European Union Referendum Bill

Lord Turnbull Excerpts

Monday 2nd November 2015 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Turnbull]

22: After Clause 5, insert the following new Clause—
“Office for Budget Responsibility
(1) The Secretary of State shall request the Office for Budget Responsibility to consider and report on the effect on the United Kingdom economy of withdrawal from the European Union.
(2) The report provided for by subsection (1) must be published, and laid before each House of Parliament, no later than 12 weeks prior to the appointed date of the referendum.”

[Lord Turnbull]

I apologise for missing the earlier part of this debate; I was detained on other business in the House. I have heard enough, however, to convince me of the importance of providing an authoritative and objective analysis not just of what “in” looks like but of what “out” would look like. I have also heard enough to convince me just how complex a task this is, but it is a task that we have to complete—we owe it to our electorate. I do not share the pessimism that not many people out there will want to read this: they may not read the actual reports, but they will certainly want to go into the discussion of them.

It can be argued that reporting on the impact to the economy, which is the subject of this amendment, would be subsumed in one or another of the amendments in the previous group, or in the analysis that the Minister has offered. I very much welcome the assurance that she has given us. This amendment is less about scope and more about who is best placed to provide an objective account, whether that is the Government, the campaigning groups or an independent entity. For many of the issues—including those listed by the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, of residence, citizenship, employment and the various regulatory regimes which will replace EU legislation—answers can be provided only by the Government, as they are the only people who know the full complexities of them. However, for a report on the impact on the economy, I believe that we do have an alternative—we have created the Office for Budget Responsibility, which has developed a reputation for objectivity—and I think we could entrust this task to it.

There have been two major reports produced by Treasury officials—it was after I left the Treasury, but I am still very proud of them—the assessment of the five tests for entering into the euro, in 2003, and the implications for Scottish independence of the attempt to share a currency. Both were excellent pieces of work, objective and authoritative; and both, I believe, had a significant influence on the decisions that were made. However, in the case of a possible exit by the UK, I believe that political pressures will make it difficult to separate analysis and advocacy, to use the terms that my noble friend Lord Hannay has used, in any reports emanating from the Government. Special steps will need to be taken within Government, for the bits that they are doing, to separate out the people developing the advocacy part of it from the people doing the work.

In the case of the impact on the economy, when we have a body such as the Office for Budget Responsibility available, with a reputation for competence and independence, I believe that we should use it. I beg to move.

Amendment 23 (to Amendment 22)

Tabled by

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Turnbull]

My Lords, the purpose of the amendment was to draw attention not just to the question of information but to the validation of that information—the quality of it and the trust that people can put in it. One point on which I can agree with the noble Lords, Lord Forsyth and Lord Blencathra, is that the information should be symmetrical, but I fear that the way that the debate will go is that the Government will negotiate a series of changes and will want to come back and tell people that they are good and sufficient. So I think that we will hear rather more about the benefits of staying in and not enough about the effects—I will not say “dangers” or “fears”—of going out. Symmetry is the first principle and validation is the second. There may be objections to using the OBR but, whatever the Government produce, and I welcome this proposal, they will have to answer the question of how we make people believe that the analysis is authoritative and technical. I see that the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, wishes to intervene. The purpose of the analysis is to help people to make up their mind; it is not to offer them judgments.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

I appreciate that people are thinking about the dinner break, but will the noble Lord just reflect on when we last tried this? It was when the Scottish Government produced their White Paper on the referendum. The assumption was that the oil price would be $110. Is he not concerned about that experience?

[Lord Turnbull]

The noble Lord keeps using the word “forecast”. I do not see these as forecasts; they are analyses based on different assumptions, the purpose of which would be to draw out for people the complexity of the situation and the number of variables in play, and to draw attention to aspects that they may not have thought of. The idea that the OBR would produce a single forecast that could be falsified simply on the basis of one variable is wrong.

I return to the fact that there is to be a response from the Government. I think that we should wait for that but I hope that it will address how this work can be done by government, even if it does not use institutions outside government, in such a way that people can have the greatest faith in it.

Amendment 23 (to Amendment 22) not moved.

Assisted Dying Bill [HL]

Lord Turnbull Excerpts

Friday 16th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayman]

I am grateful to my noble and right reverend friend. The difficulty is trying to put this in the Bill, to deal with all the different circumstances that will arise with individuals or with practitioners. I would be much more comfortable with that, because I think we are all on the same page with regard to not wanting someone who has had absolutely no contact with their doctor, because of all the issues which we know arise. However, I would much rather that those sorts of issues were dealt with in guidance, both from the GMC and the Secretary of State. It would then be much more possible to make sure that there would be equality of access for patients.

[Lord Turnbull (CB)]

I will add one point to my noble friend’s argument which is absolutely telling. One can be registered with a GP and never see them for 20 years. You might be a very fit 40 year-old, but you could suddenly get a devastating diagnosis of cancer and wish to talk to your GP. Although you are registered with them, that GP does not know anything about you at all.

[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Non-Afl)]

I will add to that last point, for which I am grateful. I have been a supporter of the principles of the Bill for almost the whole of my adult life, and I have had the same GP for 26 years. Every year I insist that he looks at my living will form, and we then have a very robust argument, because he is against the principle of assisted dying, and I insist that he takes account of my wishes in that living will form on an annual basis. I know that were I to be in a situation where I would require and wish to take advantage of the Bill, were it to become an Act, I would not be in a position where I could expect him to give me that support. We have been very clear with each other over the past 25 years. I do not know what the position of his colleagues in the practice is, but I am abundantly clear that when that point is reached, I will want to have a GP or a specialist consultant who is able to take a good medical history and read my notes, to understand what medical practitioners over the last 25 years have said about me, and to reach a valid professional judgment about whether my wish—I make that point; it is not the GP’s wish or the family’s wish—to take advantage of this provision is based on a good medical prognosis. It is not beyond the wit of the medical profession to do that even if they do not intimately know me. I hope that we will see that in the Bill.

Freedom of Information Act 2000

Lord Turnbull Excerpts

Tuesday 17th January 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Turnbull]

My Lords, the FOI Act has, as intended, brought important benefits to citizens by giving them information on decisions affecting their lives. However, one area of the Act is not working as intended—the so-called safe space. In all the discussions leading to the Act, the code of practice, the White Paper, the Bill itself and reports by committees, the need for a safe space was repeatedly acknowledged. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, speaking on the Bill in 2000, said:

“I should … make clear that many people on both sides of the debate consider that it is appropriate that policy making should not take place in a goldfish bowl: that there should be a process which allows Ministers, public authorities and civil servants to exchange views in a way that they feel will be private to give them that space to think and make decisions”.—[Official Report, 24/10/00; col. 282.]

When taken with the principle of Pepper v Hart that the courts should be able to look at the parliamentary record as well as at the specific wording of the Act, it is crystal clear what Parliament intended. Why, then, has the safe space been under repeated attack? It is because Section 35 does not confer an absolute exemption but requires a balancing public interest test. In applying that test, however, the commissioners and the tribunal have tended to focus narrowly on the information sought in the request, not the wider signal that the disclosure produces. Any release contains two forms of information: that inherent in the document, and that which provides signals how about the commissioner/tribunal are expected to respond in future cases. There will be cases where the information itself may cause little harm but where releases of similar documents could have a big effect on the behaviour of Ministers and officials. The commissioners and the tribunal appear to place little weight on this wider impact despite the advice of many distinguished people.

There is a further dimension. The Civil Service is required to give its best advice to Governments of different complexions. This will inevitably become more difficult if the advice given by named officials is revealed to successor Governments, a danger referred to in the papers by none other than the noble Lords, Lord Heseltine, Lord Mandelson and Lord Butler. There are two ways out of this: either the commissioner and the tribunal pay more heed to the original intention of Parliament or the use of the ministerial veto, always intended as a backstop, will, sadly, become more frequent.