House Of Lords: Appointments System

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 19th July 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

I very often agree with the noble Baroness, except I have never tweeted in my life, and I recommend her not to. The policy of the Green Party is to replace the system of appointment—which has given us all the excellent noble Lords here on these Benches in their parties—with a PR-democratically elected Chamber. Frankly, that would simply replace an accountable appointments system, where Prime Ministers are openly responsible for who they appoint, with an unaccountable appointments system of lists drawn up by secretive party secretariats.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords—

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[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

I remind Conservative Peers that on a current poll basis the Conservatives have exactly twice the poll percentage of public support that we do, so we are not overrepresented.

Particularly under Boris Johnson, the Conservatives have broken that agreement. Do the Government not accept that we are now in a position where any change of government would have to be accompanied either by the voluntary resignation of a substantial number of Conservative Peers or the appointment of a large number of new governmental Peers, which would be bad for the size of the House?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I think the question of “disproportionate” was answered by Members of your Lordships’ House rather than me, so I will not add to the pain of those Benches. I think that there needs to be—and I have advocated this publicly in the House and privately—better representation of His Majesty’s Opposition in your Lordships’ House. I do not think it is generally acceptable that His Majesty’s Opposition should have fewer representatives in this House than the Cross Benches. I recognise that, and for all the criticism of the previous Prime Minister, Mr Johnson, he approved the appointment of Labour Peers. I hope that will go forward.

House of Lords Appointments Commission

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 21st July 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, there is an instant when you are thinking, then you have to stand up and give a reply to your Lordships’ always-penetrating questions. I was going to say in response to my noble friend Lord Balfe that I must have been pretty awful at putting arguments from this Dispatch Box because I have lost quite a few. I think the phrase is: “them’s the breaks”. We listen to the arguments put forward by your Lordships. I have had the privilege of taking—and am currently taking—legislation through your Lordships’ House, and have gained very much from the engagement and events with Peers on all sides, and indeed in Her Majesty’s Opposition.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the Minister makes the best of sometimes rather weak cases when putting them forward. He knows the Prime Minister much better than I do. Does he occasionally wonder whether the Prime Minister—a declared disruptor of our institutions—wants to undermine the current constitution of our second Chamber by flooding us with more and more appointments, and whether that will push us towards the next stage of much-needed reform?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, disruption is in the eye of the beholder. The historical policy of the Liberal Democrats is to replace your Lordships’ House with an elected Chamber.

Heatwave Response

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 21st July 2022 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord True) (Con)]

I am very grateful to the noble Baroness. I entirely endorse what she said about the horrific nature of some of the pictures and films we saw, behind each of which is a person whose life has been affected; our hearts go out to all those people. I also wholly agree with what she said about the role of fire services in this particular instance, as well as all the other emergency and response services, which have worked so hard during those events.

I take the point the noble Baroness made about needing to learn lessons, and hopefully this will be one of the things that feeds into the new resilience strategy under preparation at the moment. I can certainly assure her that, in both the national security risk assessment and our work on resilience, the lessons of the last few days will be taken into account. I am grateful for what she said about those who have worked so hard.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the response to this extraordinary event has been extremely good. I hope the Minister will agree with me that the local responses were as important as the national effort. This reinforces the argument that we need to pay more attention to ensuring that our local authorities, their public health officers and others play a larger role and have the resources necessary to help their communities, because not everything can be done from London or Whitehall.

I hope that the events of the last two or three days have finally killed off the views of climate change deniers and those in the Minister’s own party who say that climate change adaptation is better than attempts to stop the transition in its tracks. While a more active Government would mean a larger state, that is less disastrous, they would argue, than climate change. I hope that he would also agree that the active interventions needed to stop climate change will involve a good deal of long-term public investment and that this may need to take priority over tax cuts. Those who insist that tax cuts are what come first under any circumstance—which seems to be the major theme of the current Conservative leadership contest—should take account of what we need to do if we are to adapt to climate change. This includes water storage—which the east of England in particular needs to invest in more—and ways of changing the built environment, particularly by greening our cities and providing houses and flats built not just for keeping warm but for keeping cool in the summer by, for example, reducing the amount of glass. In the longer term, a whole range of measures will be needed to ensure that we cope with the international transition. Can the Minister tell us a little more about the national resilience strategy: how do the Government plan to present that, and how will it engage a national conversation on the very substantial transition we need to make over the next five to 10 years?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for his questions, and he knows that I share his deep and profound respect and affection for local government and the astonishing public service given by local government officers and councillors up and down this country. The local resilience forums referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Basildon, yesterday have performed admirably—I endorse what was said—during this response and are mitigating almost all the problems before escalation. DLUHC and partners held four resilience co-ordination group meetings, some of which were attended by the Secretary of State, and strategic co-ordination groups have overseen the local response. We have also welcomed co-operation with the devolved Administrations.

On the noble Lord’s broader points, I speak for Her Majesty’s Government, not for who one might want to lead a future Government. This Government, under the leadership of my right honourable friend Mr Johnson, have been, as I said earlier in the week, absolutely at the forefront of progress towards net zero. Our objective is that, by 2030, 95% of British electricity will be low-carbon. We are looking for 40,000 more jobs in the clean industries—a figure that we think will reach almost half a million by 2030. COP 26 shows the deep commitment of this Government to that battle. The resilience strategy is nearing completion and will be published after the Recess. I cannot advise your Lordships on the actual timing and date of its publication, but work is well advanced.

Procurement Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Committee stage
Wednesday 13th July 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, again, I have set out the argument. The noble Baroness disagrees but I am not going to repeat a third time the reason why we think maximising social value is unnecessary and would be a duplicative addition. Each procurement is different and what is appropriate, for example, for a large-scale infrastructure project is not for smaller transactional procurements.

Furthermore, procurement policy should be aligned with wider government policy and, as such, the publication of a national procurement policy statement is based on the strategic policy priorities relevant at the time. It would not be appropriate, in our submission, to include in the Bill priorities which can and probably will change —we have heard that they will—based on an Administration’s objectives. It is always important that policy priorities are included in individual procurements only where they are relevant to the subject of the contract.

On Monday, for example, noble Lords on all sides gave those of us on the Front Bench, I freely confess, a hard time in discussing the importance of minimising bureaucracy to facilitate SME participation in procurement. I took that away as a powerful call, which I have said we will discuss. As I think I have already indicated outside the Chamber, the Government are keen to meet and consider these points.

The paradox is that seeking to include extraneous requirements, which this and other amendments in the group risk, could make it harder for small businesses to bid for public contracts. One cannot talk the small business game, which noble Lords did strongly and fairly, while adding compliance requirements that make things harder for small businesses and help larger organisations to corner the market.

We think that Amendments 48 and 52 in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Hunt and Lord Coaker, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, are unnecessary and potentially unhelpful to contracting authorities in attempting to impose on them an obligation to have regard to improving the economic, social, environmental and cultural well-being of the relevant area in and throughout all their procurement activities. In particular, they would place unnecessary burdens on them in relation to areas where this is of limited relevance and, again, open them up unnecessarily to the risk of legal challenge.

I wonder whether we would all agree—in fact, I do not have to wonder; I know that we would not all agree—on what carrying out procurement in a “socially responsible way” means. In a sense, that is implicit in the challenge from the noble Baroness opposite. We all might have rather different understandings of what that requires. Imposing a legal obligation of such potential breadth on contracting authorities is, we submit, exposing contracting authorities to unnecessary risk and complexity. Contracting authorities will be able to take account of measures that improve the economic, social and environmental well-being of the relevant area—this may differ from local authority to local authority, for example—where it is relevant to the subject matter of the contract. The Bill already allows this, which is absolutely in line with the Government’s levelling-up agenda.

On Amendments 53 and 58 in the names of my noble friend Lord Lansley and the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, as I said in our debate on an earlier group, the term “public benefit” is deliberately undefined; consequently, it is intended to be a flexible concept that gives contracting authorities a degree of discretion. Again, local authorities may have different views from place to place on what the most urgent benefit in their area is. Although all the proposed economic, environmental and social additions, including creating new businesses, jobs and skills, and reducing geographic disparities in the United Kingdom, might be facets of public benefit in different circumstances—I do not challenge that—we do not believe that it would be helpful to elaborate them in the Bill.

It might also be unfair to small contracting authorities to impose an obligation to consider the reduction of geographic disparities in the United Kingdom; they might be more concerned about disparities up the road. Doing so risks excluding other matters that might be more valid in specific circumstances. The Government consider that contracting authorities are better placed to make that decision in the individual circumstances at hand. We want contracting authorities to think about the extent to which public money spent on their specific contracts can deliver greater benefit than it otherwise would. I think that there is agreement in the Committee on that point. As I have said, each procurement is different; for example, what is appropriate in delivering a giant infrastructure project is not appropriate for smaller procurements.

I turn to Amendments 59 and 59A from the noble Lord, Lord Wallace—

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I have listened carefully to what the Minister said but I am still puzzled. We are trying to craft a Bill that will have quite a long shelf life over a period when we may have a change of Government or some change in government. The Minister is saying that the catch-all public benefit is the only thing that we should have in the Bill in terms of principles and objectives. I would have thought that the consensus across all our democratic parties on public benefit and social value is a little wider than that and that it would help to provide guidance if that were spelled out rather more in the Bill. Otherwise, the principles and objectives will simply swing from one side to the other when different Governments come.

Everything cannot be left to each changing Minister to define. Surely the concept of public benefit is one that we share, as is the concept of social value. We also share the view that £300 billion-worth of public procurement sets a culture, the core of which I hope that all Conservatives, Labour, Liberal Democrats and Greens share, because that is what we are attempting to get. The Minister is saying that we cannot agree on that. I am aware of some people—the Chicago school of economists and those who follow them—who deny the concept of public benefit altogether and believe that private benefit is the only thing that drives the economy, prosperity and society. I hope that we are not there and are not starting from there.

[Lord True (Con)]

The noble Lord always slightly loses me when he rides off in his speeches. I have a vision of him lying awake, trying to get to sleep, thinking of these terrible right-wing Conservatives whom he always cites and seeing the worst in everything. I thought that the great tradition of the Liberal party and liberal values, which I was brought up with and adhere to, is to give space to variety and not uniformity; there should be flexibility, with opportunities for local judgments and for contracting authorities to make them. The concept of public benefit is wide and flexible and should be so to give contracting authorities a degree of discretion to consider whether their specific contracts can deliver greater benefits than they otherwise would.

For example, contracting authorities are already able to make it clear in their technical specifications that fair trade options can be included in the products provided to meet the requirements of the contracts, provided that they do not discriminate against other products of other suppliers. The noble Lord objected to the mention of the terrible word “money”, but public procurement needs to have a focus on achieving value for money. The two things are not contradistinctions.

While I would expect contracting authorities to consider these matters where appropriate, it would not be helpful to elaborate them in the Bill, for the reasons that the Government have submitted, as they would not apply to all contracts. The course that the other side is proposing will lead to a uniformity imposed on a diversity, which is the antithesis of local values. I respectfully request that these amendments be withdrawn.

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[Lord True (Con)]

A considerable number of amendments mandate that contracting authorities must have regard to certain items. Others add to the objectives in Clause 11. It is a difference of interpretation. The Government are in one place. On reflection, I think that perhaps people outside government circles will think that that is not as unwise as it now seems. I again respectfully suggest that the amendment be withdrawn.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

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[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

I have just one more question. It is about periodicity. From the point of view of a contractor, it would be unwelcome to have too frequent changes in the public policy statement or too long periods in which the statement is not revisited. If I were a contractor, I would want to know when a new statement might be coming.

We have a relatively strong convention that strategic reviews of foreign policy and defence take place every two to four years or at the beginning of each Parliament. Would the Minister consider whether there needs to be something in the Bill to prevent new Ministers, when they come into their department, nine months after their predecessor took office, having their statement instead, which would be quite chaotic; or a Minister who had been there for seven years deciding that he did not want to have anything to do with it? Some encouragement for a regular period of ministerial statements might be a positive aspect for the Bill.

[Lord True (Con)]

As so often, the noble Lord makes an important point. I was charmed by one aspect of his arguments on continuity, when he complained that the Conservative Party kept changing Prime Ministers. I thought he was one of the main cheerleaders for a change in Prime Minister, so he cannot, in the immortal phrase, have his cake and eat it.

There is a duty in the Bill as drafted for a Minister of the Crown to keep the national procurement policy statement under review. It is not in the Bill—noble Lords have not been particularly receptive to the argument I put forward, although the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, has shown his eagerness to get his hands on the levers of power and use them—but the Government’s intention, with great generosity, is that it should be possible for a review of the NPPS to be undertaken in each Parliament. If one made a period of eight years or whatever statutory, then a new or different Government coming in would have to task primary legislation to make that change. That is the kind of structure we have been trying to operate in. Part of the reason the Bill has been framed in the way it has is to leave flexibilities, some of which your Lordships do not like and some of which at least one of your Lordships does.

I turn to Amendment—

Procurement Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Committee stage
Monday 11th July 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, although I am not a great expert on this subject, it seems that this is a case in which judicial review would be extremely easy because the question of how one justifies it is not spelled out here. Could the Minister perhaps write to us between now and Report about what criteria would then be used to justify the decisions taken? I entirely agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, that one wants to ensure as far as possible that we do not leave large holes for judicial review to come in.

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, obviously I accept that, but we will certainly undertake to provide further information.

The noble Lord, Lord Scriven, was adumbrating cases where it should be possible to take different issues into account in terms of local activity. I understand the point that noble Lords are making about clarity. Clarity can either be sought through superdefinition, chasing the Snark through the end of the rainbow—sorry, I am mixing my metaphors—or it can be something for which the Government set out a clear framework that ultimately it is open to anyone in a free society to test under the common law. There is a balance to be found here and we will write further.

On Amendment 57, the noble Lords, Lord Wallace and Lord Fox, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, complain that Clause 11 does not define value for money in order to leave a degree of flexibility for different types of organisation with different drivers to place a different emphasis on the concept. That is not unusual in legislation. Value for money as a concept is not uncommon on the statute book without further definition. It has been used in relation to setting high-level objectives for organisations, including the general duties of Ofcom in Section 3 of the Communications Act 2003 and indeed those of the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority in Section 4 of the Energy Act.

There are many precedents, I am told, but I have only given two of them where the term is left undefined, and this allows a degree of flexibility. We are happy with the broad interpretation of value for money, but Amendment 58 would have the effect of limiting the scope for future reviews of what value for money means. That is something that future Governments might wish to do. We do not support that position at the moment but, again, I am ready to listen to further discussion in Committee.

Amendments 128 and 130, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Brixton, amend the provisions on award criteria. I am grateful to the noble Lord, first for the explanatory statement which sets out that his amendment intends to ensure that value for money does not override other procurement objectives, and secondly for his exposition of it. While it is important to be clear that Clause 22 does not affect the relative weighting of the objectives in Clause 11, I am grateful to the noble Lord for his consideration of this point and respond on that basis.

Public procurement needs to be focused on achieving value for money, and we submit that this is rightly at the top of the list of objectives set out in Clause 11. The noble Lord laid an amendment, the second part of which would in effect—taken literally—relegate or at least abnegate the possibility of placing value for money exclusively at the top. Our submission is that, while value for money will be the highest priority in procurement for the Government and that is reflected in the drafting of the Bill, it does not disapply or override the obligation on contracting authorities to have due regard to the other matters in Clause 11. I have no doubt that this will be probed further, but I hope that this will reassure the noble Lord that the amendment is not only unnecessary but, in its detail, we could not accept it. There is a balance to be sought here, and that balance will be seen differently by successive Administrations in successive places.

There was a very interesting range of amendments put forward in this group. I have listened carefully, and we will engage further on the points raised. I hope on that basis that noble Lords will feel ready to withdraw or not move their amendments.

Functioning of Government

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 7th July 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, of course Her Majesty’s Government need to go on during this moment of very considerable external economic and political difficulty, but does the Minister accept that a great deal now needs to change? I see that the Daily Mail is still attacking any alternative to this Government as a “coalition of chaos”. However, the chaos that this Government have succeeded in creating with a single party seems to make that a very difficult case to put forward.

The relationship between government and Parliament needs to change. The attitude of government to the conventions and constraints of our unwritten constitution needs to change sharply. The relationship between government and the civil servants needs to change. If the noble Lord continues in office—with perhaps a new Minister in the Commons responsible for the constitution—will he insist that constitutional behaviour must absolutely be part of what the next Government do and that some constitutional change is essential to bring back confidence in public life?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the Government will continue their work to deliver the programme on which they were elected. We set out our programme for this Session in the gracious Speech. The Government remain in action, and the Leader of the House of Commons has announced a forward programme for business in the other place. The usual channels have announced the programme for this place, and I look forward to day three of the Procurement Bill on Monday in Grand Committee.

Procurement Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Committee stage
Wednesday 6th July 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I will have to take counsel and advice on that, and I will certainly come back. As I said, the fundamental position is to try to keep things as they are, exempting passenger transport services that are currently exempt and covered by the Department for Transport. Concession contracts are dealt with slightly differently under the regime—we will discuss that later—but I will come back to the Committee to clarify the points that the noble Lord asked about.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

I thank the noble Lord for his explanations; if some of them had been available earlier, it might have been easier to accept some of the Government’s arguments. I find Clause 109 the most difficult: it gives the Minister the power to amend primary legislation without any reference to Parliament. But I note that he said that this will be looked at and perhaps discussed with others between Committee and Report, and I thank him for that constructive approach.

In turn, I am sure that he noted the strong views around the Committee about this particular Bill and the broader issues with skeleton Bills. We will return to this in a number of other areas in the Bill where we want to see spelled out things that we are at the moment expected to take for granted that the Minister will later say something about, provide a strategic policy statement on or whatever. That is simply not enough, so this will be a continuing issue.

In passing, as we keep stubbing our toes against the GPA, I am quite surprised that Jacob Rees-Mogg has not demanded that Britain withdraws from the GPA, because if we are to take back control we had better take it back properly of some of these international obligations, which clearly limit and constrain what we can do in a range of quite often important issues, but perhaps that is an over-partisan remark in Committee on a Bill. We will have to return to this, but I thank the Minister for the constructive way in which he has responded. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

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[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

Flexibility, I think I understand, means a skeleton Bill. I think we all understand that. It will either be in the strategic policy statement, which we will come to, or it needs to be in the Bill. I think that around the Committee, everyone will feel that more ought to be in the Bill than is there now, so that we all know where we are going. If we are not allowed to have a draft of the strategic policy statement before the Bill finishes its passage, that is really not adequate.

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I think the noble Lord makes a slightly different point. It is a point of concern, and we discussed it on the earlier group. I understand that how much is in secondary legislation and so on is a concern to noble Lords. When I talk about flexibility, I am talking about a structure that is simple and clear, and does not say, “Before you apply to procurement, you have to do a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h…”. We could probably use up the whole alphabet with the aspirations that we will hear in this Committee before anyone can get past the starting gate that we are discussing now. One needs to bear in mind the need for that sort of flexibility. That is the relative simplicity I am thinking about. However, time is late and I need to respond, not to the debate launched by the noble Lord opposite, but to the amendments.

My noble friend Lady Noakes came forward with a very thoughtful amendment, as always. There has been an outstanding debate, and I will want to study it in Hansard and reflect on everybody’s contributions. My noble friend had a very specific point in relation to estimation of cost and how services should be aggregated. Her probing amendment seeks to establish where the Government are coming from.

The proposed methodology in the Bill for estimating the value of contracts, which allows some flexibility, is very similar to the long-standing valuation rules in existing regulations and will therefore be helpful to procurers. Paragraph 4 of Schedule 3 contains an “anti-avoidance” provision that is designed to ensure that contracting authorities do not artificially subdivide procurements in order to evade the rules. This mirrors an analogous concept in the long-standing regulatory scheme but we think that it is presented in a simpler and more user-friendly way. It involves a general rule that contracting authorities should, where possible, seek to aggregate for the purposes of valuation but, as my noble friend said, it also permits exceptions where there are good reasons. Without the “good reasons” exception, the provision becomes something of a blunt instrument.

My noble friend asked for some examples so I will give one: an authority buying its printers from a particular supplier does not necessarily mean that it should buy all its toner, paper and servicing from the same supplier if it believes that it can get a better deal elsewhere. We believe that contracting authorities need to continue to have discretion not to aggregate where they have good reasons not to do so. I will look carefully at my noble friend’s point about the overall estimation of costs but we do not believe that it would be desirable to set out in legislation what constitutes a good reason because this will depend on the circumstances of each case. I request that this amendment be withdrawn.

Amendment 81, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, seeks to add elements from the Government’s Sourcing Playbook as a new clause before Clause 14 to require contracting authorities to conduct a “delivery model assessment” when introducing “significant change” in their business model, helping to inform strategic decisions on insourcing and outsourcing. I agree with the noble Lord that rigorous assessment of contracting authorities’ plans is essential for good delivery. However, again, we have continuously sought throughout the development of the Bill to ensure that it remains flexible and does not unnecessarily stipulate blanket requirements, which tie contracting authorities down to a single process that adds unnecessary burdens or will not necessarily work in all cases. For example, “make or buy” decisions, which the noble Lord asked about, need to be considered carefully—indeed, our commercial guidance in playbooks includes comprehensive guidance on this—but, in our submission, it is not necessary for this to be mandated in legislation. Furthermore, large outsourcing contracts will obviously be scrutinised by departmental, Cabinet Office and Treasury controls to ensure value for money and successful delivery.

So we believe that these things should not be mandated by legislation and that this is already achieved through the development and implementation of the sourcing playbooks, which the noble Lord kindly drew our attention to and actually complimented very much with his desire to put them into primary legislation. I am grateful for his endorsement of those principles.

I turn to Amendment 82, tabled by the noble Lords, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Aberdare. Some of the underlying arguments on this clause obviously touched on extremely important issues. The amendment proposes to amend Clause 14 to create a presumption that contracting authorities should publish a “planned procurement notice” unless there is good reason not to. Again, I agree that it is vital that the market—particularly certain aspects of it to which the noble Lord and others referred—is given sufficiently early warning of what contracting authorities intend to buy so that suppliers can gear up to deliver. This is particularly important for SMEs and charities, which were referred to by the noble Lord and others.

The Bill makes additional provision to this effect in Part 8. Contracting authorities with an annual procurement spend of more than £100 million will already be required to publish a “pipeline notice”, which will contain information about upcoming procurement with an estimated value of more than £2 million that the contracting authority plans to undertake in the reporting period. This will allow suppliers to see higher-value upcoming procurements and make a decision on whether they wish to bid.

However, contracting authorities should be left to determine where planned procurement notices are useful for lower-value contracts, owing to the potential burden. I will come back to charities. Contracting authorities are incentivised to make use of these notices through a reduction in the tendering period in circumstances in which they are properly issued. They will not necessarily be useful in all circumstances; as such, the Government are currently not of the view that it would be helpful to mandate their use, but I will reflect on what the noble Lord said.

Amendment 84, tabled and interestingly spoken to by my noble friend Lord Lansley, seeks to add to the purposes of “preliminary market engagement” in Clause 15(1). This includes,

“ascertaining how the tender notice may be expressed in terms of outcomes and”

KPIs

“for the purpose of minimising … processes”.

Focusing on the outcomes of the contract, as opposed to being too prescriptive on how these are achieved, is indeed a sensible reason for conducting preliminary engagement—I agree with my noble friend on that. Contracting authorities are encouraged to consider KPIs in their preliminary market engagement. For example, Clause 15(1)(c) includes

“preparing the tender notice and associated tender documents”.

I will look at the Bill against what my noble friend has said, but, as I have said, in some respects the Bill already provides for this and encourages the purpose that he has asked for in terms of Clause 15(1)(c) giving the purpose of preparing the tender notice and documents.

Amendments 85 and 87, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, and others, are important. They provide that, when undertaking “preliminary market engagement”, contracting authorities may engage with suppliers in relation to designing a procurement process that will maximise certain public goods and encourage innovation. I very much hear what noble Lords across the Committee have said about innovation, and I will certainly take that thought away. I think there would be a lot of understanding and support in government for that aspiration; innovative new entrant suppliers should be actively sought out.

We wish to promote and encourage contracting authorities to conduct preliminary market engagement. However, this engagement needs to be appropriate and related to the subsequent procurement. Imposing such an obligation on contracting authorities could have the counterproductive effect of disincentivising preliminary market engagement which, I am sure we all agree, would not be desirable.

Procurement Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Committee stage
Monday 4th July 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord True (Con)]

I was actually coming on to the rest of that but, with respect, the noble Lord asked me a specific question about government communications in his utterance; therefore I was responding to it.

Going further, in line with the existing exemption under the current regime, as provided for in the GPA, partner nations will typically agree to the rules for the award of contracts in a joint project by one or more of the partners in an international agreement. We cannot expect our international contracting partners, each with different national procurement procedures in some cases, to follow the specific procedural rules in this Bill. The ability to switch off the procedural rules in the legislation where there is a clash with what was agreed with the parties to the international agreement is essential to facilitate arrangements; however, I will clarify that further for the noble Lord. Again, I ask that this amendment be withdrawn.

I turn to Amendment 42, which relates to local authorities. I apologise for the length of my speech but a number of different themes came out here. Given my life and my having been involved in setting up joint arrangements with other authorities, I understand where the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, is coming from in seeking to add to and amend Clause 10 to make it explicit that a group of local authorities forming a consortium may constitute a centralised procurement authority. As an old local government hand, I do not particularly like that phrase; on the other hand, earlier, I cited the Yorkshire procurement arrangements as the type of thing that would be permitted and would be a centralised procurement authority.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I suggest looking at the definitions in Clause 112. I note that the terms “central government authority”, which clearly does not apply, and “centralised procurement authority” occur together. I suggest that, in introducing an amendment on Report, the Government may care to consider something that replaces “centralised” with “combined”? That would not have the implication of being run from Whitehall and would express much more explicitly what is intended.

[Lord True (Con)]

I will certainly reflect on anything that is said in Committee. “Combined authority” has a particular meaning and understanding. Local authorities can procure things together without being a combined authority; perhaps the noble Lord, being a good Liberal Democrat, might like to propose a federalised approach. I will take away the point he made. I was going to say that I agree with him and the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, that it is correct that local authorities can band together to form consortia to undertake procurements; that is something we wish to encourage. I will look into the particular case of border lands that the noble Lord—

EU Retained Law

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 23rd June 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I was not sure whether to laugh or cry when I read the Statement. It takes us into a surreal world of fantastical Government, in which, as the Minister for Brexit Opportunities declares,

“our country will achieve great things.”—[Official Report, Commons, 22/6/22; col. 866.]

That is like Donald Trump promising he will make America great again—just as windy and as empty of content.

There is no evidence behind this Statement. I challenge the Minister to find any. A great deal of evidence was gathered and analysed on exactly this issue between 2012 and 2015 in what was labelled the balance of competences exercise. Eurosceptic Conservatives in the coalition Government believed that an extensive survey of business, sector by sector, would produce a long list of unnecessary Euro regulations that the UK Government could then demand to be renegotiated.

Three Ministers oversaw this exercise: David Lidington, Greg Clark and myself—two Conservatives and a Liberal Democrat. Sector by sector the responses came in, saying that companies were happy with the current balance between domestic and European regulation. Several transport companies argued for greater emphasis on common European regulation rather than less of it. The Scotch Whisky Association, whose then chief executive was David Frost, now the noble Lord, Lord Frost, was particularly enthusiastic about the advantages of common regulation with the European single market. Of course, that was before the noble Lord’s damascene conversion from evidence-based argument to embittered opposition to everything European.

Can the Minister tell us what consultations the Government have conducted in the past year with large and small companies before committing themselves to diverge from EU regulations in the way Mr Rees-Mogg plans? My understanding is that UK exporters, both large and small companies, would much prefer the Government to maintain close alignment between UK regulations and those in our largest overseas market. Does the Minister have any recent evidence to the contrary? Does he understand that the Government have any recent evidence to the contrary?

The chimera of making a bonfire of regulations has appealed to the ideological right ever since Friedrich von Hayek and Milton Friedman. Belief in the superiority of unregulated markets has survived through stark evidence to the contrary, as in the loose regulations that led to the Grenfell fire. Margaret Thatcher understood that a well-regulated market is fundamental to a thriving economy, which is why she pushed for the common regulatory structures of the European single market. British Ministers and officials played a major role in creating that common single market. Many of the regulations that Mr Rees-Mogg is now denouncing were shaped by UK efforts, not imposed by foreign Governments on a powerless UK, as he is now suggesting—but Mr Rees-Mogg’s career has been entirely in finance rather than the real economy of production, marketing and exporting, and much of it offshore in Hong Kong, Singapore and other low-tax financial jurisdictions.

Mr Rees-Mogg is also the Minister for Government Efficiency. He notes in his Statement the extra work that Whitehall officials have undertaken to grasp these “Brexit freedoms”, as he puts it. He does not note that leaving the EU and setting up a range of national regulatory agencies to replace those we shared with our European partners has required a substantial increase in both the number of officials and the costs involved. Part of our contribution to the EU budget went towards funding those common agencies; some of them, such as Europol, were led by British officials. Yet at the same time as being Minister for Efficiency—that wonderfully odd phrase—Mr Rees-Mogg is pushing for a sharp reduction in Civil Service numbers, without regard to the additional tasks that it is taking on. Can the Minister explain how the Government propose to manage this additional effort while slashing the number of staff?

There are more windy comments in the Statement about restoring the sovereignty of Parliament, followed by the declaration that most of this will be pushed through under secondary, even tertiary, legislation, without effective parliamentary scrutiny. The illusion that we now stand imperially sovereign in the world, freed of the European yoke, is punctured by the letter that the noble Lord, Lord Grimstone, circulated yesterday, announcing that we are opening trade negotiations with the Gulf Cooperation Council—in which we will not mention civil or political rights so as to avoid offence. This Government are willing to negotiate and compromise with the GCC but not with our democratic neighbours. Can the Minister explain how giving concessions to the Gulf autocracies avoids limiting UK sovereignty while Mr Rees-Mogg insists that any compromise with the EU infringes on UK sovereignty?

Last night, I wondered whether the Minister might revolt as he attempted to justify this irrational ideological waffle and follow the example of the noble Lord, Lord Agnew, by walking out of the Chamber and the Government mid-Statement. However, I fear that he has not yet reached that point, despite the nonsensical Statement that he is forced to defend.

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord True) (Con)]

My Lords, there has been a rather obsessive theme from the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, today, who seems excited at the prospect that I might walk out of the Government. I can absolutely disabuse him of his expectation of that prospect. Unless the Prime Minister decides otherwise, I shall be extremely content to remain here and take the Brexit freedoms Bill through your Lordships’ House.

Having listened to the noble Lord, on the sixth anniversary of the Brexit referendum, I am inclined to say that the Liberal Democrat Party does not know whether to laugh or cry. His sneering response tells me that the Liberal Democrats, like the Bourbons of Naples, have learned nothing and forgotten nothing in their desperation to keep the United Kingdom in line with the European Union’s orders.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I talked about what companies are saying to the Government, and that is about evidence. We are six years down the line from the Brexit referendum; by now we ought to be talking about what sort of relationship we have with the European Union.

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Lord has had one go, and I think I characterised his party’s position perfectly accurately. The party opposite gave a much more measured response and asked me some specific questions. He asked me one which I shall answer. Again, I am disappointed that, on this sixth anniversary, the Labour Party is still saying that it is not important, in effect, to examine these 2,400 elements of retained EU law, which have a status equal to United Kingdom Acts of Parliament. It is perfectly reasonable that those matters should be examined. My right honourable friend Mr Rees-Mogg made it very clear that it is not necessarily the expectation that all these will be swept away, as the noble Lord said. These matters will be looked at on their merits. Frankly, one of the examples that my right honourable friend gave in the other place was the power of vacuum cleaners. Perhaps if we had more powerful vacuum cleaners in this place, we would not have mice running around the place, gorging themselves on all the bits and pieces of crumbs that are left.

There is a serious issue here, despite what was said opposite. It is perfectly reasonable that departments examine the case for the continuation of this mass of regulations. This is the expectation of departments, in concert with interested parties. The noble Lord asked whether we had done consultation. We have engaged with a range of organisations with interest in retained EU law. We have worked closely with all departments, and their stakeholder groups through them across Whitehall. That engagement has included lawyers, academics, universities and other non-governmental organisations. More recently, it is well known that the Minister for Brexit Opportunities also issued a call to the British public, not I think through an organ widely read on the Benches opposite, on the regulations that they might wish to abolish—particularly focusing, as I think we should, on those that make life harder for small businesses, which shut out competition or simply increase the cost of operating. Through a large number of small changes, we can enact real economic change.

The noble Baroness asked about sunsetting, as she called it, and reports on that matter. The issue to which she referred is still subject to consideration of how the reforms will be carried forward in that respect. So far as the cost is concerned, I assure her that the dashboard was built by Cabinet Office officials using the Tableau software, and was created with no additional cost to Her Majesty’s Government.

As for the benefits, I give an undertaking to the noble Baroness on her perfectly reasonable and proper question that there will be an impact assessment published with the Brexit freedoms Bill when we bring it forward, and that will obviously be laid before your Lordships’ House.

Upholding Standards in Public Life

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 8th June 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I am at the disposal of your Lordships’ House but, as the noble Viscount will understand, matters on debates are for the usual channels. Should such a debate be scheduled, I will be happy to answer to your Lordships’ House, as always.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the Ministerial Code is clearly vital to maintaining trust between the Civil Service and Ministers. The November 2021 report cited a public opinion poll which suggested

“that 85% of the Senior Civil Service and 90% of Fast Streamers had no confidence in the regulation of the Ministerial Code”.

Does the Minister not think that suggests we have an underlying crisis in the relationship between the Civil Service and No. 10?

Border Checks on Imported Goods: New IT Systems

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 25th May 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, as my noble friend will know, consideration is being given to these matters. I will not tread into that in this particular answer, but I can assure him that elements of trust should certainly play a part in any wisely conducted border. That is why my right honourable friend Mr Rees-Mogg has set up a pilot project called Ecosystem of Trust—not my phrase—to work with the private sector. It is designed to prove the concept of trusted supply chains across the board, not simply in relation to Northern Ireland.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the Prime Minister promised two-and-a-half years ago to get Brexit done. It seems extremely inefficient that this key element of our future trading relationship with the European Union has to be postponed time and again. Does the Minister not think it is time that the Minister for Government Efficiency has some sharp words with the Minister for Brexit Opportunities?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I am sure that my right honourable friend is capable of almost any form of conversation. I repeat: this is not a delay. It is a deliberate decision to take a different approach and part of that decision is that the 2025 target is being brought forward, as I explained to your Lordships earlier.

Procurement Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

2nd reading
Wednesday 25th May 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

I will indeed write a letter. It is very helpful to have my noble friend write my speeches for me.

I will answer other points but, to conclude, I thank noble Lords for their extremely intelligent, thoughtful and well-considered remarks, which the Government will consider in Committee. Our proposals have been consulted on extensively and we believe that they are common sense, but we can always gain from listening to your Lordships. In that spirit, I hope that your Lordships will support these proposals as they progress through the House.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

I do not want to detain the House, but, since my noble friend Lord Strasburger made some serious points about a major contract, could the Minister possibly say that he will undertake to meet him and others to respond to some of the points he made?

[Lord True (Con)]

The noble Lord made a speech that went wide of the Bill. I will look at what he said in Hansard and respond thereafter. I make no commitment at this point.

Elections Bill

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

3rd reading
Monday 25th April 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

I thought it was. I thank those noble Lords for their constructive interest in and engagement with these measures. We have not always agreed—sometimes we have—but I have been grateful for their willingness to work with this side and our Bill team on these matters. As a result of this willingness to reach compromises around the House, the Bill leaves your Lordships’ House improved and strengthened.

On our Benches, I thank my noble friends Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, Lord Holmes of Richmond, Lord Hayward and Lady Noakes for their input, which has led to amendments that I also believe have enhanced the legislation. I am astonishingly grateful to my noble friend Lady Scott, who seems to step into every breach when I fall or, if you like, am not sufficient. She has such an impressive capacity to pick up the technical issues and work at pace, and I have been so grateful to her for her good humour and tireless work. It is much appreciated. I also thank my noble friend Lord Howe, who is not here, for stepping into the breach when I unfortunately had my lights punched out by a Covid headache and worse. I fell short then of a promise to all noble Lords that I would be here every hour of every debate. Of course, that could not be helped, but I assure your Lordships, as someone who likes to live up to his word, that it will be a source of annoyance when I look back on this.

Finally, we all want to go, but I cannot let anyone go—I know that people on all sides of the House understand this—without mentioning the extraordinary hard work of the Bill team and the policy officials behind the Bill, many of whom have worked for what may seem like half a lifetime to them on preparing it and putting it together. There are so many of them that it would be invidious to name them all, but many of your Lordships have had direct personal contact with them. They have been enormously professional, good humoured and patient—which you have to be if you work with me—and have lived up to the very highest standards of the UK Civil Service and the quality of public service that we all admire. So, my final thanks are to them.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, perhaps I may remark to my noble friend Lord Rennard and the noble Lord, Lord Hayward, that in the process of this Bill I have appreciated that it is possible to be quite astonishingly, nerdishly expert on the details of elections to the degree to which the two of them and one or two of our colleagues on the Labour Benches are. That goes far beyond my limited experience, having fought only five elections in my life. They really understand the details in all sorts of ways. I have done some of my electioneering in some of the more difficult parts of the United Kingdom.

I thank the many pro-democracy organisations that have helped and advised us and lobbied about the Bill as it has gone through: Best for Britain, Unlock Democracy, the Electoral Reform Society, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and the Democracy Defence Coalition. I particularly thank Elizabeth Plummer in our Whips’ Office, who has done superb work with others around the House to make sure that the amendments are there on time.

It is difficult to welcome this Bill. It came to the House accompanied by a number of very critical reports, including one from the constitutional affairs committee of the House of Commons, which said that the Bill in its current form was not fit for purpose. We have improved it a little—we now face ping-pong on some of those improvements—but it is still not entirely what is needed.

As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, said, rather powerfully, this is a constitutional Bill on which there was an absence of cross-party consultation or consensus on the fundamentals of our constitutional democracy—that is a worry. We will have to return to this. The next Parliament, whenever it comes, will have to undertake the job of simplifying and clarifying electoral law, which is what we should have been doing—and have failed to do—with this Bill. Perhaps there are some improvements, and there are certainly some necessary changes in this Bill. There are a number of other areas which we on these Benches bitterly regret and, for that, I can make only moderate thanks to the Minister and the Bill team for what has been achieved.

Civil Servants: Reduction of Numbers

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 24th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether the proposals set out by the Minister for Government Efficiency to reduce the number of civil servants by 65,000 will require either (1) a reduction in government functions, or (2) the increased use of outsourcing companies and consultants.

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord True) (Con)]

My Lords, there was a significant increase in the number of civil servants employed to manage the temporary requirements of Covid-19 and preparations for leaving the EU. Given that the spending review committed departments to reducing Civil Service numbers to pre-pandemic levels, work is under way to ensure that the functions are working as efficiently as possible, to reduce the use of consultants and to manage the use of outsourcing companies.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, does the Minister accept that it is a little surreal to have made Jacob Rees-Mogg Minister for Government Efficiency, and that his explicit view that civil servants are time wasters who do not work hard enough does not help morale in the Civil Service or, indeed, Civil Service efficiency? Does he recognise that one of the major areas of government waste over the last three or four years has been the excessive employment of outside consultants? Is there now also a target for a reduction in the use of outside consultants, who cost twice as much or more per head as civil servants?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I reject the first part of the question. I am absolutely delighted that my right honourable friend is bringing his insight to the Cabinet Office and I look forward to working with him. As far as consultants are concerned, yes, the Government are seeking to reduce consultancy spend. Central government and arm’s-length bodies spent approximately £1.5 billion on consultancy in 2021; that is why the consulting hub was set up last year to lead the consultancy reform programme. I can certainly assure the noble Lord and others that much attention will be given to that.

Elections Bill

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Lords Hansard - Part 1 & Committee stage
Wednesday 23rd March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, it has been a lengthy debate. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, that I have not presented any amendment. I am presenting to your Lordships’ House a Bill which has been passed by the elected House, and your Lordships are expressing opinions on it. It is certainly not the Government who have sought to Christmas-tree the Bill with a generalised debate on proportional representation. The actors in that are elsewhere than at the Dispatch Box.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the amendment which was introduced in the Commons and is now Clause 11 was a Christmas-tree addition to the Bill by the Government.

[Lord True (Con)]

I will come to that, my Lords. If the Committee will be indulgent, I think it has heard quite a lot of debate on this subject and I will try to come to the point. As I see it, this very lengthy debate boiled down to two things. First, do we like first past the post? Regrettably, a lot of your Lordships who spoke do not seem to like it, although, like the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, having fought a few elections myself, it seems pretty simple and clear for electors to stick a cross on a piece of paper and get a result. The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, was not impressed by that, but the simplicity and clarity of first past the post has a lot to say for it. The second issue in the debate was: should we do this now, in this Bill and in these particular elections? I shall seek to address both of them.

It is irresistible to contemplate the thought of the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, poring over his opinion polls about how popular PR is. I remind him that, before the referendum in 2011—you can look it up on Wikipedia if you like—the opinion polls said how rapturously enthusiastic the majority of the British public were about PR. When the actual argument came along and it was put, they voted for first past the post by—I cannot remember the figure, but I think the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, said it was 68%. I would not advise the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, to put too much faith in his opinion polls, although it is a characteristic of that party.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I am speaking to what is before the Committee at the moment. As far as the Scottish and Welsh elections are concerned, the noble Lord knows very well that there is devolution, which this Government respect.

I will respond to what the noble Lord said about the London Assembly. It involves rather more complex issues in terms of the Assembly’s potential make-up. We will be considering further how these principles could be applied to the London Assembly and perhaps promoting the use of first past the post, but we are open to representations on how that could be implemented. For the moment, the proposition is on these specific elections, against the background I have described: the Government committed to first past the post, the Elections Bill and the evidence of problems in 2021.

I turn to the broader amendments—which I must because they are before the Committee—from the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb. It is always the less popular parties which clamour for PR. They want to introduce a new clause abolishing the use of first past the post at parliamentary general elections held more than six months after the passage of the Bill. For the reasons I have already discussed, we cannot accept that. First past the post ensures a clear link between elected representatives and constituents in a manner that other voting systems do not. The noble Lord, Lord Murphy, was compelling on that point.

The new clause proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, is not clear even on what sort of electoral system he wants to introduce—that is the most bizarre thing about the amendment that he is asking your Lordships to agree with. He wants to get rid of the present system within two years, but he does not say what would happen if an election came along before that or in the period where there was uncertainty because a new system would require further primary legislation to enact it. There is a real risk, if we went down the road proposed by the noble Lord, that we might not have an established legal method as to how Members of the other place were elected. To be confronted with this question mark of an amendment when the Government are charged with being frivolous—I think the proponents of this amendment are frivolous. All we know from the noble Lord’s amendment is that he wants a system that would have had, over the past five parliamentary general elections, a mean average Gallagher proportionality index of less than 10—that will get them jumping around in the pubs in Saltaire and Moulsecoomb, I am sure.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

I am sure that the Minister knows that this is copied from the SNP amendment in the Commons. One may talk about umpteen different proportional systems—and no electoral system is perfect, of course—but there is a choice to be made, putting it simply, between the Irish and the Scottish and Welsh systems. I prefer the Irish, but I think it would be appropriate to have some consultation among parties before a decision was finally taken. The point that a number of us have been making throughout the Bill is that, on constitutional matters such as this, it would be appropriate to aim for some consensus among the parties, rather than have each party—as in our aggressive two-party system—changing the rules to favour itself.

[Lord True (Con)]

The noble Lord has completely failed to answer the core question. He has thought about this amendment and tabled it, it is here on the list and in it he says:

“The simple majority system must not be used for any Parliamentary general election after the end of the period of six months beginning on the day on which this Act is passed.”


Who knows when the end of the Session will be, but let us say that this Act is fortunate enough to get on to the statute book, that means that for any election in 2023 or 2024, we would not be allowed to use first past the post—if your Lordships agreed to the amendment that the Liberal Democrats have put before the Committee, supported by the Green group—but would have to flounder around to find some other system, which the noble Lord will not specify, which would have a mean average Gallagher proportionality index of less than 10.

I am accused—the Government are accused—of coming to this Dispatch Box arguing for first past the post, which people understand, while the people on the other side come forward with a kind of canard of nonsense, such as in the noble Lord’s amendment. We are also asked for citizens’ assemblies, but I can only repeat what the noble Lord, Lord Grocott said, with much greater eloquence than mine, that we did have a big citizens’ assembly of nearly 20 million people who decided this in 2011.

I am not convinced by the arguments that I have heard on proportional representation; I do not believe that this is the appropriate Bill in which to try to change our system from first past the post within six months, as is proposed. But, returning to the core of the question, I do believe that it is reasonable to have a simpler system than the system that proved so confusing and led to so many wasted votes in the London elections and that we should go for first past the post, as the Government have maintained very clearly. I ask the House to reject the amendments that have been tabled.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I fear I cannot accept these amendments, although, having been mildly disobliging on the previous group about those against first past the post, I will open with an area of agreement. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, my noble friend Lord Lexden and the party opposite that we must do more—as much as we can—to engage young people in civic education and understanding what it is to be a future citizen. We are also having other discussions on trying, we hope, to persuade more young people to vote. There is strong agreement there.

We cannot accept these amendments because the Government, having reflected on the matter, simply do not believe that a reduction to 16 is the correct course. My noble friend Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts made a very strong speech on this. There are many difficult questions, as the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, said, about what constitutes full adulthood, which society has to wrestle with. We think, in common with most countries in the world—although not, I acknowledge, the devolved Administrations in Scotland and Wales—that the current position is correct.

We made that very clear to the electorate; we were not trying to hide it, because it was and is a subject of discussion between the parties. We have been criticised for our manifesto not being clear, but it was absolutely clear on this point:

“We will maintain the voting age at 18—the age at which one gains full citizenship.”


That was very explicitly stated. You may not agree with that, but it is the position. I hope the Committee will respect that. Eighteen is widely recognised in the vast majority of democratic countries as the right age at which to enfranchise young people.

There are difficulties. For example, the very radical proposal by the Liberal Democrats to legalise cannabis was not for people below 18 because they were not mature before that age. In 2010, the party opposite raised the age for using sunbeds to 18. Other examples have been given on some more fundamental and difficult questions of peace and war. With respect to the arguments I have heard, the Government believe that the settled, present position is correct, in common with most other democratic countries.

My noble friend Lord Holmes of Richmond’s amendment seeks to lower the voting age to 16 and 17 year-olds by linking the franchise to taxation. I fear I must disappoint him; taxation has never been the basis of democratic representation in this country. For example, an American citizen of voting age who works and pays taxes in the United Kingdom does not have the right to vote in parliamentary elections simply by virtue of tax. However, a British citizen of voting age who pays no income tax, such as a student, rightly retains the right to vote, as do those earning less than the tax-free allowance. In council tax there is a class S exemption—I think it is called that; it was in my day—for households of 16 and 17 year-olds precisely so that they should not pay council tax. The mixing of taxation and voting rights raises difficult problems. It would also potentially disfranchise people who could, for a range of reasons, be unable to work or find work or who may be working but not earning enough to pay taxes.

With respect to those who have a different opinion, the Government have reflected on this. Engagement is important; I was very proud when I was leader of a local authority—I know many other local authorities do the same—of the UK Youth Parliament and youth engagement through schools. I have similar recollections to the noble Lord opposite. These things are important. Let us work together across parties to try to do that, but I cannot recommend that the House adopts this principle in the Bill. I forecast to the Committee that, if it were proposed, because it was a manifesto commitment by the Government to maintain the present position, it would not find favour in the other place. I therefore ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, in withdrawing this amendment, I point out that, if we are saying that there is a problem—which the Minister has admitted, but has said that this is not the answer—then the question of how we manage to get more young people on the register, which we will come to on automatic voter registration, is important. The very near collapse of citizenship education in our state schools is an urgent matter, which we should all address on a cross-party basis. I look forward to the Minister returning to that. I hope he will take back to his colleagues in the Department for Education how important many of us feel this to be.

I merely remark to the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, that the extensive coverage in this Bill of the extension of overseas voting is there because Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, Conservatives Abroad and the Conservative Party’s international office decided that this would be to the Conservatives’ advantage. Surveys in the mid-2000s suggested that 68% of those voting overseas were voting for the Conservative Party. I was suggesting earlier that a little bit of balance and cross-party agreement on how one extends the electorate might be desirable. Sadly, I do not think this Government are in the mood for that. That is one of the many things I regret about the way this Bill has been introduced and is being handled. I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Constitutional Reform

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Monday 21st March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

It is certainly a secret ballot. The noble Lord is well known in the House for his assiduous pressing of this point—he almost qualifies as the elder Cato on Carthage—but the system remains enacted by Parliament, and it will remain until Parliament decides otherwise.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, could the Minister tell us who is responsible as Minister for the Constitution? I looked it up this morning on the government website, and it said that Chloe Smith had been the Minister for the Constitution in 2020-21 but gave no successor. She was responsible to a Cabinet Minister, Michael Gove, who was then the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. He is now, in whatever his department is called, also Minister for Intergovernmental Relations, and one of his junior Ministers, Kemi Badenoch, is handling the Elections Bill in the Commons, but I cannot quite see who is in charge of the constitution. Perhaps it is the noble Lord, Lord True, himself—in which case, I congratulate him. If so, to which Cabinet Minister does he think he is responsible for discussions and policy on constitutional matters?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, so far as the elements of constitutional policy that remain within the Cabinet Office, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster is the responsible Cabinet Minister—and, yes, I report to him as Minister of State. Other aspects of the constitutional brief—for example, policy in relation to the union, elections and local government—lie with my right honourable friend Mr Michael Gove and DLUHC.

Elections Bill

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Lords Hansard - Part 2 & Committee stage
Monday 21st March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

Yes, I had better write at this hour. I had it somewhere, but I have lost it in the folder. I will certainly write to the noble Lord. I tried to answer the question. If I have not, I will write; sorry.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I think it is the sense of quite a few of us that it might be wiser to remove the phrase “causing spiritual injury to” because that is, I think, the most difficult element of it. I think most of us would understand

“placing undue spiritual pressure on”.

I respectfully suggest that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, might be a useful person to consult on this. Some of us may remember the occasion when, as Lord Chancellor, he attended a requiem mass for a Catholic judge in Glasgow and was threatened with exclusion from his own church, very clearly threatening to use spiritual pressure. He has presumably thought all of this through extremely well.

I thank the Minister for explaining the efforts that have gone into defining “undue influence” rather better. I still feel that we are looking at something which we all know is there but we are not at all sure that the police, let alone the Crown Prosecution Service, are going to want to take on very much. This is an area involving the boundaries between campaigning, free speech, improper behaviour and downright offences which we will probably have to live with, unsatisfactorily, because that is part of the nature of democracy.

Elections Bill

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Lords Hansard - Part 1 & Committee stage
Thursday 17th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

All those bodies in the current list in Section 88(2) of PPERA are carved out, whatever their description. We will come on to the concerns raised about what is in Clause 25, but I repeat that assurance. In saying that, I understand some of the suspicions and concerns raised by noble Lords.

I do not wish to be adversarial in any way, but the other thing I would say in starting is this. As I have said several times in these discussions, I agree that, one day, ideally, a consolidation Bill would be highly desirable. I fully accept that. There are issues here that are relatively urgent, whether we are agree or not: for example, around foreign money, digital campaigning and so on and so forth. The Government are seeking to make progress on those, but it is not a zero-sum game. In presenting this legislation—by the way, as a Minister who has himself had to try to get his mind round all the various references and cross-references in the Bill—I am not in any way saying that a consolidation Bill, one day, is not a desirable end. Anybody involved in the political world would agree.

Clause 25 is really what this debate is about. The potential problems and suspicions—raised, for example, by the noble Viscount—arise from the perceived view of Clause 25 that has been expressed in this debate. Perhaps I could deal with the first part, which is about potentially adding new categories. We are conscious that, as the world evolves, new legitimate categories of third parties that are not currently on the list might emerge. Because they are not protected by the carve-out in Section 88(2), they might be significantly restricted in their ability to campaign by this provision if they could not be added to the list quickly. That is why Clause 25 makes provision for the amendment of the list of eligible categories of third-party campaigns in PPERA, to add a new category of campaigner that might emerge. That would allow any Government, not just this Government, to amend the list to enable new groups or styles of campaigners to take part. Parliament would have a lock on that, via the affirmative resolution procedure.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

I simply wish to congratulate the Minister on following so very clearly the precautionary principle in legislating here for something that has not yet happened and might happen, because it would be useful to have this in place if it did happen. That is what I understand him to be saying.

[Lord True (Con)]

I am saying that there is a practical possibility that this might arise. I take it that, however expressed, that was assent from those Benches, and I am grateful for that.

These provisions will ensure that we can be responsive to the emergence of new categories of third parties, or changes to the legal description of existing categories of third parties—there is some legal language in Section 88(2) —so that they are not unduly restricted from campaigning and participating in our democracy in the future. That is added with a parliamentary lock.

I am grateful for the engagement on the points we come to next; I have heard the concerns of the Liberal Democrat and other Benches, most notably, as we heard again in the debate today, from the party opposite. I thank all who have spoken to me on this subject, and the noble Lord, Lord Collins of Highbury, for the points he made on Clause 25 regarding the power to remove—the specific subject of his amendment—or vary the list.

I hope that part of making progress on a Bill is making progress, but it is the person at the Dispatch Box who has the responsibility to listen—my job as a Minister. I hope we can go forward with that in mind.

The Government have listened to the concerns raised. I pay great respect to the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee’s recent report on the subject of Ministers having the power to remove entries from the list of eligible categories of third-party campaigners in Section 88(2). That is why I asked my officials to meet, as the noble Lord said, with the TUC and TULO on 7 March to discuss their concerns.

Although powers to update lists in legislation are not unusual—and indeed can be important where, either due to changes in legal definitions or oversight, Governments may need to respond quickly—we acknowledge the concerns that have been expressed. The Government have heard the concerns around whether the power in Clause 25 could be abused by a future Government. I reassure the noble Lord and others who have spoken that before the next stage of the Bill I intend to consider at the very least what further safeguards could be added to the clause, along the lines of, for example, Amendments 42 and 45 from the noble Lord, relating to the role of the Electoral Commission. I have heard the force of opinion in the Committee on these provisions.

Elections Bill

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Lords Hansard - Part 1 & Committee stage
Tuesday 15th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I am often grateful I was never an election agent. I fought five elections and was once approached and asked if I would work as an agent for an early election. I am eternally grateful that I did not accept, because I did not begin to understand the complications and responsibilities of the task then. I have learned some of them since, but life has got a great deal more complicated over the last 50 or 60 years as the technology of elections and the power of the national parties, compared with the local parties, have shifted quite radically.

When I read this clause, I was struck by the word “only”, which appears repeatedly. That was the word I wanted to challenge. For example, it says that

“facilities are made use of on behalf of a candidate only if their use on behalf of the candidate is directed”.

Why does “only” keep recurring in various different contexts? It is clearly intended to weaken the possibility that the candidate could, in any way, be regarded as responsible. That worries me. Any good lawyer would be able to unpick the candidate being responsible under most circumstances for what the national party had done within his or her constituency. We well know, from the case to which this clause relates, that the national parties as a whole have come to engage in specific constituencies to target them and to spend a great deal of money from the national level in them. I suspect that candidates are always aware of this, but they may not always have wished to encourage it.

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful for this short debate. I will not enter into the discussions of election experiences, but I certainly agree with the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, that it is not always easy to find election agents. Anyone who has been involved in politics is mindful of the difficulties which sometimes arise in the course of elections.

What we are seeking to do in Clause 18—I will come on to “encouraged”, which has been suggested goes in the opposite direction—is to clarify the law on notional expenditure. A debate on Clause 18 stand part will follow this debate and it is probably the appropriate place for this. It makes it clear that candidates need to report only benefits in kind: property, goods, services and facilities provided for the use or benefit of a candidate at a discount or free which the candidate has used or which the candidate or their election agent has directed, authorised or encouraged someone else to use on their behalf.

This brings me to the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Collins. I say to the noble and right reverend Lord that I do not think that he is suggesting that the Secretary of State should draft regulations. I accept that this is a probing amendment; it is not a proposition that the Government have put on the Marshalled List. The noble Lord is seeking clarification of the term “encouraged”. The wording in the Bill was chosen to cover as many scenarios as possible and to capture circumstances where the candidate or their agent encouraged a particular use of property, goods, services or facilities, without going as far as directing it or specifically authorising its use. There is an area of uncertainty here, as he acknowledged. However, if only formal authorisation is required, the risk is that the candidate could encourage someone to use a benefit in kind without having to not report it as they did not give authorisation for it to be used. Requiring further regulations to define this term would risk reducing the breadth of the scope of these new rules on notional expenditure and opening up potential loopholes that we are seeking to address. The language in this clause has been crafted to strike a balance between the status quo, where no form of authorisation is required, which has generated understandable concerns from candidates and agents, and the overly blunt alternative of formal authorisation, which could risk being circumvented in practice, as the noble Lord suggested.

This clarification of the law on notional spending is vital to ensure that candidates should not fear being responsible for benefits in kind of which they had no knowledge. I think we would agree with that; the Explanatory Notes say that. Encouragement in the context in which we understand it and in this Bill must be a positive act. It is not intended to capture situations where a candidate did not have knowledge of someone using a benefit in kind on their behalf.

As I said at the outset, as an experienced campaigner I acknowledge that it is not always easy readily to apply the rules on election spending practically to the day-to-day reality of a campaign. We will discuss guidance in greater detail later today, but I assure the Committee that we intend that the Electoral Commission will produce guidance for campaigners to help them understand specifically these concepts and to apply and comply with the rules on notional spending in so doing. In the past, the commission has made good use of illustrative examples to aid campaigners. Further to this, we are broadening the scope of the statutory codes of practice on election spending that can be prepared by the commission to ensure that the codes include guidance on notional spending.

Some Members of the Committee asked for some specific comments on legal meanings or for further detail on “encouraged”. We expect that this guidance and the codes of practice will come forward from not the Secretary of State but the Electoral Commission. I understand where the noble Lord is coming from and will reflect on what has been said, and if I can I will put further clarification to him in writing and submit it to the House before Report, because I appreciate the direction he is coming from.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I in no way suggested that. I merely remarked that the question of where the largest donation to the Brexit campaign came from has not been explained, which is entirely different. I trust that the Minister is also concerned about that, rather than making jokes about it.

[Lord True (Con)]

I made no joke. I drew attention to the noble Lord’s remarks, and they will stand on the record. So far as this matter is concerned—and I have heard the cascade of innuendo ending with the remark that Ministers can be bought, which will also lie in Hansard—I move on to a serious response to a serious—

[Lord True (Con)]

I stand by the remarks I made in response to comments from the Front Bench of the Liberal Democrat party. I would like to—

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I do not know whether the noble Lord reads the Sunday Times—perhaps he only reads the Sunday Telegraph—but the Sunday Times in the last two weeks has included a good deal of evidence on the role of the donors, access to Ministers and what one of the Conservative Party’s largest donors has called “access capitalism”. Perhaps he has missed all that.

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I was working on my allotment on Sunday morning. I will come to the point that was raised by the noble Lord opposite, which I take extremely seriously. It is a probing amendment but an important subject. I have discussed it with the noble Baroness and the noble Lord. I look forward also to engaging in discussions when we come to her amendments, which are on an analogous subject.

What the noble Lord suggests is, obviously, on the face of it, a good idea: that the commission should reject the application of a political party if its declaration of assets and liabilities demonstrates assets designated under the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018. I absolutely recognise the importance of that regime, although a debate on its intricacies does not fall within the scope of this Bill. I do not make any complaints about that, however, and I am happy to address it because of the gravity and importance of the issue.

On the specific point the noble Lord raises—I will be brief—sanctions law is incredibly clear: all individuals and legal entities who are within, or undertake activities within, the United Kingdom’s territory must comply with UK financial sanctions that are in force. This includes not only political parties but candidates and other types of campaigners listed in the relevant areas of the legislation. Where a person or entity is designated as subject to financial sanctions, the nature of the resulting restrictions means that the person’s assets are frozen and consequently that person would be prohibited from using those assets for any purpose. This would include the funding of a political party.

While the Government entirely agree with the principle that sanctioned assets should not be used for the benefit of anyone—including prospective political parties, which we are discussing specifically on this amendment— we believe that the current sanctioning regime already provides for this and we remain to be convinced that an additional provision is required in this Bill. I am sympathetic to the noble Lord’s intentions here. I believe that his point is already acknowledged but, in the light of the importance of the matter that he has raised, I will make doubly sure that that is the case. With that assurance, I hope he feels able to withdraw his amendment. I am ready to discuss the matter with him further, as we have already engaged.

Elections Bill

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Lords Hansard - Part 2 & Committee stage
Tuesday 15th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

I would have to be advised on that matter. I understand where the noble Lord is coming from, because I agree that it is hard to believe that a group would want to proceed in that way. I shall share with the Committee what information is available on this.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

We on these Benches are totally unaware of this organisation, but I am glad to hear that it was staffed by Liberal Democrats. I am sure the Minister would expect it to be a dastardly Liberal Democrat plot, but I am completely unaware of it. Could his private office provide us with some information and background—there must be some—to inform us of the case, how serious it was and how it was dealt with? It somehow did not hit the Sunday Times on my Sunday morning, just before I got to my allotment.

[Lord True (Con)]

The noble Lord will be taken to task for not reading the Observer if he keeps coming out with his Sunday morning reading. I was not there and the Government were not there but, looking at the empirical record, we believe that this was a prima facie case. I can report only what information I have: that it was staffed by former Liberal Democrats and operated in five target Liberal Democrat constituencies, but I accept the noble Lord’s assurance that he knew nothing about it.

The clause that we have put in the Bill will prohibit recognised third-party campaigners registering as political parties and gaining access to a spending limit for each registration. The list of individuals and entities permitted to be on the third-party campaigner register will also be amended to remove political parties.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

The Minister referred to the established 12-month period. I was not aware of it as an established principle. Perhaps now or in a letter, the Minister will tell us when it was established, how long it has been in effect and how it has been tried and tested, since he is so good at telling us that.

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I will stand corrected if it is not the case, but the principle of a 12-month regulatory period has been in place for more than 20 years. That is the advice I have and if I am wrong, I will gladly correct that; no doubt my noble friend behind me will correct me very fast.

The closely related Amendment 33A seeks to create an exemption from expenditure rules for third-party exempt campaigners where they could not reasonably be expected to be aware that they were campaigning during a regulated election period. One understands the arguments that were put, but regulated periods have been in place for years. Third parties engaging in election campaigning should be aware of the rules and of the existence of regulated periods. However, the Electoral Commission has produced extensive guidance to help third parties understand the rules. It states:

“Most campaign activity undertaken before an election is announced is unlikely to meet the purpose test”.


It is an important test that is specifically intended to protect civil society, because

“you are unlikely to be reasonably regarded as intending to influence people to vote in an election when you do not know or expect that the election is happening.”

I have heard arguments around the corner of that, but the basic principle of the purpose test is there, and therefore the Government do not accept the idea that regulated periods for third parties are overly burdensome. It is important that spending is regulated and transparent and it is right that spending that promotes a political party in the lead-up to an election is regulated, whether that is undertaken by the party itself or by a third-party campaigner. Therefore, with great respect, I fear that I cannot accept my noble friend’s amendment and ask him to withdraw it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, may I ask the Minister a question? I do not entirely understand this clause and the unincorporated association element is the least clear to me. I googled “unincorporated association” this morning and came away more confused than when I started. I think we would all be very grateful if the Minister’s office could circulate a letter explaining why this is there, what sort of organisations they have in mind, whether there is a history or problems with unincorporated associations and, if so, what they were, so that we have some idea of why this is necessary. I get a sense from others who have spoken that we are puzzled by where this clause is coming from, why it is there and what it is intended to do.

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I have to confess that I irritate my wonderful team in the Box when I say—and this of course plays straight into the attack—why is this not a consolidation Act? Of course, in the great scheme of things, consolidation Acts on all sorts of things would be wonderful. As I have said, this is intended to be a reforming Act dealing with some matters which are relatively urgent, but I agree that the way that it operates is relatively opaque and I understand why noble Lords have asked these questions.

Like others, I am not going to stray into Clause 25, although I realise there is an interrelation between the two. I know from the engagement I have had with colleagues on all Benches that Clause 25 is an issue which the House wants to consider in some detail, and I am fully ready for that. If the House will forgive me, I will not go into that except in so far as it deals with this matter.

Clause 24 is intended to do something that we would all like to do, which is to ensure that campaign spending comes only from UK-based or otherwise eligible sources. The clause is intended to address some of the concerns raised by the DCMS Select Committee in the other place in a 2019 report on disinformation—so-called fake news and foreign interference in UK elections.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

I am sorry to be obtuse. I do not entirely understand Clause 24(7), which defines the requisite UK connection of an unincorporated association. I think I understand it as meaning that there must be at least two people associated with it who, while they and anyone else in the unincorporated association may be living overseas, are at least on the register. Is it therefore envisaged that we will have more unincorporated associations which are based overseas but campaigning in Britain?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, it is required to have a UK connection. I will write to noble Lords to explain that clearly. In the two days that I have been listening in Committee, your Lordships have rightly—sometimes gently, sometimes aggressively—asked the Government to deal with foreign intervention. That is what this clause is intended to bear down on. We can have further discussion on the meaning of subsection (7) and I will undertake to write on that but I hope that, with those assurances—

Lobbying of Ministers

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 1st March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

I would indeed; I am quite old fashioned and I greatly respect the trade union tradition. I also respect the freedom of politicians such as Mr Ed Davey, who became a lobbyist immediately after losing his ministerial job in 2015.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the Sunday Times two weeks ago told us a lot about the donors board, which has unpublished, unremarked, unrecorded meetings with the Prime Minister and other senior Members, some of whom clearly have actively lobbied for their own interests, while some have received public contracts. If we are committed to transparency, can we not be assured that such meetings will be properly recorded and details of those who attend published afterwards?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, once again, I take note of what the noble Lord says. In the system that we have in this country, ministerial meetings are noted by officials; as we established earlier in this exchange and as my noble friend Lord Lansley said, data is regularly published thanks to his legislation.

Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Report stage
Wednesday 9th February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

I am sure the Minister is aware that the House of Commons spent less than two hours in Committee, on Report and on the final stages of this Bill—so to say that it gave it considerable attention would I think be a slight exaggeration.

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, your Lordships are required to deal with the Bills that are sent to us by the other place, and the other place has sent us a Bill with no such provision. Members of your Lordships’ House under the chairmanship of my noble friend Lord McLoughlin on the Joint Committee, which reflected at length on these matters, did not propose such an amendment. None of those who have scrutinised the legislation formally have proposed what the noble and learned Lord has suggested.

The noble and learned Lord said that we could not return to an ancient system. There is perhaps a faint irony in advancing that argument in an unelected House with a tradition that dates back centuries. He said that we had to be 21st century. Well, we tried “21st century” in 2011 and, frankly, I rather prefer the experience of many decades in the long past which I believe served us well, and the proposition before your Lordships, supported by my party and the party opposite at the general election, was that we should do away with the failed 21st-century experiment.

We do not have to talk the talk about the problems that a Commons vote might cause. There has been a lot of speculation, to and fro, on this, but we lived it in 2017 to 2019; that Parliament refused three times to be dissolved and to meet the verdict of the people.

The repeal of the Fixed-term Parliaments Act was in our manifesto and that of the party opposite. I found it fascinating to hear the throaty roar of approval from the Benches opposite when any noble Lord, starting with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, said that we must not go back to the situation before the Act was passed. I remind the party opposite, as did my noble friend, of the Labour Party’s promise to the people:

“A Labour government will repeal the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011, which has stifled democracy and propped up weak governments”.


They wish to maintain an essential part of that Act in the form of a Commons vote.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, for his thoughts on the Cabinet Manual. It is important. I am pleased to say that, of course, the Government agree on the fundamental importance of the Cabinet Manual, and I can confirm to the House, as I have indicated privately to the noble Lord, that the Government intend to publish an updated version of the Cabinet Manual within this Parliament. In response to the noble Baroness opposite, I can also add that I have written to the newly appointed chair of the Constitution Committee, the noble Baroness, Lady Drake, to set out the Government’s intentions on this topic.

There have been a number of developments that render the current version out of date, not least—if we ever get to the end of it—this legislation going through now, which will have to be taken into account. As a result, this amendment, which would prevent the Bill coming into force until after a revised version of the Cabinet Manual has been published, is not needed and would be unhelpful. It would delay the commencement of legislation, which, one would infer, our Parliament will pass shortly, and we would be left carrying on under the terms of the Fixed-term Parliaments Act. I hope, for that technical reason, but also on the basis of the assurance that I have given the House, that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

I thank the Minister for repeating that statement. I stress that the revision of the manual should ideally come well before the timing of the next election, and I strongly support the opposition suggestion that there should be a debate, ideally in both Houses, on the conventions that will have been restated. On that basis, I am happy to beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Ministerial Code

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 27th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, as I said in my original Answer, Ministers are personally responsible for deciding how to act and conduct themselves in the light of the code, and for justifying their actions and conduct to Parliament and the public. I refer the noble Lord opposite to the statement that my noble friend Lord Goldsmith put out yesterday, in which he said:

“I did not authorise & do not support anything that would have put animals’ lives ahead of people’s … I never discussed the … charity or their efforts to evacuate animals with the”


Prime Minister.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, did the Minister by any chance see the strapline comment by Guido Fawkes over the video of the noble Lord, Lord Agnew, leaving the Chamber, which read, “We have now reached the point where Ministers have to explain which scandal of the Government’s they are resigning over”? We have another scandal here—an apparent contradiction between what one Minister has said and what it appears from the official record—which needs to be cleared up. We have a Ministerial Code which is effectively policed by a Prime Minister who has now lost public trust. Could not the Government begin to regain public trust by accepting recommendations from the Committee on Standards in Public Life that the Ministerial Code should be placed on a firmer statutory basis?

[Lord True (Con)]

The noble Lord started off with “scandal” and retreated to “apparent contradiction”. I would advise him and others to refer both to the statement put out by my noble friend Lord Goldsmith and the official statements put out by No. 10 Downing Street and the Defence Secretary at the Foreign Affairs Select Committee yesterday.

Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Committee stage
Tuesday 25th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, has frequently looked forward to that fabled day when the Liberal Democrats will again have, as he sees it, a balance of power in government. Perhaps a manual could be published on what would be the likely behaviour of the Liberal Democrats in the event they had such constitutional authority.

Jokes apart, I am grateful to the noble Lord for raising these points. They are two fundamentally important documents, which, as my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth and the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, pointed out, are government documents. We published a Dissolution Principles document because we are aware that principles can operate effectively only when they are commonly understood and, yes, when there is tacit agreement that they should be respected, irrespective of the particular political challenges and circumstances of the day. There has been substantial discussion and scrutiny of the principles, including by the Joint Committee chaired by my noble friend Lord McLoughlin, by PACAC in the other place, and in dialogue back and forth.

As others have said, Amendment 10 proposes that there should be a process for Parliament to scrutinise a restatement of the principles in the form of a vote in both Houses, which has the difficulties that my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth and others referred to. The Government have reservations that this would be a step towards a codification of principles and conventions, just as we saw that the 2011 Act, which we have discussed, was not necessarily helpful because of the need for flexibility. In fact, Lord Sumption recognised in principle the challenges of codification when he gave evidence to the Joint Committee. He argued:

“One should be careful not to start codifying conventions, because their practical value is that they represent experience and practice … what is required to make Parliament work is not necessarily the same today as it was half a century ago.”


That will be so in the future. The Government believe that a careful balance needs to be struck between ensuring that there is a tacit agreement that these principles should be upheld—I acknowledge the duty to be mindful of the views of people inside and outside politics—and leaving space for these conventions to move in line with the political context.

In practical terms, on this and the next amendment, the Government would be concerned that this amendment means that the provisions of the Bill would only come into effect once both Houses had considered and voted on a Dissolutions principle. That risks creating uncertainty around the coming into force of the Act and, therefore, the arrangements for calling any election, which we have all agreed today should be avoided.

The same applies to Amendment 11. As noble Lords have emphasised throughout the debates today, constitutional conventions have a vital role to play in our parliamentary democracy. I am conscious that the separate tradition of the Liberal Democrats, which I respect, is that they wish more and more to be written down. The Cabinet Manual, alongside other authoritative texts such as Erskine May, is an important point of reference and reflection for how conventions are understood—but iterations enable evolution.

The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, is quite right to say that it will be necessary to revisit these sections of the Cabinet Manual once the 2011 Act is repealed. The Cabinet Manual recognises that conventions continue to evolve, and the Government will in due course respond to the report of the Constitution Committee and set out their intentions with regard to updating the Cabinet Manual. We are grateful to the committee for its considered review of the manual and its thoughtful identification of the key issues that ought to be considered in terms of any update. I am acutely aware that the Government’s response is long overdue, and I have humbly apologised for this to the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor. We are carefully considering those recommendations and will respond in due course.

To continue on the amendment, the Government agree that the Cabinet Manual should be an accurate reflection of our constitutional arrangements, but we are of the view that this amendment for a parliamentary vote is unnecessarily restrictive, for the reasons given by my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth and others. But the Government are particularly concerned that the provisions of the Bill would only come into force once a revised version of the Cabinet Manual has been published. Such an undertaking would necessarily require a considerable amount of work. Tying the provisions of the Bill to such a project risks creating uncertainty, which, again, we wish to avoid.

Both these amendments would run the risk of fixing our understanding of these conventions at a point in time—that is point one—undermining the flexibility that is essential to our constitutional arrangements. On the matter of the Cabinet Manual, I urge the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment, which would add complications because of the Catch-22 situation: the Cabinet Manual draws its authority from its ability to accurately reflect our arrangements, but we have not yet determined in Parliament what the successor arrangements to FTPA should be.

While obviously accepting the importance of both the principles and the manual as well as their relevance across party, beyond party and beyond this Parliament, I hope that the noble Lord will be content to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the question really is: where are these documents and when are they going to be published? There were some very critical comments from various committees of both Houses, including the Joint Committee, about the lack of quality in what is currently provided in the Dissolution Principles and about the outdatedness of the Cabinet Manual, particularly the part of it that deals with Government formation.

There may be an overall majority for one party at the next election, which would be easier, but we need to future-proof the Bill as we take it through and to prepare for other eventualities. The Joint Committee marks that we are more likely to have non-majoritarian outcomes from elections in the coming years than we have had in the last 50. Perhaps the Minister will be prepared to talk between now and Report about being able to provide some statement on Report about a rather more definite timespan than “in due course”, which, as we know, means “kicked into the long grass for the next year or two”.

We need to have, as far as we can, some shared assumptions, some cross-party agreement, about these crucial conventions in our constitution. That requires trust. Trust is currently in very short supply; trust in this Government and this Prime Minister, if the opinion polls are correct, is currently going through the floor. Where trust is lacking, one needs written rules. Where written rules are challenged, we end up requiring statute. Yes, we would perhaps prefer the flexibility of shared assumptions, but in that case we need to talk about what they are and make sure that we all share similar assumptions, before we slide into a situation that could be another critical outcome or contested set of procedures around the next election.

I look forward to talking further with the Minister, and I may or may not wish to bring these amendments back in some form on Report. For the moment, I am happy to beg leave to withdraw the amendment, and I wish all your Lordships a very pleasant evening.

House of Lords: Appointments

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Monday 24th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, pending any further constructive and radical reform of the House, can the Government not at least agree that the appointments body should become a statutory body and that a set of principles, comparable to the Dissolution principles we will discuss tomorrow, could be drawn up by the Government in co-operation with all other parties represented in the House of Commons to form the basis for a common understanding of the principles by which appointments to this House should be made?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the House of Lords Appointments Commission performs an important role but, as I have told the House before, there are no current plans to alter its remit. Following the opening Question from the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, one thing I think we could agree on is that the Liberal Democrats are at least very well represented in this House—I do not use the term “overrepresented”, preferred by my noble friend behind me.

Downing Street Christmas Parties

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 9th December 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I reject the characterisation of both my right honourable friend the Prime Minister and the many people who work in No. 10 Downing Street and elsewhere, whether political employees, political figures or civil servants. Whatever emerges from the findings of these alleged events, I think it is quite wrong to extrapolate from that to besmirch a whole class of people who are seeking to do their very best for this country.

So far as the facts are concerned, as I have said, the Cabinet Secretary will investigate. As the noble Baroness said, matters relating to adherence to the law are properly for the police to investigate, and the Cabinet Office will liaise with them as appropriate.

I believe it is best that we should now wait for the findings of this inquiry, which the Prime Minister has directed should be produced as soon as possible.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I am sure the Minister is aware that the morning newspapers and the other blogs that many of us have read now list a good deal more than three parties as having broken the rules at that time. Do we have a guarantee that the findings will be published in full when they come out?

I turn to what I think is the most important thing for all of us now. Public trust and public confidence in the rules to beat this pandemic have clearly been very badly damaged and need to be re-established, particularly as the new variant is sweeping through the country. How do the Government plan to ensure that public confidence and trust in the rules can be rebuilt? Are the Government providing a strategy on that? Do they think, for example, that, in the current circumstances, the Prime Minister is the best person to lead that, or that perhaps another Minister might be more capable of commanding public confidence for the next few weeks?

[Lord True (Con)]

As a preamble, I failed to respond to the noble Baroness opposite on who might have been at any of these alleged events. I can assure her that, obviously, that is part of the investigation and report that the Cabinet Secretary will complete, but I am not in a position to make a statement on that myself.

So far as what the noble Lord has just said, I do not believe that this should damage trust. Obviously, there are several strands here. There is proper public concern and indignation, which I referred to in the Statement, about the tape that came out, and a proper wish to establish the facts on these events. We have to be candid that, separate from that and wider than that, there is a persistent political campaign against the Prime Minister to besmirch his character—

Ministerial Code

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Monday 6th December 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord True) (Con)]

My Lords, the Ministerial Code is the responsibility of the Prime Minister of the day. It is customarily updated and issued on their assuming or returning to office, and any amendments to the code are a decision for the Prime Minister.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I recognise that the Prime Minister issued the latest version on almost the same day when he advised Her Majesty the Queen to prorogue Parliament so that he could avoid parliamentary scrutiny of his actions for another couple of months. Is not it time now, given the widespread concern about behaviour in public life and the recommendations of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, for a more measured review, which might well include asking for comments and contributions from the relevant committees of both Houses?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, high standards in public life are of fundamental importance. I respectfully submit, regularly from this Dispatch Box, that we are fortunate in this country in the high standards we have in public life. Of course this Government look carefully at reports and advice given on various aspects. As the noble Lord will know, we are carefully considering a number of recently published reports and will respond in due course.

Hereditary Peers: By-elections

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 10th November 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I regret that I do not agree with my noble friend. He will know that the position of the Government is that we do not favour piecemeal reform and that overall reform needs careful consideration.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the role and composition of a second Chamber would be appropriately discussed by a constitutional convention. The noble Lord may recall that his party’s manifesto promised us the establishment of a constitutional convention, which should appropriately be on an all-party basis. The Government appear to have abandoned that. Will the Minister pledge to argue with his colleagues that they should reconsider it?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, again, we have discussed this before. I have made clear in this House and the Government have made clear that the proposed groundwork of the commission is being carried forward in separate workstreams—for example, the Faulks review on judicial work. We have decided to pursue this through separate workstreams.

Ministerial Code

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 9th November 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

No, my Lords.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I am sure that the Minister is fully briefed on the report last week from the Committee on Standards in Public Life. Paragraph 2.25 says:

“It is clear to the Committee that the degree of independence in the regulation of the Ministerial Code … falls below what is necessary to ensure effective regulation and maintain public credibility.”


Do the Government accept this criticism and, if so, are there plans to strengthen the independence of the adviser on ministerial interests?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I have partly answered that, in saying that the Government are obviously considering all the very important and thoughtful reports that have been presented on these matters in recent weeks and months. We take matters of ethics extraordinarily seriously, as I believe every Member of your Lordships’ House does, on all sides. I give an assurance to the House that we will come back with a Statement on these issues in due course.

Government Departments: Non-Executive Directors

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 8th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what professional expertise and qualifications they look for when appointing non-executive directors of Government departments.

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord True) (Con)]

My Lords, departmental non-executive board members are appointed by the Secretary of State following the principle of selection based on merit. The majority of roles are advertised on Her Majesty’s Government’s public appointments website. The corporate governance code for central government departments states that appointees shall be

“experts from outside government … primarily from the commercial private sector, with experience of managing large and complex organisations”.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

The Minister will be aware of the comments that the Committee on Standards in Public Life made in Standards Matter 2. Paragraph 88 states:

“However there is an increasing trend amongst ministers to appoint supporters or political allies as NEDs. This both undermines the ability of NEDs to scrutinise the work of their departments, and has a knock-on effect on the appointments process elsewhere.”


Does the Minister accept that criticism and does he also accept the strong recommendation of the Committee on Standards in Public Life that the appointments process for non-executive directors of government departments should be regulated?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the Government obviously respect the recommendations in any report from the Committee on Standards in Public Life, and we will consider and respond to those recommendations in due course. I believe that talent is not confined to people of a single political opinion. Therefore, I do not follow the noble Lord in the implication that anybody who has ever supported the Conservative Party should be disqualified from one of these roles.

National Insurance Numbers: Electoral Register

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 22nd July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con) [V]]

My Lords, we will have many hours to discuss these matters on the Elections Bill. Time is short now, but I reject the view that that Bill is anything to do with voter suppression. I think the Labour Party has adopted a position on that which is contrary to the overwhelming view of the public that voter ID is sensible. So far as automatic registration is concerned, I can only repeat that the Government have no plans to introduce it.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, one person’s forced registration may be another person’s citizens’ rights. When I was the Lords’ Minister in the Cabinet Office, some years ago now, government digital experts were discussing the greater integration of local and central public data and the idea that digitisation might well extend to the electoral register. Is that still on the cards? Is this something that we may expect to be covered, either positively or negatively, in the Government’s digital strategy paper, when next it appears?

[Lord True (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I have indicated that the Government do not see attractions in producing a single national electoral register or centralised database. It is one of the aspects of our position that we should not move forward to automatic registration, and there are others. I have to disappoint the noble Lord on that score.

Security of Ministers’ Offices and Communications

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 29th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord True) (Con)]

My Lords, on private emails, government guidance is that official devices, email accounts and communication applications should be used for communicating classified information. Other forms of electronic communication may be used in the course of conducting government business. Each Minister is responsible for ensuring that government information is handled in a secure way. The specific quantitative points the noble Baroness raised I cannot respond to at this point. But, in answer to another of the noble Baroness’s questions, the official information held in private email accounts is subject to FoI.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the government guidance seems to be not entirely clear. When Ministers are using private emails for official business, does this mean that their officials, including their own private offices and Permanent Secretaries, have access to these or are they outside the regard of civil servants? Can we be sure that CCTV is securely held? Are private contractors engaged in this? Is the technology—hardware and software—also secure or is some of it procured from, for example, China?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I apologise to the noble Baroness opposite for not answering the question on CCTV, which was a lapsus memoriae—we are not supposed to use Latin, but it was. As I understand it, the Department of Health is looking into the specifics here. It constitutes a leak and is a serious matter with security implications. I can tell the House that our understanding is that this is certainly not a covert camera, nor is there a general policy of such cameras across Whitehall. As far as the question of emails is concerned, Ministers will have informal conversations from time to time in person or remotely, but significant contact relating to government business from such discussions should be, and is, passed back to officials. That would be in line with the relevant guidance on information handling and security. The Cabinet Office has previously published guidance on how information is held for the purposes of access to information. We obviously review this from time to time. I would expect all Ministers to seek to conform to the guidance.

Constitution Inquiry

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Monday 14th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the Government will continue to apply the law of the land until the law of the land is changed.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the commitment to constitutional integrity and the absolute sovereignty of the UK Parliament comprise a piece of legal purism which I think the Government would criticise if the European Commission displayed such a tendency. Does the Minister recognise that the commitment to absolute UK sovereignty was what led to the division of Ireland? Does he not accept that insistence on it with regard to Northern Ireland and Scotland now is likely to lead to further division?

[Lord True (Con)]

No, my Lords, I do not agree. We currently have a constitutional settlement in which there are reserved and devolved matters. I think we all believe that devolution has benefited the United Kingdom, and the Government’s priority—as the priority of all of us should be—is to make that work in amity and with commonality, as we were reminded earlier.

Size of the House of Lords

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 18th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I agree with the noble Baroness that the role of the Official Opposition is extremely important, and new Peers have been appointed —the Prime Minister has nominated people to the Labour Party Benches. Indeed, I had the great privilege of hearing the maiden speech from the noble Baroness, Lady Merron, only last week.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, may I follow the question of the noble Baroness, Lady Smith? The Labour Party acted with great restraint in the first 11 years after the 1999 reforms. It was six years before there were more Labour Peers than Conservative, and at the end of the Labour Government there were only 26 more Labour Peers than Conservatives. We now have 83 more Conservative Peers than Labour, almost as many as there are all other party Peers. Do the Government intend to respect the convention that no group should have a majority in this House or do they intend to carry on appointing more until they approach an overall majority?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the Conservative Party has only about 33% of the seats in the Lords, which obviously is way short of its share of the vote. This House has always benefited from negotiation and balance. However, there is a fundamental principle of our constitution that the Queen’s Government must be enabled to carry on, and everybody watches very closely the relationship between this House and the House of Commons.

Ministerial Code

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 27th April 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord True) (Con)]

My Lords, I assert again the importance of the Ministerial Code, which, as the noble Baroness said, is the responsibility of the Prime Minister of the day. The fact is that Ministers remain in office only for as long as they retain the confidence of the Prime Minister, whose constitutional role means that the management of ministerial appointments is his and is separate from the legislature. On the general running interest that there appears to be in the refurbishment of the Prime Minister’s flat, the costs of the wider refurbishment have been personally met by the Prime Minister. As has been said, the Government have been considering the merits of whether works on parts, or all, of the Downing Street estate could be funded by a trust, and this work is ongoing.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the Statement refers to Britain as a “robust democracy”. We have done without a written constitution because we have rested on the honour and good conduct of our Ministers and, above all, our Prime Ministers. Can the Minister name any other constitutional democracy, or any other democracy in the world, in which the Prime Minister decides on the rules of ministerial conduct and appoints his own independent adviser without checks and balances from the justiciary or his legislature? Should we not now have to move towards an explicitly constitutional democracy, or risk drifting towards a people’s democracy?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I am rather old and to me “people’s democracy” conjures up the old eastern bloc. I am interested in high-quality, high-integrity government. The Ministerial Code is the foundation of that. But I must repeat to noble Lords, as I did to the noble Baroness opposite: the constitutional reality is that the appointment of Ministers is in the hands of the Prime Minister of the day. The Government are not considering a change to that position.

Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Act 2014

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 22nd April 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I make a practice at this Dispatch Box of not throwing stones, and I think everyone in every party should be cautious about throwing stones. In response to what the noble Baroness said—I am sorry that she is in her place, but it is good to see her—on the question of in-house lobbyists, it is true that the Government did not pursue that in 2014. There are issues involved. It obviously will be considered currently. Such an approach would require thousands of businesses, charities, NGOs and trade bodies to pay a registration fee of £1,000 a year to write or speak to Ministers. That could be detrimental to the public interest, but I note what the noble Baroness says.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I take my share of responsibility for the last Act. It is now clear that we have to extend further the coverage of lobbying activities. Will the Minister accept that these should include greater transparency for political think tanks, including full declaration of their sources of funding? As he will know, Conservative MPs are concerned about the Runnymede Trust. Others of us are concerned about the Institute of Economic Affairs and Policy Exchange, for example, which declare on their websites their access to Ministers and their influence over government policy.

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Lord makes a further suggestion. Since 2010, with the help of the party opposite, we have brought in a statutory registration of consultant lobbyists and a new routine of regular government transparency publications on spending, salaries, contracts and tenders. We are implementing the recommendations of the Boardman review on procurement. We have banned the practice under previous Governments of quangos hiring lobbyists to lobby the Government. We have made sure that taxpayer-funded government grants are not used for lobbying purposes and have provided for greater transparency on trade unions. We have done a number of things. That does not mean that more may not need to be done. I accept that work is ongoing to consider these matters.

Constitution, Democracy and Human Rights Commission

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 14th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I have said that the Government are delivering the commitment in the manifesto to look at the broader aspects of the constitution in a range of separate workstreams. Obviously, this and others to be announced in due course will all reflect what the noble Baroness has said and what I have said—indeed, that is the case for those reviews that have been set up already and the cross-party Joint Committee that is looking at the FTPA.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I wish to repeat what the noble Lord, Lord Young, said in his opening question, which is that any constitutional reform needs to have broad-based support that inspires public confidence. How do the Conservative Party and its associated right-wing think tanks, eating the elephant in chunks and bending the conventions of the constitution in the way that it has in the last year, begin to deal with public alienation from politics and holding the union of Great Britain together?

[Lord True (Con)]

I think that on reflection the noble Lord will think that he does a disservice to those serving on the Independent Review of Administrative Law, those reviewing under Sir Peter Gross the operation of the Human Rights Act and indeed Members of both Houses on the Joint Committee when he characterises them in that way.

Elections: May 2021

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 14th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord True) (Con)]

My Lords, I certainly assure the noble Baroness that the Government believe that safe and secure elections are the cornerstone of any democracy. The law is that these elections should go ahead on this date. The Prime Minister said that all matters are always under review, as they are in a pandemic. People then seemed to ride away and say that that was an indication that they would be postponed, but, as the Minister for the Constitution said in the other place yesterday, a very high bar would have to be set to not proceed with these elections. As far as her comments about returning officers, they obviously look at polling stations, but I will take note of the points the noble Baroness made. Certainly, voting should be easy.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

I hope I can get the Minister to add that local democracy is absolutely part of the foundation to any effective constitutional democracy, which is one of the reasons why we have to be very careful about postponing these elections further. I thank the Minister for the Statement and I thank Bradford Council for the very extensive briefing it gave me this morning on the difficulties. Can the Minister assure us that, since elections are so fundamental to democracy, as such, any decision will be taken not by the Government alone but in full consultation with all other parties contesting the elections? Given the difficulty of campaigning under current circumstances, will the Government be prepared to consider providing, for example, two pieces of free post to every nominated candidate, to make sure that parties which have more easy access to funds do not get disproportionate benefits from being able to pay for post?

[Lord True (Con)]

As the noble Lord knew I would, I thoroughly endorse the first remark he made. I believe local democracy is the cornerstone, and I wish that were more widely recognised. The Government will continue to engage with political parties to ensure that people are able to campaign safely and securely and to secure information. As far as his specific proposal is concerned, I will certainly make sure that that is fed into consideration.

UK-EU Future Relationship Negotiations and Transition Period

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 8th December 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord True) (Con)]

My Lords, we are all working to get a deal but the only deal that is possible is one that is compatible with our sovereignty and takes back control of our laws, trade and waters. Although an agreement is preferable, we are prepared to leave on so-called Australia-style terms. People and businesses must prepare for the changes that coming on 31 December, most of which relate to our departure from the EU single market and customs union, not the outcome of the talks.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, references to Australia and Canada deny the geography, which is that we must retain close relations across the board with our neighbours whether we are in the EU or outside it. Does the Minister have a response to the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Hague, in yesterday’s Daily Telegraph? He said that no deal with our European neighbours would

“create the biggest crisis in our relations for more than a century.”

[Lord True (Con)]

I repeat: we are seeking a deal. As the Prime Minister said a few minutes ago, hope springs eternal. There are significant differences. I do not agree that there would be a crisis that could not be surmounted by the British people.

Ministerial Code

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 24th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I would not characterise it in that particular way. The Prime Minister concluded in this case that the Ministerial Code was not breached. There was a prior case in 2012 when there was a finding that the code had been breached and the Minister also remained in office.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, has the Minister read the lecture given by the noble Lord, Lord Evans, to the Institute of Business Ethics on 11 November? The noble Lord commented that

“too many in public life, including some in our political leadership, are choosing to disregard the norms of ethics and propriety that have explicitly governed public life for the last 25 years, and … when contraventions of ethical standards occur, nothing happens.”

Does the Minister agree?

[Lord True (Con)]

No, my Lords, I do not agree, because I do not consider that that generalised charge against people in public service is justified. I find high standards of probity among the colleagues I work with and among the people I have had the honour of opposing in the past when they were in government.

Great Britain and Northern Ireland: Access for Goods

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 12th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, there is one way: support for the Belfast/Good Friday agreement. I trust very much that when the unfettered access provisions come back to this House, the Labour Party will support them.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, we are all aware of the extensive movement of animals across the internal Irish border and across the Irish Sea, and the extensive movement also of milk and milk products. If there is to be unfettered access across the Irish Sea, do the Government envisage that there will have to be checks at what will now become the EU’s external border? What progress, in that case, has been made towards recruiting the vets and inspectors needed to enforce the checks required there?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, work is under way, as noble Lords have raised before, in seeking to recruit vets and, in other areas of this policy, customs agents. That work is ongoing. We are hopeful that we will achieve the desired end.

Home Secretary: Allegations of Bullying

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Monday 2nd November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

The process is independent. The Prime Minister asked the Cabinet Office to establish the facts, in line with the Ministerial Code, and the Independent Adviser on Ministers’ Interests, Sir Alex Allan, has a role through providing further independent advice to the Prime Minister. So far as the process is concerned, I regret that I must repeat that I cannot comment on that while it is continuing.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Young, in response to a previous answer from the Minister, said that the code is an honour code, implying that it is up to the Minister concerned to take responsibility and to resign in the case of a serious breach. Last month, the Cabinet Secretary said to a Commons committee that the Prime Minister is the ultimate arbiter. That seems deeply inappropriate in the current conditions. Does the Minister not think that there is merit in the First Division Association proposal that an independent arbiter, with status outside government, should be the final arbiter in these cases?

EU Exit: Negotiations and the Joint Committee

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 21st October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

No, my Lords, I do not accept the one-sided strictures being heard once again in this House. The Government have proposed arrangements with the European Union that have precedents in agreements that that Union has reached with other countries of the world. The Government have asked for nothing unreasonable.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, the Government are set on a Canada-style agreement. Have they studied the Canadian network of agreements with the United States, its close neighbour, which cover border controls, aviation, energy, police co-operation, common standards, road haulage and even fishing in the waters along their border? That is because it is a close neighbour. Do the Government have a strategy for somehow increasing the distance between the UK and the European continent? Or do they accept that after 1 January, we will have to start to negotiate on all these other matters as well with our new neighbours?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the United Kingdom is a sovereign nation and has relations with every other country in the world. Of course, our relationship with our European neighbours is important and we will continue to negotiate with them, whether in this process or in whatever circumstances we find in the future.

EU Exit: End of Transition Period

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 24th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I am not sure whether to sympathise with the Minister for having to defend a Statement with which he cannot entirely agree, to admire his loyalty in following each step the Government take towards a harder break with the EU than was ever hinted at by the Vote Leave campaign in the referendum, or to be appalled by his willingness to swallow the shifty rationalisations of the Johnson-Cummings-Gove cabal.

Yesterday in Grand Committee, the noble Lord, Lord True, attacked the European Union for challenging

“the United Kingdom’s well-established position on state aid”.—[Official Report, 23/9/20; col. GC 506.]

True or false? I asked two friends in the City if they knew what the Government’s established policy on state aid was and they burst out laughing at the idea that there is any clear policy. The interview that Lynton Crosby gave the Financial Times on Monday helped me to understand the Government’s current position. He said that

“in negotiations like this you need a little bit of crazy to keep your opponents guessing”.

I thought, “Ah, this is the art of the deal. The Donald Trump approach to negotiation—monster your opponents, talk tough, insist that they act reasonably, and either they will compromise further than they intended to or you can walk away and blame them for the failure. It is the Johnson-Trump playbook.” If the Statement is an attempt to bluff the EU into believing that we are well prepared for a no-deal outcome, it is clearly a failure. It shows that we are woefully unprepared and is an attempt to shift the blame onto business and potentially on to the French and Belgian Governments.

It has been clear to almost everyone concerned with the UK’s external trade since Theresa May’s Government decided to leave the single market that the channel ports would pose problems, except that Dominic Raab did not realise that and Boris Johnson did not bother to think about it. It was also clear that it would take well over a year to create the new infrastructure needed and to recruit and train the additional staff. Yet, here we are, 100 days short of 2021, and the Statement deplores a “lack of business preparedness”. The rest of us deplore the lack of government preparedness. The same mixture of incompetence, ideology and negligence that has marked the Government’s approach to Covid-19 marks their approach to the channel ports.

The same sweeping aside of inconvenient facts marks Ministers’ handling of the Irish border. The British Academy held its first seminar on the problem of the Irish border if the UK were to leave the EU in March 2016, attended by officials, among others. Yet the Prime Minister now claims that in October 2019, three years later, he still did not understand the complexity of the issue. The Statement refers to hundreds more Border Force staff “being recruited now”. Why were they not recruited months ago? How many of the additional Border Force and customs personnel required will be fully trained and in post by 1 January, and how many are still being recruited or trained?

The Statement refers to new technology being important. Is this now being fully tested and will it be in working order on 1 January? The Statement refers to “queues” and “associated disruption and delay” in Dover, at least for the first six months. What arrangements have been made to ensure that fresh food, vegetables and fish are not delayed beyond the point where they are spoiled, which would lead to shortages in British supermarkets? Can the Minister explain what is meant by the warning that

“if our neighbours decline to be pragmatic”

we will face the worst circumstances? Do we demand that the French and Belgians decline to enforce their own border checks because we are not ready to enforce our own? Is this the Trump-Johnson playbook again: “We are unreasonable but will pin the blame for chaos on you, unless you help get us out of the mess”?

The noble Lord, Lord True, will now defend Michael Gove’s extraordinary Statement with his weasel words about an “exit on Australian terms” and his fantasies about how a “truly sovereign state” may behave. I hope that there will come a point where the noble Lord will consider that his self-respect as a Conservative requires him not to follow Johnson and Cummings’s efforts further down the road to alternative reality and fake facts, be true to his best instincts instead and follow the principled example of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen.

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord True) (Con)]

My Lords, there were a number of observations there, some of which could be characterised as a little wide of the Statement and perhaps a little behind the game—the game being that the British people have decided to leave the European Union. We are leaving the single market and the customs union and are preparing for that. Frankly, continually railing about this situation—as the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, did with some colourful language in parts of his intervention—does not help us address some of the specific issues in this Statement. For the avoidance of doubt, I am very content with the direction of travel of the United Kingdom and this Government. Unfortunately, I cannot ease the angst of the Liberal Democrat party in that respect, but I note it. Since the noble Lord offered sympathy to me, I reciprocate.

So far as the specific questions I was asked are concerned, I hope I have made a note of most of them. If I have not, I will follow them up. The overall stance of both interventions was, “Why haven’t we done more sooner? Why are there still some uncertainties?” Obviously, there are still some uncertainties; that is the nature of a broad negotiation. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, went wide of the specifics in the Statement, as she fairly acknowledged, but much of the central, core stuff that this Statement is concerned with flows from the fact—which is not affected by whether we get a free trade agreement—that we are leaving the customs union and have to address that situation. We have already adjusted our own phasing of border controls up until July 2021 specifically to help. I note what was said about our friends and counterparties in other member states. Obviously, their policy decisions are for them, but we hope to have fruitful and helpful exchanges with them up to and through this process’s conclusion.

I was asked about Gibraltar. I assure the noble Baroness that the Foreign Office is working closely with Gibraltar and that its interests will very much be taken into account in the transition process. Next Monday there is a meeting of the withdrawal agreement joint committee, which will deal with a number of aspects.

Comment was made about the reports in newspapers about what was called the Kent access pass. It was said in newspapers that this was a border in Kent. The noble Baroness asked how this would operate. It is an approach related to road use, and it is not intended that every vehicle will be stopped. As the noble Baroness says, that would be difficult to do. The reality is that disruption will occur if vehicles without the right documentation arrive at the point of departure. The Government’s whole strategy—our conversations with the road haulage industry, the publicity campaigns we have been running and the process of “Check an HGV” and smart freight—is designed to make sure that the maximum number of haulage vehicles will have the appropriate documentation. If they enter Kent and do not have that documentation, it will be possible for that to be picked up by ANPR and other resources.

The concentration will be on the M2 and M20. The Kent Resilience Forum is looking at all aspects of movement in Kent, but it is a roads-based approach intended to reinforce the advice with an element of deterrent. The cost of the port and inland infra- structure is up to £470 million; some of that is in place. Conversations are ongoing with local authorities and local Members of Parliament about the specifics. Some of this has already been put in the public domain; more will come into the public domain shortly.

On standards, there is not a direct correlation between price and standards. Some very high-quality goods can be cheaper. One of the purposes of free trade deals, which the Statement quite rightly says will help many countries around the world, is that—this is in the history of free trade deals—they tend to lower prices. That is to the benefit of the underprivileged as well as the privileged.

Border Force recruitment is going on. I do not have the exact figures, but £10 million has been put aside to recruit around 500 more Border Force personnel and training is in progress. I will pick up the other points in the two statements after I sit down, when I see Hansard. There are various estimates of elements of the cost. I will try to help as far as I can.

This is a practical programme. There are many thousands of excellent civil servants working on it, and the Government have great confidence that Britain will be ready and able to trade from the end of the year.

Brexit: Civil Service Code

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 17th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the situation should not arise because, as the noble Baroness has said, the new Cabinet Secretary has confirmed that he is content for civil servants to work on the Bill and to support Ministers in their duties as it passes through the House. Civil servants are not being asked to act in a way that conflicts with the Civil Service Code. That is the position.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, the Civil Service Code states very clearly, regarding integrity:

“You must … comply with the law”.


The Government’s legal position states that parliamentary sovereignty can override international agreements, but not domestic law. The withdrawal agreement was passed by both Houses of Parliament and thus became—less than nine months ago—part of our domestic law. If the Cabinet Secretary is now telling civil servants that they can disregard this part of the Civil Service Code, is it not appropriate that the Minister for the Civil Service should make a Statement to Parliament, given that the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act makes it clear that the Minister for the Civil Service is responsible to Parliament for the Civil Service Code?

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, as I have said, the Cabinet Secretary has made the position clear. All civil servants are of course expected to carry out their role with dedication and commitment to the Civil Service and its core values of integrity, honesty, objectivity and impartiality, which are, as the noble Lord has said, set out in legislation. In my experience, every civil servant rises to that high level required. The Cabinet Secretary has said that he is content for civil servants to work on this Bill.

Parliament: Restoration and Renewal Project

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 22nd July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True]

My Lords, the sponsor body is independent: that was the decision of your Lordships’ House and of the other place. The strategic review was announced in May by the sponsor body and it is for it to progress as it wishes. It is open to every Member of Parliament, not just the Prime Minister, to put forward their views to the sponsor body.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I understand that the Prime Minister’s letter proposing that both Houses of Parliament might relocate to York had already been sent when the Minister answered questions on this on 15 July, yet he made no reference to it in any of his replies. Was that because he was not aware of the letter or because he chose not to inform this House that the Commons might also be moved?

On 9 July, in answering questions on the ISC report on Russia, he described suggestions that the Conservative Party had received large sums from Russian donors as “wild charges”. Now that several articles in the quality press and the published ISC report have substantiated that such sums have been accepted by the Conservatives, will he withdraw that reply?

[Lord True]

My Lords, I think the second part of the noble Lord’s question is germane to the Question that follows; I am not sure if he has a chance to ask a question on that. The Conservative Party’s donations are declared, permissible and controlled. On the first part of his question, I stand by every word I used last week.

House of Lords and Machinery of Government: Consultation on Changes

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 15th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have (1) to consult relevant Parliamentary select committees about the constitutional implications of, and (2) to await the outcome of the proposed Constitution, Democracy and Rights Commission to inform, changes to (a) the machinery of Government, (b) the location of their departments and the civil service, and (c) the location of the House of Lords.

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord True) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government have committed to ensuring that the administration of government is less London-centric and to locating more Civil Service roles and public bodies out of London and into the regions and nations of the United Kingdom. No decisions have yet been taken on the form and scope of the commission on the constitution, democracy and rights. We will consult Select Committees about any relevant decisions in the normal way.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, if one wants to distribute civil servants around the country, proper devolution for England would be the best way by far to do that. The Conservative manifesto last December declared:

“we also need to look at the broader aspects of our constitution: the relationship between the Government, Parliament and the courts; the functioning of the Royal Prerogative; the role of the House of Lords”

and that they would

“set up a Constitution, Democracy & Rights Commission that will examine these issues in depth”.

Instead, No. 10 is briefing out piecemeal changes that were not in the manifesto but which only appeared in Dominic Cummings’s blog. Is Cummings’s blog now more authoritative as a guide to government policy than the manifesto?

[Lord True]

My Lords, at risk to my career, I must say that Mr Cummings’s blog is not on my reading list, and I do not normally consult social media in general. However, I say to the noble Lord that the commission will examine the broader aspects of the constitution in depth and develop proposals to restore trust in our institutions and the operation of our democracy. We will consider the composition and focus of the commission carefully and will provide an update in due course.

House of Lords: Relocation

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 14th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True]

My Lords, this great House is part of a legislature, and in any consideration of its future the exigencies of parliamentary practice and procedure will always have to be considered. The Government will, of course, give careful consideration to ensuring that our Parliament continues to operate effectively.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, if, as the Minister has just confirmed, the final decision is a matter for Parliament alone, can he explain the justification for the extensive press briefing last week and Michael Gove’s confirmation that this is indeed something the Government are considering? Have there yet been any assessments by the Government of how this will be taken forward? Have there been any studies either of the site in York—which has actually been vacant for some time because they find it very hard to get interest from commercial operators for it—or how this will affect the relationship between the two Houses or between Parliament and Government? If not, why not?

[Lord True]

My Lords, I just said that the relationship between the two Houses and parliamentary procedure will obviously be matters for consideration. Noble Lord will know that the R&R process means that the sponsor body has to consider alternative sites for Parliament. This is a matter on which there will be further announcements in due course.

Intelligence and Security Committee: Russia Report

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 9th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True]

My Lords, I will not repeat what I said about the view that we take of the Putin Government’s disinformation activities. I note what my noble friend said. I hope I have told the House that a Motion will be tabled for the establishment of the committee next week, and I am sure the committee will take note of what my noble friend and others have said about the importance of publishing the report.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I am sorry that the Minister has used the term “wild charges” to describe the question asked by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones. I have read in a number of serious British newspapers comments on major financial contributions to the Conservative Party in recent years by Russian oligarchs resident in London and their families. If those are wild charges, I am surprised the Conservative Party did not sue. In these circumstances, can the Minister guarantee to this House that the report will be published before we rise for the Summer Recess?

[Lord True]

My Lords, I can only repeat what I have told the House. Motions will be laid for the constitution of the committee next week. It is then the responsibility of the committee to decide how and when it publishes its report. I am sure it will take note of what the noble Lord and others have said. But again, I wholly reject the charge that the Prime Minister in any way is responsible for delaying the report.

EU: Customs Arrangements

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 8th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True]

My Lords, I always travel in hope, and I share the noble Lord’s aspirations. As was famously said:

“Jaw, jaw is better than war, war.”


In every aspect of this great question, all people of authority in every part of the United Kingdom share a responsibility for the overall good of the people of the United Kingdom. Certainly, I want to see good relations right across the border, and I give the noble Lord that assurance.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, we are often told that effective border management requires active co-operation between states on both sides of the border. A number of recent reports suggest that the Dutch, Belgians and French are far better prepared for the new border arrangements than we are. But is it compatible with the British Government’s rather hard interpretation of sovereignty to allow French customs and passport officers to operate on British soil as they have in recent years, or, for that matter, for British passport officers and customs officers to operate on Dutch, Belgian or French soil as they also do? Does that now need to stop to defend the sovereignty of the United Kingdom?

[Lord True]

My Lords, again, that is slightly wide of the Question. The treaty to which the noble Lord refers is one under which arrangements subsist between the Governments of the United Kingdom and France. That is the position. I hope we will be as well prepared as any nation.

David Frost

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 30th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True]

My Lords, I do not believe that a single appointment constitutes the politicisation of the Civil Service, for which Her Majesty’s Government have a very high regard. Reform of public service was in the Government’s manifesto and we will carry out that pledge.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, both the Prime Minister and Michael Gove cited President Roosevelt as the model for this Government’s approach. When I was first a student in the United States, I was invited to seminars given by three former members of President Roosevelt’s cabinet, all of whom emphasised the efforts Roosevelt made to carry cross-party support in both Houses of Congress for his New Deal. Are this Government similarly committed to building support across the parties and in both Houses of Parliament or do they prefer, as Dominic Cummings suggests, to move fast and break the conventions?

[Lord True]

My Lords, this Government, who have a great public mandate, want to carry the widest possible support and, indeed, increase their support across this nation. I welcome the support given by Sir Keir Starmer to the principle of heavy investment in infrastructure, which the Prime Minister is announcing.

UK-EU Negotiations

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 18th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, Ministers have frequently referred to the Canadian or Australian models as “oven-ready” recipes for a deal. Can the Minister therefore confirm that our negotiators are including arrangements for the provisional application of such a mixed-competence agreement while we wait for national ratification? The Canadian FTA was signed in 2016 but ratification is not yet complete. Does he understand what the Prime Minister means by the Australian model? The Australian Government website tells me that the seventh round of negotiations on a potential agreement took place last month.

[Lord True]

My Lords, I am not good at figures but I think that the Australian Government have about 29 different arrangements with the European Union. With regard to the phrase “oven ready”, I am afraid that I like cooking—something that I have enjoyed particularly during the lockdown. Turning to the central core of the noble Lord’s question, the Government are preparing for every eventuality. There is an intense amount of planning on a wide range of fronts, and I assure him that that process is continuing.

Constitution, Democracy and Rights Commission

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 16th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True]

My Lords, again, I cannot anticipate the composition and focus of the commission. However, I can say to the noble Lord that the Government have already presented legislation on boundaries, which is before the other place at the moment, and we have also signified that we will look at matters relating to the conduct of elections.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I welcome the Minister’s statement that the Government are taking very careful consideration of the agenda. There is a great deal of expertise on constitutional and political issues in this Chamber. Will the Minister commit to a Lords debate on the agenda and terms of reference of the constitutional commission, either before the summer or at least in our September Session, to inform the process of consideration?

[Lord True]

My Lords, I had the pleasure of sitting on the Back Benches behind the noble Lord when he was on the Front Bench, and he will know that that is a matter for the usual channels to determine. For my own part, I always welcome discussion with anybody on this important matter.

Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Monday 15th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True [V]]

My Lords, in their manifesto, the Government emphasised the need for long-term consideration of our constitutional arrangements, as my noble friend Lord Howell of Guildford said. The noble Baroness is correct that this should not be hurried. The Government will bring forward their proposals on how we should proceed in due course.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, in the last few years, there has been a great deal of discussion, particularly from within the Conservative Party, about the need to strengthen the principle of parliamentary sovereignty. If we abolish the Fixed-term Parliaments Act, we will go back to a substantial role for executive sovereignty in the UK. Does the Minister accept that we cannot go backwards by abolishing the Act and that we need to strengthen Parliament’s role in organising its own meetings, terms, Prorogation and Dissolution?

[Lord True [V]]

My Lords, as I said, many matters will be considered and we will make further announcements in due course. I think the noble Lord would agree that Parliament did not have its finest hour under the aegis of the Fixed-term Parliaments Act. That is why, partly to restore Parliament’s reputation, we need clear arrangements that command support.

EU: Trade and Security Partnership

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 9th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]]

My Lords, the February document that the Government published on the future relationship included a chapter on digital services that sets out that we need to

“encourage regulatory cooperation and a strategic dialogue on emerging technologies”.

I could not find this in the items for discussion in the fourth round of negotiations, nor does any progress seem to have been made on it. Are the Government hoping that we will continue to have regulatory co-operation in this very important emerging industry? As a fallback position, are they discussing with the Americans whether we will converge on American data regulation rather than European regulations if these negotiations break down?

[Lord True [V]]

My Lords, the noble Lord is right: there is an international dimension to these questions. We expect foreign policy co-operation broadly to be substantial with the EU, as it is with many of our international partners, but we do not think that an institutional framework is necessary to deliver it.

EU: Plans for No Deal

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 2nd June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True]

My Lords, I read with great interest your Lordships’ report on the Northern Ireland protocol. I do not agree with every judgment in it, but it was very valuable and the Government will make a response in due course. I said—I think when I answered the noble Baroness on a previous occasion—that a business engagement forum in Northern Ireland is imminent. A process of engagement with business across the country is of great importance, is ongoing and will be intensified.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the Minister in his first Answer said that we are negotiating on the basis of the agreement reached last October. Earlier this year, we had a number of authoritative briefings, presumably from No. 10, to say that the decisive result of last December’s general election in effect sidelined the political declaration and that we were now negotiating on what the Minister also described as a more minimalist arrangement. The political declaration talked about an “overarching” framework and a continuing security, foreign policy and defence relationship, which is a great deal more than Canada or Australia. Have we now abandoned the political declaration, or are we still, as the European Commission would like, negotiating on the basis of that agreement?

[Lord True]

My Lords, we have put into law a withdrawal agreement, including the NI protocol, and that is the basis of our continuing policy. The Government have published a number of documents which have been laid before your Lordships’ House on our approach to negotiations and, most recently, on the Northern Ireland protocol. That is the basis on which we are proceeding, in good faith and hope.

Public Services: Update

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 29th April 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

I, too, welcome this Statement and the remarkable change of tone it contains about public sector workers used by Conservative Ministers and advisers until a few weeks ago. Last December’s Conservative manifesto, and even more the writings of Conservative advisers such as Dominic Cummings and Rachel Wolf, condemned the Civil Service as “incompetent” and wasteful, as ignorant about science and looking after their own interests rather than the public as a whole.

Happily, Ministers have now realised that civil servants and others across the public sector believe in the concept of public service, which right-wing libertarians and public choice economists have rubbished for so long. Across our entire public service, from the NHS to the police and military to Whitehall and local authorities, we have seen people rising to the challenge, moving jobs to help others, and working all hours. Many of them, we should also recognise, are far more modestly paid than their equivalents in the private sector, but they have shown their commitment and their loyalty to the communities they serve.

I am glad to see the reference to local resilience forums, and the recognition that this is a series of local crises across the country as well as a national crisis. I hope that this will persuade the Government to reverse their marginalisation of local authorities and to recognise the vital contribution that effective local government makes to a thriving democracy. I was struck when I read the section on democracy and political reform in last December’s Conservative manifesto that it contained no reference at all to local democracy. I hope that the Minister will argue for its inclusion in the agenda for the constitution, democracy and human rights commission which the Government have promised to set up this year.

The Statement expresses gratitude to

“to colleagues from the devolved Administrations for their participation and their constructive contributions to all our discussions. Those discussions have helped us to understand how the virus has affected every part of our United Kingdom.”

Can the Minister tell the House how the Government have ensured that they have understood the impact on every part of the UK, given that the large majority of the UK’s population lives in England and that there appears to have been no visible mechanism for consultation with the English regions or even with the city mayors from outside London?

The Minister mentioned that the military has now been brought in to help out with logistics but also with expanding testing for the virus. The Statement does not explain why the initial programme of testing was contracted out to a large private consultancy firm: a contract which, the Daily Telegraph has reported, was awarded without the normal tendering process. Was that because of an instinctive Conservative assumption that the private sector is always better than the public sector? The underutilisation of the first testing centres, reported and repeated difficulties with the booking system, and the apparent assumption that all care and health workers had access to their own cars and had time to drive up to 50 miles to be tested all show this to have been one of the weakest aspects of the response to the epidemic. I am glad that the military have now been brought in to expand testing. Why were they not brought in at the outset? My own experience in government, dealing with the digitisation of Whitehall, suggested that outside consultancies often charge more and deliver less.

The Statement refers also to the redeployment of a large number of civil servants across Whitehall to cope with the crisis. What other tasks of government have had to be put on hold as a result? I understand, for example, that the Government’s promised White Paper on data strategy, for which the Minister is responsible to the Lords, is now several months behind schedule, since officials had been transferred; first, to help with preparation for Brexit and now to respond to the epidemic. I understand that officials working on the Brexit negotiations have also been redeployed in response to the epidemic. Will the Minister commit to informing the House in the near future whether the team negotiating Brexit is still sufficiently staffed to handle the complex negotiations that we are engaged in or whether the demands of this emergency will enforce a change of pace if we are to avoid confusion or failure?

Finally, I welcome very warmly the Government’s tribute to

“the stoicism and steadfastness, the hard work and heroism, the compassion and commitment of those working at the front line of public service.”

We all make that tribute, and long may the Government’s change of tone continue.

[Lord True]

My Lords, perhaps I may begin by congratulating the Prime Minister and Carrie Symonds on the birth of their son. It is a story of movement from near death to new life in a few weeks. I am sure that that is what we all avidly pray for for this economy and this nation as we look ahead to a way out of this crisis and to new hope.

I thank the noble Lord and the noble Baroness for their responses to the Statement and the constructive way in which they put forward their points of view, many of which I share. I endorse their admiration for all that is being done in the NHS, social care, the public services and the private sector in the face of this crisis. Naturally, I add my own respect and prayers for those people and their families who have given, literally, all they had to give. None of us, as the nation showed at 11 o’clock yesterday, will forget them.

Everyone across the land, which includes central government and, yes, local government, is doing the best they can, as fast as they can, and the most they can in these difficult times. As the noble Baroness said, there has been an extraordinary response from the public in the coming-together across the land, and long may it last.

We must not forget that some remarkable things have been achieved. I acknowledge to both the noble Baroness and the noble Lord that there have also been things that have not gone as well in every detail as all would hope. I think that it was General Moltke who said that no plan extends with certainty beyond first contact with the main force of the enemy, and Covid is a new, hidden, mutable and invisible enemy with characteristics not met before. However, I assure the House that the Government and all their agencies are working night and day to ensure that our front-line health and social care staff have the equipment they need to tackle this virus, and we have delivered more than 1,000 million items of PPE since the outbreak began, including 36 million to care homes.

I agree with the noble Baroness that transparency is important. As she acknowledged, we are moving today to bring together the different strands of statistics in relation to care homes, which will give full and proper transparency on that. Her point on BAME is very important. Work on that is under way, as the scientists have said at the daily briefings. I cannot give her a date for an outcome to the work.

Care homes are obviously a sector of enormous importance, and they have been of concern to the Government all the way through. As I have said, 36 million items of PPE have already been delivered to care homes, but it is a vulnerable section of the community where I acknowledge the need always to strive to do better.

On communications, I will take up the noble Baroness’s point; I understand it very well. I acknowledge her point on the need for the broadest co-operation if and when we move into test and trace. On publishing frameworks, I think that the noble Baroness and the House know that the Government’s position is that we have first to keep on with the effort that that public are making to contain this virus and to meet the five tests before we move forward to any release from the current lockdown provisions. As the Prime Minister acknowledged when he came back to work, over the next few days, the Government will continue to examine carefully all these issues.

On the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, I do not need any reminder of the need to commend the Civil Service. I have always had the highest respect for it and have worked with it through my life. The ideal of public service is one that I personally consider to be of the highest importance, and it is something to which I have always aspired. I assure the noble Lord that that is shared widely, if not universally, across the Government. On the importance of local authorities, I referred to the local resilience fora. Local authorities are making a great contribution. We will continue to work to improve and maintain communications with them and with agencies right across England, as the noble Lord rightly said.

I welcome what the noble Lord said about the military. Its role has been extraordinary. The Armed Forces have made a great difference and perhaps have not had as much attention in the media as they might have done, but I was grateful for what he said on that score.

So far as the redeployment of civil servants and the delay of business is concerned, there has been an impact on some aspects of government business, of course. It is right that full priority should be given to confronting this crisis, but on the noble Lord’s concerns about the negotiations towards the transition on 31 December, I assure him that a very effective team with a large number of civil servants is at work there, as was said in the recent Statement. Indeed, if he read Monsieur Barnier’s statement, he will have seen how Monsieur Barnier himself commented on the professionalism of David Frost and his team in carrying forward those negotiations. I believe that we can have confidence in that.

I hope that I have answered most of the points made. If not, I will write to noble Lords.

European Union: Future Relationship

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Tuesday 28th April 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Speaker]

I call the noble Viscount, Lord Ridley. No? I call the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, then. No? Then I call the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, seven months ago the Government presented to Parliament the political declaration setting out the framework for the future relationship which did not talk about a free trade area, but rather about,

“an ambitious broad, deep and flexible partnership”

including

“foreign policy, security and defence and wider areas of co-operation.”

The paper presented to us by the Government in February set out a much narrower free trade agreement, as the Minister has just said. It says nothing about a wider partnership. Should we now accept that the declaration made last October is no longer a reference point for the Government’s negotiations?

[Lord True]

My Lords, the Government have set out their negotiating objectives before Parliament and in talks with the European Union. The Government are seeking to negotiate in good faith on the basis of those documents.

Ministerial Code

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 12th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord True) (Con)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have spoken, particularly the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, many of whose thoughtful remarks struck a chord not only with the House in general but with me. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, for giving us this further opportunity to debate the Ministerial Code. I have been a Minister for less than a month; in that time, I have signed the Ministerial Code and responded three times to your Lordships on this subject. I am therefore left in little doubt that it is a matter of importance and one in which your Lordships, quite rightly, take a great interest from a position of great experience.

I will try to answer as many questions as possible that have quite reasonably been raised in the debate, but perhaps I might offer a preface. Here I echo some of the comments made by a number of those who have spoken. We must strive to secure good governance, which means that Ministers and officials work well and harmoniously together. That is the aim of effective administration, and it is from that sense of a shared objective that good decisions and implementation should follow.

I was there in 1992 when Prime Minister Major agreed to publish the Questions of Procedure for Ministers. I suspect that some of us on the political side probably gave similar advice to the noble Lord. However, we must not overdramatise; we must recognise the issues that we have to address, some of which have been raised in this debate. In general, however, the quality of governance in this country—I do not accept, as some noble Lords put forward, that a dramatic new kind of cowboy Administration have come in—and the standards are extraordinarily high, and we do not serve good governance by denying that or overdramatising the situation. I was asked whether I wanted to defend the indefensible: I do not think that I am defending the indefensible when I say that governance generally operates well, and the Ministerial Code is part of that.

When an Administration change and when a new Prime Minister comes in, it has always been the case that there is a challenge. I remember talking to the noble Lord, Lord Butler, two days before the change of administration in 1997, saying to him, “Here you are at this stage of your career; a change of Government will present a great career challenge.” The noble Lord quite rightly relished that. Of course, we all know that history proved that a new Government came in and I am sure that the Conservatives said some of the same things about the incoming Blair Government as are being said today.

That takes me directly to the point made about the position of Mr Cummings and his authority. The cases of Alistair Campbell and Jonathan Powell, who were given direct authority over officials in 1997, is not analogous. Following the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010, to which the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, referred—I thank him for his work on that—the position of special advisers was put on a statutory basis, and Mr Cummings’s role is governed by that Act.

Turning to some of the other points that were made, I agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Butler, said about balance and degree. That is inherent in what I just said about not exaggerating the degree of the problem. Every case and every serious allegation that is made must be subject to a testing of the facts. That is the way things are going on currently, which has been mentioned by a number of noble Lords. That must always be the case. In any judgment, at the end of the day—I do not refer to this particular case; I refer to any judgment—an element of degree must always come into it, as the noble Lord, Lord Butler, said.

My noble friend Lord Young asked me a series of questions, some of which he was kind enough to give me notice of, so I will try to answer one or two of them. As far as training is concerned—this issue was raised by a number of noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Tyler, at the start—all Lords Ministers have done the Valuing Everyone course or have slots booked to do it. I have done it myself and agree that it is a very valuable and important course; I would encourage everyone to undertake it. There is quite a queue to take the course in this large House, as noble Lords can imagine, but I assure noble Lords that this training is being given. It is vital that all parties in both Houses continue to encourage completion of that training.

On the case of Ms Khan, I cannot comment because it is subject to litigation. I hope that the noble Lord will understand; he has put his point on the record and I am sure that that is there for people to see.

On the point about a story in the Daily Mail, it may surprise some noble Lords in this House that I do not believe everything I read in that paper. I am particularly surprised that my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham is such an aficionado of the Daily Mail, but one lives and learns. I am aware of no such contract. The advice I am given is that Mr Cummings is a special adviser and subject to the special adviser code of conduct.

As far as contractors are concerned—I was away for a week when Mr Sabisky was enjoying his career in government—contractors are subject to the Civil Service code of principles, but again it would be inappropriate for me to comment on a particular vetting status or contractual arrangement applying to an individual. I hope that I have answered, or at least responded to, most of the points that my noble friend made.

The noble Lord, Lord McNally, raised the issue of ministerial training and I have sought to respond to that. On the question of the employment of special advisers, I thought we were discussing the Ministerial Code but I will always try to assist your Lordships. On special advisers, the point has been made that, as set out in the 2010 Act, they are selected for appointment by Ministers, and Ministers are ultimately responsible. However, all appointments must be approved by the Prime Minister, and it is inherent in that that the Prime Minister has a role in ensuring that special advisers are appropriate to their appointment and are conducting their activities appropriately. I see nothing particularly sinister in that.

My noble friend Lady Finn made some strong and powerful points, and I am sure that everyone who heard them will reflect on them. I said earlier in my remarks that I think there is a shared challenge in making good governance work. Sometimes there will be robust exchanges and sometimes friendly ones. When a Government come in with a new approach and a new mandate, or are refreshed by a general election, of course it is incumbent on the system to seek to implement in the most expeditious and effective way what that would-be Government have promised to the people.

Unlike the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, I am not afraid of using the word “people” because ultimately it is from a popular mandate that a Government’s authority arises. It is always interesting to hear a Liberal criticising insurgency; I thought that the beauty of the Liberal Party was that it had always been insurgent.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I was talking about Conservatives describing themselves as insurgents. I always thought that the Conservative Party was the establishment. It is a matter of puzzlement that we have so many Conservatives now describing themselves as the anti-establishment.

[Lord True]

I am a Conservative of liberal mind, I am afraid—with a small “l”.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

Very small.

[Lord True]

I will not ensure that Hansard records that remark from a seated position; I would not like to think that anyone would think that of me.

With regard to reviewing the code, my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth pointed out in a very authoritative speech the progress of the code over time. It is periodically reviewed, and Mr Johnson recently published an update in August. Ultimately it is not for me to say; it is for the Prime Minister if he or she wishes to make a change, but it has recently been revised and reviewed. I believe that the Ministerial Code is strong. It is subject to review and an assistance to good government—

Ministerial Code: Breaches

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Monday 2nd March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True]

My Lords, in answer to the second question, any Minister holds office at the wish of the Prime Minister and if he considers, in the case of any Minister on any subject, that that Minister is not performing, that Minister will be subject to the appropriate sanctions. As for the noble Baroness’s first question, my right honourable friend answered this in the other House. Allegations have been made that the Home Secretary breached the Ministerial Code and the Cabinet Office has been asked to look at the facts, as reported.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I fear that this affair may have some further way to go. There are, for example, various reports in the newspapers that there was a hitlist of other Permanent Secretaries that the Government would like to get rid of. None of us, I think, wants to go down the road of Washington, where relations between members of the American Cabinet and its staff are clearly toxic in a number of ways. Do we not now need some sort of investigation that will be published to re-establish the necessary confidence between Ministers and civil servants, without which effective government is very difficult to carry on?

[Lord True]

No, my Lords, the allegation of a hitlist is false and has been denied. All in this House would agree that good government depends on all the elements of a ministry and a Government working well together. I had the privilege of working in the Civil Service as a special adviser in the past and I know that to be the case. This Government wholly respect the role of the Civil Service; they need the Civil Service to be free to give robust advice and there needs to be proper respect between all arms of government decision-making.

Ministers: Training

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 27th February 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True]

My Lords, there is a code for special advisers.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the paragraph that the noble Lord just quoted actually says that the Prime Minister

“may ask the Cabinet Office”.

What is the status of the Ministerial Code? When we had an exchange in this House at the time of the resignation of a previous Foreign Secretary, now the Prime Minister, and it was pointed out that he had been reprimanded for breaking the Ministerial Code in several places, it was also pointed out by the then Cabinet Office Minister that the Ministerial Code is an honour code and based on the idea that Ministers will always act on their honour. Is it now time that we had some stronger sanction than that?

[Lord True]

My Lords, I repeat: Ministers hold office at the Prime Minister’s request and remain in office only for as long as they retain the Prime Minister’s confidence. I note what the noble Lord says. The current position is that the Prime Minister is the ultimate judge of the standards of behaviour expected and the appropriate consequences. The conduct of any Minister in office is subject to the most absolute scrutiny—that is, public scrutiny—and this Government intend to hold, and do hold, to the very highest standards of ministerial behaviour at every level.

EU: Future Relationship

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 27th February 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I, too, welcome the Minister to his new position and look forward to a series of robust exchanges in the months to come. As I was coming down to the House, I was interested to learn that there is now a revised version of the Statement. Perhaps it might be of interest to the House to point out what has been revised. The original text stated that

“as a sovereign, self-governing independent nation we will have the freedom to … lower all our taxes”.

The Minister correctly read out the revised version, which is

“to set all our taxes.”

That seems a wise revision by a Government who are about to produce a Budget which intends to increase spending very considerably. If they were to promise in a wonderfully populist way to lower all our taxes at the same time, it would be a little more Trumpian than even Johnsonian.

I would like to tackle the language and assumptions of the Government’s current approach. This is a very harsh, autonomous independence. As has been pointed out, sovereignty—independent sovereign equality—runs all the way through it, as does the notion of the people’s Government, the “servants” of the people. Saying that

“we follow the people’s priorities”

is the not the language of Churchill or Thatcher. It is the language of Viktor Orban, the Prime Minister of Hungary, or even President Erdoğan of Turkey. This is not constitutional parliamentary language. This is not Edmund Burke. The Conservative Party has to recognise that it is slipping into different territory.

In his speech last week, David Frost started and finished by quoting Edmund Burke, but he also rubbished the idea of shared sovereignty. I recall listening to Geoffrey Howe and Margaret Thatcher talking about shared sovereignty and how we benefit in constructing a multilateral international order by sharing our sovereignty through international treaties and agreements, international organisations and international law. Britain has done a great deal in that regard. The language of the Statement suggests that we reject most of that and that we think we are now dealing with a power—the sovereign European Union—which is threatening our sovereignty and independence.

I have not yet heard any Minister say that in dealing with the United States we will expect the United States to treat us as a sovereign equal. I hope the Minister can assure us that we expect the same from the United States because it would not be desirable to establish our independence from the European Union hostile force—as it clearly in many ways is—by reinforcing our dependence in security, intelligence and a range of other ways on the United States. We see it in current extradition procedures and in the presence of American intelligence operatives in this country, who are not fully covered by treaty arrangements and not fully reported to Parliament. That is a degree of dependence which is certainly an evasion of British sovereignty, if we are going to talk about our sovereign independence.

How are we going to establish our political and economic independence by January next year? If we are going to be economically independent, are we going to ensure, for example, that all our key telecommunications equipment is made inside this country? Are we going to ensure that we have an independently owned steel industry, or at least a steel industry of some sort, or is that not part of economic independence? Do we think that supporting offshore financial centres under British sovereignty is part of independence, given that integration into the offshore world which is the ultimate denial of sovereignty in taxation and other terms? If we are not, that is misleading, populist language. It is wonderful to suggest that we stand for the people, but actually, we do not.

Free trade limits sovereignty. Protectionism is what protects sovereignty. North Korea is in many ways one of the most sovereign countries in this world. Once you open yourself to foreign investment and trade, you limit your sovereignty, and that is what we have done. We are one of the most open countries to foreign takeovers and, as a result, we have limited sovereignty and we have to share it with others. If we are talking the language of sovereign equality, we should remember what that great realist Thucydides said: strong states do what they like, small states—and we are smaller than China or the United States—do what they must.

There is no understanding of Britain’s position in the world now we have left the European Union. We have no foreign policy at present. That is not part of this current populist dimension. How do we approach climate change and how do we deal with pandemics? We have to share sovereignty. I hope, when it comes to the climate change conference, the Government will sign up to new international obligations, which will also limit Britain’s sovereignty. Perhaps it is only signing up to shared obligations with the European Union that we object to and we do not, apparently, object quite so much to signing up with China or India.

Can the Minister also assure us that what I understood the Statement to mean on regulatory divergence is that we demand the principle of regulatory divergence but, in practice, we shall be fairly closely aligned? We are standing up for the ideological dimension that we choose but, when it comes to it, we will probably go along with them. Of course, the alternative, if we do not align with European regulations, will be to align more closely with American regulations, rather than, I suspect, to choose our own.

I hope the Minister recognises that the change of tone from the political declaration we signed last October is very worrying for anyone who cares about our position in the world. He will have read the Times editorial the day before yesterday, which said that if we now suggest that we are not bound by agreements that we signed up to last year on Northern Ireland and on the political direction, no one will be prepared to trust us and we will not be able to get a future agreement. When a not particularly left-wing newspaper, such as the Times, says that about the Government’s approach to their negotiations, we should all be very worried indeed.

[Lord True]

I thank the noble Baroness and the noble Lord. Obviously, I thank them for their references to my arrival here. I feel privileged to follow my noble friend Lord Callanan in answering on this subject at this Dispatch Box. He was often stoic and always willing to be open to the rest of the House. I assure both noble Lords who have spoken that I will endeavour to be fully open and I look forward to working with them. I know my noble friend is a hard act to follow and I will try to do that.

I will come to each of the contributions in a moment. I felt that they had something in common. One was, perhaps, slightly more robust but there still seemed to be a lack of recognition on the Benches opposite of the fundamental change in the circumstances in which this nation—and, frankly, this Parliament—operates and, I submit, has a duty to operate. Not only was there a very clear referendum result some years ago, following which this House did not cover itself in glory in the way it behaved, but there has recently been a general election—as referred to in the Statement—in which the British people gave a decisive steer. It is a mandate—whatever people on the other side may feel —and an instruction that, as the Statement said, we on this side feel an overwhelming duty and responsibility to respond to. Everything that this Government will try to do in this House will start from the fundamental fact that the British people have voted to leave and they have voted to be independent and that is the policy that this Government will pursue.

I come to some of the points raised. With respect to the noble Baroness, it was a little like hearing the briefing on the process before Brexit actually happened. The Government are trying to be as open with the House as possible right from the start, publishing this mandate before the negotiations begin. We are in a new phase. Brexit has happened. In the period up until 31 December, we are seeking to reach an agreement with our friends and allies in Europe; that is, an agreement based on full respect and friendly co-operation, and centred on free trade. With great respect to the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, it sounded as though he was seeing the Government as inspired by Stalinist socialism in one country. The Government are fully alive to our international friendships and obligations, which stretch right across the world. I repeat that the key position, which this House must understand, is that we want friendly relations and co-operation between sovereign equals, but it must be informed by the decisions taken by the British people—by our mandate.

On workers’ rights and environmental matters, the Statement was unequivocal. The position taken by the Government is that we aspire to the very highest standards in those areas. We had exchanges earlier about environmental matters. There is no question of the Government resiling from that aspiration.

The noble Baroness asked about friction. Our objective is free trade. That was the proposal put forward by our European friends. But, if it turns out that some element of friction—which we hope will be minimal or non-existent—is present, we have made clear the importance of our need to be an independent, sovereign nation. The noble Baroness talked about a different relationship. We do not want a different relationship in the sense of being hostile, as the noble Lord implied. We bear no hostility to our European friends but we do want a free trade agreement as sovereign equals. In that sense, the relationship is certainly different.

Financial services are, of course, absolutely critical. The noble Baroness asked about this. The position is that, again, it is an area of hopeful co-operation. We have a common interest with the EU in establishing an enduring relationship on financial services, based on mutual trust and co-operation. As my right honourable friend said in the other place, that means completing equivalence assessments, one hopes by the agreed June 2020 deadline.

We must not run ahead of the negotiating process—it is yet to begin. It is disappointing to hear in your Lordships’ House the assumption that everything is impossible. I do not agree with that. I am happy to repeat that we will, of course, try to keep the House informed in an appropriate way as the negotiations go forward; yes, we will keep the devolved Administrations informed. Indeed, in the House of Commons, my right honourable friend expressed his gratitude for the valuable recent discussions he had had with representatives of the devolved Administrations.

On language, I was invited to be robust, but I must try to stop being robust now that I am a Minister. I want full co-operation and friendship with the noble Lord, who I enjoyed working with in coalition, but it is a bit rich to be given a lesson on language by a party that went to the last election planning to revoke Article 50 without any reference at all to the British people. To my reckoning, that seemed mildly harsh. I will not go into a philosophical argument about what sovereignty means. Some things the noble Lord said were true; some were not. This Government intend to be a leader on climate change, as we have already demonstrated.

I have tried to answer the questions, but I am sorry to have gone over time. We must accept this as a fresh phase, and I hope the whole House, on all sides, addresses this phase in the positive spirit of wishing to get a good outcome by the end of this year, both for this country and for the European Union. That is the position of this Government and what we will try to achieve.

Local Audit and Accountability Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord True and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 19th June 2013 Grand Committee

[Lord True]

My Lords, I declare an interest myself, as leader of a local authority, and apologise for not being able to take part in these proceedings before. I shall make a very small point, which need not be clarified now but perhaps could be before Report.

I have a great deal of sympathy with the tenor of comments being made universally around the Committee about the risks of overlapping. I strongly follow the noble Earl’s comments about the importance of the integrity and role of audit as it is practised by local authority officers at the moment. I was going to raise my query later, but I shall follow the noble Earl, because it affects independence, which is the subject of this amendment. Paragraph 2(2)(b) of Schedule 4 would not disqualify somebody from being a member if,

“the panel member has not been an officer or employee of an entity connected with the authority within that period”—

that is, for five years.

The only thing that needs to be made clear and perhaps can be made clear on Report is whether that means the authority or the individual. Let us posit a case of somebody who has been an officer of a body and has gained a great deal of lifetime experience, and has retired early, perhaps eight years ago—we do not want any age complication, so let us just say that he no longer works for that authority. After his departure, some years later, that body becomes a connected authority, whereas he has had no connection with it for some time. His experience might be useful, and one does not want to exclude potential individuals by idle wording. I take it that the Bill means that somebody who has been working for, or connected with, the authority in the past five years should be excluded. However, the way in which it is written could mean that if you have worked at any time for a body that becomes connected in the previous five years, you would be excluded. I think that the second category might be considered, as somebody could be useful in pursuing this role.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, the definition of independence is set out in Schedule 4, which says that a person is independent if they are not a member or officer of the authority and have not been within the past five years, or a “relative or close friend” of such a person. Questions of objectivity and competence, particularly competence, are, apart from qualifications in accountancy, a little more subjective. Professional competence is defined by qualifications rather than by other things.

The intention here is to allow flexibility rather than to be too prescriptive. I am told that 80% of local authorities already have audit committees; 31% have at least one independent member and 15% have more than two independent members. If panels can be constituted from members of the audit committee, that is fine, provided that they are independently chaired and have an independent majority. There could be two independent members of the local audit committee, plus one other, to make the specific appointment for external audit. I assume we all accept that there is a difference between the continuing internal audit process and the appointment of external auditors. We are trying not to be too prescriptive on this, but that is the distinction that we are drawing.

There are concerns that audit committees will get in a muddle about having audit panels alongside them, but that is not at all necessary, particularly in larger authorities. We are not convinced that we need to make audit committees a statutory requirement in local government, although, of course, practice is such that the overwhelming majority of large and small local authorities have audit committees. Local authority audit committees may wish to set up a small auditor panel, which may be connected with the audit committee, provided that it has an independent chair and an independent majority. There can be important links between the role of a panel and the audit committee, but their specific roles are distinct.

We do not think that there is a wider case for imposing statutory majority independent audit committees on local government for internal audit, for some of the reasons mentioned, but for a panel that appoints the external auditors that case should stand. Under the accounts and audit regulations, local authorities are already required to ensure that a committee, or a meeting of the whole body, reviews arrangements for the internal control and effectiveness of internal audit, approves the annual governance statement and considers and approves the statement of accounts. That is what the audit committees in most local authorities already do, usually led by back-bench councillors and, as noble Lords have said, very often by opposition councillors. However, the Government are not prescriptive about the precise structure that local bodies use to meet these requirements. Based on these existing functions, guidance from the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy suggests that members of audit committees should be independent of the executive but need not be fully independent of the council.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, we are, in a sense, continuing the previous debate. Before I directly address the amendment in terms of defining “independent”, I shall speak with another hat on. As noble Lords will know, I speak for the Cabinet Office on issues of civil society and I am struck by the fact that the largest single part of the population that is becoming more active in all civil society activities is the fit retired. There is a very large and growing element there and it is precisely the area from which local bodies are likely to find the independent members that they are looking for. Looking around this room, I note that many of us would fit into that category but, unfortunately, we are not retired. Therefore we have less time than we would otherwise like to have. The noble Lord, Lord Tope, is particularly fit, although I like to think that I am fitter than he is.

We are happy to look into the question of how one defines “close friend” and of course we will have discussions on a range of these issues between Committee and Report. However, I reiterate that a third of audit committees already have independent members and 15% have two independent members. We see the independent panels which will appoint external auditors as not having the heavy weight of work that audit committees have but as fulfilling a rather more distinctive function.

The proposal in the amendment for mandatory audit committees is addressed more directly in other amendments but, as I understand it, this specific amendment is intended to ensure that, as well as being independent of the authority, members of an auditor panel or audit committee do not have wider conflicts of interest that might compromise their independence. I agree that potential conflicts of interest should of course be taken into account in appointing members of auditor panels. However, the Bill already includes a duty for relevant authorities to have regard to guidance issued by the Secretary of State in relation to their independent auditor panels.

We intend that such guidance will cover exactly these sorts of issues, such as how auditor panels will operate and who should sit on them. We intend to work closely with the sector and interested parties on developing such guidance and identifying what wider interests should be considered in appointing members of a panel. I hope these reassurances are sufficient for the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment, or perhaps to ask for further discussion between the Committee and Report stages.

[Lord True]

My Lords, I should apologise to the Committee. It was probably my fault that we got confused. I was following my noble friend Lord Lytton and my eyes went to page 40, and we therefore drifted on to the next group.

Perhaps I may ask a brief question. The noble Lord, Lord Beecham, raised the question of a “close friend”—it is good to know that the noble Lord has many close friends—and he is right to be concerned about the definition. Where is the question of political friendship dealt with in this? While it is good practice in local authorities, including my own, to have an opposition chairman—we are conscious of the political issue—is the situation of independents having close political associations but not close personal ones dealt with, in this or other legislation, in a way which would enable the work of panels not to be distorted by political considerations? In some authorities which are perhaps not as well governed as others, those kinds of considerations can be just as important as personal friendships.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, we are willing to look at that as well and I will write to the noble Lord. After all, we are talking about panels that may consist of two independents and one member of the audit committee. We are not talking about a vast number of people to be found outside. However, my understanding is that “independent” will exclude close political friendship. My experience of close political friendship also tends to mean close personal friendship, but we could discuss that in the bar or on another occasion.