Business of the House

Debate between Lord Robathan and Lord Hunt of Kings Heath

Thursday 4th April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Robathan]

Thank you; I accept that. First, we are here to revise legislation. Although we do not get it perfectly right, we do it quite well—much better than the other place, in which I sat for 23 years. That is to the credit of the House of Lords. The second reason we are here is to act as a check—it can only be a minor one—on the tyranny of the elected House. We should be very concerned about this being pushed through the way it is. We legislate in haste; we will repent at leisure.

Other noble Lords—I am looking at two or three on the Benches opposite—were here for the Dangerous Dogs Act. After it was passed, in haste, everybody said that it was a terrible mistake because it was not properly thought through, or examined by Parliament, Select Committees or the clerks. It was not properly examined at all, and what we are doing here is the same. I am not even talking specifically about the Bill that will come up later. I am talking about the whole process by which we pass legislation. The way this procedure has been brought forward is an abuse of Parliament.

The debate has been closed down by one Liberal Democrat, one Labour Peer and at least two Cross-Benchers. Be careful what you wish for because, guess what, if this is to be accepted practice, it will be used against every party, every person on their feet, and every person who wants to raise an issue, by the Government, by the Opposition and by whomsoever. I appeal to noble Lords: of course we all have strong feelings about this but let us remember that the procedures of this House are here for a purpose. They are not perfect, and here I take issue with my noble friend Lord Ridley who said that he did not accept that they were arcane. Actually, some of them are, but, without a dictionary, I do not know if “arcane” is necessarily that appalling.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, the noble Lord has talked a lot about the procedures of this House. However, going back over many years, the House does know when a filibuster is going on and takes action to stop it. The noble Lord talks about the tyranny of the other place. It is usually tyranny of Governments that we talk about. The reason the Commons has had to do this is that, as he said, we have a shambolic Government who have completely lost control of the most important issue that this nation has faced for many decades. The Commons has had to take control. We should surely at least respect that by giving the Bill an opportunity to have a Second Reading. The noble Lord talks about the role of this House. The role of this House is not to filibuster.

[Lord Robathan]

I am grateful to the noble Lord. I agree: it should not be about filibustering. However, I and a great many other people believe we are acting as a check on the wrong procedure down the other end. The noble Lord was here in January 2011. I wonder whether he took part in the filibuster I looked up, which tried to stop the referendum on parliamentary voting. Did he not? Perhaps he was on the Government Benches at the time? No, he would not have been. The noble Lord, Lord Prescott, formerly Deputy Prime Minister, who is not in his place, was apparently very active in it. So I am afraid that filibusters—as the noble Lord suggests this might be—are not unique to any particular party. We should go by constitutional precedent, proper convention—

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Lord Robathan and Lord Hunt of Kings Heath

Committee: 7th sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Wednesday 14th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Adonis]

If knowing anything about issues was a criteria for voting, we would need the noble Lord sitting in the judgment of Solomon over every member of the electorate to decide whether they qualified for the franchise. Being a conservative, he would probably approve of that, but we tend to have more objective criteria.

What we need in this country is to get young people more systematically engaged. A number of members of the noble Lord’s party in the House of Commons, including two former Secretaries of State for Education, are now in favour of votes for 16 and 17 year-olds, and there appears to be a majority in the House of Commons. I very much hope—and this could be the ultimate irony of Brexit—that the first time that 16 and 17 year-olds get to vote in a poll in this country is in a Brexit referendum held early next year, where they make the decisive difference in the decision this country will take to stay in the European Union. If so, the noble Earl’s great ambitions may be realised to an even greater and more positive extent than he may realise.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)]

My Lords, I should welcome the long-term political suicide of the party opposite in its failure to embrace the wishes and ambitions of young people, but the tragedy is that those young people will be most affected by its approach to Europe and to Brexit. This approach seems to be driven by some wistful look back at this country’s imperial past. It is interesting that the noble Lord referred to Australia and Canada, because that seems to be the basis of the party opposite’s approach to negotiations—we will pass up the market that is on our doorstep for the sake of some ludicrous imperialistic notion. How many times do we hear members of the party opposite refer to Australia, New Zealand and Canada in the media when push comes to shove as to where they are going to get these mystical trade agreements?

[Lord Robathan]

Much as I like all three countries that the noble Lord just referred to, the facts are that I have a niece studying in Australia and another in Canada. Sadly, I have none studying in France or Germany at the moment.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, I rejoice in the success of the noble Lord’s family, though I do not think it takes away the point.

[Lord Robathan]

It takes away the noble Lord’s point.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

I do not think so. The point I am making is that the party opposite’s visceral hatred of the EU and its obsession with past glories is taking us down a path which will have a hugely negative impact on many young people.

The noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, moved this amendment to see whether the Minister has been able to reflect on our earlier debate. Perhaps I may take him back to the debate about the Erasmus programme on 26 February. The Minister may well recollect that he made some encouraging noises about the value that the Government place on that programme. He then went on to say that,

“no decisions have yet been made about post-2020 programme participation as the scope of that programme has not been agreed”.—[Official Report, 26/2/18; col. 478.]

If only the Minister would go a little further and say that it is the Government’s intention that this country will participate in the post-2020 Erasmus programme, that would give some grounds for optimism among young people who need to make a decision very soon about applying for the programme because it will take them past 2020. He would do them a great favour were he to do so.