Tax Credits (Income Thresholds and Determination of Rates) (Amendment) Regulations 2015

Debate between Lord Deben and Lord Richard

Monday 26th October 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Richard]

My Lords, I am bound to say to the noble Lord that I am not sufficiently qualified medically, politically or personally to know what is in the mind of Mr Leigh when he gets up in the House of Commons. To expect me to be able to do that is, frankly, unrealistic.

The answer to the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, again is very simple. Of course the Government chose to do it. Why? Because it cut off discussion. It meant that they were not accountable on the Floor of the House of Commons. They knew when they did it that there was a convention here that we did not vote against statutory instruments; we did not turn them down. By doing it that way the Government thought they were impregnable in their approach. I do not think they are.

[Lord Deben]

Could it not have been that they did it that way because that is what the Act said they had to do? Would that not be a more proper judgment of what the Government did?

[Lord Richard]

The Act gave the Government the power to do it. It did not compel them to do it. If they wanted to do it by way of an Act of Parliament it could have been done that way. They could have added it to the Finance Bill and it would have come up here and in the normal way financial privilege would have applied and none of this nonsense would have been created. Perhaps the reason the Government chose to legislate in this way was because it was bound to create political controversy. Perhaps that was the object of the exercise.

I want to say a word about the debate in 2008. It was when this House limited the power of a Labour Government to raise the national insurance upper threshold so that it could be done only through primary legislation. The two cases are almost identical. In each case, the Government were trying to alter tax provisions by a statutory regulation. In each case, this House was standing in their way. The only real difference is that in 2008—