Demonstrations in the Vicinity of Parliament (Removal of Authorisation Requirements) Bill [HL] Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateLord Tyler
Main Page: Lord Tyler (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)Demonstrations in the Vicinity of Parliament (Removal of Authorisation Requirements) Bill [HL]
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Lord Tyler
Perhaps I should reassure noble Lords who took part in the previous debate that I have no intention of promoting the location of a wind farm in Parliament Square.
I am especially delighted that, in addition to a number of Members of your Lordships' House who will speak in the debate, I can see one or two others who I know have a long-standing commitment to our democratic and architectural heritage. I am particularly delighted that my noble friend Lord Wallace of Saltaire is to respond from the Front Bench, because, as will become apparent later, he, too, has a track record in these matters.
There is widespread agreement that the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 was not the most appropriate legal mechanism to regulate and manage democratic demonstrations in and around Parliament Square. Some thought that it was simply ineffective; others that it was excessively heavy-handed; but I think that all now agree that it has not really worked. Worst of all, it has put our police force in an unnecessarily compromised position, seeking to administer a very defective law. All of us, as lawmakers, have an important responsibility to take that into account.
My Bill would repeal the part of the Act which manages to be both inadequate and overbearing. The words in my Bill are directly lifted from the previous Administration’s draft Constitutional Renewal Bill. However, I should also say that my Bill takes account of the pioneering demolition job done by Mr Mark Thomas, whom I heard on BBC Radio 4—but I think there are other occasions on which he was able to demonstrate its inadequacy—and of the persistent campaigning of my noble friend Lady Miller of Chilthorne Domer. As noble colleagues will know, since I introduced my Bill, a very useful Bill has been brought forward by my noble friend Lord Marlesford. I do not want in any way to suggest that my Bill is an alternative to his; indeed, it could lead on to his; but as his Bill has been more recently introduced, we cannot as yet give it the attention that it deserves.
However, I think that we all agree that the present messy hiatus is intolerable. It may take an initiative from Parliament, advised by our security experts. I noted the reaction of colleagues in your Lordships' House when there was a clap of thunder—at least, I hope it was a clap of thunder—a few minutes ago at midday. We are all very conscious of security concerns. It may take the advice of our security experts to both Houses of Parliament to break the bureaucratic logjam and knock together the heads of the London Mayor and Westminster City Council who, to my mind, have been trying to find interminable ways to pass the buck.
As I said, pre-legislative scrutiny on various Bills that have come before your Lordships' House has considered the issue. I was involved in the Joint Committee that considered the draft Constitutional Renewal Bill in 2008, where we had a lot of fact-based evidence before us. That put in their place some of the more fanciful prejudices that had been apparent. For example, we looked with some scepticism at the idea that Parliament should exercise remarkable special privileges for itself in relation to noise nuisance—another theme from the previous debate. Was the idea that we should pass a special law saying, “You are disturbing us in this building”, in a way that we would not allow anyone else to pass special laws? No other offices could do that.
However, we had some extremely good evidence from the Westminster City Council's environmental health officer who is responsible for us. I apologise to your Lordships' House for quoting at length, but I think this is important. He said:
“The first thing is that if you have to look at noise from the local government perspective, noise actually creates a nuisance. That is the way legislation frames it. That nuisance is really aimed around protecting residential areas but the courts have been tolerant with us in terms of applying it to work premises as well … If we were to look at demonstrations that we have experienced, what we have found is that when we have tried to measure the sound as each phase of traffic passes through Parliament Square the sound of the loudspeakers disappears; it is drowned out by the noise of the traffic”.
So it is important that all these issues should be considered in the light of factual evidence. In other words, the noise of protesters is seldom, if ever, a statutory nuisance that Parliament has to find a way of circumventing.
Then, from the Constitutional Renewal Bill in the latter part of the last Parliament, we had provisions that went into the so-called CRAG Bill—the Constitutional Reform and Governance Bill, as it became—and they were lost in the 2010 wash-up. Finally, as noble Lords will know, we have in Part 3 of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill, currently before the House in Committee, a very welcome restriction of the area to be the subject of a unique control regime. We have not reached that point in the Committee proceedings yet so it would be inappropriate for me to comment on it in detail. However, my Bill precedes these later developments. My job today is simply to suggest that the repeal of SOCPA is an opportunity for really constructive, positive, imaginative thinking about the relationship between Parliament and the public spaces around this building.
I have some experience in architecture and planning; I have never qualified but when I had a real job I worked for the RIBA in these matters so I can tell colleagues that some of the discussions about the future of Parliament Square go way back to the 1960s when I worked in that role. Personally, I think public spaces are the key to this issue. I welcome the fact that the public see democratic demonstrations and marches focused on this building, on Parliament, and not just on Downing Street. Parliament is the proper site for democratic dialogue, not the Executive's offices in Whitehall. Surely, that is entirely appropriate in a parliamentary democracy. We do not yet have an elective dictatorship run from the bunker in No. 10.
Equally, the current physical characteristics of the immediate environs of Parliament are hardly conducive to an effective dialogue between electors and the elected representatives, let alone with those of us who are appointed at this end of the Palace. Parliament Square is an extraordinarily important, iconic, architectural construct. It is surrounded by significant buildings such as the abbey, the Supreme Court, Parliament and the Treasury. You have the church, the judiciary, the legislature and the Executive. What could be of wider significance in our democracy?
It was in that context that, many years ago, there was the very important analysis of what should happen in Parliament Square, which was given the title of World Squares for All and it dealt with Parliament Square regeneration. We do not have to buy into all its recommendations but it included the principles that pedestrian access to the central area should be approached more sensitively, that traffic should be more carefully and sensibly addressed and that, of course, as I have already said, security should be looked at in the context of potential threats today.
As long ago as June 2008, the Chairman of Committees of your Lordships' House wrote to the Mayor of London calling for the closure of Abingdon Street and St Margaret Street. In his letter, he said that that closure should take place,
“to all traffic except vehicles requiring access on behalf of parliamentarians and the emergency services”.
His letter urged that this would create a “coherent open space”, allowing both Londoners and tourists,
“fully to enjoy the historic buildings contained within it”.
No doubt my noble friend the Chairman of Committees will be able to tell us whether he received a coherent reply from Mr Johnson. The ideas submitted by the Chairman of Committees on behalf of your Lordships were naturally very modest, but even they seem to have been brushed aside in the interminable discussions that have taken place since.
In the 2008 debate, my noble friend Lady Hamwee described her feelings every time she came here. She said that she was,
“ashamed, embarrassed and uncomfortable about what London presents to our visitors when they visit the Palace of Westminster and Westminster Abbey”.—[Official Report, 14/7/08; col. 1053.]
As a non-Londoner but someone who has had an almost lifetime interest both in our built environment and also democratic politics, I could not have put it better myself.
Since then, there has been a deafening silence. We should revisit the options urgently and not let the passage of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill impose an entirely negative context. We should look at positive opportunities as well. Most importantly, those practical proposals could ensure general public access to the central area and so secure what I would describe as popular self-policing, rather than simply permit the present exclusive, permanent encampment by a small minority to persist for ever.
It is a disaster that the Mayor of London and Westminster City Council seem completely to have blocked progress. I will make one suggestion; I do not pretend that it is the answer to everything. Why should we not relocate or replicate Speakers’ Corner in the centre of Parliament Square? I am very grateful for my noble friend Lady Trumpington's agreement. My erstwhile colleague in the other place, the former MP Mr Peter Bradley, founded the excellent Speakers’ Corner Trust, in which I have no pecuniary interest but which I and a number of distinguished parliamentarians of both Houses wholeheartedly support. He could find this an important opportunity. It is ironic that the trust has created a number of speakers’ corners in the United Kingdom and abroad—in Lichfield, in Leicester and in Prague—and yet we are discounting the idea of finding the right place for one in our own city of London, as near as possible to our Parliament.
I understand also that some very useful and comprehensive research is being undertaken at the moment by the Hansard Society—again, I declare a non-pecuniary interest as an officer of the society—on behalf of the parliamentary officers of both this House and the other place who sit in the Group on Information for the Public. I will not test noble Lords, but I wonder how many have any knowledge of what the GIP is or does, because it does not have any responsibility or accountability to Members of either House. Anyway, it is a useful exercise. The society is looking at the whole question of what should be said and done to tell Parliament's story, which will include the way in which Parliament Square is to be planned in future. I would be very interested to know what the GIP hopes the long-term aim, outcome and timescale of this research should be.
I come back to the issue of security. Naturally, we should all aim to ensure the safety of all who visit this building, as well as those who work here, and there is a strong argument for the removal of traffic from the east and south sides of the square for that reason alone. I am sure that the necessary access and parking issues could be successfully addressed. I also recognise, as has been mentioned before in your Lordships' House, that the sessional orders of both Houses may require some review. However, surely we cannot allow that review to hold up the wider improvements that have become so urgent. As the very successful depopulation of Trafalgar Square has demonstrated, it is perfectly possible to achieve greater priority for people over vehicles without major disruption. We are always told by the motoring lobby that this is impossible, but we have proved it possible in Trafalgar Square, and we need to look at it again in the immediate environs of this building.
Our overall objective must surely be that the heart of our parliamentary democracy should be seen as such, with clear guidelines on what should be permitted and even encouraged to enhance this role, without recourse to unwieldy, excessive and unworkable regulation. Your Lordships' House will no doubt remember the disgraceful case of Maya Evans and Milan Rai, who were arrested in 2005 under existing legislation simply for reading out the names of war dead at the Cenotaph. That was wholly disproportionate. It reflected a piece of legislation—the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act—that vastly overestimates the risks attached to legitimate, well managed demonstrations and protests. The Act is very obviously a blunt instrument that by its nature gags free speech in the very place where it should be allowed. Indeed, for every demonstration that grabs the attention of the media—perhaps one a year, on average—there are so many which are well managed by stewards and the police. I do not know whether there are any figures that my noble friend can give us, but I think there must be many demonstrations of that type every year. We will recall the Ghurkhas, the countryside march, which was on a much bigger scale, and, indeed, the biggest one of all, the demonstration and lobby of Parliament in favour of Make Poverty History. They were well managed, well organised and extremely important ways in which our fellow citizens were able to communicate their views to parliamentarians. Far from discouraging them, we should make better provision for them, instead of allowing permanent encampments of a small minority to persist while attempting to enforce the totally unworkable overregulation of everybody else.
I end with a quote from a 2008 letter published in the Guardian on 1 May—May Day. It is perhaps significant for those who share my view that May Day should not be allowed to be for just a minority. Those of us who are parliamentary democrats can take significant dates, such as May Day, as being ours too for all radicals. The letter runs as follows:
“The current proposal is to close off the south side, with traffic continuing to flow between parliament and Westminster Abbey. If, however, the east side were closed as well, a grand new open space would be created from the end of Whitehall through Old Palace Yard. That would provide a far more welcoming context for parliament itself, allowing the removal of most of the barriers, and creating a space where visitors can gather/demonstrate. The wealthy inhabitants of Smith Square object to this as they will have to drive round the other side of Westminster Abbey. Given the national importance of this democratic space, I hope that broader considerations will prevail”.
Amen to that, say I. The author of that letter was, of course, the Minister, my noble friend Lord Wallace of Saltaire. I beg to move.
Lord Tyler
My Lords, I certainly do not seek to delay and to detain the House for more than a few minutes. This has been a very positive debate, and I think there has been wide agreement on all sides.
I take up just one small point. My noble friend Lord Cormack is usually spot-on accurate, but I think I am right in saying that the statue to which he referred was not of George V but of George VI. However, that is significant in this respect: I recall one particular demonstration by the Gurkhas, and somehow the Gurkhas immediately around the monarch who led us during the Second World War, when they served this country so well, was symbolic of precisely the sort of important demonstrations that might not get the attention that they deserve. I therefore very much welcome the fact that no one on any side of the House is seeking to use the opportunity of the new legislation before the Government simply to impose yet more draconian—I think that was the word used by my noble friend—controls over demonstrations. We seek to enable demonstrations to be more effectively managed for the sake of all—indeed, for the safety of demonstrators, apart from anyone else.
I thought that the noble Lord, Lord Desai, who expressed some misgivings, summed it up very well when he said—I paraphrase, and I hope that I have got this about right—that he supported everyone’s right to demonstrate so long as they do not prevent others from doing so. That is the crucial issue at present. We want to enable people to use their democratic rights as our fellow citizens outside their Parliament, and not to be tucked away somewhere quite different.
The noble Lord, Lord Wills, was very generous in his compliments, and I in turn compliment him. He worked very hard to get the balance right, but I have to admit that I think that we on all sides would now accept that the present regime failed, that it is therefore right to look at another one, and that we have to strike a new balance.
The noble Lord, Lord Rosser, rightly identified the fact that the area for limitation, control and management is more restricted under the Bill, but I think that is welcome. I think it is a kilometre, not a mile—oh, dangerous, European stuff—but the previous legislation was excessive, and this Bill is much improved. However, again, as other noble Lords have said, the strict definition, which goes back to some previous legislation on Parliament Square, might not be sufficient and we might need to look at Abingdon Green and the area immediately around the statue to which I have referred.
I end now with what my noble friend Lord Wallace of Saltaire said. His final words were extraordinarily encouraging, because he is saying to us that, in parallel with any new restrictions on demonstrations when the SOCPA provisions are removed, we must urgently have positive reassessment of the role of this iconic square. It is so important, not just to our architectural heritage but to the way in which we relate to our fellow citizens. If this is the centre of a parliamentary democracy we cannot continue, as we are, discouraging people from seeing it as such, and seeing its relationship to the other pillars of our state—which are still, curiously enough, the church, the Supreme Court and the Executive up Whitehall.
My noble friend’s final words were very encouraging, and I am sure that there will be others in your Lordships’ House who will hold him and the Government to account if we do not see some progress in the next few months on the positive as well as the negative concerns that we all have.