Spending Round 2019

Debate between Lord Robathan and Lord Tunnicliffe

Wednesday 25th September 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Robathan (Con)]

My Lords, I see the House filling up, although I am not sure that it is filling up for my speech. I know that it is traditional to say this but, having listened to almost all the speeches, I genuinely heard some very interesting ones. The noble Lord, Lord Liddle, with whom I do not agree entirely on everything, made some interesting points. I reassure my noble friend Lord Cormack that I agree with him that this is a very serious constitutional crisis—perhaps not on everything else.

It has also been interesting to see that the Opposition—the Liberal Democrats and the Labour Party—are opposing the end of austerity. I thought that they had been against it from the very beginning. I will say one thing about the reason that we had the unfortunate—I agree that it was unfortunate—austerity programme, for want of a better term. When we took office in 2010—I was a Minister at the time—there was a serious issue with the public finances. The Liberal Democrats agreed at the time that we had to sort it out. To a certain extent, although not totally, we have done pretty well on that over the last nine years. Some mistakes were made and I will turn to a couple now. On the spending round, there are two issues that I want to particularly concentrate on.

[Lord Tunnicliffe]

The Opposition, as far as I know, have not said that they do not welcome an end to austerity. They just have a very different vision of what it looks like.

[Lord Robathan]

Various people from the other side have commented that the Government need to be careful about how much money they spend. I agree with that, as it happens.

The first point that I want to make is about the police and the criminal justice system. I have had experience of the criminal justice system from going to courts recently, and Westminster Magistrates’ Court in particular; I hasten to add that I was not in the dock. It was quite shocking because of cuts to the court services. In particular, there were temporary staff who did not know the answers to pretty simple questions. I found that pretty worrying.

With regards to the police, I think all noble Lords can agree that the police were cut far too far and, while I do not necessarily make a direct correlation, there has been, it appears to me—noble Lords may contradict me—an upsurge in knife crime. Every day we see, particularly in London, young people being killed with knives. There must be some small connection, if not direct correlation, between that and the fact that the police are rather overstretched. After all, we have pretty full employment and, traditionally, that has led to fewer idle hands and less petty crime, so I welcome the extra spending—a 6.3% increase. It should never have been reduced so far and the idea of having 20,000 extra police officers, assuming that they are well employed and well directed, is one that we can all welcome.

I take the point made by the right reverend Prelate—I think it was his point—that we need to make sure that we think not just about prison places but about rehabilitation as well. We have this day Long Lartin rioting and that, again, to a certain extent, must be because prison officers are stretched. We also see, interestingly, that the Prison Service, as I read today in the Times, I think, is in the top 100—possibly number 49—professions chosen by graduates today, a rather encouraging sign.

The second point I would like to introduce is defence. I was a Minister during the SDSR in 2010. I argued against some of the savage cuts; indeed, I even raised the matter with the then Prime Minister. I welcome the extra £2.2 billion as a good start—but where shall we start? We are looking now at Iran and the threat from drones that appear to have been used to attack tankers in the Middle East, and that will affect us all. We are looking at Yemen and the attacks on Saudi Arabia. Again, this has the potential to spread. We are looking at a belligerent Russia in Crimea, the Ukraine and Salisbury. We are looking at China, which is not an enemy, but it is spreading in the Spratly Islands. I was not here at the beginning of this month because I was in Ethiopia, and I can tell you that China is buying Africa. It is quite straightforward: it is throwing money at Africa, Sri Lanka and other places, and buying them. We need to be very cognisant of that, and be prepared for it and for all eventualities. We do not want another Cold War with Russia, but the behaviour of President Putin is—I think all noble Lords will agree—fairly worrying. I do not want to go into the topic of North Korea, but again, there are problems. An old Latin adage is, “Si vis pacem, para bellum”—that is how we pronounced it in my prep school anyway—“If you want peace, prepare for war”. I think we need to consider that a bit further, so I welcome the spending, although I would probably go further.

Finally, on spending, I will turn to the £2 billion put aside for Brexit funding for 2020-21. We are in a mess. I think every noble Lord can agree with that—indeed, my noble friend Lord Cormack and I agree about that. The country is divided. We have those within, if I might say so, the London metropolitan elite bubble who cannot understand why anybody would vote to leave. I will briefly say that I went to the funeral last week of a long-standing councillor in my erstwhile constituency in the village of Countesthorpe—a man called David Jennings. He had been a parish councillor for 49 years. He was not a grand ex-guardsman like myself. He had been a milkman and a carer—he did all sorts of jobs—and was a pillar of the community. I looked around the Church—I did not know which way they voted in the referendum—and I saw the decent, ordinary people that is Middle England. London does not always understand that.

I will turn briefly, without upsetting my noble friend in front of me, to the legal judgment: we do not want to move to judge-made law. I was taught about the separation of powers: the Executive, the legislature and the judiciary. It seems to me that the legislature is trying to take over from the Executive and the judiciary from the legislature. This is a very dangerous route to follow. The courts are there to uphold the law, not to make it. By the way, I will be agnostic on whether they are right or wrong on the actual judgment, but I heard Lord Sumption, whom I do not know and with whom I expect I do not agree about one or two things, today describe the ruling as “revolutionary”. I suggest that is worrying. Courts should restrict themselves to upholding justice, and not interfere in political decisions with which they do not agree, as indeed the High Court in London did earlier this month.

I am very concerned about the ruling. I do not consider judges—I see the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, down there—enemies of the people, but many will see this judgment as a political one, not a legal one. I mention this because I think we should not be here today in Parliament. Should the courts rule on the impartiality of the Speaker, for instance? We know he is not impartial—he has said as much. Or should they rule on the breaking of conventions by Parliament when it has taken over the business of the House of Commons? This is a dangerous road down which we proceed.