Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill

Lord Rooker Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 25th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rooker (Lab)]

My Lords, I have found the debate fascinating today. I thank the Minister for the detailed responses he has given. I have not changed my mind on any of the issues, and I very much support the noble Lords, Lord Norton and Lord Butler, and my noble friend Lord Grocott on the issues they have raised.

I looked around the House and realised I was probably the only person present who fought and won both the elections in 1974. I have been sitting here thinking what the weather was like. I know what it was like. On 28 February, it was snowing as I was still knocking up at 9.30 pm out in the constituency; it was a very important period in my life. My noble friend Lady Taylor asked me during one of the debates whether I would have supported a quick election a month after I had won in 1974. I was physically whacked at that point. Therefore, I was quite content, because the message came through after we all assembled that there would have to be another election later in the year. But that is not really what I want to raise.

I am going to devalue the debate; I am sorry about that. In respect of the length of a Parliament, I accept that the Bill restores the status quo; that is probably the least important part of the Bill. But in my view that is no excuse not to put the issue on the record for the future. I am going to repeat much of what I said on Second Reading. Five years is not the norm for general elections in the UK, to start with. I am no academic and no expert, but I know in the past that there was a legal maximum of three years, and there was a period where there was a legal maximum of seven years. I think the maximum has been five years since the Parliament Act 1911, but five-year Parliaments are rare.

Going early is a clear advantage to the sitting Government. That is why, during the 1970s, 1980s and probably 1990s, I became convinced that I was in favour of a fixed-term Parliament, because I could see the manipulation that was going on and the temptation for Governments to manipulate the economy, basically. In some ways, I regret that the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 failed. It was designed to fail, almost. I accept it is going, and I am not trying to bring it back, but there are some difficulties with going back to the status quo ante.

There have been 20 general elections since 1945. Thirteen have been early, and the sitting Prime Minister won 10 out of those 13. Those 20, between 1945 and the last general election, were within 74 years, so we are talking about an election just under every four years. My experience in the other place was of seven general elections, and I sat for 27 years, so we averaged just under four years.

It was worse, in a way, not knowing when elections were going to be. My party was not a rich party. We had no offices in the city. Each time, I had to find somewhere for a headquarters, not knowing when the election was, and get phones in. It was difficult in those days, but nevertheless it was a joy to be in the other place for so long.

Giving the Prime Minister the choice of date is an advantage in the electoral system, and that is what I am against. I realise that building the checks and balances is not easy, because for every check there are disadvantages either way. But I do not think that it should be built into the system. As I said, I accept that we are abandoning the fixed term that we brought in in 2011. What I object to is the maximum length, which should be more like what we are actually used to, which is four years rather than five. There is some support for this view. People think that Governments run out of steam after four years, and there is some evidence for that but my point is not about it. My objection is quite different. Governments that seek to rig the electoral system, as this one is attempting to do, should be more limited as to how long it is before they meet the electorate. I want to shorten the time. I almost put an amendment down for three years to strengthen the point that I wanted to make—which I made at Second Reading, but when you have a good story to tell it is worth repeating.

This is nothing personal to any of the Ministers either here or in the other place, but there is a pattern whereby the Government are attempting overall to rig the electoral system. There is a succession of Bills and regulations before Parliament or due to come before Parliament, and I have a little list, which is not exhaustive, of their intentions: voter suppression, straight out of the Trump playbook, which we are about to get; action against the courts, shrinking their ability to hold the ruling party to account—that is the reality— curbing citizens’ right to protest; restricting the freedom of the press by removing the public interest defence; moves against election monitors and the referee in a concerted attack on the Electoral Commission, whose powers have never been as strong as I thought they should have been; widening the scope of the Official Secrets Act; and open attempts before our eyes to control the media via Ofcom.

There is a pattern here. We deal with each little bit as it comes along and have debates like we have had today, of a very high quality and forensic in looking at what is a very small Bill with massive implications—but the debate is in the context of this Bill. We have arguments already flattened by the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, who said, “No, the ouster clause won’t be used as a precedent, because there’s another Bill that hasn’t got the same ouster clause in.” This can make the point, as the noble Lord, Lord Norton, did, that the draftsman will find a way. I am very disappointed that the draftsmen have co-operated with all this, because they have operated under instructions. There are all these issues and others, which I will not go over. I quoted Lord Puttnam at Second Reading, who gave a couple of further examples.

It all makes it harder for a Government to lose power. That is what the pattern actually creates. Would a four-year limit stop this? No. I am just trying to shorten it from five. Would it limit the damage? Well, maybe. Is it worth raising? Oh yes, because I intend to raise it at every possible opportunity; not just on this Bill, but on all the others as they come. I am not alone. There are the Select Committees that were mentioned earlier, the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee and the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. We have had two incredibly powerful reports published just before Christmas from this House—the unelected House—about the threats to our democratic process, which is really important.

This is where the tragedy is in some ways. I would love to be able to switch off from what I have now and pop back to the other place for a couple of years and say, “By the way, it’s not quite like we think it is. Things have got bad—it’s a little bit back in time.” That is not possible, however, because I came to this place ignorant of its powers, even though I had been down there and was a Minister as I swapped over. There is massive ignorance among the Members of both places about our roles and what we are doing.

I do not have a solution to this because the argument is always, “You’re unelected, you don’t count.” But because we are unelected and we do not have a vote in a general election, we are disinterested in some ways. I see no problem in this place saying to the other place to think again, because we are only a sub-committee of the other place. All our powers are to ask it to think again. At every opportunity, the House of Commons rightly has the last word. It does not matter what happens—it has the last word in every case.

I know that in extremes the Parliament Act can be used, but it been used only twice in my time. It is still the case, however, that the Commons has the final word. That is the case I always put across when doing the Peers in Schools programme. Our powers are incredibly limited, but they mean we can say, “Think again”. Sometimes we say, “And again”. I think there are a couple of examples where it was three times, then this place—obviously, as it is unelected—said, “You’ve had a good think about it, we’ll leave it alone.” That is our function. The fact is that they did not change that in the Bill.

There is an interchange sometimes when Ministers talk about Parliament but are actually talking about the Government. Government and Parliament are interchangeable—well, to Ministers they might be, but to the rest of the population they are not. Ministers say that Parliament has decided, but they mean that the majority controlled by the Government in the other place has decided. It is the Government who have decided. The whipping system and the timetable system have decided. In some ways I greatly regret the timetabling system used down there, but we had good reasons. I have lived through guillotines and I know what the rules were. What was it—100 hours to get a guillotine for wasting time upstairs in Committee? That is why timetabling was brought in.

The fact is that we receive Bills in this place that have not been thoroughly examined in the elected Chamber and that is a tragedy. There was a time when I tried, as a Minister, to suggest that we ought to have Bills with the bits that had not been discussed highlighted, but it is incredibly complicated to say which sections were not debated or looked at; you just cannot do it. We have to use our common sense and gumption.

The fact is that they are not doing their job in the Commons. That is the reality. Their job is to keep an eye on the Government and to question what the Executive are doing—and they are simply not doing it. They are distracted by other things, such as trying to do the job of local councillors for a start. It is easy for me to say that because it was not like that. I do not want to say that those were the good old days and throw back, but the House of Commons is not doing its job of scrutinising the Executive and we are receiving legislation that has not been properly scrutinised. Then, unfortunately, the Government say, “Oh, it’s the House of Lords, always defeating the Government.” We are not; we are simply saying that we want the Commons to do its job. That is what we are asking them to do.

In this case, I would be astonished if Clause 3 is still in the Bill when it leaves this place. There is the amendment supported by the Cross Benches and the noble Lord, Lord Butler, about letting Parliament decide on Dissolution; if you have one, you do not need the other. It is simple. Keep the judges away—I absolutely agree with that—but there is an easy way to do it: let the elected House do it.

I have made my point, but I shall keep coming back. For each Bill and regulation that comes along, I will recite the same list, because there is a pattern and the penny has to drop at some point.