arguments that the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, has put forward again so clearly. We need say nothing more about “normally” except that we were anxious to help to improve the Bill. This was not anti the Government or anti the Scottish Administration.

My second point relates to Amendment 12 in this group, which is to do with the question of justiciability. For the reasons that have been advanced at some length, so I need not repeat them, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, and I are agreed that this word is justiciable. It would be very foolish of the Minister to reject the advice of a man as distinguished in the law as the noble and learned Lord. The word “normally” is bound to appear before a court. If the UK Government decide to legislate on a matter that is devolved and say, “This is not a normal situation”, and some person, whether in the Scottish Government or affected by the legislation, says, “No, it is not”, and it goes to court, the court cannot say, “We’re not going to resolve this matter”—it must answer the question. So to say that it is justiciable is exactly right, and it is wrong for the Minister to ignore that. The Minister kindly suggested that he and I should meet, and we did, but I am afraid that we simply agreed to differ on the issue of justiciability.

I should mention one other point that does not arise out of these two amendments precisely, which is that this is to do with the Sewel convention. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, will permit me to quote what he said in Committee on 8 December. In response to the argument that the Smith commission stated that:

“The Sewel Convention will be put on a statutory footing”,

he said, referring to the noble and learned Lord speaking from the Front Bench:

“Surely on his own argument the Government will have to withdraw Clause 2, not only on the grounds of what constitutes a statutory footing but because it embodies the words of Lord Sewel, which he spoke when the Scotland Bill was before Parliament, and not the convention as understood at the time the commission produced its report”.

The noble and learned Lord rejected that, saying:

“I do not accept that, because it appears that what is understood by the Sewel convention is the expression of that convention by Lord Sewel during the passage of the Scotland Act 1998 through Parliament”.—[Official Report, 8/12/15; cols. 1506-07.]

I must confess that it astonished me to hear that. Can the Minister make it clear whether the Government stick by that statement at col. 1507, which was repeated in response to the noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose? In due course I hope to move Amendment 12.

Scotland Bill

Debate between Lord Cormack and Lord McCluskey

Tuesday 8th December 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord McCluskey (CB)]

My Lords, I had not expected to be on my feet just at this moment, but I will speak to Amendments 4 and 5. Amendment 4 asks that the word “only” should be inserted into line 11, so that the new provision would read:

“The only purpose of this section is … to signify the commitment of the Parliament and Government of the United Kingdom to the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Government”.

The first question I have to ask the Minister is: if this is not the only purpose of the section, what other purpose or purposes does the section have? I do not see any value in having the words, “The purpose”, unless we make it clear that this is the only purpose.

My Amendment 5 would remove the words,

“with due regard to the other provisions of this Act”.

As I understand statutory interpretation, when a court or other body is called upon to understand an Act of Parliament, it may well be necessary, in the case of any kind of ambiguity, to look at any other provisions of the Act which bear upon the same matter. There is a duty in law and in custom for courts and others to have due regard to the other provisions of the Act, so I do not see what purpose this provision serves here. My own general approach is that the shorter legislation is, the better. Legislation is often too wordy and too confused. If the words are not necessary, they should not be there. That is the simple basis on which I speak to both the amendments standing in my name.

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly to Amendment 7, which stands in my name, but before doing so I agree with what the noble and learned Lord, Lord McCluskey, just said about wordy legislation and endorse entirely what my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth said in his crisp, succinct introduction of his own two amendments. This is a very unsatisfactory Bill, brought about by extremely unsatisfactory circumstances. If we in your Lordships’ House are going to try to improve a bad Bill—as is for ever our task, and one which was never more needed than in the case of this Bill—we have to address certain very important aspects of it.

I concentrated my amendment on the whole subject of parliamentary sovereignty. Although the Scottish Parliament came about because of the wish of the Scottish people in a referendum, nevertheless it was created by Act of Parliament. If it is to be abolished, that should be done by Act of Parliament, too. I neither forecast nor advocate its abolition but if we are to have such a provision in this Bill—I doubt whether it is needed, and my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth made that position plain in his speech—it should be a parliamentary provision. That is why I suggest that it should be on the basis of a two-thirds majority in a vote of the House of Commons, in which 75% of the Members elected by Scottish constituencies vote for abolition. That provides as strong a parliamentary safeguard as can be envisaged. It is infinitely to be preferred to the referendum route.