Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Bill

Debate between Lord Norton of Louth and Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Monday 22nd July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I support all the amendments in this group and some of the later ones, particularly those in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Blunkett and Lord Bethell, and the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Basildon. I was sad that I was not able to take part in the Second Reading but I hope to make up for it now.

For me, the pertinent questions are: who is the restoration and renewal project for, and what is it intended to achieve? The Bill is incredibly unambitious. It is designed to keep things roughly as they are—or, in some cases, exactly as they are—to serve those people who currently occupy the building, whether MPs, Peers or staff. I love the idea of a coffee bar in the Royal Gallery—it might warm it up—because it is almost unusable at most times of the year. However, it is only partly right if we look to MPs, Peers and staff for what is appropriate for the future.

Public engagement has to be at the heart of the project. If we do not engage the public properly, they will not see this as a good use of money. We are talking about billions of pounds of public funds from the Treasury and it must not look like an upgrade for our offices; it has to look like part of the national fabric. We must therefore involve the public in renewing the heart of our democracy.

It is a fundamental principle of our parliamentary democracy that no Parliament can bind its successors in law, and yet this Bill will do exactly that. This building will be set in stone for decades. It will take a decade to start the work and a decade to complete it and in that time we will not take into account the fact that our society is moving on. The public can be more radical than we are. We tend to get stuck in mud with our processes. We have a new clock, a new system with the Lord Speaker and so on, but these changes have been incredibly slow. Public engagement will suggest more radical things than we do here.

Once the building is done, there will be no opportunities for moving on, changing our systems or doing anything new or perhaps more democratic. Whether it is introducing an elected Chamber, electronic voting or whatever, it will be much harder because people will say, “We cannot do that because we have just spent billions on recreating what we had before. It will not fit and we cannot spend any more money”. This country has undergone massive constitutional changes over the past couple of decades and it is illogical to persist in the way we are going when society is moving on. We cannot afford to be blinkered about what is happening around us. For these reasons, the amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, are essential. The sponsor body must have as one of its central purposes the duty to ensure that its work accommodates future concerns, changes and political developments. If it does not do that, it will be seen as a huge waste of money.

I would go even further with public engagement and say that we should parallel the sponsor body’s work on restoring and renewing the building with establishing a citizens’ assembly, which is what Theresa May should have done with Brexit. Such an assembly could offer a way in which to restore and renew our whole political system. A Government with vision past the next few months would breathe life into a new era of citizenship and change public engagement for the better. This place is not a museum but a working building, and we have to accept that work sometimes changes.

These amendments are vital. I regret that they have been watered down—I would have supported the unwatered-down version—but I will support them at any further point in our work.

[Lord Norton of Louth (Con)]

My Lords, I add my support to the amendments, which are important. I also endorse everything that has been said about citizenship and education, and the role that the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, has played in that.

The Bill is unfortunately titled. The title is somewhat misleading because it places the emphasis on restoration and renewal of a physical entity—the Palace—rather than the restoration and renewal of Parliament as an institution. That should be at the heart of informing the debate as we go forward because we have to configure the Parliament in order to fulfil the functions that both Houses fulfil.

In its recent report the Liaison Committee endorsed the view that we have a number of functions which are not confined to the legislative-Executive relationship but encompass as well the legislative-public relationship. We should see this through the prism of not only the relationship between Parliament and government but the relationship between Parliament and those outside who the institution serves. I endorse the point that we are trustees. We need to look at it in that perspective and consider how we can configure or reconfigure space to fulfil those functions. That should be the driving force. We should look at it dynamically in terms of our functions, not as some fixed physical entity.

Reinforcing that—this point has been touched upon—is the context in which the discussion is taking place: how people outside see the institution, which, at the moment, is not positive. The recent audit of political engagement by the Hansard Society tracked the extent to which there is dissatisfaction with the way our system works. The proportion of respondents who feel that the system of governing needs a great deal of improvement stands at 72%—the highest level it has been in the audit series. The level of distrust has been a change of kind and not only extent. By that I mean that people used to distrust MPs; now they distrust the House of Commons. That is a challenge that we have to face up to and address. We have to see it in that context.

We need to think about how we relate to those outside the House in the way that has been stressed, and I agree with most of what has been said. That encompasses not only seeking to educate but, as has been stressed, engaging with people outside Parliament—not only in terms of restoration and renewal but how we craft an institution that can continuously engage with people outside.

The noble Baroness who has just spoken seems to think that we are going to be stuck with whatever the fixture is. However, one can anticipate that and have flexible space that is adaptable to needs as they change over time. In that context we need to anticipate and address the, if you like, known knowns and think about the known unknowns and the extent to which the Palace may be configured on that basis.

We need to configure space so that we can enable greater interaction between Members and those making representations and, has been stressed, those who wish to be present for proceedings. I endorse what the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, said. It reinforces my point about not just seeing the Palace as a fixed body but that dynamic of how we relate to people outside, creating space here for that purpose but thinking how we can configure it in such a way so that we can engage with those outside who cannot come here as well.

I wholly endorse what has been said. It is important that it is in the Bill, for the reasons that have been given. It should be at the forefront of what we are doing. My noble friend Lord Bethell referred to it basically as a secondary function, for reasons I understand, but we should stress it as a primary function in terms of what this institution is about. That has to be at the forefront throughout the work that is undertaken and, for those reasons, I endorse the amendments.