Backbench Business Committee

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Tuesday 15th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Allen]

Left to their own devices, Governments and Front Benchers never become more radical. They start with ideas and radicalism, and it is the role of Back Benchers not only to hold them to account but to stimulate them into maintaining their reforming and radical instincts. I do not want this to develop into too much of a love-in, but if we—certainly those on the Opposition Benches—had been able to select a Leader of the House from the Conservative party, it would have been the current Leader of the House. Similarly, had we been able to select someone from the Liberal Democrats to be the Deputy Leader of the House, it would have been the current incumbent.

We have a conjunction of remarkable, coincidental fortune that means that we can take the issue on now—and we should. Now is not the time to be timid. We have free votes on the motions from 9.30 onwards. I hope that Members—above all, new Members—will seize that opportunity. Obviously, I want them to vote with me in my Lobby tonight, but if they do not, they must please vote according to what they feel is important rather than because they are trying to figure out the main chance of getting on to the slippery slope and getting that red box one day. They will be respected more if they use this unique opportunity to take our Parliament further than if they merely look around to see which Whip—unofficially, of course—is twitching in the leftwards or rightwards direction.

There is a fundamental balance—imbalance, perhaps—between Parliament and the Executive. It has been evident throughout my political life, but newcomers particularly may be able to taste a rebalancing through which, for once, the parliamentary midget is growing and taking on the 800-pound gorilla of the Executive. I hope that the midget has been working out over the past couple of weeks and building muscles, although it should not challenge or frighten the Executive. Governments should welcome a strong Parliament. A strong Parliament is not a threat; it helps to produce better law and better value for money. It makes life better for our citizens. It complements and is a partner to Government, occasionally drawing attention to their defects. Are not we stronger when our defects are remedied? Perhaps I am too optimistic, but in my political lifetime, the moment has come when there is a sense that we can push on and have a Parliament worthy of the name.

Although the subject of business is the Back-Bench business committee, the occasion is far more important than the particular internal committee that we will set up. It is important because, in the past two or three years, not one Member who is not new has not felt pressure and shame about the way in which we have been portrayed—occasionally deservedly so. Now we have a chance to show that Members of Parliament are not as they are described day after day in The Daily Telegraph or the Daily Mail, but that they bring genuine value to our political life, that they are an asset to our politics and can make a real contribution through Select Committees, on the Floor of the House, through questioning or in Westminster Hall. We need to have the passion returned to our Chamber so that we can do such work. If we can do that openly and honestly, we will win people over. They will say that we are once again worthy of being the British people’s forum—not a nice little ancient backdrop to Government statements or simply leather Benches and ornate wood work, but fundamental to what people want to discuss in our democracy.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his election as the Chair of the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee. Hearing him speak makes me think that he is well chosen. He is giving voice to incredibly welcome ideas. As he says, it is an exciting time to be elected to this Parliament—there is a wind of change, and a real step forward in, for example, the election of Chairs and members of Select Committees. I welcome the amendments that would increase the House’s transparency and democracy—that is incredibly important—but hope that we can go further. I take comfort from his comments that we are the beginning, not the end of a process. I would like us to learn from other legislatures, too. That might be a radical suggestion, but there are many legislatures that do an interesting job from which we could learn. I therefore warmly commend that the hon. Gentleman consider other things, too.

[Mr Allen]

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention and welcome her to the House. I am sure that she will contribute not only to environmental politics but to a broader sphere, particularly in the ideas that she has expressed about our democracy. We should have humility and learn from not only other nations but from the operation of the devolved Administrations in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, where—dare I say it?—one can sometimes find a more real Parliament than we have here. Sometimes, one can find genuine debate and exchange, which has been so rare here. However, we can recapture it if we work at it.

The Back-Bench business committee will help us create such a Parliament here. It will help us revert to being the people’s forum. Rather than the debates in which we are all interested happening on the “Today” programme or “Newsnight”, those interactions and key conversations could take place here. When I woke up the other morning, I listened to “Today”, which was considering three main issues: a possible increase in student fees; a report about a possible 3 million unemployed; and a report about abused children and whether there is a way in which to sort out the problem much earlier in their lives. Those are three genuinely important issues, which we all want to discuss. I came to the House of Commons and the whole day went by without a single one of those items, which had been headline news that morning, being debated or discussed. It should be the other way round. If we recreate our Parliament, we will raise the issues and the media will follow behind us. We should all aspire to that sort of House of Commons. The Back-Bench business committee is a small flame that can move outwards and ensure that we do that job particularly well.

Like so many hon. Members, I must say that the Government have done a remarkable thing in introducing the proposals today. Within weeks of a general election, they have moved on the subject. I must be blunt—I do not wish to offend any Labour colleagues, but we dragged our feet. The Wright Committee made every possible effort to conclude the matter. We tried to engage with the most senior people in our party to show that we cared about that and if only for purely political and electoral reasons, demonstrate that we cared about the future of our political system. The new coalition Government deserve credit for, and should be congratulated on, tabling the proposals. That needs to be put on record.

Some 95% of the proposals are what the Wright Committee suggested, but there is a bit of slippage with some. That has happened because, when one gets into government, certain practicalities get in the way. There is a desire to ensure that other priorities are fulfilled, as well as the dead-weight, often of senior civil service bureaucracy, and sometimes of our colleagues in the various Whips Offices, who feel that things must stay exactly as they are because that is how they control things. It reflects the old joke, “How many MPs does it take to change a light bulb?” “Change? Change?!” Sometimes we get a sense from our colleagues of better safe than sorry. If there is a little risk-taking in the Chamber, I hope that Labour Members will make allowance for it and grant it leeway, particularly if people fall flat on their face when it happens. We need to advance our system so that our democracy can prosper.

In the past week or so, we have witnessed the beginning of a sensible conversation. In trying to create a Back-Bench business committee, the interaction between all the different people who are involved—certainly the minority parties, which have been sorely tested by the failure of the usual channels to give them a fair crack of the whip—has been important. Back Benchers have been involved, and Select Committee Chairs, within days of being elected, have shown their muscle and their desire to protect the rights of the House. Front Benchers have also played a positive role—I include my new Front-Bench colleague as well as other Front Benchers in that. I hope that, rather than proposals having to be withdrawn on the Floor of the House—for which I am grateful; I will deal with that later—the dialogue can take place a little more formally and a little earlier in future. If we can make progress with the conversation, perhaps we can address such matters by consensus rather than by withdrawing stuff on the Floor of the House. It is a difficult task, especially so for two new incumbents, but I wish them well in trying to get the conversation under way.

Let me deal with the amendments. Many are in my name and the names of 32 other Back-Bench colleagues. It could have been 232, and I claim no credit for the amendments, but my name appears first, so I am happy to speak about them. But first, I should like to give a little more perspective on what can be very dry, dusty stuff—the Back-Bench business committee, what is a quorum and how we elect the Chair—and say what the proposed committee is really about. The committee is about taking the chunk of business that all of us accept is the province, property and interest of Back-Benchers, pulling it together and taking a Back-Bench view on how best to use it. Rather than the Leader of the House deciding that we should have a general debate next week on something or other, there would be a process by which all of us, collectively, could decide what that debate should be about. We could decide that tomorrow’s debate will be about something that happened overnight or a Government announcement on widows’ pensions. The debate could be on the terrible murders in the north-west, how we respond to the BP crisis or whatever, but it should be on a cause that we feel, collectively, should be debated, and that our constituents would like us to debate. They might even want to turn the television on to see us talking about that subject live, rather than see a digest later with John Humphrys, Jeremy Paxman or somebody else.

However, we need to be clear that when we talk about a Back-Bench business committee—the Wright Committee made this absolutely plain—it is not a case of, “Tomorrow, the world!” Some distinguished colleagues on that Committee, including my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel), who spoke about this tonight, made it very clear that the Government have a right to discuss their business. It is part of the House’s role to examine seriously legislation that the Government introduce, but at the end of the day, providing they have a majority, they should carry their business. We are talking about that bit of business that is non-legislative but which involves the keen interest of Members of Parliament.

Too often, we see Members of Parliament rattling through lists of things that they regard as important. If I may say, Mr Deputy Speaker, you are one of the greatest exponents of the early-day motion. With the proposed committee, we are almost turning the early-day motion into a motion that we can genuinely discuss at an early day. If there is so much interest in debating a particular topic, it could be on the agenda the next day or the day after that, even if we would need a further mechanism for that. The Government need not fear that their agenda will be taken over, but Parliament could for the first time say, “Our agenda, at least in part, is our possession,” and it will be able to decide, on a small number of days, what we will discuss. That is very important—it is one of the key things that the committee will do.

There is a group of amendments on the Order Paper that addresses a questionable aspect of the Government’s proposals; namely, the one-year termination. The Government proposal is that members of the Back-Bench business committee will be members for only one year, which is unlike tenures for other parliamentary offices and institutions, which last five years. Chairs and members of Select Committees—there can barely be a Member in the Chamber tonight who is not standing for membership of a Select Committee—will be in office for five years if they are successful, which gives a sense of continuity, and members and Chairs have the ability to learn a subject, and to grow as a Committee with their colleagues.

Let us imagine if we were on Select Committees for only one year. We would already be counting down the time, thinking, “There might be something else on the way. I might want to swap over. Somebody doesn’t like me and I don’t get on with so-and-so, and the chair is a bit of a pain.” The Chair, of course, would be saying, “I’ve only got a year, but I really want to do something long term with this Select Committee, so let’s pick up whatever is in the papers.”

There is a more insidious problem. If Members are really good as Back Benchers, they might just cross Front Benchers—the wrong people. They might be so good—they might expose something, or scrutinise and call their those on their Front Bench to account—that instead of being lauded and given plaudits, they go on a list. I have been in the Whips office, and I have had my lists. The vow of silence forbids me from going further on that, but I can tell the House that we were not lining up to give accolades to the Gwyneth Dunwoodys—precisely the opposite. Let us imagine the whispering campaigns that would take place if Select Committee members or Chairs had a one-year tenure, and the undermining that could go on. People would say, “You can get rid of that Chairman and have a go yourself,” or, “You’re not on a Select Committee. So-and-so is not very good. She or he always creates a problem, so why don’t you think about putting your name forward.”

I know that colleagues on the Government Bench—the Leader and Deputy Leader of the House—do not intend that. However, much as I wish them longevity, they might not be here this time next year, and some less benign people might be. The latter might propose a review not to strengthen the Back-Bench business committee, but to undermine it. If someone took that chance, we would all greatly regret it, because we have a historic opportunity. This is the one and only time in my long political lifetime in this place that such an opportunity has come to pass. The right hon. and hon. Gentlemen have been incredibly flexible today, so I ask them, before the winding-up speeches, whether they wish to continue to oppose the amendments in my name and those of my colleagues by which we seek to provide the same sort of lifespan and stability that we expect as members or Chairs of Select Committees, so that this new bud can be protected should there be some stormy weather a year out that we cannot predict now.

Perhaps I am being too suspicious—it may be those years in the Whips Office and my brain is still a bit frazzled. We could pass the matter over if there were just one proposal to undermine the committee—the proposal to review the committee after one year. However, there is a second occasion when the committee might be undermined, because its members must be elected after a year. There is even a third occasion, because the Chair must be elected after a year. With those three proposals we are, as Sherlock Holmes said, starting to develop a pattern. With great respect, I say to Government Front Benchers that there is still a moment when they might ask themselves whether they want to perpetuate that pattern, or whether they could generously reconsider the matter and either allow the amendments to be made, or decide not to promote their proposals.

There is another, rather demeaning aspect, which I was surprised to see included. When the Back-Bench business committee meets, it will have arguments. I intervened, regretfully, on this point in the speech by my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire, who otherwise made some very good points. If the meetings are wholly in public, decision-making will be driven underground, because sometimes it is dirty and messy. It can be a compromise, with promises made, so that something else is done in six months’ time when people will not know that it is the result of a deal already done. I would like as much of that as possible to take place openly in the business committee, but not necessarily in the full glare of publicity. If decision-making is totally open, people will behave differently, and we may end up with worse decisions.