Constitutional Change: Constitution Committee Report

Baroness Taylor of Bolton Excerpts

Wednesday 7th December 2011 Grand Committee

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lady Jay and the committee on yet another very interesting report that the whole House would do well to read. I was not surprised that the noble Lord described my noble friend as an efficient chairman. Having worked with her in government, I am sure that she was. I hope she takes that as a compliment.

The fact that so many people want to speak in this very short debate today shows just how important constitutional change is at this time. There is a great deal happening that we have not always fully taken on board. Certainly, we have not always taken on board the potential interrelationships between some of the changes that are being proposed. We have had mention of the Bills that have become Acts of Parliament; there is promise of more reform in the future; and we have the potential for what might happen so far as devolution and a referendum on independence are concerned. If we are going to have such significant changes, perhaps both Houses in this Parliament need to spend a little more time thinking carefully about their consequences. That is assuming that the Government intend to go ahead with further constitutional change at a time when there does not seem to be great public appetite for it given all the other problems of economic challenge that we are facing.

There are many interesting features in the report—the noble Lord, Lord Renton, mentioned some. He drew attention to paragraph 104, which advocates post-legislative scrutiny for constitutional matters. I am very much in favour of post-legislative scrutiny. When I established the Modernisation Committee in another place in 1997, we wanted to get more momentum on prelegislative scrutiny, but I was always disappointed that we were not able to do more on post-legislative scrutiny. When it comes to constitutional change, post-legislative scrutiny might be necessary, but it is a bit late by then. My great concern is that enough thought does not go into the early stages, which is what this report focuses on.

There is, as my noble friend Lady Jay, said, one fundamental difference around the nature and significance of constitutional change. Is legislation on the constitution fundamentally different from other types of legislation? The Government indicate that that is not the case; I for my part believe that it very much is. I can recall from my time as a constituency MP—others will have had this experience—many occasions when legislation being passed through both Houses proved difficult or not up to the mark. The Child Support Agency is a very obvious example. Members of Parliament knew from constituency casework that it was going wrong from day 1. After lots of attempts and changes, we were able to put it right. It was not perfect, but we made it workable. But if constitutional change goes wrong, and if it has unintended consequences, which can very often be the case, how do we fix our democracy and how do we get it back when the damage is done? That emphasises the need for proper preparation.

I think that we could all agree that we are at a time when trust in politicians and political parties, which are essential to choice in a political democracy, is low, and that is for a variety of reasons. My fear is that the nature of the constitutional change that has gone through this Parliament already, and some that is proposed, will militate against improving the situation. For example, fixed-term Parliaments could lead to a crisis if the public felt that a Government should be voted down but, for technical reasons and the way in which that Bill was passed, that could not happen. I believe that problems will arise from the constant turmoil of boundary reviews if these are going to take place every five years—it is difficult enough for many people to know who their Member of Parliament is and identify with them at the moment. I think that many Members at the other end have realised rather late in the day some of the internal consequences of constant boundary reviews. If electoral wards are going to be changed every five years, that will not help the level of trust but, more important and perhaps more obvious than that, it will impact on the work of MPs. If the day after you are elected you have to concentrate on getting reselected for a potential new boundary constituency, you may be spending too much time looking over your shoulder at party or local matters rather than spending your time at Westminster, and it will turn Members of Parliament into constant rivals. It is bad enough when it happens once every 15 years, but if it is going to happen every Parliament, it will be extremely difficult. I speak as someone who has gone through boundary reviews and some of those difficulties. If we are going to have senators with a 15-year mandate, I am not sure where public trust comes in there, especially as we see that at the moment there is very little identification of individual constituents with Members of the European Parliament. You are going to have PR and party establishments are going to decide who is a senator without an Appointments Commission, and I do not think that is going to improve trust.

I think the Government need to learn from this committee’s report, otherwise we will be in danger of constitutional turmoil. I think there are real difficulties and real dangers that people will turn off from politics even further. We have seen an alarming situation develop in some European countries recently where being an elected politician disqualifies you from being part of the Government. That is because of a lack of trust between politicians and the electorate. I think that the Government need to look at this report more carefully. I noted how polite my noble friend was in her description. I was going to say that the ministerial response was complacency with a touch of arrogance, but I hope there is still time, and I urge Ministers not to put this report on the shelf but to be aware of the problems of unintended consequences and the potential turmoil of all the changes being talked about at the present time.