Law Commission
Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope Excerpts(10 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope (LD)
My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow my noble friend Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, and this is an important debate. I start by declaring an interest: I am currently chair of the trustees of the General Medical Council’s superannuation scheme. That might give a clue as to what I shall be talking about in the course of my brief remarks.
My noble friend Lord Hodgson has done the Grand Committee a great favour by tabling this Question for Short Debate. It is an important subject for the reasons that he described, but the timing of acquiring it is particularly valuable. It makes me think that we talk about the need to find ways to get adequate scrutiny for medical and other regulators, but actually the Ministry of Justice should have regular accountability sessions to Parliament. A Question for Short Debate such as the one this afternoon is an excellent example of that. It is something we should do annually because it is an important part of Parliament’s work carefully to scrutinise the invaluable work that the Law Commissions collectively, throughout the legislatures in the United Kingdom, do. They are of valuable assistance not just to Parliament but to us as individual legislators. My noble friend Lord Hodgson gets high marks for bringing this forward, and we should think about doing it more regularly in future.
I cheated; I spoke to the Law Commission and asked it where its annual report was, and it very kindly sent me a link, so I have had a chance, which my noble friend has not yet had, to look at that report. You would have to acknowledge that a fair amount of progress has been made. There is the influence that the Law Commission had on the Care Bill, to name but one, which is a massive piece of legislation and has taken up a lot of parliamentary time. That is an example of how the process should and can be used.
The Ministry of Justice deserves some credit for what has been achieved but I agree with my noble friend: there is emerging concern about the three pieces of legislation outlined in the annual report. If we can learn more about what is in the ministerial mind of the Ministry of Justice for those three pieces of legislation, that will be extremely valuable.
I want to make a point about time in Parliament. Although the value of the Law Commission is special, it is obviously no use whatever unless it can have adequate parliamentary time. My noble friend is right to say that there are two avenues into Parliament: the specialist procedure and the generality of proposals adopted by government departments are both available. He mentioned this in passing: I think that people will be puzzled by the excuse from time immemorial from business managers in Parliament—I used to be a member of the usual channels in the other place at an earlier stage of my parliamentary career, and business managers on the government side are always saying this—that they are strapped for time, and they would love to be able to help but they cannot because they do not have the appropriate slots. Ordinary people would be puzzled by that right now because parliamentary recesses, particularly this year, are more frequent and for a longer duration than in my experience they have been in the recent past.
My first question is, if the Ministry of Justice and the Law Commission are working closely together, why the Ministry of Justice is not knocking on the door of the business managers more regularly, saying, “If we’ve got a little bit more latitude in the business in front of the House, surely we can find a slot for some of this work”. I am sure that that must create a huge amount of frustration. The value of the Law Commissions throughout the jurisdictions in the United Kingdom is immense in the expertise that they make available to Parliament. Although my noble friend is right to guard against getting the Law Commissions involved in parliamentary or political controversy, the work that they do, the consultations that they carry out and the standing that they have with their interlocutors produce a quality of consultation that White Papers and Green Papers perhaps do not because they are necessarily promoted by government departments. The Law Commissioners must be very frustrated that they spend time on these measures and then find, as my noble friend reported, that some Bills are left languishing for seven and a half years. We have to work harder to find ways of getting parliamentary time for this important work.
In passing, I point out what we all know: the Queen’s Speech that we are looking forward to after the forthcoming Prorogation will contain—because they always do—a provision for other measures being laid before Parliament. That provision always gives some scope for Law Commission proposals and I do not think that we have been as assiduous and robust as we should have been in taking advantage of it. Indeed, we should be saying to the Law Commissions throughout the United Kingdom that over a five-year Parliament we will certainly guarantee them some time. There should be some understanding that there will be a bit of time for the special procedure and for government Bills. If the Law Commission sees fit to spend time giving careful consideration to some of these proposals for public care and maintenance and other revisions of our body of law, then the least we can do politically is to give it a better idea of what time will be available for that.
As my noble friend anticipated, I want to talk briefly about the case for early inclusion of the regulation of healthcare professionals in the upcoming Queen’s Speech. I want to put a single question to my noble friend on the Front Bench to which I do not know the answer. I do not know to what extent the Ministry of Justice has leverage with the usual channels—in my experience, not many people have leverage with the usual channels except the usual channels themselves. However, there must be some way for the Ministry of Justice to say, whether formally or informally, that it supports a piece of legislation. This is a substantial piece of legislation. It has 250-plus clauses, so fitting it into one parliamentary Session would be a tight fit, particularly in the next Session. We know when the election is going to be but I think that it will be an unusual, and perhaps an unusually unpredictable, space as far as parliamentary time is concerned.
I think that to go into the merits of the proposal would be technically out of order, but the need for it is great. I served for four years as a GMC member until last year, and enjoyed the experience. I even read distinguished reports written by some of our colleagues. In particular, the report by the noble Lord, Lord Patel, on the regulation of medical education was a very important piece of work, which I enjoyed. However, the one thing that I learnt, if I learnt anything, was that the Medical Act 1983 is no longer fit for purpose; it is fragmented, it is not suitable and it does not begin to deal adequately with nine different regulatory medical bodies, 32 professions and 1.44 million professionals. It is all about patient safety.
There is a point that I would make to my noble friend in seeking his assistance in getting some leverage for this measure to be included in the Queen’s Speech as either a draft or a full-blown Bill. My spies tell me that the worry in the Government is that health will be too tricky an issue in an election year. However, I think that patient protection is very important and, although contentious, if it were adopted by a department, it would be a departmental Bill and could become part of the political give and take. I think that such a Bill would be well received. It would certainly be treated very seriously here in the House of Lords, and there is the expertise in this House to do the measure justice. With that, I ask my noble friend to think very carefully. If he does have any influence with the usual channels, then if this is not in the Queen’s Speech there should at least be something that indicates what it is going to happen to it. The alternative is that this massively valuable work will be lost. The Queen’s Speech after the upcoming one will be in a very difficult set of political circumstances so we have to grasp the moment now, and we need his help to do so. I hope that he can help the Grand Committee by giving us that assurance today.
Lord Faulks
My Lords, I am aware of the limited time I have been given. The noble Lord, Lord Beecham, has somewhat exceeded his time. He properly asked me a number of questions, as have other noble Lords. I will do my best in the limited time to answer as many of them as possible, but I am sure that noble Lords will appreciate that time does not allow me to give as much detail as I would otherwise have liked.
I begin by thanking my noble friend Lord Hodgson, who describes himself as no lawyer, but he is quite right to bring this matter to the attention of your Lordships’ House and he has performed a valuable service in so doing.
The Law Commission is the statutory independent body created by the Law Commissions Act 1965 to keep the law under review and to recommend reform where it is needed. The aim of the commission is to ensure that the law is fair, modern, simple and as cost-effective as possible. I speak from my own experience that, in decades gone by, the Law Commission would produce valuable reports but, sadly, often little was done with them because there was not sufficient political will, time, or whatever to bring some of its sensible suggestions into force.
However, in the past few years, the Law Commission, in collaboration with the Ministry of Justice, has engaged in a major exercise to enhance its profile within Whitehall and to increase the level of implementation of its work. Elements of that include the introduction of the new procedure, to which we have had reference, in your Lordships’ House for the consideration of non-controversial Law Commission Bills; a statutory duty on the Lord Chancellor to report to Parliament on implementation of Law Commission work—that is perhaps a partial answer to a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood; and a statutory protocol on the relationship between the Law Commission and government departments. Those actions have resulted in a more efficient and streamlined way of working for the commission. As much was recognised in the recent triennial review undertaken in respect of the Law Commission, which was reported to this House. The review identified a number of areas of particularly good practice by the Law Commission and its sponsor team at the Ministry of Justice. It commended the open and transparent approach to law reform and policy-making as an exemplar of open policy-making.
When the commission examines a particular area of law, it first establishes the scope of its work in conjunction with the relevant government department. It then consults on existing law and on proposals for change. It makes a report to the Lord Chancellor or the relevant Minister with recommendations and reasons. The report may—and often does—include a draft Bill giving effect to the commission’s recommendations. The Bills are referred to as Law Commission Bills.
Since the new procedure was put in place in 2010, six Bills have been through the Law Commission Bill procedure. As your Lordships will appreciate, there are practical reasons for a limit to the number of Bills that can go through the procedure in a Session, but as and when opportunities have arisen, Bills have been taken forward using that special procedure.
It is perhaps important also to stress that we use what might be described as the normal procedure wherever possible to take forward the commission’s recommendations. For example, most of the recommendations in the Contempt of Court—Juror Misconduct and Internet Publications report were included in the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill introduced in Parliament in February 2014, and which is part of a carryover Bill, which will be considered by your Lordships’ House during the summer or perhaps in the autumn.
The special procedure has helped to clear the previous backlog and significantly reduce delays. Bills that have benefited from this new procedure include the Trusts (Capital and Income) Act 2013—the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, will be familiar with that—the Consumer Insurance (Disclosure and Representations) Act 2012, with which my noble friend Lord Hodgson will be familiar, the Third Parties (Rights Against Insurers) Act 2010, the Perpetuities and Accumulations Act 2009, referred to by my noble friend, the Inheritance and Trustees Powers Bill; and the Partnerships (Prosecution) (Scotland) Act. With the exception of the Inheritance and Trustees’ Powers Bill, which is awaiting Royal Assent, all are now Acts and have made important changes to the effectiveness, efficiency and quality of the law.
In March 2010, the Lord Chancellor and the commission agreed a statutory protocol governing how government departments and the Law Commission should work together on law reform projects. We see this as a key document for ensuring a more productive relationship with the Law Commission and improved rates of implementation of Law Commission reports.
The protocol covers the various stages of a project: before the commission takes the project on; at the outset of the project; during the currency of the project; and after the project. It applies both to projects set out in one of the commission’s regular programmes of law reform and to projects which arise out of individual referrals made to the commission. The protocol applies only to projects which the commission takes on after the date on which the protocol was agreed, although government departments and the commission have agreed to take it into account, as far as practicable, in relation to projects which were in progress at that date. This protocol does not apply to commission proposals for consolidation or statute law revision. I commend the protocol as a thorough and efficient process.
During the debate, reference was made to what might or might not need to be included in the Queen’s Speech. The Committee will of course appreciate that I am not in a position to comment on the contents of the Queen’s Speech. I take account of what the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, said about the other measures that it provisionally contains and I undertake to bring the contents of this debate to the attention of the Ministry of Justice—and further, if necessary. I cannot give any further assurance beyond that. However I can say, counter to the observations made by the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, that there is a good level of communication between the Ministry of Justice and the Law Commission, particularly in relation to the forthcoming programme. The consultation for the commission’s 12th programme closed on 31 October and the commission is currently reviewing the suggestions that have been made. It has submitted proposals, and the main part of its law reform will then be set for the following three years.
The noble Lord, Lord Beecham, referred to the report of the Law Commission's proposals and criticised certain delays in some areas and the failure to implement—or not to take up—certain proposals. Although the Law Commission provides invaluable assistance to any Government of whatever colour on law reform, there is no obligation on the part of a Government to bring forward proposals: it is a question of using a valuable resource. For example, the noble Lord referred to remedies against public authorities. I was one of the consultees on that particular exercise. I can say that there was far from agreement among the consultees about the correct way forward. The fact that the Law Commission examines a subject and comes up with proposals does not necessarily mean that it has provided the perfect answer, although very often it provides valuable assistance.
I should make some observations about the Lord Chancellor's Report on the Implementation of Law Commission Proposals and the duty introduced by the Law Commission Act 2009 for an annual report. The noble Lord, Lord Beecham, has already read it, and the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, will be able to read it shortly. It was published on 8 May, so this is a timely debate. On easements and covenants, I refer the noble Lord to paragraph 52, on the insurance contract Bill, paragraph 8 on third parties’ rights against insurers, paragraph 32 and termination of tenancies paragraph 61, which may assist his reading thereafter.
The report shows that a number of Law Commission proposals have taken effect:
“The Trusts (Capital and Income) Act 2013 has come into force, as have the amendments to the Companies Act 2006 which streamline the system for registering charges and securities interests granted by companies. In furtherance of the Commission’s function to repeal laws that no longer serve any useful purpose”—
another important part of its work—the largest ever Statute Law (Repeals) Act, removing more than 800 Acts from the statute book, received royal assent on 31 January, 2013 and came into force immediately.
Perhaps I may deal with one area which I know several noble Lords were concerned about, which was the regulation of healthcare professionals. Rightly, there was reference to the considerable amount of work that was done in that respect and I think that there will be a lot of sympathy for the observations made by the noble Lord, Lord Patel, about the need to consolidate and improve the regulation of healthcare professionals.
The Law Commission began its work in response to the Department of Health’s White Paper in 2011. It carried out research into the then current regulatory system for healthcare professional regulation in preparation for its public consultation, which opened on 1 March 2012. It ran for a total of 13 weeks, and the Department of Health submitted a response. Following analysis of the responses to the consultation exercise and engagement with the Department of Health and other key stakeholders working to develop its policy, the Law Commission published its report and recommendations alongside a draft Bill on 2 April 2014. On behalf of my colleagues at the department, I would like to say thank you to the Law Commission for the significant amount of time and effort that has been put into developing such a detailed and thorough analysis. I can tell the Committee that the Department of Health is considering the Law Commission’s proposal with great interest and will produce a formal response in due course.
Of course, there has also been the report by Robert Francis QC, containing a total of 290 recommendations, a number of which related to the regulation of healthcare professionals, which will also bear considerable consideration. I know that officials at the Department of Health and the Nursing and Midwifery Council are currently working on the possibility of secondary legislation and associated amendments to the NMC rules which will give the NMC power to carry out its fitness to practice and registration functions more efficiently. The GMC and the NMC are also working together with other healthcare regulators to agree a consistent approach to being open and honest. As the noble Lord, Lord Patel, will know only too well, the explicit professional duty of candour, much debated in your Lordships’ House over the years and which is now a firm recommendation, is likely to find its way into law in due course.
I fear that I am unable to commit further than that, but I hope that noble Lords will find some encouragement from that.
Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope
Before the Minister sits down, the question I asked was whether the Ministry of Justice could add its considerable weight to what I know is the view in the Department of Health that it is important to make some progress with that legislation in some way in the next parliamentary Session. Is the MoJ willing to support that view to the people putting together the proposals for the parliamentary programme for the next year?
Lord Faulks
The MoJ has a role by statute to liaise with the Law Commission. That is about as far as I can take it. I personally have sympathy with the concerns expressed. So far as that assists, I hope that I can bring them to the attention of my masters, as it were, in the Ministry of Justice. I fear that I cannot go any further than that. I think that the noble Lord will understand that.
I think that that has dealt with most of the main issues. As I said, the particular concerns of my noble friend Lord Hodgson are, I think, largely met in the report. That is not to say that they are not of considerable importance—they are. However, I respectfully reject the suggestion that the Government are sitting on their hands in respect of the unimplemented proposals. I hope that I have explained that there has been a great deal of progress. Of course, some have not been progressed at the pace that some would like, but there have to be priorities. To give one example, on one aspect of potential reform that has been mentioned, the termination of tenancies project, which relates to the Law Commission report published in 2006, we accept that that is a very long period between publication and decision, but we hope to reach a final decision this year.
The noble Lord, Lord Beecham, was critical of the Government’s criticism of his party’s suggestions in relation to private landlords and security of tenure. I think that the debate so far has focused on whether or not rate freezes of three years were necessarily a good idea. The noble Lord eschewed party politics and then proceeded to indulge in it. I respond by saying simply that the case for rent control is far from clear.
Crime and Courts Bill [HL]
Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope Excerpts(11 years, 11 months ago)
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Lord Lucas
My Lords, I should declare an interest as chair of the Enforcement Law Reform Group. As such, I count many bailiffs among my acquaintances—and do not know one who would not support this amendment. Everybody in the bailiff industry, from those who have spent a lifetime in it to the most vocal advocates of the poor, wants regulation and a complaints system. This has been an active subject in government since 1980. We have had several times when action has been promised and no times when action has resulted. It is high time that the Government did something. The previous Minister in charge of this promised that he would do something, and it was delayed and delayed. We have a new Minister in charge and again we are promised that something will happen, but nothing substantial has come forward. It is time we had action. It is no bad thing that we in this House should pass an amendment signalling just how seriously we regard this constant delay. It is very important that whatever we do about regulation, we have an appeals process: some way in which bad behaviour can be brought to book and in which complaints can be heard.
There are pros and cons of doing it in any particular direction. I have had very good experiences with ombudsmen—not in this area, but others; it is a system that works well. But it is not good enough to have no appeals process. Having done bailiff regulation in whatever way the Government propose to do it, we cannot even think of not having a serious system of appeal and for dealing with bad practice. Without it, the bad practice will not disappear. The serious members of the bailiff profession very much want it to, but they need the Government’s help. The Government have set up a system of remuneration for bailiffs which invites bad practice, because it makes it uncommercial and uncompetitive to behave according to the rules. Under those circumstances one should not be surprised that things get pushed a bit. Proposals and studies on the proper system of remuneration for bailiffs have been around for a long time; we have not yet seen them implemented. The Government ought to make progress, and I should be delighted if the Minister would give a firm promise on this to prevent the noble Baroness pressing her amendment. However, if she does press it, and if I am unhappy with what the Minister says, I shall be in the Lobby with her.
Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope
I follow my noble friend Lord Lucas and concur with what he and the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, said. The House owes her a debt of gratitude for pursuing this matter to Third Reading. After these proceedings the House has many important duties and discussions, so I want to be brief. I concur with everything said by the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher. However, unusually for me given the context of the discussion, I want to ask my noble friend on the Front Bench a party-political question. It is a very simple one. The governing coalition agreement makes specific reference to more protection against aggressive bailiffs; that is what we as a coalition Government in 2010 undertook to do. Can the Minister assure me that in 2015, when the coalition agreement runs its course, he will be able to provide me with an answer to the question, “What additional protection against aggressive bailiffs have we as a junior coalition partner been able to provide?”? That is a very important question and I am certain that it will be asked.
That is the first point I want to make. The second point is that time is now running out; I know this as well as the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher. April 2013 is not a cliff edge that will suddenly cause an explosion of debt-enforcement proceedings. However, that date marks a significant change to the risks faced by low-income households against a very difficult financial background, which we all know about. It is not safe to leave in place the current inadequate proceedings—the framework within which debt enforcement is conducted—against the background of what we all hope will be a short-term period of financial distress. These low-income families have nowhere else to go. They are, by definition, the most vulnerable people in the country. Sometimes their heritable property and homes are at stake, so the stakes for them could not be higher. It is therefore essential that we do everything in our power to make sure that the rules are observed.
No one is suggesting that debt enforcement cannot be pursued. That would be quite wrong. There is no party politics in this, and I am not making a party-political complaint, but the department has been sitting on this for far too long. Speaking for myself, if the Minister is not able to give the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, her amendment as stated, I want to know how long it will take for him to bring about the change that the amendment requests. I know the Minister very well, and I know that he takes these issues seriously. I know that he has strength as a political operator and a huge amount of experience. I do not believe that it is impossible for someone of his stature to go back to the department and say, “You have a maximum of 12 months to sort this out, otherwise my reputation as a Minister will come under attack”. That is all he needs to do because if I was his senior adviser on this matter and he raised an eyebrow and uttered sentences of that kind, I would not think twice about trying to sort the problem. Time is not on our side.
People get touched by debt-enforcement proceedings after they have had personal experience. I know this because when I was fledgling provincial solicitor I used to instruct sheriff officers who were subject to the control of the sheriff. Any sheriff officer who got on the wrong side of the rules in front of Sheriff James Patterson in Jedburgh Court got a dose of Jedburgh justice himself. As a solicitor for organisations such as the then South of Scotland Electricity Board, I found that the operation of debt enforcement was perfectly controlled but deeply affecting. I remember as a young solicitor understanding the effects of properly enforced debt obligations on families in a small rural community. They made a real mark on me. My experience since is that anybody who is touched by any element of debt-enforcement proceedings is traumatised in a way that few other occurrences—domestic, personal or otherwise—produce, so we have a double obligation to try to get these things right.
I am about to retire as a lay member of the General Medical Council. For the past four years, I have had an engaging and enjoyable time watching the beneficial effects of a sensible, light-touch regulation system with licences, appeals and complaints that put a framework around everything that the professionals in the system do. I am absolutely persuaded that it is in the interests of bailiffs, debtors, creditors, courts and everyone else to have a playing field on which the rules are absolutely clear. The essential elements of that are an appeal system that people understand, a competent complaints service and licences that can be withdrawn if people flagrantly abuse the rules. It works in medicine and in other walks of life—it will work in debt-enforcement proceedings.
In conclusion, I say to my noble friend that, as coalition partners, we not only have to provide an answer before 2015 to the urgent political question of providing more protection but, more importantly, we have to get the system in place before universal credit compounds all the benefit problems, council tax debts and other issues to which the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, referred. Time is running out. We must get this done. I know the Minister understands the importance of this, so the key thing for me is the timeline. If the Minister does not in his response put his own imprimatur that he will get this done in a reasonable time, I may follow the noble Baroness into the Lobby if she decides to press this to a Division.
The Lord Bishop of Lichfield
My Lords, I too am glad to support the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, and her amendment which seeks to establish a statutory ombudsman for complaints about bailiffs. I am glad to do so also because Wednesbury, of the famous Wednesbury rules, comes from the ancient Black Country town in my diocese where the recession and austerity have acquainted many citizens with bailiffs for the first time.
Most of us have had the infuriating experience of having our wheels clamped by a private company and of officials who then would not listen to reason. How much worse it must be to have one’s personal possessions, or even one’s home, taken away. It is vital that those authorised on our behalf to collect fines should be properly accountable and their behaviour regulated.
The second reason I want to support this amendment is that the citizens advice bureaux, the Zacchaeus 2000 Trust and the Money Advisory Trust are all behind it. They have been concerned about the practices of some private bailiffs for many years. As we have heard, CABs dealt with getting on for 250,000 problems to do with private bailiffs this past year. They have some heartrending examples of people being pushed into unpayable debt by bailiffs acting illegally. We must do all in our power to prevent vulnerable people being led to believe that the justice system in our country is all about the rich punishing the poor. The present system of certifying county courts fails to monitor individual bailiffs’ behaviour; it is intimidating and costly for vulnerable people to bring complaints and there is no power for a court to award redress.
The Zacchaeus 2000 Trust helps 650 impoverished debtors a year in London. It is convinced that there is a relationship between debt and mental illness and between destitution and poor maternal nutrition and, consequently, babies with lifetime mental and physical illness. Zacchaeus 2000 meets bailiffs when they are enforcing council tax and fines on impoverished debtors. Of course, the courts must be supported and their penalties enforced but we do not want the ethos of the car clampers to be repeated in debt collecting in our poorest boroughs.
The present system is widely perceived as unsatisfactory and toothless. A legal ombudsman would give debtors and the advice sector a proper remedy when bailiffs do not comply with the Wednesbury standards.
House of Lords: Working Practices
Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope Excerpts(14 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Rooker
Only after the event, and that is the difficulty. The argument for taking Statements in Grand Committee is powerfully made. Five minutes were taken up by one person when there are only 20 minutes for questions because there is no mechanism for getting some order into the system. If there was, I would not say anything, but going into Grand Committee is important.
I want to raise an issue which I know from some of the speeches is controversial. By the way, I agree with everything that has been said, but the role of the chair, particularly at Question Time, is not an unimportant matter. Between 2005 and 2007, the noble Baroness, Lady Amos, was the Leader of the House and I was the Deputy Leader, I had responsibility for Question Time. I have kept all the daily papers from that time. I have got them in a box, and I know exactly who got called, when they were called, and their party, for every Question Time for those two years. I can produce the figures. They were difficult to do, but nevertheless I kept all the papers because I just walked out of here and chucked them into a box.
Lord Rooker
No, no. There was almost a competition between us. My noble friend Lady Amos would say, “I once got 36 supplementary questions through. How many did you get today?”. I usually managed 24 or 25 supplementaries in half an hour, which is pretty good going when you think about what happened during the Statement today. I want to repeat a point I made last October in the debate on the Queen’s Speech. There is a serious problem in that with the expertise in this House and the range of Questions that can come up on a daily basis—we are not constrained like the other place—I think that there are hundreds of Members of this House who are reluctant to try to ask a supplementary question. That is because the method of doing so is to enter a bear pit.
I have no experience of it. In fact, last week I stood up for the first time ever and asked a supplementary question at Question Time. I had never done it before, and it was an easy one because no one else stood up. However, it can be a bear pit and many people just will not do it. But if you were to ask them whether they had something to say, they would reply, “Yes. I had a good point to make but I wasn’t prepared to join in. If I could have been called, I would take my luck with everyone else”. I know that this is a tricky one because, in a way, it would give the chair the authority of the Leader. It is important because I do not think there is another legislature anywhere in the world where the Executive decides who is asking the questions that scrutinise the Ministers. That is intrinsically wrong for a start. It has got to be a bad principle in terms of democracy. The Government decide which Member can ask the Government a question. I know it is done fairly because for two years I supervised it myself, but it looks wrong. The Lord Speaker could do it in terms of the blocks as people stand. My noble friend Lady Jones is not here, although I am pleased to see my noble friend Lord Grocott in his place.
When I referred to this last October, I said that I had not done any research on it, but I did say that we keep hearing from the same noble Lords at Question Time. After that, someone did some work on the figures, and we had them today. Over a whole Session, half of the supplementary questions—over 1,500 of them—were asked by 8 per cent of Peers, which is 57 Peers. The same people asked all those questions because they are prepared to bully and shout and intimidate others into sitting down. That cannot be conducive to proper scrutiny at Question Time. A few people dominate, and we know who they are because we see them all the while—the same 57 people ask half the supplementaries. So I appreciate the fact that that research was carried out.
Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope
My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow my noble friend Lord Rooker. I say that because he and I have been studying these things across both Houses for a number of years. I enjoyed his speech and I concur with absolutely everything he said. What I want to try to do with the short time allocated to me is argue that we really do have a new set of circumstances surrounding this debate. Whether or not it was a shot fox, as the noble Lord, Lord Filkin, said, I welcomed the announcement as soon as the coalition was formed that we were going to have a Leader’s Working Group. I hope it will give consideration as to whether it should be a standing group; the noble Lord, Lord Norton, is right about that. I am relatively new here. I have never experienced a Leader’s Working Group and I therefore do not know what the rules of engagement are or how its members are selected. I suspect the answer is “through the usual channels”, which takes us back into the loop we heard about earlier and whether or not they will have influence. I hope that the style and approach of the work of the Leader’s Group will be open and transparent. There is a case for electing Back-Benchers to the group; otherwise it will be far too easy for party political groupings to put forward members who may have grudges and form on issues.
There is a majority for change in this House if it is handled properly. At my first political demonstration, I followed Jo Grimond, marching towards the sound of gunfire. What was the chant? It was, “What are we for? Moderate change. When do we want it? In due course”. I am now in the coalition and a holy warrior for change: I want change and I want it quite soon. I can put a time on it now because the difference with this debate today is that we know we are going to have five-year Parliaments. There is high risk that this House, this important institution, could be facing profound change by 5 May 2015. That does not sound a long time and we have a great deal of work to do if we are to have a modern legislature that is capable of anticipating that change, facing it and planning for it. We do not know what will happen to us, but if we do nothing it will be worse.
There is a new urgency about what the Leader’s Group will bring to the House. The noble Lord, Lord Rooker, is right. We need to pilot things and think carefully about them. I am very pleased to be the chair of the Information Committee. I was fingered by a Whip and told that I was to be chair of the Information Committee, which was very interesting. I thought, “Do I not need to face an election?”. “Oh no. Nothing as bizarre as that”, I was told. My role is to try to help in outreach, which is a horrible word. My predecessor, the noble Lord, Lord Renton of Mount Harry, produced a fantastic report called Are the Lords Listening? Creating Connections between People and Parliament, and noble Lords such as the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, and the Lord Speaker are doing wonderful outreach work in explaining the House to people. The noble Lord, Lord Luce, said that there is “profound ignorance” among the public about what we do here. He is not exaggerating; that is an absolute statement of the current position. If that is the case, we should spend 25 per cent of our time—I shall certainly spend 25 per cent of my time—in Parliament for the next five years trying to explain to people what we do here.
It is not difficult. I have visited one or two schools as part of the schools outreach programme, which I recommend to noble Lords. You get mostly positive feedback, some of which is amusing and entertaining, and you always bring back anecdotes to tell down the pub on a Friday night. It is worth doing. We need to get into a position where people understand that we are legislators. That is all we need to say: “We are legislators”.
I think it was the noble Lord, Lord Luce, who made the point that substantive debates were influential on government policy. People say to me that it would be helpful to use the IT and social networking sites that are available as these could provide the opportunity for an effective dialogue. People want propositions tested. For example, if they are against the genetic modification of crops, or whatever, they would want to raise a debate but not, for heaven’s sake, move for Papers and then withdraw the Motion. Try explaining that to a 15 year-old. I have tried and failed. We have to get the terminology, the language and the formality of this place in tune with people who do not know what Papers are because everything is done digitally. The noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, and his colleagues have done an enormous amount of viable work in this direction but we must do more. Explaining how we work and what we do should not be difficult. However, we do not have an endless amount of time in which to do it.
The Information Committee organises and supports the work in the Library and we need to consider extra resources to support the working practices. There are 400 active Members of the House. How do I know that? Because the lists are in the Library. People are in and out of the Library, calling on resources and using them productively on the Floor of the House in order to do the work they are bidden to do in Parliament. Those 400 people need better support. Why? Because we are getting bigger in number and the facilities need to be properly promoted. The struggle for resources is a constraint on us all. We get valuable assistance from the Library and we need to keep up its quality. However, I warn the House that, unless we put resources in over the next five years, that quality is bound to slip and become diluted. There are plans for extra members in the Library in the new island site when it comes on stream but, as chair of the Information Committee, I give notice that I will be making a robust but sensible application for continuing support for individual Members who are trying to do their work in this House. I shall also look for support from colleagues to do outreach work.
We have to consider how we shape the perception of the House. The Robert Burns quote of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, was apt but she missed the last two lines:
“O wad some Pow’r the giftie gie us
To see oursels as others see us!
It wad frae money a blunder free us,
And foolish notion:
What airs in dress an’ gait wad lea’e us
And ev’n devotion!”.
It is an old, superior Scottish culture and I could not resist it. I had to refer to the book to get the quote right, but I hope the accent was better.
I was lucky to be part of the governance committee under the noble Baroness, Lady Murphy. Again, the noble Lord, Lord Luce, set the tone of the debate when he said that there needs to be an independent review of governance. I was a House of Commons Commissioner for a long time and I was very nervous about this. I was the external spokesman for the commission during my time in the Commons and, when we had the Braithwaite review, the scales fell from my eyes. Someone from outside—no one particularly special—came in, sat down, went round, asked some quiet questions with no axes to grind and produced a devastating report on what was happening externally and where we were deficient. We should not be frightened of doing that. although we shall have to do it quietly and sensibly and we cannot throw the baby out with the bathwater and so on. We need an internal standing committee, as suggested by the noble Lord, Lord Norton, to look, with external help, at the issue of governance.
The noble Lord, Lord Cope, busily defended Whips—the poor souls—and said that people speak to them every five minutes. That is a great shame; what a load it must be if people talk to you a lot. I was a Whip and I know that Whips look after party interests. However, those are not the only interests here. The government Chief Whip and the Leader of the House look after the executive interest but in the House of Lords there is also the holy grail of the institutional interest which the Lord Speaker should hold tightly in his or her grasp. I think that the usual channels do not take a sufficient overview of the institution and have too much influence. However, you always think that if you are not a Whip and think the reverse if you are and nothing much will change in that direction. However, it is not sufficient to say it is okay; that the usual channels have got it fixed and it all works. It does—and I am grateful to the people who do it—but we need to have a completely new transparency and consider how it looks from the outside. People need to see what is happening so that they can be confident that what they are being told is fit for purpose.
Lord Cope of Berkeley
There are differences between the way in which Whips in this House and Whips in the other House operate. Of course, Whips in this House look after the interests of their party among other things, and they also have a great responsibility, as they do in the other House, for the institution as a whole, but the Whips in this House have in addition a great responsibility for the members of their group, be it their party or the Cross Benches. If they do not look after them, they do not get on very well. They are also extremely open to both public and private scrutiny.
Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope
I defer to my noble friend’s greater experience: I have never been a Whip here nor do I intend to apply to become one. The usual channels need somebody to oversee what they do. There needs to be more constructive tension between the Government, the Whips, the usual channels and the Lord Speaker. We need some sensible, adult thought about that.
Lord McNally
It says here: “Did the House vote on these examples? Yes, it did”. It must have been when the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, was not here. I could go on. My point is simply that we have been steadily adding to the armoury of tools and as we move forward we need to recognise that, although there is a considerable appetite for further reform to our practices and procedures in many parts of the House, notably among those who have contributed to today’s debate, others take a different view—and we have heard a few of those today.
There is little time left tonight, save to say that we will set up the Leader’s Group, which will have the widest of wide agendas. We will then see what it reports back to us. That will be a very exciting time. The noble Lord, Lord Rooker, asked what we are here for. In my 15 years in this House, I have never had any doubt that I am a parliamentarian. The noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, said that we are here as legislators. The noble Lord, Lord Elton, said that we are here to check the Executive. The noble Lord, Lord Luce, said that he used topical debates to influence government policy. The noble Baroness, Lady Howe, said that she goes about making a nuisance of herself. That combination is what we are here for, and we want the procedures to fulfil those roles. We do not need to agonise too much about this; the task is to find the working practices to facilitate that work.
Some themes have come through. It is interesting that about 10 speakers referred to a revised role of the Lord Speaker. I am sure that the Leader’s Group will look at that but, as the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Alloway, and others have said, there are doubts about it. We have said before that powers to the Lord Speaker would be a slippery slope. Well, let the Leader’s Group look at that.
I have always been a great advocate of pre- and post-legislative scrutiny, and I hope that we can look at that very quickly.
The noble Lord, Lord Rooker, talked about Questions being a bear pit. I am not too sure about that. This is a Parliament, and I worry about what people who are invited to join a Parliament expect it to be. I also listened to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Parekh. I know a place where people come in, read their speeches and go out. Has anyone seen the American Congress being televised? It looks like a funeral parlour most of the time. One of the things that I like about this place is the courtesy of people staying and listening to speeches. I know that Members harbour suspicions about my intentions for this House. I am even a bit suspicious of the noble Lord, Lord Butler, wanting us to get rid of the ermine. We wear it only once a year, and I think that we should keep some of the old courtesies and perhaps some of the old clothing. I have said once before, and got into terrible trouble when I did so, that if we start to look like Croydon Council we will be treated like Croydon Council. I had forgotten that there is a complete mafia of Croydon councillors in this House, who stopped me the next day and said “Oi!”. One of the constructive things about this place is that it retains those courtesies, which are part of its power.
The noble Lord, Lord Brooke, asked what our approach would be to trial and pilots, the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker. That is a very good suggestion, but it is a matter for the Leader’s Group, which I hope it will take on board.
I turn to other points that I can cover in the time left. The noble Lords, Lord Rooker and Lord Filkin, referred to whether the Leader’s Group remit would extend to the governance arrangements of the House. The terms of reference will be widely drawn. The group will need to set priorities and will take its own decisions on what it wants to cover, but it is setting itself a big agenda.
A large number of noble Lords pointed out that we cannot consider our practices and procedures in isolation from those of the House of Commons. The House of Lords and the House of Commons keep their separation up to a point. We should learn from what they have done. There have been several good references to the work of the Wright committee. I do not think that we have been standing still even while the Wright committee has been working, but the Leader’s Group gives an impetus to what has been going on here. As a first step, my noble friend might talk to Sir George Young, the Leader of the House of Commons. I cannot remember who mentioned this point, but striking up a dialogue with the House of Commons is not always as easy as colleagues might think. However, knowing the two men I have just mentioned, some soft soundings might help in meshing what is going on at both ends of the building.
Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope
It would be helpful to the House if my noble friend could give some indication of how long this might take. My noble friend Lord Goodlad is a serious man who I am sure will take this very seriously. But is there any chance of getting an interim report by, say, the end of the calendar year?
Lord McNally
Again, that would be both impudent of me and unfair to my noble friend Lord Goodlad and his group. From what has been said today, this will not be a speedy process. There is a big agenda and a lot to be considered. As has been said, the group will look for advice not only from within this Chamber but from bodies outside which have studied these matters.