Public Bodies Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Newton of Braintree and Lord Lester of Herne Hill

Tuesday 11th January 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lester of Herne Hill]

My Lords, I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, that I was not able to be here to hear his speech. I was upstairs in the Joint Committee on Human Rights, which has authorised me to ask the Minister whether, as we were given to understand, we will receive the human rights memorandum from the Cabinet Office so that our committee can do its job properly. That memorandum has still not been received and we want to finalise our report by next Tuesday. I hope that the Minister can tell us in his reply that what was promised many weeks ago will happen.

My second point in general support of the amendments is that, although it is admirable that some bodies of a judicial nature may be removed from the schedules by other amendments, if Amendment 175 in my name and in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Pannick—a paving amendment for which was approved by the House on the first day in Committee—is accepted by the Government and not sought to be reversed in the other place, the provisions in Amendment 175 will be relevant to our discussions today and hereafter. It is unsatisfactory that we are having this debate without knowing whether Amendment 175 will stand. Importantly, Amendment 175 would apply not only to courts but to any body—whether a court or not—that performs a judicial function and it would deal with the issue of independence raised by the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham.

In a sense, we are putting the cart before the horse because a failure to insert into the Bill the criteria against which all these decisions can be measured means that we are having to proceed piecemeal, body by body, at enormous and appalling length in the Committee process. I respectfully urge the Government to accept these amendments for all the reasons that have been given so far but to deal with the system of the Bill as a whole by indicating at an early stage that Amendment 175 or a similar provision will bind Ministers when they exercise their delegated powers. That is the price that Ministers must pay if they are not to proceed by way of primary legislation. There need to be constitutional limits on the powers exercised by Ministers, as Committees of this House have indicated in the past.

[Lord Newton of Braintree]

My Lords, I am afraid that I cannot claim, like the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, not to have taken part recently in proceedings on this Bill, because I have been a persistent defender of my Front Bench, nor do I intend to stop being so today.

However, I want to associate myself in two respects with the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham. First, I think that the Bill leaves—to put it mildly—a lot to be desired. Secondly, I think that the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Holbeach, is to be congratulated on the way he has dealt with this poisoned chalice. I am glad to see that, if I have read the runes aright, the person speaking to the proposals today will be a Minister from the Ministry of Justice, which is where the proposals originated from and where any blame for them, if blame is justified, should lie.

By way of other brief preliminary, I should say that when I first saw the schedule of headline decisions that was published in early October—this picks up a point made earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Lester—I could find no intellectual coherence at all in the Ministry of Justice’s proposals, which seemed to be piecemeal suggestions with no connection between them whatever. I hope, therefore, that at least we may have some coherent explanation about the pattern of these proposals and decisions for procedure rule committees, justice councils and other bodies, including CAFCASS, that are scattered about, most of which are now to be withdrawn from Schedule 7 by the amendments that have been helpfully tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Holbeach.

However—I do not know whether the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, has spotted this—unless my eyes have deceived me the Civil Justice Council will potentially remain on the list of bodies in Schedule 7. If I have that wrong, I would be glad to be told. That links with my own frequently expressed concern about the Administrative Justice and Tribunals Council—in which I have declared an historical interest—which has been separated out and put down for the chop in Schedule 1. There is no intellectual coherence at all to the proposals. I would like to hear some coherence this afternoon.

I will make three other points. First, the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, asked some good questions. My answers might not necessarily be the same as his in all cases, but those questions need answering. Secondly, I share almost completely the doubts of the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham. We are getting rid of too much independent outside inspection or oversight of bodies and are being told, in effect, that the Ministry of Justice can take care of itself and does not want these bodies breathing down its neck. That does not correspond with my views about how government in this kind of society should work or how it works best. Thirdly, I echo the concerns expressed by other noble Lords about the way in which the proposals have been handled. I reiterate what I said at the beginning because, as a House, we need some reassurance that, frankly, the Government know what they are doing.

Public Bodies Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Newton of Braintree and Lord Lester of Herne Hill

Tuesday 14th December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Newton of Braintree]

My Lords, I rise to speak briefly. Having supported my noble friend Lord McNally as loyally as I could last night, I find myself in a slightly more difficult position today. I really do think that we need some sensitive answers to the questions that have been raised in this debate. I have a peripheral historic interest in that when I was chair of the Council on Tribunals, late of the Administrative Justice and Tribunals Council, I was consulted in the course of the review which started off the whole process of reforming coroners. There may have been some thought at that time of making the coroners’ court arrangements a tribunal. We have not gone down that path, but it leads me to what I want to say.

Whether it is a tribunal, a court or sui generis, it is essentially part of the judicial process. That is why I think that the key issues in the debate are those that were raised by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and a number of others, including the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, about the need for independence. We are just seeing the full establishment of a Tribunals Service, part of whose merit was that it was led, for the first time, by a senior judge. We had the Lord Chief Justice as President of Tribunals, to whom the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, referred, and judicial leaders in different ways from all parts of the judicial system. Why is this being taken out and left to civil servants in the Ministry of Justice? I cannot see any answer to that question and, unlike the noble Lord, Lord Harris, with most of whose remarks I agree, I do not believe the Ministry of Justice could do it however much money and officials it has. It is an issue of principle.

I will not go quite as far as my noble friend Lord Lester and say that if the Government will not accept the amendment, I shall vote against them. However, if we are just given an intransigent response that says that we will not even take this away and look at it, I shall be in great difficulty.

[Lord Lester of Herne Hill]

My Lords, I ought to point out that I said I would abstain.