Scotland Bill

Debate between Lord Sanderson of Bowden and Lord McCluskey

Monday 29th February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sanderson of Bowden (Con)]

My Lords, I strongly support Amendment 56L, produced by my noble friend. I consider the work of an independent fiscal commission to be vital for the future not just of the Scottish Parliament but of the whole United Kingdom in this new arrangement where so many powers are being devolved. I said at Second Reading that I believed the OBR was a great initiative of the coalition Government, and it was. I am pleased to see in Amendment 56L that, if the amendment is passed, the OBR will have access to the sort of information that it needs to help the Scottish Fiscal Commission come to the right conclusions. I am still smarting from the reports that came out from the SNP just before the referendum that oil was going to be $112 a barrel. If a Government in Scotland are to do their own forecasting and that is the sort of answer that we will receive, no one, but no one, will believe them.

The amendment moves the OBR and the Scottish Fiscal Commission closer together. I have seen a very useful letter from the Chief Secretary to the Treasury to, I think, the committee in the other place. This is what he said about what the committee had said:

“There is a clear consensus”—

that is, a consensus in the Scottish Parliament—

“that forecasting should be done by a body independent of government. We agree with the conclusions of the Finance Committee of the Scottish Parliament and recommend that an enhanced Scottish Fiscal Commission be made responsible for forecasting in Scotland”.

My question for the Minister is: how far has the Scottish Parliament gone in legislating in this matter? May I have an assurance that those words will come true and we will have a proper Scottish Fiscal Commission? A commission, of course, is only as good as its membership. Let us hope that its membership is very understanding and knowledgeable, because I believe this to be crucial to the future success of the new arrangements.

[Lord McCluskey (CB)]

My Lords, I am sorry that the Government were unable to adopt something more along the lines of my Amendment 67. The purpose of that amendment was to ensure that there was an independent Scottish Fiscal Commission, and the provisions in it were designed to achieve exactly that. However, I recognise that I could not possibly win a vote if I sought to move that amendment and divide the House.

The other point is that in substance, Amendment 56L does the job as well as one could reasonably expect it to. I am happy to support it in the circumstances and I will not move Amendment 67, but I have one modest question. The point is that subsection (1) of the new clause says:

“The Office for Budget Responsibility has a right of access at any reasonable time”.

Note the word “reasonable”. The next line says that it is entitled to ask for information,

“which it may reasonably require”.

New subsection (2) says,

“which the Office reasonably thinks necessary for that purpose”.

I am not sure how that operates, because it was well understood in law that the word “reasonable” was so elastic that it was not precise enough—for example, to found a conviction for not doing the reasonable thing if that is what the statute required you to do. Therefore I am not sure how this is to be policed. If the Office for Budget Responsibility asks for information in the way that is qualified by the word “reasonably” in this new clause, and if the Scottish Government do not agree with its assessment of reasonableness, how is that dispute to be resolved?

Scotland Bill

Debate between Lord Sanderson of Bowden and Lord McCluskey

Tuesday 19th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord McCluskey]

I spent more than 50 years in the criminal and civil Scottish courts, as an advocate and prosecutor and as a law officer and a judge, and I never encountered any problem arising out from the British Transport Police. I support the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Empey, that there is no problem here to be dealt with. The second point simply relates to paragraph 67 of the Smith commission report, which, as the noble and learned Lord pointed out, refers to the functions of the British Transport Police and says that they will be a devolved matter. There is no reasoning whatever behind that; we do not know where it came from or where it was supported, even by the Liberal representatives on the Smith commission. I would be interested to hear from some of them what the reasoning behind that was, because it is not detectable from the Smith report.

[Lord Sanderson of Bowden]

I, too, have grave concerns about this part of the Smith commission report, in paragraph 67, on the functions of the British police in Scotland being a devolved matter. We have heard from somebody from Northern Ireland on this whole question of security, which is so important. Why, if we have something that works as the British Transport Police does, do we change it? It is very dangerous to change it in this Bill—and I hope that my friend on the Front Bench will be able to give us a reasonable answer.

Scotland Bill

Debate between Lord Sanderson of Bowden and Lord McCluskey

Wednesday 28th March 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord McCluskey]

In addition to economic and legal aspects—many different opinions have been expressed publicly by members of the Scottish Government and the United Kingdom Government—I wonder whether the noble Lord has considered legal matters such as the right of Scotland or the ability of Scotland, if independent, to join the European Union or to retain the pound and matters of that kind. Does he think it is advisable that, in addition to a committee of experts such as the noble Lord, Lord Gordon of Strathblane, has mentioned, there should be from this House a committee including lawyers and experts who can offer independent advice on such questions?

[Lord Sanderson of Bowden]

My Lords, I assume that my noble friend had serious reservations about the terms of Section 30 being agreed with the First Minister. After all, in recent press comments, the First Minister has said, “Will you please leave this all to us in Scotland and we will organise the referendum as we want it?”. I send good wishes to those from the Government who will carry out these vital negotiations but the questions that have to be settled are so important. I support my noble friend in saying that, if we do not get what we want on the question or any of the other important issues, we must have a chance to deal with it at Westminster.

I know that my noble and learned friend when he comes to reply will say, “Oh, but this amendment is not for the face of the Bill”, which I accept. But I believe that he has to give us some sort of undertaking that the very matters which my noble friend Lord Forsyth has raised in this amendment are dealt with and that we will get full and frank discussion of what is involved in this whole exercise.