Liaison Committee

Baroness Neville-Jones Excerpts

Thursday 21st March 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

I am sure the Chairman of Committees would not wish to conclude without answering my questions on the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy.

[Baroness Neville-Jones]

My Lords, before the noble Lord answers the question on the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy, of which I am member, I have to say that this House would benefit more from an effective foreign affairs committee than it does from what I regard as an ineffective Joint Committee on Security. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, that unless that committee can be made effective—it does require the ability to set up sub-committees in order to do its work, but I shall not labour that point at the moment—we would be better off concentrating our efforts on a committee that is supported and will work, rather than taking part in a Joint Committee which, at the moment, does not have a particularly good future.

[The Chairman of Committees]

I shall try to deal with the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, yet again. The committee’s view was that the Joint Committee should revisit and constrain itself to working with its original remit, which was to meet, I think the term was, frequently but irregularly three or four times a year. That was the Joint Committee’s understanding. There are, in effect, two committees to deal with security issues. There is the Intelligence and Security Committee, which looks at the security services, and there is the Joint Committee on Security, a totally different creature that tends to look at a broader concept of security and deals with energy security, food security and so on.

The Joint Committee on Security is disappointing because, perhaps as a function of its composition and size, it has had recurring difficulty in sustaining interest from Members of the other place. This is largely because, as the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, said, the other place has appointed the chairs of highly demanding Select Committees, and perhaps being on that committee is relatively low down on the order of priorities of its Members. It might be more helpful if the committee itself started a discussion on whether it could make itself more effective by addressing size and composition. Until then, it is clear that the view of the House of Commons committee and our committee is that there should be no expansion of its powers to appoint sub-committees.

[Baroness Neville-Jones]

My Lords, I agree entirely with what the noble Lord has just said about the unsatisfactory nature of both the size of the committee and the levels of attendance, particularly by Members of the House of Commons. It has to be said, however, that the chairmen of the various committees—home affairs, defence, foreign affairs and so on—themselves insisted on being members of this committee in order partly to ensure that it did not actually step on to their patch. That creates real difficulties for the effective work of the committee, which is precisely why it is difficult to find the interstices where we might be permitted to do something. There are some fundamentally unsatisfactory aspects to the existence of this committee that go to its mandate. I do not think that we will make a satisfactory committee out of conforming to the mandate: rather, the mandate has to change in order to make a satisfactory committee.

[The Chairman of Committees]

That might very well be the case, and I suggest that the starting-off point is to look at composition, size and mandate rather than giving the committee powers to appoint a sub-committee. The issue is much more fundamental than giving it the power to appoint a sub-committee. The remaining important and recurring point is that of a foreign affairs Select Committee. I acknowledge fully everything that has been said, and I am sure there will be proper and full discussion at the earliest opportunity.