Queen’s Speech

Lord Taverne Excerpts

Thursday 13th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Taverne (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I want to discuss democracy. Our democracy is in danger and very few Conservatives seem to care. It is in danger when we cannot trust our leaders and when voters cannot make fair judgments because government statements may be falsehoods.

In the most outspoken and undiplomatic language that I have ever heard, Sylvie Bermann, the former French Ambassador to London and an ardent anglophile, declared that our Prime Minister is “an inveterate liar”. Every Conservative MP and anyone who accepts that honesty is vital to democracy should read The Assault on Truth by Peter Oborne—as already mentioned, a conservative journalist who voted leave—which lists the catalogue of Johnson’s untruths and broken promises. In Johnson’s first job as a journalist on the Times, he was sacked for inventing stories. When he became an MP and a shadow spokesman, he was sacked for lying about an affair with a female colleague on the Spectator, a charge that he had vehemently denied as

“an inverted pyramid of piffle”.

However, his lack of concern for truth became a vital public concern once he was leader of the leave campaign and then of the Conservative Party. One untrue statement in particular may have influenced the results of the referendum. It was the claim that Turkey was about to enter the European Union, enabling millions of Turks to invade Britain. The claim was widely publicised and believed although there was no possibility of Turkey joining; several EU members had declared that they would veto its application, and Britain could have done so as well. On “Channel 4 News”, Michael Crick challenged Johnson about Vote Leave’s campaign material in the referendum. One poster featured a British passport depicted as an open door alongside the slogan:

“TURKEY (population 76 million) IS JOINING THE EU. Vote Leave”.


Crick suggested that that claim was absurd. Johnson twice stated:

“I didn’t say anything about Turkey in the referendum”.


Not only must he have known as leader what Vote Leave’s message was but in the week before the referendum Johnson, Michael Gove and Gisela Stuart—now the noble Baroness, Lady Stuart—had declared in a joint public letter that

“the only way to avoid having common borders with Turkey is to Vote Leave”.

Johnson solemnly pledged, as we have heard, that no British Prime Minister would ever countenance a border in the Irish Sea and that there would be no checks on trade between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK. Both now exist. The DUP feels betrayed, Arlene Foster has lost her job and the survival of the peace agreement may well be threatened.

Perhaps the most dangerous threat to democracy, however, is Johnson’s assault on the independence of the judiciary. The Attorney-General, supposedly guardian of the rule of law, actually declared, presumably with the consent of her boss, that the courts should not be allowed to overrule politicians. She threatened to limit the powers of the Supreme Court. Why? Because it declared illegal Johnson’s attempt to prorogue Parliament. She has threatened to reduce the role of judicial review, one of the most important legal developments to control ultra vires actions by government. Indeed, there is an ominous talk of a Bill

“to defend the judiciary from being drawn into political questions”.

Nowadays, blind loyalty is what pays. When eminent Tories rebelled to rule out a no-deal Brexit they promptly had the Whip withdrawn. On the other hand, a loyal Johnsonite such as Priti Patel can breach the Ministerial Code with impunity even when an independent inquiry finds her guilty of bullying.

Whenever anyone questions Johnson’s integrity, the riposte is, “Look, he wins elections”. That is true, but perhaps we are nearing a tipping point. It may be the Electoral Commission’s investigation into who paid for the renovation of No. 10 or public reaction to the chumocracy and the awarding of lucrative contracts to friends and wealthy donors. The public may grow more intolerant of sleaze; a recent poll found that 37% already think that Johnson is corrupt. As a schoolboy, Johnson said that he would be king of the world. He may yet become the king of sleaze.

Queen’s Speech

Lord Taverne Excerpts

Wednesday 8th January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Taverne (LD)]

My Lords, I believe that we are too ready to ignore some real present dangers to democracy. Johnson is of course no Hitler, but there are disturbing signs that he does not understand some of the basic elements of democracy, and we have no idea what we may stumble into. Certainly, neither Johnson nor the bulk of the present Conservative party—let alone the most influential figure in the party today, Dominic Cummings—seems to grasp the danger to democracy of a Government who lie. Nor do they care a hoot about parliamentary democracy, which has been the rock on which British democracy has traditionally been based.

Johnson clearly does not believe in the importance of scrutiny by Parliament of government policy, as he showed in his attempt to prorogue Parliament, which in the event was foiled by that bastion of our liberties, the Supreme Court. Ominously, he has announced that we should re-examine the role of the Supreme Court in its relations with Parliament, because he seems to regard the court as an undemocratic obstacle to what in his opinion may be important government policy.

Now that he has a majority, he can also sweep aside any obstacles created by inquisitorial MPs, such as those who passed the Hilary Benn Act, which he tried to invalidate. Furthermore, Johnson has encouraged a general campaign against experts and elites, especially against politicians who seek to question the people’s will as expressed in the 2016 referendum, which it seems is inviolate, however much circumstances may have changed.

In fact, one of the most dangerous developments in our politics today is the constant invocation of “the will of the people”. All democracies start with the proposition that Governments should govern in accordance with the wishes of the people, but that proposition is not unqualified. As Locke maintained, it must be subject to the rule of law and the rights of minorities and of the individual. Furthermore, because of the complexities of government, Burke argued that MPs should not be delegates who vote as instructed by some outside body but representatives who take account of majority wishes but exercise their own judgment after hearing the argument and evidence. Without those qualifications, “the will of the people” becomes an extremely useful term for autocrats.

Today it is commonplace to hear any qualification to the need to obey “the will of the people” as a denial of democracy. But that is the creed of Rousseau, the hero of Robespierre and the Committee of Public Safety. and of almost any autocrat since, from Mussolini and Hitler to Erdoğan today. The Conservative Party seems to have swallowed Rousseau hook, line and sinker and forgotten its own history. Exit Locke and Burke; MPs must now be delegates, no longer representatives.

We may soon find ourselves in very dangerous territory. Suppose, as is far from impossible, that no substantial progress has been made in the difficult negotiations for a free trade agreement by the statutory deadline at the end of this year. We may indeed end up after all with a no-deal Brexit and a situation of chaos. Only today, Mr Boris Johnson has announced that he is happy to leave without a free trade agreement. No doubt the lie machine will get to work to prove that failure is in fact a famous victory, but people may finally decide that this is not what they were promised. If so, it will of course all be the fault of Europeans, civil servants or other elite enemies of the people, but especially obstructive parliamentarians, an easy target for blame in the present political mood. It will be an ugly world. There is perhaps more than just a whiff of Weimar in the air.

Queen’s Speech

Lord Taverne Excerpts

Wednesday 28th June 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Taverne (LD)]

My Lords, today’s conventional wisdom among pro-Europeans is that we must go for a soft Brexit. Some say, “Stay in the single market, the customs union, or both, or have some sort of Norwegian solution”. I contest that view. I doubt whether a soft Brexit will be on offer; I believe it will not be acceptable to the Government if offered, and if it were acceptable it would not be that much better than a hard Brexit.

The Government and MPs have consistently misjudged the mood of the 27, which are not in a mood to accommodate us. They see the Brexit vote as a stupid act of self-harm, and now a distraction from the need to build a new Europe, based on the new German-French entente. Nor, I believe, would Norway welcome the inevitable disruption of the EEA.

A soft Brexit would involve not only political difficulties but technical negotiations that are far more complicated than is generally realised, almost as complex as a new free trade agreement. It is unlikely to be agreed within the time available. All versions of a soft Brexit mean, as far as I can see, accepting the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice—anathema to Mrs May—and accepting EU regulations governing trade, with no say in their formulation. As has been observed, sovereignty would be not regained but lost. We would also have to accept at least some free movement of labour. It will also do nothing for free trade and services, with London’s financial companies losing their passport rights and being unable to operate inside the European Union, and, probably, with London’s very profitable clearing-house activities moving out.

The noble Lord, Lord Adonis, made an extremely eloquent and impressive speech and the noble Lord, Lord Birt, said something of the same kind—although he is not in his place. If it is so important to stay inside the single market and so vital that we stay inside the customs union, the question arises: why leave? I come back to Donald Tusk’s advice, when he said that in the end the choice would be between a hard Brexit and remain. Does that mean that, if remain is impossible, we are bound for a hard Brexit?

But is remain impossible? Let us consider three propositions. First, leavers did not vote for Brexit to make us poorer. Secondly, Brexit will make us poorer and is already doing so. Thirdly, the narrow majority of Brexit voters, when they realise what Brexit means, may change their minds and should have a chance to do so. The first proposition—that voters did not vote for a poorer Brexit—is accepted by Philip Hammond and strongly confirmed by polls. A very thorough YouGov inquiry into what motivated leavers carried out on the eve of the referendum found that,

“very few expect, or would tolerate, a hit to their living standards”,

and they were almost unanimous in believing that,

“leaving the EU was a cost-free option”.

Proposition 2—that Brexit makes us poorer—is supported by evidence that grows stronger by the day. Many examples have been given, and I shall not repeat them, except to say that one of the claims that our economy is strong is very much falsified by the fact that our growth is now the slowest in the G7 and what little growth we see is based on unsustainable levels of household debt. There is, of course, a very serious and growing shortage of key workers in vital public services such as the NHS, and sectors of industry such as the building and hospitality trades and food farming—and things will get worse. Further serious adverse effects of Brexit are forecast by the overwhelming majority of economists.

I come to proposition 3—that leavers should be given a chance to change their minds. That is the most controversial. MPs insist that we must all obey the referendum verdict—the wishes of the people—and the Minister in her opening remarks said that Brexit was not revocable. That is a terrible statement to make, because it is deeply antidemocratic. It is the essence of democracy that people can change their minds. It is autocracies that stop people changing their minds. Of course, if circumstances change and people’s views change, Brexit could be reversible. It is becoming clearer that when people voted last June they did not know what Brexit meant—and now it is becoming clearer that it means lower living standards. We also know that that is not what leavers voted for. Part of the YouGov poll came to the conclusion that a massive shift of opinion could not be ruled out. If events produce a change of views of Brexit voters, as well they might, those of us who are still a small minority who argue for a cross-party campaign to stop Brexit will be not ignoring the people’s will but supporting it.