Scotland Act 1998 (Modification of Schedule 5) Order 2013

Debate between Lord Wallace of Tankerness and Lord Sutherland of Houndwood

Wednesday 16th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Tankerness]

My Lords, a number of questions are rolled up into that. First, that is not the obligation of the Electoral Commission—there is no statutory duty or anything else for it to provide the answer by 1 February. I cannot remember which noble Lords made the point that your Lordships’ Constitution Committee had produced a report in a relatively short period of time, so why could the Electoral Commission not do the same?

The task of the Electoral Commission, among other things, is to go out and sample the question, which is not something, with all due respect, that the Constitution Committee intended to do, and neither would we expect it to do so. There is, therefore, a piece of work to be done in testing the question for its intelligibility, whether it is leading or misleading, whether it is neutral or whether it can be understood by those who will be asked to answer it in the referendum. I do not believe, therefore, that there was somehow some obligation on the Electoral Commission to rush that. I can hear the criticisms now if people thought that it had in some way been rushed.

Neither my noble friend nor any other noble Lord will be inhibited from commenting on the report of the Electoral Commission, which will be published and very much in the public domain. I will come to the noble Lord, Lord Sutherland, in a moment. There is no doubt that it is a matter for the Scottish Parliament to determine. There will be every opportunity for voices to be expressed as to what the Scottish Parliament should do in the light of the advice from the Electoral Commission.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

Simply as a matter of fact, the Electoral Commission has advised me that it will publish its report early in February.

[Lord Wallace of Tankerness]

That is helpful. However, it is important to understand that there is a body of work that it ought to do, and is doing, before it publishes that advice.

The question has been raised about the franchise. As I indicated to my noble friend the Duke of Montrose, it is a matter of primary legislation for the Scottish Parliament. If it chooses to extend the franchise to 16 and 17 year-olds, issues will arise out of that; it will need to ensure that the proper protection is given to minors whose names would appear on a roll. That would be the responsibility of the Scottish Parliament in any legislation which it brings forward.

I do not believe that that is the thin end of the wedge. If only legislation passed by the Scottish Parliament was, we would have proportional representation by single transferable vote for English local authority elections, but I have not seen a great rush in the Westminster Parliament to follow the Scottish Parliament in that constitutional development

Several noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Reid, my noble friends Lord Stephen and Lord Cormack, and the noble Baroness, Lady Liddell, posed an important question about the vote for service personnel. The position is that the members of the Armed Forces and their spouses or civil partners are entitled to vote in elections, provided that they are registered to vote either by means of a service declaration or as an ordinary voter. Members of the Armed Forces will be able to vote in the referendum if they are on the register in Scotland either as a result of an address in Scotland or a qualifying address showing a connection to Scotland, such as service accommodation in Scotland; an address in Scotland where they would be living if they were not in the services; or an address in Scotland where they have lived in the past. The same rules apply to spouses and civil partners of members of the Armed Forces.

On the specific point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Liddell, service personnel who are overseas at the time of the referendum who would otherwise be eligible to vote will be able to vote by post or by proxy. I understand that the Electoral Commission and the Ministry of Defence run an annual electoral registration campaign to inform personnel and their families in units around the world about such voting matters. I will certainly talk to colleagues in the Ministry of Defence in the next round of prompting of information to ensure that they remind service personnel of the referendum.

Scotland Bill

Debate between Lord Wallace of Tankerness and Lord Sutherland of Houndwood

Monday 26th March 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Tankerness]

My Lords, I understand that there is a serious issue here. As the noble Lord, Lord Browne, indicated, if we end up telling the Scottish Parliament what to do—my noble friend Lord Forsyth says that that is not what his amendment says but I think that, de facto, that is what it would lead to—that would be a serious position for the union, and it would undermine the whole devolution settlement. That is why I find this a difficult issue.

I think that my noble friend has, as the noble Lord said, totally underestimated the number of students who would seek to apply to Scottish universities. It only stands to reason that if you can get free tuition at the St Andrews university but would have to pay £9,000 at Durham, you are more likely to apply to St Andrews. The notion of quotas has never been particularly welcomed.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

I wonder whether the Minister remembers when this argument was last put forward. On that occasion we were, perhaps unusually, on opposite sides of the argument. I was recommending a form of care for the elderly, wrongly categorised as free, and one of the counterarguments was that there would be a—they did not use the word then—tsunami of pensioners crossing the border to Scotland. I think that it would have been more of a steady trickle which grew. It did not happen, although it was claimed that it would.

[Lord Wallace of Tankerness]

My Lords, it is too easy to dismiss the possibility of it happening. It is probably much easier for a student to choose which university he or she would wish to attend than for a pensioner completely to up sticks and settle in a different part of the United Kingdom. I think, with respect, that the noble Lord is not comparing like with like. However, I do recall that when tuition fees were first significantly increased by the then United Kingdom Government, around 2003 or 2004, the then Scottish Government had to respond to it. There were very clear signs that if the Scottish Parliament did not respond to it—and my noble friend Lord Stephen has indicated that it happened again in 2006—there would be an increase.

I should like to make it clear to the noble Lord, Lord Morgan, that I strongly believe that part of the richness of university education—one of its great pluses—is that it includes people from all different backgrounds. Universities in Scotland would certainly take the view that it is important that there should continue to be students not just from other parts of the United Kingdom but from other parts of the European Union and from around the world. That adds to the richness of a university education. They seek to achieve a manageable flow of students from the rest of the United Kingdom which would ensure the long-term stability of universities in Scotland.

Scotland Bill

Debate between Lord Wallace of Tankerness and Lord Sutherland of Houndwood

Wednesday 21st March 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Tankerness]

My Lords, I am quickly trying to look at the draft Section 30 order that was attached to the consultation. It provides for just one referendum.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

May I ask the Minister a question? He may not want to answer it, but clarification would be helpful. He referred to the Government’s belief in the importance of a single direct question. Is that a belief or a sticking point? There is a big difference between the two, and for some of us it would be a sticking point. That is the point raised by the noble Lords, Lord Reid and Lord Foulkes. We have not yet solved the West Lothian question with the current legislation. This Bill will enhance that question in the minds of many people across the whole of the UK. If we were to go further in some undefined form of devo-max, the difficulties would be greater, so I take him back to his point about fairness.

Scotland Bill

Debate between Lord Wallace of Tankerness and Lord Sutherland of Houndwood

Thursday 2nd February 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

There is, however, one significant difference. Many of us come from a generation where we had to live at home when we went to university, which I did intermittently for a few hours each night. But that is not a choice available to students going from England to Scotland, so they cannot economise on the cost of university education by making a choice that others can, for example, who live in London.

[Lord Wallace of Tankerness]

They can actually make the choice to go to London and possibly not pay any more or any less.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

Clearly the choice is driven then purely by financial constraints rather than by educational aspirations.

[Lord Wallace of Tankerness]

I agree and accept that, but we are perhaps kidding ourselves to think that those students in Scotland who chose to go to a university very close to home were not also taking into account financial considerations; albeit that they were fortunate to have so many universities of considerable quality on their doorsteps. If you came from the part of Scotland that I came from, nowhere was on the doorstep. I pay particular tribute to my noble friend Lord Forsyth for what he did when he was Secretary of State for Scotland in giving an impetus to the idea of the University of the Highlands and Islands, which, as my noble friend Lord Maclennan has indicated, has now come to fruition. It has taken a somewhat long time but it was worth it. I know how keen he was on it. It has made higher education available on the doorsteps of many people who otherwise would not have had that opportunity.

I never particularly like, and do not think this debate lends itself to, technical issues, but the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, is deficient in a number of ways. It reserves to the UK Parliament the power to make variations in fee levels between different parts of the United Kingdom. I am sure that it is not really quite what he was intending. I acknowledge and appreciate that my noble friend Lord Forsyth has sought to couch this in a way that is more related to an issue of principle rather than focusing on tuition fees. However, as the noble Lord, Lord Browne, pointed out, with the possible exception of rights of audience, you would be hard pushed to actually think of any other circumstance where this principle might arise. I will clarify the position on rights of audience. I clearly recall that it certainly was the case. I know of many practising advocates now at the Scottish Bar who are also at the English Bar—and some, indeed, at the Northern Ireland Bar—as well as some solicitors trained in Scotland who now work in firms in England. It does seem easier at a practical level to go between jurisdictions than it was hitherto. The point of my noble friend’s amendment is very much focused on tuition fees, which he did not attempt to disguise in speaking to his amendment.

However, one should always be aware of the law of unintended consequences. One possible consequence of his amendment is that the Scottish Government could address this by paying the tuition fees of every student from England, Wales and Northern Ireland. My noble friend says that would be fine. Obviously it could be budgeted and other things would have to give way to fund that. However, it would suddenly mean that it would be hugely cheaper for students from England, Wales and Northern Ireland to attend universities in Scotland. My noble friend says that is ridiculous, but of course that would be the consequence.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wallace of Tankerness]

The point I was making was that there was clear evidence, which we were looking at in about 2003 or 2004, in an overall review we did of higher education at that time in Scotland, that a differential where Scotland was much cheaper than England, Wales or Northern Ireland would have a considerable impact. I totally subscribe to what noble Lords have said in this debate—that the essence of many of our universities, the advantage of them and the thing that gives richness to student life, is the fact that you are shoulder to shoulder with people from many different backgrounds, nationalities and cultures. I subscribe to that overwhelmingly. But it is naive in the extreme to think that, if university tuition in Scotland was free for students from England, it would not have some quite material effect on the numbers applying.

[Lord Sutherland of Houndwood]

I thank the noble and learned Lord for giving way and I promise not to intervene again, but there is a further argument in this area that is relevant. If Scotland is not charging fees for students who come from the continent but England is, there will be a displacement of students from continental bases to Scotland. Last time I did a back-of-the-envelope calculation, European Union students were costing Scotland between £80 million and £90 million a year. That could grow as an unintended consequence of the policies. I am not questioning good faith or decisions taken constitutionally in the right way; I am just saying that we really are creating consequences, and that is another one that we ought to look at very carefully.

[Lord Wallace of Tankerness]

I think that actually supports the argument that I was just making—that if the numbers are going up from European Union countries, a fortiori the numbers would increase from other parts of the United Kingdom. That is something that would have to be addressed. I do not think that my noble friend has actually thought that through.

Just as the noble Lord, Lord O’Neill, said to the noble Lord, Lord Browne, that he might have to talk to the leadership of his party before the matter comes back at the next stage, so my noble friend Lord Forsyth said that I should draw this matter to the attention of the Prime Minister and my noble friend Lord Maclennan asked that we think about this before Report stage. I do not think that it would be a service to the House if I did any other than say that obviously we have to reflect on the very strong views that have been expressed in this debate.