Queen’s Speech

Lord Norton of Louth Excerpts

Thursday 13th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Norton of Louth (Con) [V]]

My Lords, today’s debate is billed as being on “The Constitution and the Union”. That should be “The Constitution, including the Union”. We should not see the union as some discrete issue. Part of the problem of the past century has been treating parts of the United Kingdom as somehow separate, of treating Northern Ireland as a quasi-state and leaving it to its own devices. We need to be looking more holistically at our constitution. The way to promote the union and to ensure that we remain a union is not to promise more funding or devolution of powers. That is to play into the hands of those who favour independence. We should not be in response mode, nor should we misinterpret why people wish to stay in the union.

In 2014, when an opinion poll suggested that there might be a majority in the referendum for Scotland becoming independent, all three party leaders went to Scotland and promised a greater devolution of powers if electors voted to stay in the union. When there was a majority to stay in the union, the Government delivered on that promise. Then, as now, the Government appeared to assume a causal relationship. There is no evidence that there was one. Survey data revealed that those who voted for Scotland to remain in the union did so for several different reasons; that of wanting more devolution hardly registered.

If we are to maintain the union, we need to be on the front foot, making the case for the union, not on the back foot, making promises in response to demands from those who want independence. I remind the House of the Constitution Committee’s excellent report The Union and Devolution, published in 2016. It noted the ad hoc way in which power has been devolved. As it reported:

“This haphazard approach to the UK’s constitution, in which power has been devolved without any counter-balancing steps to protect the Union, recently culminated in an existential threat in the form of a referendum on Scottish independence. An inattentive approach to the integrity of the Union cannot continue.”


We need to be making the case for the union in all parts of the United Kingdom. The attempts to keep Scotland in the union have exacerbated the English question. The Government should be to the fore in trumpeting the benefits of the union—one constitutional entity under the Crown. As my noble and learned friend Lord Stewart was saying, the whole is far greater than the sum of the parts. The case also needs to be made for moving away from what has been characterised as a grace-and-favour approach to the devolved nations and adopting one of mutual esteem and participation. I welcome especially the report of my noble friend Lord Dunlop. We need not more legislation but an attitude shift on the part of government.

In the short time available, I cannot cover all the constitutional measures in the gracious Speech, but I want to make one point about the constitution. As we have heard, there will be a Bill to replace the Fixed-term Parliaments Act. That Act is generally unloved and was the product of a rushed attempt to deal with a particular problem. It was agreed by negotiators who were not necessarily experts in constitutional matters. As the Constitution Committee noted, the policy behind it

“shows little sign of being developed with constitutional principles in mind.”

Both the Government and Opposition are committed to replacing the Act. As we have seen with the discussion on the Government’s draft Bill and as the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, indicated, putting the situation back to what it was before September 2011 is not a straightforward task.

The 2011 Act was one of several constitutional measures over recent decades. They have been notable for their number as well as for being disparate and discrete. We need to be wary of rushing in with more. I have made the case before that we need to stand back and make sense of where we are before we embark on further constitutional change. We should not be talking of restoring balances without being clear as to what the existing balance is and should be. Change should be the result of considered reflection and, for a Conservative Government, grounded in a Conservative narrative for democracy. We need to avoid repeating the mistakes of those responsible for the Fixed-term Parliaments Act.

We need to stand back and understand the nature and value of our constitutional arrangements and make the case for those arrangements. We need to ensure that we do not lose the value of what we have. Once lost, it is difficult, if not impossible, to recreate.

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, perhaps I may suggest that we try and keep to the five minutes advisory time. If not, we are going to run extremely late in this debate.

Queen’s Speech

Lord Norton of Louth Excerpts

Wednesday 8th January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Norton of Louth (Con)]

My Lords, like several noble Lords who have spoken, I will focus on the proposal for a constitution, democracy and rights commission. Commissions take different forms. Having chaired one on behalf of the Conservative Party to examine how to strengthen Parliament, I believe they can be beneficial. However, it is important that we are clear as to purpose. I caution against setting up a body that is in effect a constitutional convention—that is, a body created to come up with a set of constitutional reforms or, indeed, a new constitution. I have previously made the case for a constitutional convocation, an informed body able to stand back and make sense of where we are before we embark on further change.

The past quarter-century has been marked by changes to the constitution on a scale not seen since the end of the 17th and early 18th centuries. Conservatives are at one with Burke in accepting that a state without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation. What is a problem is when a great many reforms take place quickly. There is not the opportunity, as has been the case before, for a reform to be assimilated into our constitutional architecture before another major change occurs.

The changes of recent years have been several and substantial. They have also been disparate and discrete, often rushed, borne of political expediency and reactive. They have not been grounded in an understanding of the system of government that has developed over centuries and been confirmed by the Glorious Revolution of 1688. That generated the basis for the emergence of the Westminster model of government. That model has been criticised, and indeed assaulted by some of the reforms of recent years, but it is at the heart of the Conservative view of democracy. It links electors to those they choose to govern the nation, with Parliament as the key buckle between them.

The system is one in which government is accountable to the House of Commons. Parliament under the Westminster model responds to what government brings forward. Because of the Glorious Revolution, the Executive cannot legislate without the consent of Parliament, but Parliament itself does not seek to wrest control of policy from the Government. That came under threat in the last Parliament.

The system has now righted itself, but recent events, on top of the other changes of the past two decades, demonstrate the need to take stock of what has happened and to do so within a clear understanding of the fundamentals of the constitution of the United Kingdom. The Westminster model has been much criticised by those who embrace different approaches to constitutional change. They, at least, have the merit of intellectual coherence—I believe them to be wrong, but they are clear and principled—whereas successive Governments have lacked any intellectually coherent approach to change.

I have previously quoted in debate the words of Sir Sidney Low, who in his short book The British Constitution, published in 1928, wrote:

“In England we often do a thing first and then discover that we have done it.”


We are in danger of spending years playing catch-up to make sense of what we have done. Now is the time to use the opportunity afforded by this manifesto commitment to stand back and assess clearly where we are, and to do so within an appreciation of the need to maintain a political system that has accountability at its heart. Events not only in the United Kingdom but globally demonstrate an urgent need for Governments to hear what people are saying and to be seen to be doing so. The greater demands for people to have a voice make the Westminster model more, not less, relevant to modern conditions.

We have lacked serious thinking about our constitution as such. I trust, therefore, that the Government will see the proposed commission as a means not for short-term fixes but for undertaking a mature, philosophically informed assessment of where we are, identifying any flaws, certainly, but also appreciating the system of government that—despite the critics—has served this nation well. Any change should be informed by a Burkean appreciation of what it is for.