Queen’s Speech

Lord Finkelstein Excerpts

Wednesday 27th May 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Finkelstein (Con)]

My Lords, I beg to second my noble friend’s Motion for an humble Address. It is a great privilege to be asked to deliver this speech and to have the opportunity to address a full House of noble Lords. I was once invited to give a speech in Norwich, which involved travelling more than four hours to get there. When I arrived, I found that there were only two people in the audience. One of them was the person who had invited me. The other waited until I had finished speaking and I invited him to join the cause that I was there to support. He said that he would like to, but it would interfere with the terms of his parole. I am pleased that I have here a more conveniently located, larger audience, and that those present have completed their probation—mostly.

Speaking to a full House also fulfils the useful function of allowing fellow Peers finally to overcome the embarrassment of not being 100% certain of one’s name. One noble Peer is aware that I am a newspaper columnist and is kind enough to ask me about it often. However, he appears to think that I work for the Daily Telegraph rather than the Times, and it has never been quite the right moment to correct him. On the day the last Session opened, he slapped me on the back and said, “Good morning, Danny. I hope that your columns are continuing to boost the circulation of the Telegraph”. I replied that I was quite certain that they were.

As the son of refugees, it is also a great honour to be given the chance to celebrate the role played by the monarchy in ensuring the stability and continuity of British democracy. As I said in my maiden speech, no one is more appreciative of the security afforded by the British constitution than the freed prisoners of totalitarian jails and concentration camps. As my grandmother put it, “While the Queen is safe in Buckingham Palace, we are safe in Hendon Central”.

I was not merely gratified to be asked to give this speech but also surprised. However, the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, assured me that I was the overwhelming popular choice, and then she spoilt it by saying, “According to YouGov”.

We are meeting here to review the Government’s legislative programme in political circumstances which only some people anticipated. As I was leaving a government department in March, following a meeting with a ministerial friend, I was taken down in the lift by Kevin, the messenger who had accompanied me to the ground floor many times over the previous five years. As we reached the bottom I said, “Well Kevin, this could be the last time we do this”. He looked at me, shook his head slowly and said, “Naaah”. This turned out to be more perceptive political analysis than most of what was written in the media over the following two months.

Everyone in this House will have their own theory of what happened, but I would just like to say this: there are in this country many people who just want quiet, moderate, sensible, pragmatic government. They do not have great theories about austerity or predistribution or varieties of capitalism. They value security and liberty and the rule of law. They want to go to work, raise families, take home as much as possible of what they earn and get decent public services at a reasonable cost. Some of these people have been called shy Tories, but in truth they mostly are not shy and they do not even really think of themselves as Tories. Some of them may vote Conservative but that is their business and no one else’s. I believe this legislative programme is for them—for the quiet, practical, moderate working people of this country: a long-term economic plan that understands, as most people do, that it is our duty in this generation to restrain our spending in order to avoid passing on ever-greater debts to our children and grandchildren; the security of a job, the chance to own a home, better schools, securing the real value of a pension, protecting the NHS, lower taxes for the lowest paid, building the northern powerhouse. This programme is set firmly in the centre ground of British politics, where the people are. I look forward to debating these measures with noble Lords in the coming Session.

Those programming business are looking to see if they are up to the tricky task of finding a day of the week on which all the parties in this House are in favour of a European referendum at the same time, and to finding plenty of time for the reports and other debates that make our House special. Legislation moved by individual noble Lords often provides the highlight of a Session. I always remember when the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Archer, on the succession to the Throne reached its Second Reading stage as it was the first time anything written by him had been read twice.

Some have suggested that this next period will be a difficult one in this House, that because the governing party is in a minority we will struggle to pass laws. Can I say that I hope and believe these critics have misunderstood this House? They have misunderstood the dedication of noble Lords and our understanding of our duty and the limits of our powers. The body of Liberal Peers, who I note are puzzlingly still in their seats notwithstanding my column in this morning’s newspaper, for so long our valued colleagues, and among them many good friends, come from the great movement of Asquith and Lloyd George that invented those limits and would not frivolously abuse them. Opposite us, too, sits the great party of Morrison, Bevin, Gaitskell and Blair that has spent decades in power and knows that its time will come again. It will treat this Government as Labour has in the past been treated and will in future wish to be treated. In any case, I know that it is rethinking many of the ideas on which it fought the last election. After all, it is not as if its manifesto was carved in stone.

[Noble Lords]

Oh!

[Lord Finkelstein]

I could not resist it, sorry. Politics excites great expectations that it cannot always meet. No matter what is done, it is never enough. There is an old Jewish joke about a woman who takes her son to the beach. It is a windy day so she wraps him up tightly in a coat, scarf and hat. No sooner have they gone out than a huge wave sweeps the boy out to sea. He is quite gone and his mother is distraught. She begins to pray, “Lord, my boy is just an innocent lad. Send him back to me”. There is a rushing sound and a massive wave crashes at her feet, depositing her boy. He is alive, he is safe—it is a miracle. She looks up, she looks down. She looks up again and says, “He had a hat!”.

This legislative programme will not do everything. It will not make every problem right. It will not be perfect. It will just take us a few steps forward and I hope that these are steps we can all take together in the spirit of one nation. In this spirit, I second the Motion.



Motion to Adjourn

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