Backbench Business Committee
Peter Bone Excerpts(14 years, 5 months ago)
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Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
It is surprising and novel for me to be called to speak so early in a debate. My speaking note says: “I am delighted to follow the hon. Member for X, who made a powerful and thoughtful speech.” Well, the shadow Leader of the House did just that.
This is an historic moment. These are radical reforms of Parliament and we are lucky to have two outstanding parliamentarians in the Leader of the House and the Deputy Leader of the House, both of whom believe in the House. If any of my remarks are critical, it is only because I want to improve matters. Some of my concerns revolve around the fact that there is to be a review in a year’s time, and we are not assured that the same Leader of the House and Deputy Leader of the House will still be sitting at the Dispatch Box then.
We are leaving behind a decade in which Parliament and the role of Parliament were diminished year by year. Back Benchers’ powers were reduced each year, there was more centralisation, and debate in Parliament was either extensively curtailed or, in some cases, non-existent. Parts of some Bills went through without even being debated in this House, and we had to rely on the other place. The media were routinely told in advance about new policy before statements were made in the House, and attempts were made by the Whips to crush the thoughts of independent Back Benchers. Parliament was seen as a rubber stamp for whatever the Prime Minister wanted. The number of sitting days was reduced, and the amount of time allowed for private Members’ Bills was savagely cut. People outside Parliament recognised that that was happening, and they wanted not only to see changes to the expenses system but to have a Government—of whatever political persuasion—who could be subject to serious scrutiny and held to account.
Things are changing, however. We have a new Speaker who is determined to protect the role of Parliament and, particularly, the power of Back-Bench MPs. We have only to look at the speed with which questions are dealt with, the restriction on Front-Bench speakers, and the number of urgent questions that are granted to see that improvements have already been made.
We also have a new coalition Government who—this next bit is very important—have abandoned the automatic programming of Bills. I have to say that I do not support the Government’s position on the programming of tonight’s business, because I believe that this debate could have gone through the night. I was not prepared to support the Opposition, however, because I felt that their stance represented pure opportunism, given that they had constantly voted for programme motions in the past.
We have also seen the Government overseeing the election of Deputy Speakers and Select Committee Chairmen. Real progress has already been made—
Mr Bone
The hon. Gentleman says that that was put in place by the previous Government, and that is true. Tonight, however, we are taking a huge leap forward with this raft of radical proposals. The establishment of a business committee, the introduction of September sittings and the speedy announcement of private Members’ Bill days are all signs that the Government have hit the ground running and are really keen on major reforms. But certain things could be improved, and many of the amendments that have been tabled need to be discussed, because they could improve on what are already important, radical proposals.
In the short time available to me, I want to speak to amendment (a), which stands in my name, relating to the number of days allocated to private Members’ Bills. In the Executive’s haste to bring this matter to the House, they have failed to appreciate that the number of days allowed for private Members’ Bills needs to be increased to compensate for the curtailing of private Members’ Bills in the previous Parliamentary Session. The amendment states:
“Line 1, leave out from ‘That’ to end and add—
‘(1) Standing Order No. 14 (Arrangement of public business) shall have effect for this Session with the following modification, namely:
In paragraph (4) the word ‘eighteen’ shall be substituted for the word ‘thirteen’ in line 42; and
(2) Private Members’ Bills shall have precedence over Government business on 10 and 17 September, 15 and 22 October, 12 and 19 November and 3 December 2010 and 21 January, 4 and 11 February, 4 and 18 March, 1 April, 13 May, 10, 17 and 24 June and 1 July 2011.’”
Mark Lazarowicz (Edinburgh North and Leith) (Lab/Co-op)
I am tempted to support the hon. Gentleman’s amendment, so I wonder whether he could address this particular point. The Leader of the House said that having the same number of days for private Members’ Bills, but extending them over a longer period, would make it easier for those Bills to go through. I did not understand that; I wonder if the hon. Gentleman could explain it.
Mr Bone
I am grateful for that intervention; I have to say that I thought there was a little bit of smoke and mirrors there. We have already heard the comments that the Leader of the House made during the previous debate on this topic, but some other comments—from both the Leader of the House and the Deputy Leader of the House—perhaps express a slightly different view.
Chris Bryant
I wholeheartedly support the amendment that the hon. Gentleman has tabled on private Members’ Bills, but I hope he is going to go on to say that the real problem with such Bills is not the number of days we devote to them, but the shenanigans that go on on a Friday morning. Either enough people cannot be got together for a quorum or Bills are talked out, and all the rest of it. Surely what we need is a system that treats Back-Bench Members with respect because they might have very good ideas that they want to get on to the statute book, so we should not be playing these sorts of silly games.
Mr Bone
I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman, but because of the way in which the business has been set out today, I have not touched on that matter, as it might have been ruled out of order. I have sought to amend the motion in the best way I could.
Early attempts to increase the time allotted for private Members’ Bills under the previous Labour Administration sadly fell by the wayside. I very much hope that our new leadership will be taking an altogether happier approach towards something that it is at the heart of ensuring a more balanced and free legislative process. How the leadership responds will to a certain extent be a litmus test of the Government’s commitment to the new type of politics.
This is not the first time that I have proposed such an amendment. The last time I did so was on 6 January 2010, when I and several other hon. Members challenged the Government on why they were cutting the days available for debate on private Members’ Bills from 13, as required by the Standing Orders, to a mere eight. The then Government’s answer was that because the parliamentary Session was a particularly short one, there should be fewer days pro rata for private Members’ Bills. I pointed out then that nowhere did the Standing Orders mention any exemption for unusually short or long parliamentary Sessions, but the Government won the vote that day.
I note that, on that day, the Deputy Leader of the House voted for my amendment. In fact, on 6 January 2010, he stated:
“I agree with an interesting point that the hon. Member for Wellingborough made… Perhaps there should be a provision in Standing Orders relating the number of days devoted to private Members’ business to the length of the Session. That would be perfectly logical and is probably a view shared by the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire. There is logic in saying that there should be more days for a long Session and fewer for a short Session, and I do not think that any of us would disagree with that.”—[Official Report, 6 January 2010; Vol. 503, c. 230.]
I could not have put it better myself.
Mr Russell Brown (Dumfries and Galloway) (Lab)
I fully recognise that the hon. Gentleman wants to move the issue of private Members’ Bills forward, but I am sure that he heard the words of my very good and hon. Friend the Member for Midlothian (Mr Hamilton) about using the spare time that exists on a Wednesday evening, for example, so that private Members’ business could be dealt with at that stage. Does the hon. Gentleman believe he is in a position to convince his Whips that they should take that issue on board?
Mr Bone
I am grateful for that intervention, which deals with a very important point that I will briefly touch on. There is a problem with the way Fridays are run, but because of how the motions were laid before the House by the Executive, as I said before, I am rather limited in what I can say on that particular point.
Mr Allen
I am listening carefully to what the hon. Gentleman is saying. I am sorry that he has had to delve into the internecine conflict between the Conservatives and Liberals who now occupy the Front Bench, so I will try to help him back to the core of the issue. Does he accept that, as my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) said, this is not about quantity, but about quality? If we had fewer private Members’ Bills, perhaps even only six, but they were brought to a conclusion, that would be much to the credit of this House. On this more than any other issue, people outside this House look to us. Interest groups, charities and others invest immense amounts of time in the process, as did my right hon. Friend the Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Mr Clarke), who incredibly managed to get two such Bills through. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that we could do better by focusing on that area?
Mr Bone
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, who shows great interest in these matters. I am aware that I am in danger of getting somewhat out of order here, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I would say that the hon. Gentleman is both right and wrong. Yes, we want quality, but we also want the same number of days, so I do not accept that it is an either/or choice. The hon. Gentleman is wrong to speak of an alleged dispute between the two parties on the Front Bench. I have an interesting quote from the Leader of the House, who was most helpful in the January debate. He was quite right to say he could give no commitment, but let us look at what he did say on 6 January 2010:
“It is important that the House jealously protects private Members’ time… Of course, I sympathise with my hon. Friend’s desire to maximise the number of days for private Members’ Bills.”
He went on to say that one of my
“more compelling points was that in a shorter Session, the number of days decreases, but in a longer Session, the number does not increase. The House may want to revert to that in the context of the Wright debate and allocating the future business of the House.”—[Official Report, 6 January 2010; Vol. 503, c. 227.]
Of course, that is exactly what tonight’s debate is about. I do not think that there is a division among the Front Benchers on that. Furthermore, when the Leader of the House and the Deputy Leader of the House were in opposition, they were supportive, and I am sure that nothing has changed just because they are now sitting on the Government side and have red boxes. I genuinely mean that.
I would like to explain to new Members that the issue here is about parliamentary Sessions, most of which run from the beginning of November to the next November. Because of the election in May, however, this Session will run from May until November 2011, which makes it particularly long. All my amendment would do is restore the five days for private Members’ Bills that were lost in the last Session to this unusually long Session.
Any member of the public reading this debate in Hansard might wonder why we should spend parliamentary time on such a seemingly arcane matter. However, private Members’ Bills are vital for democracy, and every individual in the country should have been worried about the growing power of the Executive over the last 10 years. Private Members’ Bills are important because they provide one of the few chances for Members of Parliament who are not part of the Executive to initiate, debate and ultimately create legislation, thus giving power and influence to Parliament and Back-Bench Members—outside the direct control of the Government.
There are many issues that Governments fail to recognise as important, but individual Members might see them as a priority. For example, in my view there should be an Act of Parliament requiring children to wear cycle helmets when they are riding on the public highway, but the Government will not necessarily want to bring such legislation forward. Equally, and perhaps more worryingly, because Government and Opposition Front Benchers take the same view on some important issues, they might not get aired in Parliament or be made subject to a substantive motion in the House. An example might be a referendum on our membership of the European Union. That is clearly an important issue, but the two Front-Bench teams can collude so that it never gets debated, whereas a Back-Bench Member could introduce such a Bill. Indeed, some issues might have no hope of ever getting passed into law, but they are so important that they should be discussed and drawn to the public’s attention.
There has been a great deal of upheaval in politics over the past year. We have a coalition Government and Liberal Ministers. Just a few weeks ago such a situation would have been unthinkable, but I have to say that the addition of Liberal Ministers to the Government has been remarkably successful so far as they have seemed to turn themselves into neo-Conservatives.
Let me make a more serious point. We have a remarkably large intake of new Members of Parliament in all parties, who have shown themselves to be very impressive and independent-minded. I have sat here and been amazed at the style and substance of maiden speeches. Surely that proves to everyone that the public are hungry for change, and if we are to deliver that change—which means more than just setting up reviews on transparency, or creating an unworkable expenses system—we must ensure that Back Benchers can hold this Government to account, and that the House is truly a place for debate. As the Speaker said recently, MPs must become citizens of the Chamber, and as I look around the Chamber tonight, I see a very good example of that. I think that there are more Members in the Chamber now than we saw at almost any time in the last Parliament.
Mr Greg Knight (East Yorkshire) (Con)
Although a number of issues that have been raised tonight are outwith my hon. Friend’s amendment, which relates to private Members’ Bills, I can assure him—as Chairman of the Procedure Committee—that we will examine the points that have been made.
Mr Cash
In the light of what has just been said by my right hon. Friend the Member for East Yorkshire (Mr Knight)—the Chairman of the Procedure Committee—and in the light of the important points made by my hon. Friend, does my hon. Friend accept that any restriction on the number of days will exert pressure on private Members’ Bills? For example, a Bill may need more time, particularly on Report. In my 26 years in the House, I have so often seen Bills fall at that point because they needed Government time to reach their final stages and that was not possible. My hon. Friend is entirely right to insist that the maximum possible number of days should be available.
Mr Bone
I thank my hon. Friend. I was intending to deal with that issue shortly.
I suggested five additional days to balance the Sessions, but I have not moved the trigger forward. That means that after the eighth private Members’ Friday progress can be made on Bills, which will make it easier for Members taking part in the ballot to ensure that their Bills are heard and passed into law. I thought that there was a bit of smoke and mirrors in the statement by the Leader of the House.
I have not much more to say, but I want to tell the House where I think the five extra days should go. I was going to say something about Wednesdays, but that point has already been dealt with. I propose—this touches on a point made earlier about September sittings—that two of the extra days should be in September, so that the September weeks become even more important. I was not here on the last occasion when the House sat in September, but I understand that there was a feeling that the House was almost “going through the motions”. If two of those Fridays were devoted to private Members’ Bills, the sittings would become even more important. I have also proposed adding one day in October this year, one day in June, and one day in July next year. Sittings on those days would inconvenience no one, and would add dramatically to parliamentary democracy.
Another of the last Government’s objections to more sitting Fridays was that they would somehow prevent Members from carrying out constituency business. As my staff members have reminded me today, constituency business continues throughout the week, and is certainly not restricted to Fridays. Moreover—new Members may not know this—Members do not come to the House on days when private Members’ Bills are debated unless they are interested in those Bills. Normally there is no Whip to ensure that Members attend, so there would be no requirement for a full House.
In proposing the five additional days, I am merely suggesting that the number should be returned to what would be expected in a normal two-year cycle. In a two-year period, we would expect 26 Fridays for private Members’ Bills. Given that there were only eight in the last Session, an additional 18 in the current Session would produce the 26 that would normally have occurred. I am not proposing to increase the number of days for private Members’ Bills; I am proposing to keep it in line with the spirit of Standing Orders and the House.
The public are still clamouring for change in the way in which politics is conducted, and for a check on the power of the Executive. Parliament must be allowed to fulfil its role, and Members of Parliament must be allowed freedom to express their opinions and those of their constituents. How the Government respond to this issue will be an important public indication of their commitment to real openness. I am pleased to have received a pledge from them that this will be a free vote, and that there will be no guidance from the Whips. This is a genuine House matter, and it could lead to a huge leap forward. Tonight, Members will have a chance to express their opinions about private Members’ Bills without any influence.
Mr Chope
My hon. Friend is making a brilliant speech. Can he confirm, in his peroration, that there is no reason why any Back Bencher should vote against his amendment? If a Back Bencher were so to do, they would be voting against the interests of other Back Benchers, and the only people who can possibly lose out if his amendment is carried are members of the Government.
Mr Bone
I agree and disagree with my hon. Friend. I agree with his remark about Back Benchers, but I also believe that it is very much in the interests of the Government and Front Benchers to support my amendment, because that would show that the Executive are open to scrutiny and new ideas.
We are experiencing the dawn of a new age. We have a coalition Government who are charging forward with reform. If I have an opportunity to do so, Madam Deputy Speaker, I shall press my amendment to a vote.
Mr Bone
Given the comments that the Deputy Leader of the House has just made and those made by Opposition Members, I accept that this is not about the number of Fridays, but about the quality of debate on private Members’ Bills and how we put them through this House. Given what the Deputy Leader of the House said, and given this happy frame of mind that we are in tonight, I shall not press my amendment to the vote.
Mr Heath
I am delighted to have satisfied the hon. Gentleman in his quest; we are making progress.
I am grateful to the hon. Member for North East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel) for her comments. She has made it perfectly clear throughout that she was a member of the Wright Committee who did not agree with all its proposals. She has taken a proper position. She had a minority view, she has expressed it and she has been consistent in her position. She amplified that a little by raising specific issues in tonight’s debate, so I shall deal with them. She asked whether members of the public will be excluded from the meetings of the Back-Bench business committee and indeed whether Members of Parliament who are not members of that committee will be allowed into the meetings to hear the deliberations. The rules that will apply will be the same as those for any Select Committee. I genuinely think that it is not for a Minister of the Crown to tell the Back-Bench business committee how it should undertake its role. However, I hope that it will consider, carefully and early on, how it will manage its business, and in what circumstances it will have open meetings and in what circumstances it will not, in the same way as Select Committees across the House do. She has raised an important issue, and it is a matter that the Back-Bench business committee—if we constitute it—will need to consider.
The hon. Lady asked about the party political make-up of the committee and whether seats would be allocated in the same way as for normal Select Committees or whether the system would be entirely open. As she knows, a formula reflecting the composition of the House is generally used, and it is intended that that formula will be used to determine the make-up of this committee. However, there is an issue of how we accommodate the minority parties in the Select Committee process, and I shall come later to the points made by the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart).
The hon. Lady also asked whether a Chair of another Select Committee could stand for election as chair of the Back-Bench business committee or one of its members. Nothing in the proposed Standing Orders would preclude that, but she raises an important point. It would be extraordinarily bad practice if a Chair of another Select Committee stood for election to the Back-Bench committee because their membership would inevitably raise the suspicion that that Member’s Select Committee had enhanced access to the business of the House. I would hope that that would not happen, so I strenuously urge those hon. Members who were lucky enough to be elected as Select Committee Chairs not to put themselves forward for the Back-Bench business committee.
My hon. Friend the Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) made an excellent contribution to the debate. She emphasised the frustration that we did not get the committee up and running before the general election. The previous Government failed to give us the opportunity to make the necessary changes to the Standing Orders, so I am proud of the fact that, in the first week following the conclusion of the Queen’s Speech debate, the House is determining the matter—that represents excellent progress.
My hon. Friend emphasised the need for a minimum of 27 days’ Back-Bench business in the Chamber and, as my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House said, we are happy to accept amendment (a) to motion 4 because that was always our intention. She also asked whether further progress could be made, including on the innovative use of time. I hope that we can find innovative ways of using time more effectively, and of course we firmly intend to move to a House business committee within three years. That will mean that we have a totally different way of managing the House’s business, which will be a good thing.
I think I have already dealt with my hon. Friend’s point about private Members’ Bills. She also said that the Wright Committee had further ideas that she would like to see progressed, such as some about public engagement. I agree that the Committee made further excellent suggestions. We have not lost sight of them and hope to come back to them in the future.
Political and Constitutional Reform Committee
Peter Bone Excerpts(14 years, 5 months ago)
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Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
It is the dawn of a new age and I congratulate the Deputy Leader of the House on introducing the debate so ably. When he was on the other side of the Chamber, he was keen on scrutinising the House’s actions. The House is not packed by chance tonight with Members wanting to see how the business progresses. I am sure that that will happen on many future occasions. It is a great achievement by the new Government.
For new Members, let me explain that, in the past, the Government would try to get something through on the nod, at the end of a sitting. If no one objected, it would become law. That will not happen under the coalition. The Government will table the issues for debate. [Laughter.] Hon. Members laugh, but let us consider what the Leader of the House said last Thursday.
The motion was tabled for the best of reasons. As the Deputy Leader of the House said, it was done to speed up the elections so that they could coincide with those for other Select Committee Chairmen on Wednesday. It was therefore introduced for a noble and proper reason. However, there are some questions about the Committee. As soon as an objection was made, the Leader of the House did not sulk, as the previous Leader of the House used to do. In business questions, he made helpful remarks. He explained that the motion had been tabled for speed and for the benefit of the House, but also said:
“The consequence”
of not allowing the motion to go through on Thursday
“would be that we would lose a bit of time in establishing this new Select Committee, but it would not be the end of the world if that happened—and my hon. Friend”
the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope)
“could, indeed, raise in that subsequent debate the broader questions about how this proposed new Select Committee would interface with, for example, the Public Administration and the Justice Select Committees.”—[Official Report, 3 June 2010; Vol. 510, c. 582.]
In my five years in Parliament, I never heard the Labour Leader of the House say anything so supportive to the House. The new transparency and the idea that we will discuss business after 10 o’clock if necessary are a refreshing change, on which the Leader of the House should be congratulated.
Several little issues have arisen. If we could consider them briefly, that might become the pattern for such little debates, when we have a packed House and people can raise some issues. When I sat on the Opposition Benches, we were never given such opportunities.
Some people have asked me forcefully today, “Why waste the House’s time? Why keep it sitting for three or four hours?” The House will not sit for three or four hours if I have my way. However, it is wrong, when setting up a Select Committee on an issue as important as constitutional change, to deny hon. Members the opportunity to raise significant issues. Other hon. Members have said that sitting after 10 o’clock might inconvenience some Members. The fact that the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority has made people commute makes it difficult for Members to be here late. However, we should not be running the House for the benefit of IPSA, but for that of democracy. It is not the House that should change its hours, but IPSA that should change its rules.
This is not a minor matter: we are talking about a Committee to scrutinise our constitution. I believe that such a Committee is thoroughly right. The Deputy Prime Minister helpfully said that he is proposing the biggest reform of our constitution since the Great Reform Act of 1832, so we certainly need to ensure that we set up the proposed Committee correctly. On 2 June, the Prime Minister announced in a statement that
“the Deputy Prime Minister has been given special responsibility for political and constitutional reform”.—[Official Report, 2 June 2010; Vol. 510, c. 22WS.]
That includes major items and reforms such as fixed-term Parliaments, holding a referendum on the alternative vote system, the West Lothian question, all-postal primaries and, significantly, a mostly elected second Chamber, so we need to get the scrutinising Committee right.
My hon. Friend the Deputy Leader of the House anticipated what I was going to say on that. In the previous Parliament, I sat on the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments and the Select Committee on Statutory Instruments. The former dealt with matters that affected both Houses, but the latter dealt only with matters affecting this House. If, as we have been told, the Deputy Prime Minister is to introduce reforms to the House of Lords, surely the scrutinising Committee should be a Joint Committee. The Deputy Leader of the House alluded to that in his opening remarks, but will he address that specifically in his winding-up speech?
Select Committees cost about £500,000 a year to run, so if we are going to set up a Committee, we must be sure that another Committee cannot do that work. I do not argue, as I used to hear when I sat on the Opposition Benches, that we will not do this or that because it will cost too much money—democracy cannot cost too much—but we must have an answer on that from the Deputy Leader of the House. Could the powers of scrutiny have been undertaken by the Select Committee on Justice? We are trying to cut the cost of government, so could that existing Committee have reviewed the activities of the Deputy Prime Minister, at no extra cost?
Given that there will be overlap between the Justice Committee, the Select Committee on Public Administration and the proposed Committee—if it is established—how do the Government see those conflicting interests working? We could have the absurd situation in which three Select Committees look at the same item and produce three reports. What does the Deputy Leader of the House have in mind and how will that tension be resolved?
On a more minor matter, paragraph (4) of the proposed Standing Order states:
“Unless the House otherwise orders, each Member nominated to the committee shall continue to be a member of it for the remainder of the Parliament.”
That is fine in itself, but it suggests that the Whips will nominate the members of the Committee, whereas other Select Committees will be elected by party groups. I do not know whether that is just a matter of wording, but will the Deputy Leader of the House clarify that matter?
On the election of the proposed Committee’s Chairman, motion 4 states that he must be a Labour Member, but that is wrong, because it should state that a member of Her Majesty’s official Opposition will chair the Committee. During this fixed-term Parliament, there could be a vote of no confidence in the coalition—of course, that is extremely unlikely—and a change of government, but the Chairman of the Committee would still be a Labour Member. That is not the case, of course, with the Public Accounts Committee, which has to be chaired by a member of Her Majesty’s official Opposition. I wonder whether we could look at this further, because I do not think it was the Government’s intention to bring that situation into being. A committee looking at constitutional reform should surely be chaired by someone who is not part of the governing party.
Finally—[Interruption.] Finally, in concluding my opening remarks, I would like to deal with Standing Orders, which exist to protect this House and the power of the Back Benchers. We should always change Standing Orders with great reluctance and with a lot of thought. This motion changes paragraph (7) of Standing Order No. 122B, under which 14 days’ notice is required for nominations to be given for Select Committee Chairmen, once the Committee has been set up. It is instead proposed that we set up the Committee tonight, that the nominations close tomorrow and that the election takes place the following day.
I have certain concerns about elections suddenly being announced, nominations being opened and elections being held the following day. Unless there is a really good reason for that to happen, it should not. In this particular case, there is a problem, because if Labour Members have nominated themselves to be Chairmen of an existing Select Committee, they are ruled out of putting themselves forward to be Chairman of the proposed Committee, which they did not know would be established when they put their names forward. Again, I would like to hear the views of the Government and the Deputy Leader of the House on that.
With that, I finish, having raised the issues that I wanted to raise in the debate. If we can have debates like this in future—with a packed House in which Members can raise issues about House business, rather than one in which things go through on the nod—we will be putting Parliament first. That would be a change in our democracy; this coalition has got off to a very good start.
Business of the House
Peter Bone Excerpts(14 years, 5 months ago)
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Sir George Young
I understand the concern that the hon. Gentleman raises. I hope that he will understand my saying that I will need to consult colleagues in government and perhaps the authorities in the House before we go down the particular route that he has outlined.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
Yesterday, the Prime Minister confirmed that nobody in the public sector will be allowed to earn 20 times more than what the people at the bottom earn. I calculate that no manager in the NHS will, thus, be able to earn more than £189,321.60. Can the Secretary of State for Health make a statement as to when that limit will be imposed?
Sir George Young
I commend my hon. Friend on his mental arithmetic in coming up with that figure. Clearly, this involves issues relating to those who are already getting paid salaries that exceed the differential, so the policy is easier to implement in respect of new recruits as opposed to existing staff. None the less, I shall raise this issue with the appropriate Minister, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health, and see that my hon. Friend is given an appropriate answer.
Business of the House
Peter Bone Excerpts(14 years, 6 months ago)
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Sir George Young
Those in housing need do not mind whether it is the council or a registered social landlord who provides their home. What they want is a home, and it is a fact that, for a given amount of money, one can build more homes if the money goes through registered social landlords than if it goes to the local authority. So, I would not go along with the hon. Gentleman in endorsing the idea that such housing has to be council housing. What is needed is affordable, social housing, whoever provides it.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
Will the Leader of the House arrange for an early debate on the working of IPSA? Other Members have commented on that, but for staff who have been told they will have to wait until to November to know whether their employment will continue, the position is frankly unacceptable. That needs to be sorted out earlier rather than later.
Sir George Young
Of course, my hon. Friend can apply for a debate about IPSA. It is important to recall that IPSA is an independent body, and the House has decided that it will not get directly involved in fixing or paying the allowances. None the less, I agree that there is a need for a sensible debate between the House and IPSA to ensure that Members of Parliament can effectively do their job. If my hon. Friend wants to apply for a debate, he is free to do so.
Dissolution of Parliament
Peter Bone Excerpts(14 years, 6 months ago)
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Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
What does my hon. Friend think would have happened when Callaghan’s Government fell and an election was called if the 55% rule had been operating?
Mr Chope
It was because I did not know the answer to that question that I initiated the debate. I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to speak in it as well, given that, as I have said, it will be much longer than we expected it to be.
It must also be unusual for the first Adjournment debate in a new Parliament to concern a subject that was not raised at all during the general election campaign. I can recall only one reference to it by a member of my party. At some stage during the campaign, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister announced that, if elected, he would legislate to require that in the event of a change of Prime Minister—let alone a change of Government—a general election should be triggered within six months. I think that he was emphasising the importance of accountability to the public and the people, and felt that that accountability had been lacking when the last Prime Minister became Prime Minister without the people having a say. Now that we have an arrangement that is becoming increasingly presidential in style, with rival candidates for the position of Prime Minister almost standing on soapboxes in front of millions of television viewers, it is probably all the more significant that a change of Prime Minister should generate a general election rather than being simply dealt with through the usual channels.
I know that many of my constituents were rather enthusiastic about the point made by my right hon. Friend during the general election campaign. I wonder whether the Deputy Leader of the House, when he responds to the debate on behalf of the Prime Minister, will be able to explain what has happened between the occasion, a few weeks ago, when the Prime Minister said that such a development was desirable and the position today, which seems slightly inconsistent with that stance. I understand that the talk is now about having a five-year Parliament, irrespective of how many Prime Ministers there are, and not giving the people a chance to have their say when there is a change of Prime Minister in the intervening period. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will be able to provide a response to that extra question.
I also in my preliminary remarks refer to the fact that I was elected, and was proud to be elected, on the Conservative party manifesto. I was pleased, as I am sure the Deputy Leader of the House is pleased, that page 63 of the Conservative party manifesto included the Conservative commitment to change Britain
“with a sweeping re-distribution of power…from Government to Parliament.”
We all signed up to that in the Conservative party and I hope that the hon. Gentleman will be consistent with that part of the manifesto. For the sake of completeness, I refer to page 67 of the manifesto where there was a pledge
“to make the use of the Royal Prerogative subject to greater democratic control so that Parliament is properly involved in all big national decisions.”
Mr Chope
I have not gone into the detail of that, but I am sure the hon. Lady is correct.
All of this brings me to chapter 24 of the coalition agreement, which states that the Government believe that it is necessary to make
“changes to our political system to make it far more transparent and accountable.”
The chapter continues:
“We will establish five-year fixed-term Parliaments. We will put a binding motion before the House of Commons stating that the next general election will be held on the first Thursday of May 2015. Following this motion, we will legislate to make provision for fixed-term Parliaments of five years. This legislation will also provide for dissolution if 55% or more of the House votes in favour.”
It is because of the various ambiguities in that passage that I thought it would be a good idea to explore these matters in this Adjournment debate.
I have set out a number of questions to ask. I am sure that many others could be asked as well, but the following are the questions that immediately came to mind when I looked at the wording of chapter 24. What is meant by a “binding motion”? Surely any motion that is passed can later be amended or revoked by Members of this House? Will this binding motion also be put before the House of Lords; will it need to be approved by both Houses? Will the binding motion include reference to the proposed 55% threshold for Dissolution, or will that be dealt with later in the proposed primary legislation? Will the binding motion be brought before the House before the summer recess? It was stated in the original draft coalition agreement that this motion would be put
“before the House of Commons in the first days following this agreement”,
but those words are omitted from the final version. Does this indicate a welcome ingredient of consultation and opportunity for full debate inside and outside the House, in the context of our commitment to more transparency and accountability? I hope that the Deputy Leader of the House will be able to confirm that that is the correct interpretation to put upon that change of wording.
Will the legislation that is promised in the coalition document to make provision for
“fixed-term Parliaments of five years”
only apply to future Parliaments, or will it apply retrospectively to the Parliament elected on 6 May 2010? If it is going to be retrospective legislation, how can that be justified constitutionally?
What is meant by the following statement in the coalition document:
“This legislation will also provide for dissolution if 55 per cent or more of the House votes in favour”?
Does the 55% figure mean 55% of those voting on any motion, or 55% of those eligible to vote, or 55% of all MPs elected at the 2010 general election, including Sinn Fein Members and you yourself, Mr Speaker? What role, if any, will there be for the House of Lords in the legislation?
Will Members other than the Government be able to move a motion for Dissolution? If so, what safeguards will there be to require the Speaker to give such a motion precedence over ordinary business? Those of us who have been in the House some time know that it is all very well having a motion on the Order Paper. Indeed, during the last Parliament, there were motions reflecting decisions taken across the House in important debates on future House business and our organisation of our affairs, yet the then Leader of the House refused to put those motions above the line on the Order Paper, thereby preventing Members of the House from voting on them, even though, collectively, we were in a majority. The hon. Member for Somerton and Frome and I were seething with frustration and anger about that, so I am sure he would not wish us to be in a similar situation under this new regime.
Will there be constraints on the Government’s tabling a motion for Dissolution? That point was raised in an intervention. I mentioned Germany, and an example of how something that on the face of it seems plausible could actually be cynically used for the self-interest of a coalition Government when they see that their opponents are in a particularly weak situation.
In what circumstances will a Dissolution follow if the Government are defeated on a confidence motion by a bare majority? There has been a lot of debate about that outside, and perhaps some confusion and misunderstanding, which I hope can be cleared up this evening. Are there any circumstances in which a Government defeated on a confidence motion could remain in office? If they did not remain in office could an alternative minority Government be formed even if they did not enjoy the support of a majority of MPs on confidence and supply measures? What would prevent Parliament from repealing by a vote of 50% plus one legislation requiring a 55% threshold for Dissolution?
I shall expand on some of those points in a minute, but I now turn to some fundamental procedural questions. Will the proposed legislation to establish a fixed-term Parliament and a 55% threshold for Dissolution be published first in draft, and be subject to pre-legislative scrutiny? When we were, collectively, in opposition, we were very much in favour of draft Bills and pre-legislative scrutiny. There could be no more critically important constitutional legislation than the proposals we are talking about this evening.
Will the Government set up a special Joint Committee of both Houses to consider the matter, along the lines of the Joint Committee on the draft Constitutional Renewal Bill in the last Parliament? My right hon. Friend the Leader of the House—I am delighted to see him on the Treasury Bench—and I were privileged to serve on the Committee. It drew on expertise not only from this House but from the other place; for example, Lord Armstrong of Ilminster, who has recently written on the subject in The Times, gave some important evidence and his counsels were very well received. Such a Committee would be a sensible way forward.
My next question is for my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House: will all these important and novel matters—which were not raised in the Conservative manifesto at the general election, when we said we were in favour of more free votes—be the subject of free votes for all Conservative Back Benchers? That would take quite a lot of heat out of the situation, because it would then be obvious that in order to win parliamentary support for these novel propositions, my right hon. Friends on the Front Bench would need to win not only the votes, but the arguments. A free vote would, I submit, be useful; indeed, it might be a good example of the new politics in action. To balance that out, I ask the Deputy Leader of the House why, when a fixed term of four years was proposed in the Liberal Democrat manifesto, we are now talking about a five-year fixed-term Parliament.
Some of those questions and others were raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) in an article in one of the national newspapers, and in other media outlets. He has said that he is sad that he is not able to participate in this debate, but he has been kind enough to share with me the response that he received to a letter that he wrote to the Prime Minister. It might help the House if I quoted from it a little. Members will make their own judgment about whether it clarifies or obscures what we are talking about. It says:
“I do take on board your concerns about our suggested proposal to require a 55 per cent majority to dissolve Parliament. Let me set out why I think this is an important, progressive and necessary step.
As we know from last week, the country wants strong and stable government.”
I do not want to pour cold water on anything that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister says, but I thought that in the general election campaign we were saying that the only way to deliver strong and stable government was for the Government to have an overall majority in Parliament. Indeed, I can remember distributing leaflets that were strongly against the threat of a hung Parliament, and which said that if we had a hung Parliament, there would be deals done behind closed doors; that nobody would know what was happening; that hon. Members of this House would be the last people to know what was going on; and that the country’s economic crisis demanded strong and stable government, and that is why we needed a Conservative Government with a strong majority. I still believe that proposition, and that is what I was campaigning for.
I disagree with the Prime Minister’s interpretation of what the country wanted, because the country voted for a hung Parliament. The essence of a hung Parliament—this is important for those of us who have the privilege of being Members of this Parliament—is that it is not a strong Government, but a strong Parliament. A strong Parliament is one that can hold the Executive or the Government to account. It means that we can put pressure on the Government if we disagree with them, whether on relatively minor matters such as the details of Bills, or on slightly more important matters, such as those that we are discussing this evening.
A strong Parliament and a strong Government are two separate propositions. My interpretation of the fact that we have a hung Parliament is that the people decided to have a strong Parliament. I am privileged to be a Member of this Parliament, and I hope that it will be known in due course as the strong Parliament, rather than be given the epithets that the previous Parliament was given.
Mr Bone
May I take my hon. Friend back to before the general election? He will recall that on the Order Paper, below the line, there was a motion for fixed-term Parliaments. I think that I was the only Conservative Member to sign that motion, and there were very few names on it, so before the election there was no groundswell among Conservative Members for fixed-term Parliaments.
Mr Chope
I am interested in the fact that my hon. Friend was and is in favour of fixed-term Parliaments, and he is quite right to reflect on the balance of opinion within the Conservative parliamentary party and throughout the House more widely. At one stage during the previous Parliament, it seemed that the then Government were flirting with the idea of a fixed-term Parliament. Indeed, I think that the Modernisation Committee—I shall be corrected if I am wrong—looked at the idea for a time and took evidence on it, including evidence from Officers of the House. The whole project was then kicked into the long grass.
I revert to what my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said in response to my right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden. The Prime Minister said that
“we are determined to deliver that stability with our lasting coalition. The introduction of a fixed term Parliament was, therefore, a necessary and important measure to propose. Obviously, this is a new idea for our Parliament and necessitated a mechanism for dissolution. I want to reassure you that a mechanism for a no confidence vote in the Government is unchanged.”
That is an important statement. The Prime Minister continued:
“Rather, what our proposals would do is give Parliament a new power to dissolve itself”—
rather like a Beechams powder, although that is perhaps an unfair analogy. That power, he said, is
“currently only exercised by the Prime Minister. We are, in effect, taking a power away from the Executive and putting it in the hands of Parliament, not the contrary. As you know it has always been my intention to reinforce the powers of our Parliament. I hope that this proposal is one positive measure to do just that.”
In my final quotation from the letter, the Prime Minister says:
“The House of Commons will remain able to call a vote of no confidence in the Government as at present. If that took place, a vote of 50 per cent plus one would mean that the Government falls and unless an alternative workable majority can be formed within a specified number of days, a General Election would be called.”
The convention that prevailed meant that if the Government were defeated, the Prime Minister would go to the sovereign and invite her either to dissolve Parliament or to invite somebody else to form a Government, but the new proposal seems to leave Her Majesty out of the equation. I do not know whether that is the intention, and if I am incorrect on that, I am sure that I shall be corrected in the Minister’s response.
I am not criticising anything that has been proposed; all I am doing is asking questions and saying, “Why is the change to the convention on Dissolution necessary or desirable?” The Prime Minister is giving up his constitutional right to request a Dissolution, and I can understand that that is very important—a matter of honour between himself and the Deputy Prime Minister. It means that the Prime Minister cannot pull the rug from under the coalition, but why do we need legislation or, indeed, a motion to achieve that? Surely the Prime Minister’s word is sufficient. Such a unilateral commitment gives the Liberal Democrats the assurance that the Prime Minister will not pull the rug, but during the debate on the Loyal Address earlier today the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith) said that the measure might provide for less stable government, because it would enable the Liberal Democrats to withdraw from the coalition and vote against the Government on a motion of confidence without causing a general election. I hope that the Deputy Leader of the House will be able to deal with that issue. If at some stage the Liberal Democrats withdraw from the coalition, the threat hanging over them, as things stand, is that the Prime Minister would go to the Queen and invite her to call a general election. But if the Prime Minister said that he would not do that in any circumstances, but had no reciprocal Liberal Democrat commitment not to withdraw from the coalition in any circumstances, the Liberal Democrats could withdraw and align themselves with the left, as the hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) would have much preferred them to have done in the first place. They could create an alternative coalition.
That predicament is unlike the situation that prevailed immediately after the general election, when the Liberal Democrats, those on the left and the nationalists were not able to form a sufficient number to guarantee staying in Parliament and enjoy a confidence and supply measure of support. In the situation that I have described, the Liberal Democrats would have no such constraint—they would be able to form a minority Government and stay in office for the remaining period of the fixed-term Parliament. I hope that that nightmare scenario, from a Conservative perspective, is just a nightmare and is not realistic, but I have yet to be persuaded of that. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will be able to persuade me.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
It is a great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty). He obviously has much greater knowledge than I of the Scottish Parliament, but from what he says, it seems to me that the whole idea of a fixed Parliament was designed for a proportional representation system, which thankfully we do not have in this part of the United Kingdom.
I welcome the idea of a fixed-term Parliament when I was on the Opposition Benches because it would have the advantage of removing from the Prime Minister the power to call an election on a whim. I believed that it meant not allowing the Prime Minister to decide when to go to the country, so that he could not go early just to enhance his chances. We had a clear example of that in the last Parliament—I believe it was in 2007—when the Prime Minister was thinking of going to the country and there was a lot of hoo-hah. Nobody knew what was going on, and some people said that he bottled it. I do not believe that the Executive should have that power, and I am for giving it to Parliament. What I am not for is an artificial means of keeping the Executive in power. I wholly support the coalition’s aim to have a fixed-term Parliament, but I am very much unpersuaded of the need for a 55% provision. I do not believe that it would work, for all the very good reasons that my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) gave. It could be overturned by a simple majority of the House, or there could be collusion and coalition Members could vote with the Opposition—it does not seem that it would have any effect here.
The one thing that the proposal would do, which seems to me wholly wrong, would be to remove the power of the monarch. At the moment, if a Government lose a vote of confidence, it is the monarch who decides whether the House should be dissolved or whether to try to arrange another Government. In the past, the latter has happened—Prime Ministers have gone to the monarch and said, “I would like a dissolution”, and it has not been granted and another Government have been formed. I see no reason for changing that.
This Adjournment debate is one of those wonderful occasions, already in this Parliament, when we get to debate an important issue in some depth late at night. It is wonderful to see so many Members on both sides of the House listening to and participating in the debate. I would have thought that such a change needed much more due process and consideration.
I support the view that we need a strong, stable Government at this time in our history, but that is exactly what we have got. We have a strong and powerful Government made up of two parties, which are working together. I do not believe that the election produced a strong, stable Government by artificial means. Under our electoral system, we get the Government whom the people want. The people clearly did not want the Labour party to govern with a majority, and they clearly did not want the Liberal party to govern with a majority. They also did not want the Conservative party to govern with a majority. We argued the case: “Vote for us. We need a majority and we will have a strong Government.” The people wanted parties to work together and Parliament to be strong and to scrutinise. That is the great advantage of the coalition.
I will want to support some policies wholeheartedly—for example, that of a fixed-term Parliament to remove power from the Executive, but without the 55% provision Indeed, many aspects of the Liberal Democrat manifesto could have been included in the coalition. I was very much in favour of its proposed referendum on in/out of the European Union. I voted for that in the previous Parliament. Such a merge seemed easy, given that the Conservative party was in favour of a referendum on the Lisbon treaty.
One of the great things about the coalition is that it has brought together talented people from the Liberal and Conservative parties. To reply to the debate, we have a leading parliamentarian, who, in the previous Parliament, fought fiercely for the rights of Parliament and Back Benchers and I do not believe that that will change just because he is sitting on the Front Bench with a red folder on his lap. I am sure that the Deputy Leader of the House will allay our fears about the artificial 55%. There may be a good reason for it, but, given all the questions that my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch listed, we need to know a lot more about it.
I am in favour of a fixed-term Parliament but concerned about the 55% provision.
Mr Heath
The legislation will be framed in such a way that, if no Government are formed within a particular time, Parliament stands dissolved. Now that is not a particularly difficult concept even for those who do not wish to understand—but, of course, I do not include the hon. Member for Christchurch among them. That is what will happen, and it provides an answer to those who suggest that it would be possible for a zombie Government who have lost the confidence of the House to be maintained in office. That cannot happen under the proposals that we will bring forward.
Mr Bone
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way. He is helping the House understand this system and is making good progress. However, the real change under this 55% rule is that it will remove the monarch’s role. Is the removal of the monarch’s discretion the real purpose of the proposal?
Mr Heath
With respect to the hon. Gentleman, it instead removes a difficult dilemma for the monarch, who is bound under the current conventions to take the advice of the Prime Minister seeking the Dissolution. That puts the monarch in an invidious position if that advice is not consistent with the political situation that, it might be suspected, is present in the House. By removing the prerogative exercised by the Prime Minister, the monarch is in the stronger position of not being put in the embarrassing position of having to divine by means that are not clear the intentions of the House.
An automatic Dissolution following a no confidence vote would not work in this context because it would prevent another party or parties in the House from having the opportunity to form a Government. Another general election might well not be in the national interest, particularly if it is very soon after the previous election. For example, in January 1924, Mr Baldwin lost the confidence of the House and Mr MacDonald became the Prime Minister. So we have a historical precedent.