Queen’s Speech

Baroness Scott of Bybrook Excerpts

Thursday 13th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Anderson of Swansea (Lab)]

My Lords, I follow the diversity theme of the right reverend Prelate and join in welcoming and congratulating our two maiden speakers.

A week ago—it seems a long time ago now—we had elections in Great Britain. I personally sought solace in turning again and again to the Welsh results. But, in retrospect, the big story from the elections may not be the performance of the parties but what the polls revealed about the deepening diversity in our country. Of course, the polls were influenced by the pandemic, and the incumbency factor played a role, but it does only continue a trend. The polls in Scotland and the north-east dominated the headlines; by contrast, Wales was relatively neglected. Obviously, the pressure for independence in Wales is much less than it is in Scotland, but it has doubled to just about one-third over the past seven years. However, the different national and regional responses are not reflected in this Queen’s Speech.

The Prime Minister promised a levelling-up process. The so-called red-wall seats were addressed, with more public money and more decentralised government departments. New assurances were given, and it is hoped by the Government that the same tactics will now succeed in Scotland. However, they ignore the problem of identity, which in my judgment goes much deeper. It is not just about increasing the flow of public money from the south to the north; it is not even about looking for greater flows from the south to the west, although that is of course important.

In that context, I invite your Lordships to examine the indices of poverty and deprivation in the nations and regions as a whole. In that examination, your Lordships will see that Wales is worse off than the north-east and certainly far worse off than Scotland. The facts speak for themselves. Wales has a lower GDP per head than any other country or region of the UK, the lowest growth rate of any region in the UK, the lowest proportion of taxpayers in the additional and higher rates, and the joint-highest proportion of low-income households. It is also the poorest region in terms of gross household disposable income per head. So much for levelling up. Should we shout louder? Should we have more marginal seats to be addressed? It is not just about the money side of things. Wales deserves better. It should not be taken for granted by a Prime Minister who plays for time in Scotland and has increased centralisation by taking to Whitehall powers and money that were repatriated from Brussels.

However, resources are not everything. The Prime Minister, an English nationalist to the core, ignores the problems of identity. Wales has clearly taken up the mantle of Welsh identity and the SNP dominates in Scotland, as the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, emphasised. Are we in the UK now sleep-walking into a quasi-federal state without the constitutional institutions and safeguards that support it? Today’s debate has been set aside for the question of our constitution and the union, but in fact says little of relevance about either. The Minister mentioned only electoral reform and judicial review.

Her Majesty said:

“My Government will strengthen and renew democracy”


and

“promote the strength and integrity of the union.”

That was wholly vacuous and without specific proposals. If the Prime Minister wishes to save the union, he must adopt a more imaginative and sensitive approach. He should let the former European Union money flow directly to the devolved Administrations. He should consider new powers of devolution, such as those in the Welsh Labour manifesto. He should open the debate on the nature and composition of your Lordships’ House. He should seek to be more responsive to the nations and regions, perhaps through direct or indirect elections, and take note of what the latest Lord Speaker’s committee said about his ignoring the Burns report. Most importantly, beyond calling a meeting of the leaders to discuss the results of the pandemic, which is in itself welcome—

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

Can I ask the noble Lord to wind up, please?

[Lord Anderson of Swansea (Lab)]

The Prime Minister should convene a meeting of all the leaders on the constitutional problem. He should respond to what the polls have revealed, which reflects the reality of the UK today.

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[Lord Norton of Louth (Con) [V]]

My Lords, today’s debate is billed as being on “The Constitution and the Union”. That should be “The Constitution, including the Union”. We should not see the union as some discrete issue. Part of the problem of the past century has been treating parts of the United Kingdom as somehow separate, of treating Northern Ireland as a quasi-state and leaving it to its own devices. We need to be looking more holistically at our constitution. The way to promote the union and to ensure that we remain a union is not to promise more funding or devolution of powers. That is to play into the hands of those who favour independence. We should not be in response mode, nor should we misinterpret why people wish to stay in the union.

In 2014, when an opinion poll suggested that there might be a majority in the referendum for Scotland becoming independent, all three party leaders went to Scotland and promised a greater devolution of powers if electors voted to stay in the union. When there was a majority to stay in the union, the Government delivered on that promise. Then, as now, the Government appeared to assume a causal relationship. There is no evidence that there was one. Survey data revealed that those who voted for Scotland to remain in the union did so for several different reasons; that of wanting more devolution hardly registered.

If we are to maintain the union, we need to be on the front foot, making the case for the union, not on the back foot, making promises in response to demands from those who want independence. I remind the House of the Constitution Committee’s excellent report The Union and Devolution, published in 2016. It noted the ad hoc way in which power has been devolved. As it reported:

“This haphazard approach to the UK’s constitution, in which power has been devolved without any counter-balancing steps to protect the Union, recently culminated in an existential threat in the form of a referendum on Scottish independence. An inattentive approach to the integrity of the Union cannot continue.”


We need to be making the case for the union in all parts of the United Kingdom. The attempts to keep Scotland in the union have exacerbated the English question. The Government should be to the fore in trumpeting the benefits of the union—one constitutional entity under the Crown. As my noble and learned friend Lord Stewart was saying, the whole is far greater than the sum of the parts. The case also needs to be made for moving away from what has been characterised as a grace-and-favour approach to the devolved nations and adopting one of mutual esteem and participation. I welcome especially the report of my noble friend Lord Dunlop. We need not more legislation but an attitude shift on the part of government.

In the short time available, I cannot cover all the constitutional measures in the gracious Speech, but I want to make one point about the constitution. As we have heard, there will be a Bill to replace the Fixed-term Parliaments Act. That Act is generally unloved and was the product of a rushed attempt to deal with a particular problem. It was agreed by negotiators who were not necessarily experts in constitutional matters. As the Constitution Committee noted, the policy behind it

“shows little sign of being developed with constitutional principles in mind.”

Both the Government and Opposition are committed to replacing the Act. As we have seen with the discussion on the Government’s draft Bill and as the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, indicated, putting the situation back to what it was before September 2011 is not a straightforward task.

The 2011 Act was one of several constitutional measures over recent decades. They have been notable for their number as well as for being disparate and discrete. We need to be wary of rushing in with more. I have made the case before that we need to stand back and make sense of where we are before we embark on further constitutional change. We should not be talking of restoring balances without being clear as to what the existing balance is and should be. Change should be the result of considered reflection and, for a Conservative Government, grounded in a Conservative narrative for democracy. We need to avoid repeating the mistakes of those responsible for the Fixed-term Parliaments Act.

We need to stand back and understand the nature and value of our constitutional arrangements and make the case for those arrangements. We need to ensure that we do not lose the value of what we have. Once lost, it is difficult, if not impossible, to recreate.

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, perhaps I may suggest that we try and keep to the five minutes advisory time. If not, we are going to run extremely late in this debate.

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[The Duke of Montrose (Con) [V]]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris, with his authority and perspective from a devolved part of the United Kingdom. The topics that we are asked to address today, from the gracious Speech, need our urgent consideration. I listened with much interest to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, picking apart some of the suggestions, and I hope that the Minister will be able to fill in a little more about what rebalancing the Executive, legislature and judiciary might entail.

I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Strathclyde for introducing the question of the purpose of the House of Lords. Once again we are entering a period where our concept of what purpose the House of Lords is meant to serve will be vital. We have always had in the other place a House of the people. My understanding is that the original criteria for membership of this House meant that it was to be composed of those with experience of administration. I hope the noble and learned Lord will forgive me if I sum it up as a gathering of the bishops, the barons and the beaks.

There is also a desire for continuity. As the Senior Deputy Speaker reminded us today, this is important when we consider the innovations in our experience of a virtual Parliament and whether they are worth preserving and, not so far in the future, the changes that will be brought about during the restoration and renewal programme.

The noble Lord, Lord Kerr, referred to the Act of Union 1707. My ancestor then was president of the council of the Scottish Parliament, which promoted the Bill which became the Act of Union. This, as we have learned, prompted the Scottish Lord Chancellor of the day to wind up the proceedings with the words “Aye, there’s ane end of ane auld sang”. As it is, history has not proved him correct, and since the establishment of the devolved Scottish Parliament the song is coming back again. For better or for worse, my family has been involved in various renderings of that song from the Declaration of Arbroath in 1320, which was resisting the depredations of Edward I, the Battle of Flodden, the signing of the Scottish National Covenant in 1638, which was resisting the insistence of Charles I, and so on. Even more recently, my grandfather was involved in bringing together two strands of Scottish nationalism to form what has now become the Scottish National Party.

The presence of hereditary Peers in this House can be traced back to this early history. In those days, the need to own property meant that Members had a connection to and could represent all parts of the country. They were required to provide military support to the Crown. Not only that, in the absence of any civic structure, they provided the planning and direction of construction and development, rudimentary concern for the needs of the local population and, in the early days, the dispensing of justice. Their presence gave an element of continuity. Whatever offices of state or other monetary income they received could be seen to have some bearing on all these responsibilities. The weakness of this system, which some noble Lords may like to remind me of, is that some tended to go for self-aggrandisement first. We have only to look at the speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, to see how rigorously we now police the safeguards in this regard and see that they are maintained. Fortunately nowadays many of these functions have been taken over by institutions that are answerable to some portion of the public at large and can be judged for their effectiveness.

The noble Lord, Lord Grocott, is concerned first and foremost with the excessive numbers in our House. What is not settled is what elements of the historical attributes should be reflected in the second phase of the reform. That is what I, as one of the elected hereditaries, am waiting to hear. Perhaps the ex-politicians like to feel that they can provide this. That may be true for ex-Ministers, but the recent role of many who come in from that source has been largely as observers and commentators from the sidelines. I, of course, realise that the position of hereditary Peers on their own may not be a great priority for my noble friend—

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

Could my noble friend wind up, please?

[The Duke of Montrose (Con) [V]]

—but, as we go into other constitutional questions, it may well come into play and some discussion of the purpose of this House will be essential.