Recall of MPs Bill

Lord Soley Excerpts

Wednesday 14th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I wish we had heard that sentiment a little more often when we were discussing reform of this House. We have to be very careful about nostalgia. I think I heard the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, say: “It should be as it always was”. I thought about that wonderful quotation from The Leopard:

“If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change”.

We have to be very careful not to abandon ourselves to the same nostalgia for the world of our youth that motivates those who vote for UKIP.

[Lord Soley]

Although the noble Lord might be right about not being nostalgic about things going back to 40 years or so ago, when you talk about separating legal processes from parliamentary ones you are looking at a few hundred years and things like the principles put forward by Burke in the 18th century.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

We understand that we are dealing with some fairly fundamental principles. The noble Lord, Lord Maxton, made an extremely important point about the denigration of democracy, and the depths of public disillusionment which we now face and how we come to terms with that. The defence of democracy is not necessarily the defence of Westminster as it is now, let alone as it was 40 years ago.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Dubs (Lab)]

My Lords, this is of course a probing amendment, although I would very much like to see it incorporated in the Bill in the fullness of time. However, for this evening’s purpose it is simply to give us a chance to debate the matter.

As the Bill stands, Members of Parliament may be penalised in ways that are described in the Bill. However, the amendment also refers to the work of the election court. We have an anomalous situation, because a Member of Parliament may be penalised by the election court for a lesser offence than might apply under the Bill, and yet the punishment would be more severe without any recourse to voters. That is pretty onerous, it is unfair, and we should put it right. The purpose of the amendment is to bring at least a large element of the work of the electoral court—particularly its conclusions—within the ambit of the Bill.

As I said, a Member of Parliament may be penalised by an election court for a lesser wrongdoing, but the penalty may be much more severe. Indeed, the Member of Parliament may be penalised to the point of losing his or her seat and not being allowed to stand again in the resulting by-election or any election in that constituency for a number of years. The most recent instance was after the 2010 election, when Phil Woolas had to appear for a transgression to do with the way his election campaign was run. The election court dismissed him. He lost his seat as a result and he was not able to stand again. I am not saying that what he did was right or wrong. That is not the purpose of the debate. The purpose of the debate is to say that the election court had a power which is much more than is contained in the Bill. I want to bring that part of the work of the election court within the ambit of the Bill.

In the amendment, I distinguish between illegal and corrupt practices. As I understand it, there is no statutory definition of an illegal practice so we have to be careful about being too precise, but there is a range of illegal practices which might be the subject of decisions by the election court. I will not go through them all now but they are, for example, to do with election expenses in excess of the maximum permissible; paying election expenses otherwise than through the election agent; paying them out of time; or failing to make the return or declarations as to the expenses. Other examples could include disturbing a meeting, making a false statement concerning the personal character or conduct of a candidate, and so on. There is a whole list. They may or may not be serious. How serious they are will depend on the particular circumstances and the way the practice actually happened. In other words, a very minor failure in the accuracy of the return may not be too serious, but a large failure is serious. It depends on the circumstances.

The aim of this amendment is to bring these things within the scope of the Bill. We all know that the judiciary—and for this purpose I refer to those on the election court as the judiciary—does not like being put in the position of having to unseat an elected politician. At least, I believe that is what it thinks. I certainly hope that is what it thinks. If we accept this amendment, a decision by the election court could be used via the Speaker to trigger the petition which—if it received 10% of signatures—could then lead to a by-election. That is a fairly clear-cut way of doing it. The enormous benefit is that in the end, the decision is by the voters. If enough of the voters want a by-election, there will be one; then when they have a by-election, the voters can decide whether or not to chuck the former MP out. It seems to me that this is a much better method than the way the election court works at the moment.

As I said, this is a probing amendment. The Minister may find all sorts of technical points that prevent him from accepting it. That may well be. I had the enormous help of the Public Bill Office in drafting the amendment, but even so, it is quite difficult. A few more weeks of work might have improved the wording. However, the principle is clear. I hope the Minister will give it a sympathetic ear and will say it is worth considering at the next stage of the Bill. I beg to move.

[Lord Soley (Lab)]

The election court is outside the ambit of this Bill, but my noble friend makes the case for including it. I make a brief point in support of my noble friend’s comments. I believe that my recollection is right that Phil Woolas won his case on appeal, but by that time it was too late. In effect, we had a court taking a decision which resulted in the electorate not being able to select a person who they might well otherwise have selected.

Recall of MPs Bill

Lord Soley Excerpts

Wednesday 14th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak very briefly and the Minister knows why. This morning I was able to explain to him that in a few minutes’ time there is to be a memorial service for a former Member of the House of Commons and I have been asked to give one of the tributes there. However, I would not want my silence to be mistaken for somehow resiling on my commitment to support this amendment, to which I have added my signature. The noble Lord, Lord Tyler, has made a very persuasive case in your Lordships’ House today. Although I will reserve my remarks to Report because I will not be able to be present to hear the Minister’s reply, I hope that between now and then he will have time to give great consideration to the powerful points that have been made. I read the Second Reading speech of the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, which was a very telling contribution to the debate, in which he argued that this is a bad Bill and is probably incapable of being made better. I rather agree with him on that. However, I do think that the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, is at least making a valiant effort to try to point us in the right direction. Much of the wording is of course taken from the Representation of the People Act.

I served on the Committee of Privileges in the other place and fought seven parliamentary elections, winning five of them, including a by-election. I therefore have a view about these things, which I will express at a later stage. I would never want this legislation to be used to undermine Members of the House of Commons. That should be a fundamental concern of your Lordships’ House. I served as a Member in Merseyside. I saw one of the most assiduous and respected Members, Frank Field, who continues in the House of Commons to this day, spend days, weeks and months fighting attempts to deselect him and remove him from the House of Commons. We should resist with all our might anything that can be used in a vexatious way to undermine MPs such as Frank Field. I hope that we will not therefore be frightened to send amendments back to another place so that they can give them due and proper consideration. I apologise for not being able to stay to hear the Minister’s reply.

[Lord Soley (Lab)]

I begin with an apology to the noble Lord, Lord Tyler—two apologies, to get my mea culpas out of the way: first, because I missed some of his opening remarks on these amendments, and secondly, because he was good enough to send them to me in detail a week ago or so by e-mail, and ask for a response. I have not given him that response yet—he is about to get it now. I have to say that this is a seriously bad idea. A core reason is that it brings judges into a direct role with Parliament, which judges themselves will resist very strongly. They will be right to resist it, because once we blur that line between parliamentary democracy and the judiciary we get into very murky waters, where you end up drawing lines where you do not wish to draw them. I am sure—and if there are lawyers here at the moment, they will be the first to agree—that the thing judges hate more than anything else is trying to deal with political cases. So I strongly recommend that we do not go down this road. I will go into just a little more detail—I do not want to spend long on it. The principal point here is the all-important one: judges and Parliament should be kept separate as far as possible.

On the secondary matter of misbehaviour, the misconduct issue is incredibly hard to interpret when it takes place in the context of politics. Many examples have already been given of elected Members of Parliament who might get into a situation where they clash with the law because they are either supporting a demonstration or a strike, or opposing it, or taking a stand on any number of other issues, and who may themselves fall foul of the court. In the e-mail the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, sent me he said that he was trying to address some of the points I had raised at Second Reading. However, this does not deal with them—it aggravates matters.

We need, as far as possible, to follow the Burkean principle that parliamentary representation is decided by the electorate, and that by and large you overrule that only in the most extreme cases—murder or other very serious offences of that type. Otherwise, we get into a position where the court decides. That is why I have such a strong objection to what happened in the case of Phil Woolas MP, where the court decided that he could not stand again. It is so profoundly wrong. It goes right back to the battle that Bradlaugh had with Parliament. He refused to take the oath on the Bible, so the House of Commons refused to let him become a Member. He promptly went back to the electorate, who elected him again and so on. One might say that that makes the case because he won, but there are examples where it would not.

The noble Lord, Lord Tyler, did not think that there was much in the slippery slope argument. One case in which it would have been a very slippery slope would have been when an MP objected to the First World War. If we consider the attitude and atmosphere around the country in the context of the First World War, an MP taking a pacifist position might well have been in very serious difficulty. As I said in my Second Reading speech, it is a mistake just to look backwards: look forwards. If people were to campaign for one of the opposition groups in Syria—not ISIL—and if the legislation here on terrorism were so tough that they got arrested when they came back, but the group they had been supporting in Syria was not one of the extreme groups, where would we be?

There are umpteen examples where this goes wrong. We should stick with Burke on this. If the electorate decide that somebody is their MP, that should remain the case until the next general election, unless there are some very special circumstances. The more we pull back from that practice, as Burke himself pointed out, the more difficulties we get into. I know how much thought the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, puts into these things, but I will add that members of the judiciary dread cases where they are pulled into a political process—and they are right to dread them. It is all-important that we keep a clear distinction between the law and Parliament.

[Lord Grocott]

My Lords, in one respect at least I feel a considerable empathy with the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, and that is in terms of marginal seats. When I was first elected, I had an electorate of 91,000. My opponent got 33,000 votes and I got 33,000 and a few more—so with a margin of about 300-odd and an electorate of 91,000, I can say that an acute awareness of the views of all my electors was never far from my mind. So I can understand that point. How easy it would have been for 10,000 or 15,000, perhaps, to have signed a petition very early on saying that they did not think I was much good as a Member of Parliament.

That is where my sense of understanding ends, because, unless I am reading this very badly, the series of amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, give effect to the thin end of the wedge argument that we have raised repeatedly, and about which we have been told not to worry. The new clause proposed in Amendment 30, “Hearing of parliamentary misconduct petition”, states, in proposed new subsection (3):

“The parliamentary misconduct hearing may consider evidence adduced by the petitioners that the respondent has”—

in proposed new subsection (3)(f)—

“brought into disrepute the office of Member of Parliament”.

I cannot think of an easier basis on which to claim that a Member of Parliament is not acting as perhaps he should have been.

The noble Lord will no doubt take this as a direct attack on his party, but I am afraid that it is the best example that I can think of. I repeat that information may be adduced that a Member by his conduct has,

“brought into disrepute the office of Member of Parliament”.

I simply put it to him is as neutral a way as I possibly can the example of a Member of Parliament who, immediately prior to an election, appears on video saying, “We will abolish student fees”, and, within six months or so of being elected, becomes a key member of a Government who argue passionately for the trebling of student fees. I do not happen to think that that should be a reason for petitioning—

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[Lord Finkelstein]

I am absolutely suggesting that.

[Lord Soley]

I intervene very briefly with a very short contribution. It follows what the noble Lord, Lord Finkelstein, is saying. The flaw in his argument is something he said some minutes ago, when he said any employer would have these powers in a private company. The mistake he is making is to assume that Parliament is like a corporate body. That assumption underlying his speech is a serious flaw because Parliament is and must be different. It must answer only to the electorate. The whole thrust for the past few hundred years in this country is that we have general elections when Members are elected to do their job as an elected representative, and that is it. We have already done too much of this—perhaps the noble Lord is following a tradition that has unfortunately developed in recent years where we are constraining the power of Parliament and treating it as though it is a corporate body, when in fact it is not.

[Lord Finkelstein]

Naturally, I am not against the power of Parliament to do dignified things. I am against allowing Parliament to do some of the things that this Bill would provide redress to the electorate to do. The power of recall does not belong to anybody else except to the electorate. The electorate will determine whether somebody is recalled. The electorate will determine the result of the by-election, and nobody else. The relation to Parliament, of course, must be independent on political grounds and on political issues. But the Bill proposes limited circumstances which have real effect, and have taken place—as in the examples I gave suggested, where Members of Parliament have remained in the House without challenge by the electorate. This Bill would enable the electorate to have the powers they ought to have.

Recall of MPs Bill

Lord Soley Excerpts

Wednesday 17th December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Soley (Lab)]

My Lords, like others, I have severe reservations about the Bill. I say that as an ex-MP but also as someone who takes a great concern in the rights of the electorate in all circumstances to decide who should represent them in the House of Commons. I start by reading a quote from the Cabinet Office’s impact assessment, which says:

“The Government believes this mechanism will contribute to restoring public confidence in MPs and Parliament as a whole”.

My first response is to say that that is a triumph of hope over experience. The House of Commons and MPs have never been massively popular. Popularity goes up and down, and I have no doubt that it has been down in recent years because of the expenses scandal—and the same applies to this House. Those are issues that will eventually pass. To their credit, Members of both Houses have tried to take a grip of the situation and I do not think that that is likely to happen again. But let us not pretend that MPs or Parliament have ever been wildly popular.

I listened with interest to the noble Lord, Lord Cooper of Windrush, in his first speech, on which I congratulate him, because I remember at the time when I pursued my press Bill here I took a close interest in polls on the popularity of MPs. At that time, long before the expenses scandal, MPs were placed on a trust register along with certain other professions and jobs, and got a trust rating of only 15% to 20%. I am going by memory; I think that that was over a period of time. Before journalists reach for their scribes, I then looked at the trust level for journalists, which was somewhere between 18% and 22%. But the interesting thing—and I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Cooper, with his experience would confirm this—is that if you then ask about individual journalists or MPs or ask people about their constituency MPs, even if the noble Lord, Lord Hamilton, is right in saying that most people do not know who their local MP is, the trust level goes up. They say, “I didn’t mean you”, in fact.

One of the most important lessons that I learnt many years ago in politics—I will not say how I learnt it, but it was quite entertaining—was that when you become an MP you become a leader. The other side of being a leader is being a scapegoat. You have to accept a kicking in politics. That is a harsh reality of political activity. You will never be truly popular, although as the noble Lord, Lord Hamilton, was implying you might be the least unpopular in your particular area. That is the basis on which we win elections. But I have been concerned for some time about the way in which we are eroding the rights of the electorate. My noble friend Lord Dubs cited the case of Phil Woolas, which is exactly right. I was deeply disturbed by the idea of a court preventing a person standing for Parliament who was an MP, because that put the court above the electorate, which has never been the position in the United Kingdom constitution. We need to get rid of that fairly rapidly, but we are now drifting down that rather slippery slope.

Other noble Lords have made the point that there is a problem that MPs feel bad about themselves at the moment because of the expenses scandal. But all the MPs in the House of Commons now have been re-elected since that crisis, and they are therefore there with trust. Therefore, they need to stop self-flagellation, which is a bad idea at the best of times—and it is certainly a bad idea if you have not been convicted of anything or not even been accused of something.

I go back to my two basic principles on this—first, to Edmund Burke’s comments in the late 18th century, when he said that people are elected as an MP as a representative, not as a delegate. My second point is that the electorate decides these issues. The case of Charles Bradlaugh in the 19th century, when he refused to accept that he had to sign the oath on the Bible, and forced elections to make that point, is a good case in point. He got the electorate to overrule the absurd ruling at the time that you had to sign the oath on the Bible.

Let us recognise the dangers in this: we tend to talk as though imprisonment should automatically debar an MP. I understand that—and there are incredibly difficult cases in which it is obvious that the MP ought to be thrown out, so it is very hard to argue against it. But we should sound a note of caution, which my noble friend Lord Hughes of Woodside touched on. If you look at his activities during the time of anti-apartheid, when there was talk of some of the organisations linked to the movement being regarded as criminal, you can see the dangers. Looking in back in history, you can see the number of Irish people who were sentenced to imprisonment—and the crisis that then came if they wanted to stand as MPs. You do not just have to think back to the past, however. If there was a situation in which the Government passed a law against going to Syria to fight for one of the opposition groups, or support them, what would we do if an MP—particularly a Muslim MP—went to Syria?

During the miners’ strike, the miners came down to Hammersmith—it is not a well known area for mining, but nevertheless they came down to pursue their case. I thought that their tactics were a bit disastrous, but they wanted to sell their paper, The Miner, in the streets of Hammersmith. I defended that right, and the police tried to stop them, using a bizarre and ancient law. I argued with the police for a week or two that they could not possibly stop them, but when the police insisted on stopping them and summonsed them, I started selling that newspaper too. The police then told me that they would summons me. My lawyer got all excited and said, “Great, we can go to Strasbourg on this”. I understood his enthusiasm but mine was slightly less. Nevertheless, the principle of allowing the miners to sell their magazine was important to me. Had the police pursued that summons—they did not; they dropped it—I would have gone to court. In those circumstances, I would have gone on selling that magazine, because the right to produce and sell a magazine in a situation such as the miners’ strike in my view overrode a bizarre 1916 law about disabled soldiers being able to sell magazines in the street, which was where the original law came from. If I had done that long enough, the court would have had no option but to send me to prison, even if it was for a short time—and, presumably, I would have lost my seat.

We should be very careful not to put courts in a position whereby they override the electorate. We must not create a situation—and this is the Edmund Burke case—whereby we put anybody else, an organisation or an institution, in a position in which they can overrule the electorate in that constituency. Remember, we have constituencies in this country; this is not a list system country. We have to bear in mind that constituents choose their representative and they should be able to do so.

My noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours made the case very strongly, backed up, I think, by the noble Lord, Lord Hamilton, as to how this would politicise the poll standards procedure. Let me remind the House—I am quoting from the Cabinet papers because it is important to get this right:

“The House of Commons has in place a complaints procedure under which any member of the public may make a complaint about an MP’s conduct to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards. The Commissioner will consider the complaint and, following investigation, may report the matter to the Committee for Standards”.

The rest follows, as my noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours indicated. I have no doubt, as he also indicated, that pressure will be put on individuals on the committee, if they do not want a by-election, to come down in favour of, in the case of this Bill, a punishment of less than 10 days. The reverse will also be true: people who want a by-election, because they see a great political opportunity, will go for it. Do not kid yourself that it will be only Members of the House of Commons who pursue that option. A lot of people outside—organisations, individuals and everything else—will pursue that with great vigour and, as indicated, with money.

By the way, I was fascinated that Zac Goldsmith, who has a constituency not far from where mine was, has made the commitment, which he may well come to regret, to leave the Conservative Party if we get the third runway at Heathrow. He knows that I am actively pursuing that option and I think that he may have to resign from the Conservative Party in due course. I do not think that he should have to be recalled for it, but if we are not careful, that is where this sort of thing will end up. If I was a member of the public, I would say, “Look, he promised to resign. He made a clear promise, put it out in leaflets and everything else. I want to make a complaint about him”. The Standards Committee would then have to look at that and there would be a debate as to whether he should stand down, if, for example, he chose not to. I suspect that he would stand down or stand aside from the Conservative Party. You can see the dangers in all this. That is why I have severe reservations about it.

[Lord Campbell-Savours]

There is another scenario in which the Committee decides on nine days, but a political majority in the House of Commons decides to overturn—that is what the provision requires—the decision and make it 10 days. In other words, the House of Commons itself can take a political decision and completely undermine the quasi-judicial nature of the decision.

[Lord Soley]

My noble friend has more experience of this than I have, but he is absolutely right, of course. In any event, the public pressure in a case such as this might be very high, so you have to bear in mind that this will politicise it like mad.

This brings me to my final point: the House of Commons may come to regret this. At best it will be irrelevant; at worst, we will have one or two disastrous cases of the type that I have just described. So, I think we are right. I am always a bit cautious about telling my ex-colleagues in the House of Commons that they have got it severely wrong, but we have a duty to advise and warn. At the end of the day, it is up to the House of Commons to overturn this House. It is a mistake if people say that this House legislates. We only legislate inasmuch as the House of Commons allows us to legislate. If they do not like it, they can always chuck it out.

I end on this note: because I think there will be regrets about this Bill—it will not be the first time that either House has regretted certain Bills or legislation—it may be no bad idea if we put in a sunset clause to send back to the other House. I am willing to do that, but I would quite like to hear whether the Government would consider a sunset clause. We would allow the legislation to run, maybe for five years, and then the Act would cease if we found it to be either unnecessary or very damaging. I end very strongly with the words of Edmund Burke. He was very wise when he said that we give the electorate the absolute power to decide who represents them. Every time we slice away at that, as the case of Phil Woolas did, we do ourselves and the democratic process great damage.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, I will consider that but I am not going to give any commitment on the Floor. Indeed, the noble Lord spent a good deal of time talking about the operations of the Standards Committee. I recognise that that is a particular concern to him, although it is not in the middle of the consideration of the Bill.

The wider issue, which a number of noble Lords mentioned—I recognise that 10 of the 17 speakers in this debate are former Members of the other House—is public trust in the Commons and in democracy as such. As we consider the Bill, we have to be careful not to propose that we should engage in saving the Commons from itself, which was the echo I got from some of the contributions—to supply the courage, which MPs have failed to show, to resist the popular mood was the underlying argument of one or two contributions, I think. Yes, popular attitudes to politics at present are dangerously negative. Yes, it would be wonderful if they were different, but we cannot change the public. I am afraid that Parliament has to adapt to the public while we provide—and we all need to provide—the political persuasion and political leadership to begin to change the level of public disillusionment. However, we cannot entirely stand up against it and dismiss it.

[Lord Soley]

I can assure the noble Lord—I think this applies to everyone—that it is not about doubting the courage of MPs, but about wondering whether they have thought through the consequences of exceptional cases, which will occur. Just as there was an outburst against expenses issues in this House and the other, when you get someone, whether they are imprisoned or something else, who is sentenced for something that the public feel positively about and want that person to remain an MP—as has happened on a number of occasions in history—you might get the exact reverse feeling. That process has not been thought through. It is not about courage.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, I take that point.

The noble Lord, Lord Grocott—the Earl of Grocott, as I shall always think of him now—and the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, both said that we should leave this—

Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe

Lord Soley Excerpts

Wednesday 10th December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, we are acutely aware that Ukraine needs extensive and continuing financial support and the IMF is engaged in that—and we are talking about billions of pounds over the next two years. The IMF is leading on this and the European Union is a major player. We are conscious of the energy problems of Ukraine. People in Donetsk and Luhansk may possibly even freeze to death this winter if we are not careful. We are also providing assistance in energy sector reform.

[Lord Soley (Lab)]

My Lords, can we be clear that this is not just about Ukraine? There are other countries where Russia is doing something very similar: I, for one, would be worried about Moldova, given the electoral split in last week’s election. Are we raising at the OSCE the whole activity of Russia in neighbouring states by promoting dissent and, most importantly, providing support for it from outside, often with disguised troops?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, we have continuing, active and widespread dialogues with as many of those in positions of authority in Russia as we can. Those dialogues include Moldova and other frozen conflicts: in Azerbaijan, Nagorno-Karabakh, South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

Scotland: Independence

Lord Soley Excerpts

Monday 16th June 2014 Grand Committee

[Lord Soley (Lab)]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, on securing this debate. I am sure he already knows this, but I would point out to him that he comes from a very long line of politicians who have been strongly in favour of devolution but have not been able to deliver it. In fact, the Library note makes the point clearly on a number of occasions that almost all Governments have been in favour of decentralising Britain and devolving power, but that nearly all of them have run into difficulties in doing that. I must confess to my share in that because, back in 1980, when Bryan Gould, the MP for Dagenham at the time, was the shadow Minister for planning and I was a shadow Minister, we tried to work out what a regional structure for the UK would look like. It is actually very difficult to do, particularly when you have local councils worrying about losing their powers in a regional structure. They promptly start to reject what they previously said they were in favour of.

I have always been struck by the fact that in 1707, what became the United Kingdom after the joining up of Scotland made us Great Britain was actually a federal structure even before federalism was recognised. Why was that? It was because Scotland had its own legal system, and England and Scotland had separate arrangements for the church, which was a very important part of the constitutional structure at the time. In a way we partly invented federalism but did not quite know what to do thereafter.

Perhaps the most important point that I want to make today is that while I am a bit hesitant, I am broadly in favour of a constitutional commission, but the great difficulty with it is that it is an incredibly complex area that will take a long time to do. I would quite like to find a way of addressing the issue in more discrete parts.

I will give an example of what I mean. The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, and I have often discussed this, and he made the point well that the English are a bit odd because they do not know quite what they want. Part of the problem, of course, is that a lot of English people think of themselves as British and not as English, whereas most Scottish people think of themselves as Scottish and British. The English are, in a way, a bit more ambivalent about it, although the rise of Englishness has certainly happened fairly dramatically in recent years. I do not regard myself as English and never have done so; I am a typical mixture of all parts of these islands, and that is one of its strengths.

However, it is not just the size of England in relation to Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland that is the problem; it is also the problem within England. If you take the area bounded by Cambridge, Milton Keynes, Oxford and Southampton, you are talking about more than 22 million people. That is more than one-third of the population of the whole United Kingdom and approaching half that of England. Many years ago, Bryan Gould and I were looking at regional structures, and he said, “Supposing we take out London and just have the rest of the south-east”—the “mint with the hole” approach. That of course made no sense. However, if you tried to divide up the vast region of the south-east into regions, you would struggle again to make sense of it. That problem puts some of the other problems about regions into perspective, such as the problem of whether Manchester or Liverpool should be the capital of a north-west region, without provoking a revised version of the War of the Roses. So we struggled with that. However, the south-east is the problem.

One great advantage of the debates in Scotland that led to devolution, which I strongly supported and has worked well, was that it was much more focused. You could focus on what could be done within Scotland to get that structure working. Another good thing that has come out of that—and this is an underlying fact that we should never forget—was that you need to be very clear about the powers that are devolved. Then you have a situation whereby everything that is not devolved is with the central authority. That is a very important principle because it means that you can build up to devolution without having a big argument about whether defence or foreign policy is under the control of a particular area. I use the extreme example.

I have always been in favour of devolution. I do not like the centralisation of the UK. I recall, as most of us will, that the great driving house of the industrial revolution, which emerged as both parts of the union got very much richer after 1707, was in part due to the fact that the great cities themselves were an economic driving force. Scottish nationalists would do well to remember that. Birmingham is one of the classic examples. It would be nice if we could get back to something like that, whereby the regions, and the towns and cities in the regions, became the driving force.

I am in favour of a constitutional commission and we have to be very focused on it. Time is not on our side. If you start that process and it goes on for years on end, you will end up in many years to come with the same structure that we have now.

Georgia

Lord Soley Excerpts

Monday 27th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, if it were possible to move towards peaceful devolution with Abkhazia and South Ossetia we would be very happy. The problem is that it is very difficult to get a dialogue going at all, although talks continue now between a new government representative in Georgia and the Russians. As he will know, the approach of the Sochi Olympics and the problems of the north Caucasus also affect Russian policy towards the south Caucasus.

[Lord Soley (Lab)]

My Lords, will the Minister tell us a little more about the relationship between Georgia and Russia and between us in the European Union and Russia? Russia has a crucial role to play but we hardly ever mention it. It is very hard to work out what Russian policy is in some of these areas.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, some years ago I said to one of my friends in Moscow that the Russian attitude to the Georgians reminds me very strongly of the English attitude to the Irish in about 1850. There is a certain refusal to accept that Georgia is an independent country, capable of governing itself. The new Government have tried to open a dialogue with the Russians. So far, the Kremlin has not been very open to responding to that dialogue.

Syria and the Use of Chemical Weapons

Lord Soley Excerpts

Thursday 29th August 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Soley]

My Lords, the decision on whether or not to intervene has become an increasingly difficult problem over recent years and will continue to do so given the current state of the Middle East. It is a profoundly difficult decision. If you do not intervene, lives will be lost and, if you do, lives will also be lost. The lesson of Iraq is not necessarily “Do not intervene,” but, “If you intervene, make sure that you have thought through the post-conflict situation”. That is where those sorts of things go profoundly wrong.

My problem is not whether we should use force. I am prepared to see force being used in this situation. However, I cannot see what the object would be of using force now. I could see it right at the beginning, but what is the purpose of military intervention of some type now? There is a case for intervention to prevent weapons of mass destruction from being used again. I understand that; it is laudable and proper. My problem is that I do not know how you would achieve that end. What military actions would you take to prevent weapons of mass destruction from being used again, whether in Syria or in the immediate neighbouring areas by agents of the Syrian Government? I believe that the Syrian Government used them. If it was the opposition, the Syrian Government would be in a position to show us the various stores that the weapons came from; they have never attempted to do so, nor claimed that they had lost any to the rebels.

If the purpose of intervention is to stop weapons of mass destruction being used, I need to know how it would work. That is where I get worried, because Barack Obama’s use of the word “punishment” comes from the idea that you can prevent these weapons from being used if you impose enough force on the regime to make it think twice. That is a dubious proposition.

The one area in which it could work would be if it were combined with a diplomatic initiative, which might involve reaching out to Iran. A couple of speakers have made the point that Iran has strong views about weapons of mass destruction, not least because Saddam Hussein used them against the Iranians, who saw the sheer horror of them. If Iran could be persuaded to come on board in putting pressure on the Syrians not to go on using them, the threat of force might be useful. Once you have used that force, however, there is no going back. I do not know where that would lead.

The only other purpose of using force would be to try to pressure Assad to go to the negotiating table and to persuade Russia to put pressure on Assad to go. I have made the point to the Leader of the House in previous exchanges that I do not see that either Russia or Assad has an interest in going into serious negotiations while they see that they have a chance of winning more on the battlefield. The general approach is not to negotiate if you are winning. If Assad can go on using weapons of mass destruction, he will win.

People sometimes say to me, “Saudi Arabia is pouring in arms”, and so on, but there is a difference. Russia’s aid is that of a sophisticated power with a lot of ability right across the range. That is not true of the armaments going to the opposition, so I am not at all convinced that that is equivalent. If you use the threat of military action to get Assad to negotiate, that might be of benefit. Apart from that, I cannot see how military intervention would work at this stage. That is not to say that we should rule it out for all time, but those are currently the only two points where there might be an advantage and I cannot see how they might be achieved.

My final point worries me deeply. Russia is in a strange position on this. President Putin sounds like someone who is obsessed with the United Sates, almost as though he feels inferior, has had his nose put out of joint by it and wants somehow or other to gain his revenge. The United States is no longer the dominant power that it was for the first 50 years after the Second World War. Other powers are coming up. That makes this very dangerous. When you get that sort of instability, you get bigger wars.

Finally, this is the Middle East. We are into something that will last for decades. The Foreign Secretary was right. Unfortunately, a lot of it is between those who believe either in the Sunni/Shia struggle or, more seriously, it is about whether you have religion as a central part of government or separate from it. That will be an important question, not only for the region but for the rest of the world.

Leveson Report

Lord Soley Excerpts

Monday 1st July 2013 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Soley]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they will publish, on a regular basis, the number of times since the publication of the Leveson Report the Prime Minister or other Ministers responsible for bringing forward legislation on its recommendations have met editors, owners or senior executives of newspapers, and what was discussed on each occasion.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, as was made clear in the Written Answer given to the noble Lord on 6 June, details of Ministers’ meetings with editors, proprietors and senior media executives are published on a quarterly basis and can be accessed on departmental websites on gov.uk.

[Lord Soley]

I am not sure whether I am grateful for that Answer. I tabled my Written Question in early May. It took four weeks to get an Answer, which came only after I had tabled this Oral Question. I cannot imagine how that happened.

I put it to the Minister that what is being suggested about looking at Cabinet documents is not in either the spirit or letter of the Leveson report, which says very clearly in recommendation 83 that these ought to be published on a quarterly basis and details given—not intimate details—of what was discussed and so forth. They are not there, nor are they likely to be. Frankly, more and more of us are taking the view that the press is so powerful that it can defy the will of Parliament.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, I have that section of the Leveson report in front of me. I note how much the fact and general nature of any discussion of media policy issues at these meetings raises questions of how far we go in that direction, including—as is discussed in my briefing—whether the exchange of text messages ought to be included in that. As the noble Lord will know, so far we have included the existence of meetings and the record of meetings between January and the end of March this year, which should be published within the next week.

Strengthened Statutory Procedures for the Scrutiny of Delegated Legislation: DPRRC Report

Lord Soley Excerpts

Tuesday 5th March 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Soley]

I join everyone else in thanking the staff of the committee and I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas, on the way that she chairs it and on producing the report. It has been very helpful.

For many years, I have had a concern that crosses over Governments: we have been increasing the amount of legislation by too much and, I am afraid, seeing it being increasingly badly drafted. I know that there are many reasons for that but the net result is that we end up with delegated powers that fill me with growing concern. As several noble Lords have said, if you read the words, “Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Select Committee”, you would think that a soporific way of starting the day. In fact, it is not just dry, it is arid at times, but—and this is a most important “but”—it is extremely important because it is about the way in which Parliament can control the Executive and what the Government are doing. If you use statutory instruments and other delegated powers excessively, unless you are very cautious about it, you will find that Governments have unexpected powers.

If people outside this House think that the subject is dry, they would be less inclined to think so when they consider the number of times that the committee has looked at a delegated power that would, if we had not had it changed, have allowed a Minister to increase fines to an unlimited level without an affirmative resolution of this House. Indeed, a quick look at tomorrow morning’s business in the Delegated Powers Committee tells me that there is another one on the Groceries Code Adjudicator Bill. If we do not get it changed, the ability of a Minister to fine by delegated power will have an unlimited price put on it. If people in the street knew that, they might quite rightly be a little alarmed.

I think strongly that Parliament has got to get better at dealing with scrutiny. I have held this view for many years. This House is very good at it but, having said that, with the increase in legislation, every time we pass more—and I am realistic enough to know that we cannot go back many years to when you could have far less legislation, because we live in a much more complex society—we have to think about the extra powers that government is taking, how we scrutinise them and how we hold them to account. That is really the context of this debate and it is very important.

I am glad that the Government have accepted a number of the proposals in this report. I do not wish to repeat them; I strongly agree with the proposals for improvement made by the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas, and echoed by the noble Lord, Lord Butler, a moment ago. The other key one, of course, which the Government have accepted is that they should not keep expanding the variety of orders that are made, which is increasingly confusing to members of the committee, never mind Members of the House. Heaven alone knows what would happen if someone outside this House tried to make sense of it.

At times like this, I often reflect that we used to make the assumption—if we go back a very long time in our history—that we could expect British citizens to know what was expected of them in law, and that they would know if they were in danger of breaking the law. It would be very difficult for anyone to know that now, including a qualified lawyer. This is why it is getting so much more important in our more complex society. I also hope that the Government will fully accept the recommendation to give reasons when they vary one of the existing orders. That is important.

We asked the Government—this has been mentioned a couple of times, but I want to repeat it—to confirm undertakings by the previous Government in respect of draft orders laid under Section 14 of the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Act 2006, the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004 and the Localism Act 2011. I have looked again at the letter of the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde—the former Leader of the House—written in November in response to our report, which was published in July last year. The final sentence of that letter says:

“Further consideration is being given to this point, and I will write to provide a full response in due course”.

Having had a long career in politics, when I hear a Minister use the phrase “in due course” I know that due course really means a long meandering river through the countryside that would make the Amazon look like a local village stream. It takes forever. It is frankly absurd that an answer to this question could not have been given earlier. If there is one thing I would ask the Minister to do clearly tonight, it is to give an undertaking that the Government will answer that question fairly soon. By fairly soon, I do not mean “in due course”; I mean, I hope, in the next month or so. It is unreasonable not to do so.

The committee also suggested that strengthened scrutiny should take place in respect of powers that were not actually Henry VIII powers, but very close to being such powers. That is important; we need to find a way of doing that. While I do not wish to elaborate on what has already been said about such powers, as a committee we clearly have to be attentive not only to Henry VIII powers but to those which are not quite Henry VIII powers but nevertheless give Ministers considerable powers. We need additional powers on that.

I do not know how many members of the committee or others would share my view, but I am in favour of the suggestion in paragraph 25 of the report:

“The House may wish to consider whether it might be more appropriate to take the bolder course of rationalising the entire range of current variations by legislation”.

We need to do that. I appreciate that that would need legislation and that it could not be quick. However, it would enable us to think much more strategically about how we approach this and to deal with the point rightly raised by the noble Lord, Lord Butler, with which I agree, that a number of these issues should be dealt with by a committee of both Houses. Put simply, at times both Houses are looking at the same things without knowing that the other House is considering them. I am tempted by that paragraph to say that we should go much further on this.

It has been pointed out already, and I do not wish to labour it, that the House does not always nominate a committee to undertake scrutiny of draft orders. At the moment, there are about six draft orders before the House which are not nominated to any committee. That again makes the suggestion of having a more strategic look at this problem quite attractive. The variety of these orders, the way in which they are being changed, the fact that some are not looked at at all and the fact that both Houses often look at some of these things simultaneously makes me think that a more strategic view would be better. It also could focus on how the two Houses emphasise the fact that Parliament must be able to control the Executive. That underlying principle is always there. If we could take a more strategic view, it might make a lot of sense.

It would also enable us to look again at some of the language we use. Saying to a person outside this House that something is a draft affirmative order or a super-affirmative order is more confusing than it needs to be. I sometimes think that the Henry VIII phrase is quite useful, because it implies authoritarian government, but it is not really meaningful to many people outside. Although I recognise the importance of having legal terms that at times have to be defined in legal or parliamentary drafting language, we should always bear in mind that unless we want everyone to have legal aid and to be able to see a solicitor, it would be a good aim for Bills to be able to be read and understood by an average member of the public. I know that that is a bit far-fetched but we should never lose sight of this: we are legislating for the public. It is the public who have to obey the laws, rules and regulations that are passed by delegated powers. We really have a duty to make legislation understood by them.

From an e-mail I received today, I understand that the Hansard Society is conducting a fairly detailed review of this whole area, which I very much welcome. I simply say to the Minister that perhaps he could take away the suggestion that that area is messy and not well understood. There is therefore a case for the House to find a way of reviewing it and seeing if we should not approach it by a form of legislation, as suggested in the opening lines of paragraph 25 of the report. Once again, I thank the staff and members of the committee, as well as the chair. Despite its title and, occasionally, its topic this can be a very interesting committee, where we do very important work which perhaps should be widely recognised.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I understand. This was an extremely valuable report, in particular for pointing out that we have wandered into a situation where there is considerable diversity—indeed, almost a confusion—of different sorts of arrangements under secondary legislation. I can imagine how these will have grown up with Ministers from different departments making specific concessions on different Bills. The committee is quite right to say that we should exert pressure to bring things back to as common a model as possible.

The former Leader of the House, my noble friend Lord Strathclyde, wrote to my noble friend Lady Thomas last November, accepting the committee’s conclusion that, wherever possible, existing procedures for enhanced scrutiny should be used. In his response, which I have deposited in the Library, my noble friend noted that there may be exceptions where existing procedures are not suitable, but where the Government sought to create a new procedure they would clearly set out the case for doing so.

The committee’s report also invited the Government either to set out the case for not requiring supporting documents to be laid with draft orders under Section 19 of the Localism Act 2011—to which a number of noble Lords have referred—or to give an undertaking to lay supporting documents when laying any draft order under that section. I can confirm that the Government have given an undertaking to produce material setting out the detail of, and the rationale for, any proposed order under Section 19 of the Localism Act 2011, and to provide relevant background to support the parliamentary process.

The committee’s report also looked at orders made under Section 14 of the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Act 2006. We welcome the recognition that the existing scrutiny procedures for 2006 Act are robust. The committees scrutinising such orders can choose which scrutiny process should be used. They also have the power effectively to oppose any highly controversial measures. Ministers are obliged to consider the committees’ recommendations and cannot easily set them aside. They would need to persuade the whole House to overturn any recommendation by a committee to reject an order.

In practice, any legislative reform order that has been identified as highly controversial during the consultation stage has been withdrawn. Some measures have returned with increased scrutiny in a Bill. Neither committee has ever felt the need to exercise its veto when considering draft orders. This is why the Government have not felt the need to renew the undertakings given by the previous Administration. This is not a change of policy. The undertaking was given by the previous Government in 2006, at a time when it was not clear how the powers in the Act would be used. It is now clear that the process of bringing forward draft orders and the scrutiny process has worked well. However, I recognise that some noble Lords have strong views on this issue, so we are willing to take it away and consider it further.

The Government believe that legislative reform orders are important tools to reduce burdens on business, taking forward deregulatory measures that do not fit into other legislative vehicles. The report also touched upon orders made under Section 85 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998, Section 102 of the Local Transport Act 2008 and various orders made under sections of the Local Government Acts 1999, 2000 and 2003. Some of these have been rarely, or never, used. Section 85 of the Northern Ireland Act has been infrequently used and, following the devolution of policing and justice in 2010, its use is likely to decline further. No orders have been made under the powers in the three Local Government Acts. In relation to the Local Transport Act 2008, the committee’s report on the original Bill at the time noted:

“We consider both the delegation and the level of scrutiny proposed for the powers”,

in these clauses “to be appropriate”.

The noble Baroness, Lady Thomas, touched on the mechanism by which we debate and approve secondary legislation, particularly the system of consultation and the time allowed for it. Any changes would of course be a matter for the Procedure Committee. I would not wish to pre-empt its discussions, but I acknowledge the importance of the process of consultation and of having a process which commands public confidence. Again, I will take that back to the Cabinet Office.

There is of course a great variety in the significance of secondary legislation laid before the House. It is worth remembering that Parliament itself delegates powers to Ministers and, advised by the DPRRC, decides which form of scrutiny—negative, affirmative or super-affirmative—is appropriate for any particular delegation. In addition, a significant proportion of secondary legislation is already published in draft, with the consultation process beginning long before instruments are laid.

The noble Lord, Lord Butler, suggested rationalisation of the committee structure and greater use of Joint Committees. I think a number of us would want to take that away and think about it further. I am more persuaded by the arguments of the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, about the different functions of the two Houses. My limited experience of serving on one Joint Committee suggested that the two Houses do not always blend terribly well. A great deal depends on the subject. To the credit of this House, we tend to approach things in a less partisan and more detailed manner. Perhaps there is an argument that maintaining a degree of duality may therefore be functional.

[Lord Soley]

I understand that. I have some concerns about the idea of making it totally Joint Committees; they are difficult. However, that does not rule out looking at the way in which the two Houses are examining the same bit of legislation at the same time, without being aware of each others’ views. In a way, it is also about harmonisation.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I take all those points on board. This is the sort of question that we would naturally want to continue discussing.

I very much hope that the quantity of secondary legislation will continue to decline. The general power of competence for local authorities, for example, reduces the necessity of detailed secondary legislation on a range of issues.

Civil Service: Permanent Secretaries

Lord Soley Excerpts

Thursday 13th December 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Tyler]

My Lords—

[Lord Soley]

My Lords—

[The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Lord Strathclyde)]

My Lords, we have time. I think it is probably my noble friend Lord Tyler first and then the Labour Party.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I will duck answering that question. The question of Civil Service accountability to Parliament is one of those issues now in play which does raise some very large and long-term issues and will need much further debate.

[Lord Soley]

I find a lack of clarity in the Minister’s reply. What many of us are looking for, following the comments by Francis Maude, is a very clear statement that Ministers will not be able to override the normal negotiations that take place and insist on having the Permanent Secretary they want, because that politicises it. At the moment, disagreements are usually resolved by discussion between the Civil Service and the Minister. If we have a situation, which Francis Maude seems to want, of Ministers insisting on having their civil servant, then that politicises it. Certainly what I am looking for—and I think many other people are looking for—is a clear statement from a Government Minister that it is not going to happen.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

Let me be as clear as I can. The panel is asked to interview those who have applied. It ranks those whom it considers to be above the line in terms of being appointable or not. The issue at stake is whether the Secretary of State, and behind him the Prime Minister and the head of the Civil Service, can change the order of those who are ranked above the line. I recall that, until two years ago, the Prime Minister was able to change the order of those recommended as Archbishop of Canterbury—and on occasion did so, as Margaret Thatcher once famously did. The suggestion that Secretaries of State should not be allowed to at least consider the ranking of those above the line and accepted as appointable by the panel is one that we should consider further.