Palace of Westminster Committee
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)
My Lords, I endorse what my noble friend has just said. A number of people raised this issue in the short debate we had last week, to which the Leader of the House replied. A number of people also raised the matter of equivalence of membership between the Commons and the Lords. My quite clear recollection is that the Leader of the House said that there would be two joint chairmen, but this Motion provides for the appointment of “a chairman”. We cannot have two joint chairmen, one from the Commons and one from the Lords, which is the ideal we wanted, if there is to be the appointment of a chairman. I hope that the Chairman of Committees will clarify that and give us an assurance that there will be a joint chairperson from the Commons and the Lords.
The Chairman of Committees (Lord Sewel)
My Lords, I should say first that I think we are fortunate that the two Back-Bench Members of the Joint Committee from this House will bring to its deliberations a very deep level of expertise and experience of the issues. I do not think that we could have selected two stronger candidates.
On the particular issues that the noble Lords raised, the basis of selection for the Joint Committee is party allocation. I understand that the usual channels in both Houses decided a party allocation to represent the relative strength and standing of the parties in the two Houses. Of course, in this House the three officeholders—the Lord Speaker, the Chairman of Committees and the Deputy Chairman of Committees—put aside all party affiliations during their terms of office, so clearly could not be considered in a scheme based on party allocations. I also point out that the individual who does my equivalent job in the House of Commons has not been nominated as a member of the Joint Committee.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
The Leader—sorry, he is the Chairman of Committees. He would be better as Leader of the House, but that is another story. Will the Chairman of Committees clarify the position of the joint chairman? It was made absolutely clear by the Leader of the House in our debate last week that there would be equal chairs from both Houses.
The Chairman of Committees
I am sorry that I forgot the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes—a sin of omission indeed. My understanding is that the committee will operate on the basis of Mr Grayling in the Commons chairing one session and the Leader of this House chairing the alternate session. I understand that that is how they will proceed.
House of Lords
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel(9 years, 3 months ago)
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Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
I am grateful to my noble friend for his helpful and wise contribution. It reinforces the point raised earlier by my noble friend Lord Clark: it is particularly difficult for those of us who come from afar, because the costs to get here are that much more. You do not get paid. In fact, you really do need a pension or a private income if you are to serve in this Chamber from anywhere outside of London. That is true. I am lucky to have a pension from the other place, so I am able to do so.
The main point I want to make is that we cannot consider size in isolation. We must also take account of the other constitutional changes that are either under way or planned, including further devolution to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Incidentally, it is not just to Scotland. People say, “Scottish Members of Parliament shouldn’t vote and Scottish people shouldn’t participate”, but there is devolution to Wales and there has been for Northern Ireland for a long time. I never heard the Tories say, “These Ulster Unionists shouldn’t participate in matters that affect only England”. We have to deal with that as well. We also have to try to resolve the democratic deficit in England. That could include an English Parliament, a regional government, a combination of both, or more power to the cities, but it could also include some changes in this place, which I will come to.
The Library Note has been mentioned. That Library Note was helpful, particularly on the statistics. I was particularly sorry that it did not cover the Labour Lords’ report, to which my noble friend Lady Taylor referred. Perhaps they are being rather pure and non-partisan and do not want to mention it because it comes from one party, but I think it is one of the best contributions to this debate—I am a little bit biased as I was on the committee that helped to draw it up.
Among other things, it recommends that the size of this House should be smaller than the House of Commons. I say this to my noble friend Lord Gordon of Strathblane—my really good friend—and to the noble Lord, Lord Cormack: there is something symbolic about making it smaller than the House of Commons, to reinforce the primacy of the other place. It has to be reinforced in different ways and that helps to do it. In our report, the aim was 450 Peers, but I must say—I hope I am not giving any secrets away—that we were swithering upwards and downwards when we discussed that. There is not an obvious number. As others have said, we need the number to do the job. The Select Committee I serve on, the European Union Select Committee, with its six sub-committees, needs personnel to keep it going—I must not say to man it. We need enough for that as well.
We also recommend the abolition of hereditary Peers—at least of their participation in this place, not anything worse than that. I have not heard any arguments in favour of keeping them; if there are any I look forward to hearing them. The ones who have been useful have been made life Peers anyway. We also recommend a minimum attendance and participation level. That has been discussed; I will not go into it further.
We also recommended retirement at the end of the Parliament in which Peers reach 80. I have just been appointed to do something new. Many years ago, when I was young, I was director of Age Concern Scotland. I then got elected to Parliament and I had to retire from that.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
My noble friend Lord Sewel has said it is a pity that that happened. I have just been appointed a trustee of Age Scotland, the new body that replaced Age Concern Scotland and Help the Aged in Scotland. The director, Brian Sloan, said to me when I was appointed, “Of course, George, you’ve got more of a direct interest in our work now”. He was absolutely right. This is the kind of thing that we should be doing. We are not in favour of arbitrary retirement ages; I should not advocate that. However, I do not think this is arbitrary. We have looked at it carefully and made a serious recommendation.
We then come to the longer term, which is the more important debate—no disrespect to what my noble friend Lord Williams and others have raised about the current matter. In the longer term, we need to start with the purpose of this House: not how many we are, but what we are here for. First of all, do we need a second Chamber? An argument has to be made against unicameralism in favour of a second Chamber. I used to be a unicameralist, but if you go to Scotland and see what has happened with the Scottish Parliament, where there are no checks and balances on a Parliament controlled by one party, with a First Minister, the Presiding Officer, and the majority of the Select Committees of the same party, you begin to see the advantages of a second Chamber.
If noble Lords agree with that, how should the second Chamber differ from and relate to the House of Commons? I think it was the noble Lord, Lord Butler, who said that it should be complementary to it. I think the noble Lord, Lord Walton, raised the question of the council of experts that we have here. This is a really important dilemma about what we are here for. If we want to be a council of experts that is one thing, but it does not have the legitimacy of a body that has some form of election, whether direct or indirect. That is difficult. It is difficult to argue that a nominated body, however expert and brilliant it is, should be part of the legislature. That conflict needs reconciling.
Select Committees
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel
The Chairman of Committees
That Baroness Stowell of Beeston be appointed a member of the following Committees, in the place of Lord Hill of Oareford: House, Liaison, Privileges and Conduct, Procedure and Selection.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)
This Motion is debatable. We are talking about appointing the Leader of the House to various committees. If Members of the House wanted to pursue the issue that we were discussing earlier, we could discuss it now. This is a self-regulating House. It is unbelievable that one distinguished Member of the House—he is leaving now—should get up and move a Private Member’s Bill when it was clearly the wish of the House, indicated by my noble friend the Opposition Chief Whip, that we wanted to ask more questions and have this discussed. It is a pity that this House is being steamrollered in such a way.
Procedure Committee
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel
The Chairman of Committees (Lord Sewel)
My Lords, I beg to move that the fifth report of the Procedure Committee be agreed to. The report covers a number of different areas which I will cover briefly in turn.
The first part of the report recommends a change to the terms of reference of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee to add two new grounds on which that committee may draw the special attention of the House to a statutory instrument. This change is being made at the request of the committee. The two new grounds are: (e) that the explanatory material laid in support provides insufficient information to gain a clear understanding about the instrument’s policy objective and intended implementation; and (f) that there appear to be inadequacies in the consultation process which relates to the instrument.
The second section sets out rules for government departments to follow when submitting Answers to Written Questions. The need for new rules arises from the introduction of a new system to allow electronic exchange of Questions for Written Answer and their associated Answers between both Houses and government departments. The new Question and Answer system will automatically publish all Questions and Answers on the parliamentary website and send e-mail alerts to Members, who will have a dedicated web page for viewing and organising all their Questions and Answers. Answers should be received more quickly, as Members will not have to wait for the postal delivery. Answering bodies will be able to include attachments with their answers, containing tabular, graphic or illustrative material which cannot be printed in Hansard. The digital copy of Answers will be the definitive record copy, but a printed version will continue to be published and, in addition, while recognising that we may be somewhat behind the curve of the digital age, the Leader of the House has asked Lords Ministers to continue sending printed and signed versions of Answers to all Lords Members.
The third section of the report arises from a proposal made by the usual channels to reform the rules relating to Select Committee membership with the aim of increasing the opportunities for Members to participate in Select Committee work.
The first recommendation is that from the end of the 2014 Session—I stress that is not from the end of this Session but from the end of the Session which ends with the general election—the rotation rule for all Select Committees other than the House Committee should be three Sessions instead of four. The House Committee presently has a five-Session rotation. That will be reduced to four and then eventually to three. In the longer term, we also propose that the House Committee should come down to a three-Session rotation. To avoid a sudden loss of many Members by reducing the length of service by two Sessions at once, we recommend that this change be implemented incrementally.
Other recommendations include a new rule that Members who leave a committee under the rotation rule should be eligible for reappointment to the same committee, or any of its sub-committees, only after the lapse of two full Sessions. We further recommend that it be set out in the Companion that it is desirable for a Member to serve on only one sessional investigative Select Committee at any one time.
The final section of the report recommends that from the start of the next Session maiden speeches should be marked in Hansard. I beg to move.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)
My Lords, I want to make a couple of comments in relation to the report. However, as we are discussing procedure, I should say that I find it ridiculous that comment and questions on the Ukraine Statement were restricted to 20 minutes. I know that has been extended from 10 minutes but in the other place such discussion is unrestricted. My noble friend Lady Liddell and a number of other noble Lords tried to get in and some of us did not even bother to try as we knew that discussion was limited to only 20 minutes and that a lot of noble Lords wanted to comment. However, we are going to finish early again tonight and then we are going away for three weeks. This is a matter of great importance and it is a great shame that we will not have another opportunity to comment on it at this point. I hope that the Chairman of Committees will have another—
The Chairman of Committees
I shall deal with the last question first. Grouping Questions is an intriguing suggestion that is worth looking into. It would develop almost an internal commentary, would it not? It would be a worth while exercise to have a look at.
The noble Lord, Lord Jopling, made a point about late Answers. I can give him a full assurance that there will be no hiding place for departments that are late in answering Questions.
I did not quite follow the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, when he said that Select Committee rotation was somehow designed to make us work less. It is not. It is designed to make more people work more. That is generally a good thing.
I can assure the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, that the issue of tabling Questions in recesses is on the agenda of the Procedure Committee for 24 June, and will therefore receive attention.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
The Chairman has not answered two vital questions—on the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy, and on the length of Statements.
The Chairman of Committees
I apologise for not answering on national security. The national security committee is subject to a rotation rule. When it was established, Lords Members were put on a rotation basis. If we had not moved to a three-Session rotation but had kept a four-year rotation, which all our committees are on, we would have had six Members leaving the committee this year.
On the length of Statements, I am afraid that I am not in a position to give any answer.
Houses of Parliament: Education Centre
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel
The Chairman of Committees
I think the noble Lord has already conveyed that.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)
My Lords, was not an alternative site suggested at 1 Parliament Street? Why has that not been considered?
House of Lords: New Peers
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel(10 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
To ask the Chairman of Committees what logistic and financial adjustments are proposed to take account of the recent list of new Peers.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)
Needless to say, that is a disappointing answer. I want to make it clear that I do not associate the Chairman of Committees in any way with the Government’s cynicism in failing to abolish this House and now packing it with placemen and women. However, he is in the forefront of facing the consequences. Will he confirm that we are now reaching a new peak in membership and that new working Peers are—quite rightly—attending more frequently than those who have left or have died off?
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
I mean, more than they used to attend. This is resulting in higher expenditure on allowances and greater demand on all our resources and facilities. Quite frankly, this cannot be achieved on a fixed budget.
The Chairman of Committees
My Lords, it is not part of my job to defend or attack government policy. I just try to keep the show on the road, with the helpful advice and support of the noble Lord in particular. To give a few facts, after the general election in 2010 there were, I think, 117 new creations. Since then, the net increase in the size of your Lordships’ House has been seven. It is difficult to put this: it is likely that the new creations are more active than those who are no longer with us. It is virtually impossible to find a nice set of words to convey those facts.
However, it is worth pointing out that in December the House Committee will consider whether to make any additional provision for any net increases in the membership of the House and in attendances, when it considers the forecast outturn for the current financial year and the budget for the next year.
Procedure Committee
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel
The Chairman of Committees (Lord Sewel)
My Lords, the report covers a number of different areas, which I will cover briefly in turn. The first part deals with the detailed implementation of two proposals by the Leader of the House to allocate more time for Back-Bench business. The first proposal is for a weekly one-hour topical QSD, to be selected by ballot and debated between the two party or balloted debates on Thursdays. The ballot would open at 10 am on Monday morning and be drawn at noon on Tuesday for Thursday of the following week.
As with topical Oral Questions, a topicality test would be applied: we suggest that the subject must have been covered by at least two mainstream media outlets on either the Monday or Tuesday that the ballot was open or over the preceding weekend. The second proposal focuses on balloted debates. We propose three changes: first, that the practice of rolling over Motions from one ballot to the next should be discontinued; secondly, that Members should be able to have either a Motion for balloted debate or a QSD on the same subject on the Order Paper at any one time, but not both; and finally, we propose an element of flexibility in the timing of balloted debates. Where one balloted debate has twice as many speakers as the other, there should be flexibility to shorten the less popular debate to two hours in order to extend the more popular one to three hours.
Moving on from the Leader’s proposals, the report proposes a slight change to the yearly cap on Oral Questions that the House agreed at the end of April. It has been brought to our attention that some Members were unaware that Questions tabled since January have been retrospectively counted as part of the Member’s allocation of Oral Questions for the 2013 calendar year. To avoid penalising Members who were unaware of the retrospective nature of the cap, we propose that the yearly cap on Oral Questions be calculated from 1 May to 30 April. This change will ensure that only Questions tabled after the cap was agreed to will be counted.
Finally, the report recommends to the House two proposals from the Leader relating to the High Speed 2 hybrid Bill, which is expected to be introduced in the House of Commons by the end of the year. The first is to amend the private business Standing Orders to ensure that the House’s procedures are compliant with the EU directive on environmental impact assessment by allowing the public an opportunity to comment on the environmental statement for a hybrid Bill and for those comments to be taken into account by both Houses.
The second proposal is to allow the electronic deposit of documents relating to the High Speed 2 hybrid Bill. Standing Orders currently require hard copies of all Bill documentation to be deposited in every local authority along the line of route. Given that there are around 250 local authorities and the environmental statement alone is expected to run to 50,000 pages, this proposal simply allows, but does not require, these documents to be deposited in electronic form. The Government have undertaken to make all key documents available in hard copy in all deposit locations and to continue to provide all documentation in hard copy if locations so wish. I beg to move.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Can the Chairman of Committees answer a question? On page 4, paragraph 8, the report says:
“The proposal for topical QSDs arose as part of a package intended to create more opportunities for backbench members to initiate debate. We therefore propose that they may be initiated only by backbench members”,
something with which I completely agree. In the case of the Liberal Democrats, as well as Ministers in the Government, they also have Front-Bench spokespersons who get up and speak on behalf of the Liberal Democrats. I presume that they are excluded from initiating Back-Bench debates.
The Chairman of Committees
It is intended for Back-Benchers. It should be for Back-Benchers. I am sure that people who operate as Front-Benchers will be aware of that.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
With respect, that has not answered the question. We need to be absolutely clear before we approve this that spokespersons for the Liberal Democrats are considered, for this purpose, to be Front-Benchers. With respect, they try to have it both ways. They try to have the privileges of Front-Bench spokesmen, but obviously they might try to be Back-Benchers as well. I therefore hope that it is absolutely clear.
The Chairman of Committees
My Lords, there is very little I can add to what I said. It is a matter for the usual channels to work out, if possible, whether there is such a thing as a Liberal Democrat Front-Bencher who is not a Minister.
House of Lords: Peers’ Entrance
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel
The Chairman of Committees
I think that all members of the Administration and Works Committee and of the domestic committees realise the importance of having a proper and thorough consultation before making and announcing decisions.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Would the noble Lord the Chairman of Committees care to hazard a guess at what further surprises Black Rod may have up his sleeve for us?
The Chairman of Committees
I am not sure that Black Rod keeps his surprises up his sleeve. In answer to the noble Lord, I have no detailed knowledge—they would not be surprises if I knew them.
Procedure of the House
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel
The Chairman of Committees (Lord Sewel)
My Lords, this report follows on from the decision on Back-Bench debates taken by the House in April. At that time, the Leader of the House proposed an increase in the number of Back-Bench QSDs. The report enables this intention to be implemented. It recommends that on days when a Grand Committee sits solely to consider Back-Bench Questions for Short Debate, the duration of such sittings should be extended from four hours to five hours. I beg to move.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Can the noble Lord give us an absolute assurance that unlike the Procedure Committee’s report in the last Session, this will not have unintended consequences?
The Chairman of Committees
I think the logical problem at this stage is that I can give no guarantee that it will not have unintended consequences, because they will by definition be unintended.
Procedure of the House
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel
The Chairman of Committees (Lord Sewel)
My Lords, I beg to move that the fifth report of the Procedure Committee be agreed to. There are three Motions in my name listed on today’s Order Paper, so I shall begin by outlining briefly the procedure that we will be adopting.
The fifth report, to which I now seek the agreement of the House, contains proposals relating to the tabling of Oral Questions, the repetition of Answers to House of Commons Urgent Questions, and the repeal of three obsolete Standing Orders. I suspect that noble Lords may be more interested in the second Motion in my name, which relates to the Committee’s sixth report, on the establishment of the Back-Bench debates committee.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
I think there must be some misunderstanding. According to the document that I received, the fifth report will be taken separately and the sixth report will be taken along with the Motion. Surely it would be better to deal with the fifth report first and then move on to the sixth report.
The Chairman of Committees
I thank the noble Lord for that intervention. I am trying to explain the procedure that we will be adopting. I think that in about two sentences’ time I will make it clear that we will deal with the two reports separately. We will have separate debates on the two reports; they are not conflated.
We have not made a recommendation on what would be a major change to the House’s procedures in relation to a Back-Bench debates committee, so I will simply invite the House to take note of the committee’s sixth report at that time. There will be a debate in which all those who either support or oppose the creation of a Back-Bench debates committee will have the opportunity to speak. Since the committee has made no recommendation, my opening remarks will be short and non-controversial, and my position on the Back-Bench debates committee is neutral.
When the debate on the sixth report has run its course, I shall bring it to a close by again inviting the House to agree the take note Motion. I shall then formally move the third Motion standing in my name, which seeks the House’s agreement to the establishment of a Back-Bench debates committee.
Procedure of the House
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel(11 years, 9 months ago)
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The Chairman of Committees
That the 1st report from the Select Committee (HL Paper 25) be agreed to.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
My Lords, I congratulate the Chairman of Committees on an excellent and sympathetic report. However, could he arrange for the Procedure Committee to look at another matter: namely, the accountability of Ministers to this House, particularly the accountability of the noble Lord, Lord Green? I have here a table that shows that his attendance in the current Session was less than 10%; whereas, just to take a random example, the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, was here nearly 100% of the time. The noble Lord, Lord Green, was absent yesterday when there was a PNQ, which he knew was coming up, about his attendance. He is absent again today. I do not know where he is, but he is certainly not here. However, he is going to make a statement today, not to this House but to Jeff Randall on Sky television.
It is appalling and a discourtesy to this House and to Parliament as a whole when the noble Lord considers that it is appropriate for him to make a statement on television and not to this House. Since we have the noble Lord the Leader of the House here—I shall wait for a reply to the Committee—he will say that at a time when the Prime Minister is under tremendous pressure with his former press adviser and good friend having been charged with very serious offences and when his judgment is in question, it would add to that for his adviser on banking, a senior Minister of State, not to come before this House and be accountable to the place where he ought to be.
Administration and Works Committee
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
I support the recommendation. Until this Motion is passed, I am not sure whether I am breaking any rules by having this hand-held device here. I see that Black Rod has left the Chamber, so I am safe. However, just to illustrate how useful it is, I have been able to check on the noble Lord, Lord Cormack. The House will not be surprised to hear that for many years he was a governor of the English-Speaking Union and is the founder of Heritage in Danger, so he really does do what it says on the packet.
Lord Sewel
My Lords, I shall deal briefly with a number of points made in the debate. There is a slight difference in emphasis between the noble Lords, Lord Berkeley and Lord Wills. I come down heavily in favour of the latter because I think it is important that Ministers have immediate and accurate information to transmit to the House when we are discussing legislation. It is quite good fun to see the scuttling back and forth between the Box and the Front Bench and the Minister then fumbling over a note. However, it would improve the effectiveness of this Chamber if Ministers received accurate information directly.
I agree wholeheartedly with the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood. I suspect that we will go towards a tablet-based system very quickly. I look forward to that and am sure that people will take it up.
With regard to the parliamentary website, I have to agree that I sometimes find it less than completely useful and easy to use. However, I am sure that those responsible are always endeavouring to improve and I am certain that that message will get across.
I fully recognise that, although the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, is a relative newcomer to this House, he is a doughty defender of the traditions and courtesies of the House. The whole House will agree that, as a courtesy, noble Lords in the Chamber should pay attention to the matters being debated. Along with many noble Lords, I deprecate tweeting, texting or other similar activities that indicate that the minds of noble Lords are otherwise engaged—heaven forfend.
On enforcement, as at least some noble Lords will be aware, the House has many ways of registering its displeasure if it feels that individual noble Lords are slightly overstepping or abusing their rights. I hope the House will accept this report. I think it is a step forward and brings us to a position where we are using technology without being dominated and mastered by it.
Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel
The Chairman of Committees
That Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames be appointed a member of the Select Committee in place of Lord Carlile of Berriew, resigned.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Can the Chairman of Committees give us a clear assurance that the removal of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, from this important committee is not connected in any way with his excellent article in the Telegraph describing Mr Clegg’s House of Lords reform proposals as third rate?
The Chairman of Committees (Lord Sewel)
My Lords, I have to be a bit careful here. I am sure that the generous comments of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, on Mr Clegg’s proposals were not at all a consideration in this effect.
Scotland Bill
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel(12 years, 1 month ago)
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Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
My Lords, as I said at the start, the purpose of my amendment was to have a debate on it. There are a number of amendments, as the Minister rightly said, but I am not sure that the one on Antarctica has anything to do with me. I cannot remember tabling one about Antarctica, but I certainly tabled one in relation to Calman or further fiscal responsibility. I will come back to the Minister’s point on that, because there is an inconsistency in what he says. That is the main point that needs to be made.
First, I totally understand what my noble friend Lord Sewel said. He is absolutely right about redistribution, whether it be redistribution within the whole United Kingdom, within England or within Europe. I am sure that my noble friend, who is a distinguished member of the Council of Europe delegation—
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
He is a member of the NATO delegation, but he understands the European issues and I am sure that he will know that redistribution within Europe to the poorer areas is as important as within the United Kingdom. I am not suggesting that there should not be some kind of arrangement or formula for that kind of redistribution. There is no reason why it could not be done, and I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, who has extensive knowledge of Germany, will be able to indicate that there are arrangements within Germany to make sure that some of the poorer Länder are helped by some of the richer Länder.
That can be done in a federal context as well, which brings me to the noble Lord, Lord Maclennan. He and I ultimately favour a federal system; that is the one stable system that is desirable. We had a unitary system which created tremendous problems and inequalities. In Scotland, it created problems through a lack of political accountability. At the other end is total separation with the break-up of the United Kingdom, which would be disastrous. A federal system has all the advantages of working together but with local autonomy. What we have at the moment is a quasi-federal system, and we need to move towards a proper federal system. I know that he and I agree on that.
The noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, said that he was unsure whether the 1997 referendum gives us a mandate. This is the crucial thing; he thinks that it does not, as I did not when I tabled these amendments. The noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, is laughing but he has spent almost all of today trying to persuade the Minister to concede, to change his mind and to listen to argument. Both Ministers have of course refused to consider any of his arguments but when I take account of what other people say, he laughs and says that I am inconsistent or doing a U-turn. I am just trying to go through the arguments as to whether a further referendum on a major extension of tax-raising powers for the Scottish Parliament would be necessary.
What I understand the Minister to have said is that although his recollection is much the same as mine, when we got that big majority for tax-raising powers in the 1997 referendum, the understanding in the surrounding debate was that it was for plus or minus 3p.
However, he extrapolates, using the new legal concept that my noble friend Lord Browne has devised, that it gives the Government a partial mandate to introduce the new tax-raising powers in Calman. These go a long way, as the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, pointed out. However, he has reservations and does not think it is enough of a mandate to go for full fiscal responsibility. I find that strange. It is very difficult to understand why, if the referendum was a mandate in the context of plus or minus 3p and is a mandate for Calman, which goes half way towards full fiscal responsibility, it is not a mandate for full fiscal responsibility. Does it go a quarter of the way? I presume that it does if it goes half way. Does it go three-quarters of the way? We do not know. It is a very difficult concept and we really need to think about this.
Scotland Bill
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel(12 years, 2 months ago)
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Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
When we get to the Minister’s reply, I think we will find that it is not already in the Bill in the form that I would like. We need to work out exactly how much is needed to fund the planned expenditure of the Scottish Parliament and to look at ways in which that can be funded through taxes raised by the Scottish Parliament. Some people in Scotland, MSPs and others, including Peter Duncan of the Conservative Party, have come out with a scheme that they call devo-plus. I do not agree with it fully but it deserves looking at. It is one of a number of options that should be looked at for funding Scottish expenditure with income from within Scotland.
Lord Sewel
Way back in the mists of time, I used to construct a series of social surveys. One of them was a series of questions on the powers of local government. We asked people two sets of questions: the first on which powers were at which tier of local government; and the second on whether local government should have more powers. The initial answer to the latter question was always yes. Then we asked what powers they wanted to see local government have, and about 90 per cent of them were powers that local government already had. That is the problem with the “more powers” argument: it assumes that people are fully aware of the powers that the Parliament already has. I simply do not think that that is the case.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
I wish I had not given way; that intervention was not all that helpful to my argument. If the noble Lord, Lord Steel, David Cameron and I can agree on a way forward, there must be some hope that this rainbow coalition will find out what is best for Scotland and for Britain, and will avoid the dangers of separation and of breaking up the United Kingdom. That is the way forward. I have spoken for quite long enough now.
Scotland Bill
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel(12 years, 3 months ago)
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Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
I think that things are moving up the scale, although they are taking some time to do so. We are making a little bit of an impact there now.
I want to make it clear that in moving the amendment I am conscious of the sensitivities in relationships between Westminster and Holyrood, and between the UK Government and the Scottish Government. We have found in many of our discussions that this is a sensitive area in which we have to tread very warily, and I would hesitate to say anything that suggested that the UK Parliament was imposing its will upon the Scottish Parliament.
I say that having been a Member of the Scottish Parliament for four years. A number of noble Lords who have participated in these proceedings have also been MSPs—including the noble Lord, Lord Steel, who was Presiding Officer, the noble Lord, Lords, Lord Selkirk, Lord Watson and others who have participated, and, of course, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace, the Minister who is to reply. Those of us who have been in Holyrood are aware of those sensitivities and we move with caution.
However, this Parliament has some responsibilities. The action of the United Kingdom Government in imposing very high fees precipitated this issue in the first place. I know that this is one area where the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, and I might not totally see eye to eye. I am very pleased to see present the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, who was a distinguished vice-chancellor of my old university, Edinburgh—not when I was a student, I hasten to add; he is not nearly that old, and neither am I. His experience and deep knowledge of the university sector will be very helpful, and that demonstrates some of the value of this Chamber.
We also have a wider responsibility for the European Convention on Human Rights and the equality legislation, as epitomised in the Equality Act. We therefore have to bear some responsibility for and take some interest in discrimination and equality. What has been not just proposed but agreed by the Scottish Executive and Scottish Government is tremendously unfair discrimination against students from England, Wales and Northern Ireland who go to Scottish universities. It really is quite disgraceful. It is astonishing, when you think of it, that students from Lisbon, Madrid or Berlin will all get in free to Scottish universities, but students from Belfast, London or Cardiff will have to pay fees.
Lord Sewel
Does the noble Lord recognise the supreme irony in the Scottish Government’s position? On the one hand, they are arguing for independence, but the policy they are pursuing can be carried out only while they remain members of the United Kingdom. If they achieved independence within the EU, they would not be able to have this pernicious policy.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
My noble friend, who was a distinguished administrator and academic at the University of Aberdeen—he was vice-principal—has put his finger on one very important matter. In fact, he has taken away a major part of my speech. Never mind about that. It is a massive irony, as my noble friend said, that the Scottish Government are able to impose these discriminatory fees only because Scotland is part of the United Kingdom. If Scotland was an independent country, as the SNP wants, that Government would be unable to impose those fees. Students from England, Wales and Northern Ireland would be in exactly the same position as students from Poland, Germany or wherever in the European Union.
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Debate between Lord Foulkes of Cumnock and Lord Sewel(13 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Sewel
It is not a matter of asking yes or no; it is a matter of asking what the substance is behind yes or no, which is either first past the post or the alternative vote system. That is the difficulty. If you are presenting content in the question that is being put, options are clearly the way of presenting that to the public. In other referendums, the question has been put more simply as do you want something or do you not want something. It is not a matter of wanting one or the other. That is what we are presenting to the people at this time.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
I find the argument given by my noble friend Lady McDonagh much more convincing. With respect, she has been involved in a number of elections and referendums, as have a lot of us in this House. With no disrespect to the Electoral Commission, until recently it did not have anyone on it who had either been elected to anything or been involved actively in elections or referendums. It is only very recently, with a change in the law, that we have had people on the Electoral Commission who know what they are talking about in relation to elections and referendums. Surely the argument given by my noble friend is right. Yes is a positive argument and no is a negative argument. Therefore, yes is seen to be something far more attractive than no. If you are putting the option, you have to explain the option; you do not just go around sloganising. You have to explain in more detail what first past the post or the alternative vote is about. That is a much more sensible suggestion to put forward. I urge the Leader of the House to think carefully about that and not just to accept something because the Electoral Commission has said it. There is a tendency in both Houses for some people just accepting things because the commission says it. Now we have changed the commission’s composition and added to it some people who know what they are talking about with regard to elections and referendums. Its suggestions in future will be better informed. But will the Leader of the House listen to my noble friend on this?