Draft Voting Eligibility (Prisoners) Bill (Joint Committee)

David Nuttall Excerpts

Tuesday 16th April 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

I beg to move amendment (a), leave out the names at the end of the motion and insert

“That the membership of the Committee shall be nominated by the Committee of Selection under Standing Order No. 121 following elections within the parties using whatever democratic and transparent method they choose.”

The amendment stands in my name and those of quite a few of my right hon. and hon. Friends, as well as that of at least one Opposition Member.

I must say that the opening remarks from the two Front Benches, otherwise known as the usual channels, caused me to feel that there was every good reason for us to change our present procedures. My right hon. Friend the Leader of the House presented objections relating to both principle and practice. One of his points about practice was that it was important for us to be able to deal with Joint Committees very quickly. The decision to set up this Joint Committee was made in late November, but, some four months later, we still have not set it up. I detected no sense of urgency; perhaps, if I am wrong about that, my right hon. Friend will intervene.

I do not think that it was a convincing argument that if we were to elect the members of the Committee through our party groups, there would be an unacceptable delay. The delay that has taken place so far has been due to the Government, and no one else can be held responsible for it. Indeed, I have heard suggestions that the Government have always been rather keen on kicking this whole subject into the long grass, and that my amendment, which was not inspired by the Government, was just an extension of the long grass and meant that this whole issue and the appointment of the Joint Committee could be delayed further.

I do not buy into the notion that there is an issue to do with practical problems because of the question of speed, nor do I buy into the objections in principle. I am not suggesting we should change the standing orders and deal with all Joint Committees on the same basis. I am suggesting that this particular subject is unique—I think we can use that over-used word in this instance—because at present we find ourselves before an international court being told we have to change our law when this elected House of Commons has made it clear that we do not wish to change the law. This is not some run-of-the mill situation, therefore.

It is a unique situation, and it strikes me that it would have been much better for the Executive to have kept their hands well out of it. Whatever they do or do not do is going to be looked at by politicians in the rest of Europe. When the Lord Chancellor introduced the draft Bill, he conceded this was essentially a political issue as much as a legal issue. If the Government were able to say, “We put forward these three alternative proposals in a draft Bill; we then left it to the House of Commons, in its wisdom, to decide who should serve on a Joint Committee; and that Joint Committee took evidence and examined it and reached various conclusions”, the Government would be under no obligation to accept those conclusions. If a Joint Committee, however comprised, was to reach conclusions that were not in accordance with the evidence it received, that would bring the Joint Committee into disrepute.

I do not accept the principle put forward by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House that it will be impossible to have a properly balanced Joint Committee if it is elected. I suggest quite the reverse: if a Committee is elected, its members are accountable to the people who elected them. If those elected Committee members do not participate in the Committee proceedings or if they reach perverse conclusions, they will find it very hard to get re-elected.

When we appoint members to Select Committees or our party groups, we will inevitably be electing mainly the enthusiasts. The Environmental Audit Committee has a lot more enthusiasts for what I would call “greenery” and an acceptance of climate change science than it has members who disagree with that, although I am delighted that my right hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr Lilley) has latterly joined the Committee to try to introduce some balance.

Perhaps the example of that Committee gives the answer to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House. If Members feel a Committee is becoming too homogenous and is not being objective in its assessments of the evidence before it, the remedy lies in the Members of this House choosing an alternative member of the Committee to introduce balance. I do not believe only the usual channels can introduce balance into this Committee; quite the reverse, in fact.

On the issue of whether some Members proposed to serve on the Committee have a prior view, we know that some of them do, as that was expressed in the vote in the House on this subject. Other Members put forward a motion to the Committee that decides on the allocation of time for Back-Bench business; they put their heads above the parapet, and we know whether or not they are serving on that Committee. The same point applies in respect of the matters before us today.

My right hon. Friend the Leader of the House says, not totally tongue-in-cheek, that it is open to us, as the House, to put forward amendments for alternatives. I am not criticising any Members of this Committee. My amendment is not designed to do that; it is designed to ensure that the decision on the membership of the Committee is made by the individual Back-Bench groups of the Conservatives, the Liberal Democrats and the official Opposition. Those groups can then elect the people they would like to see on the Joint Committee. It seems to me that that system would work perfectly well and would distance the Government effectively from any of the Committee’s work.

As the chairman of the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, I can say that there is quite a lot of suspicion among the other 46 member countries that the UK Government are trying to ensure that nothing happens very quickly as they realise that the UK Parliament is totally at odds with the judges in the European Court of Human Rights on this issue. If the Lord Chancellor could have said to his counterparts in other countries that he had nothing to do with who was on the Committee, that the usual channels were not involved, that the Government left it to the Members of the House of Commons to choose their own Committee members and that the Government did not have to accept their findings but could merely see what they think, he would have had a better alibi. People looking in from outside might say that the motion is a fix by the usual channels.

I understand that the Select Committee on Justice undertook an informal bidding process, making representations to the effect that it wanted one of its number to serve on the Joint Committee. The Justice Committee is not the lead Select Committee on this matter—that is the Select Committee on Political and Constitutional Reform, of which I happen to be a member. The Justice Committee put forward a number of names that were considered by the usual channels, and one of those names was chosen and is among those in the motion.

That seems to me to be a totally non-transparent way of dealing with such issues and it is not appropriate that we should set a precedent whereby a Select Committee can start to lobby the Government covertly to have one of its members as a member of a Joint Committee when that Select Committee is not the lead Committee. The Political and Constitutional Reform Committee has taken evidence on this subject from the Deputy Prime Minister and others, and if we are to give somebody from a Select Committee a place, we have not necessary chosen the right one.

My point is that the process would be much better dealt with without the Government’s involvement and that is why I hope that Members will feel able to support my amendment—not necessarily by voting for it tonight, but by asking their Whips and colleagues whether the natural development of the Wright Committee reforms would be to introduce a further reform in this regard. That would mean that if we choose to set up a Joint Committee in the future we can do so quickly, knowing what the rules are and demonstrating that we are giving power to the Back Benches on such important issues. That is even more the case with pre-legislative scrutiny.

After the Government’s rough experience of setting up a pre-legislative scrutiny Committee on the reform of the other place, I should have thought that they might say that they would do better to draw their neck in and leave it to Members to choose the members of such Committees. They would then be free to decide whether to accept the recommendations, taking into account the extent to which those Members have responded positively or otherwise to the evidence put before them.

I have pleasure in moving the amendment and I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving us the opportunity to speak about this important subject before we go on to other business before the House this evening.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

I do not intend to delay the House for long, because I appreciate that there is other business that we need to get on to, but I wish to support the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) and signed by me and several other hon. Members.

It seems reasonable to me that the membership of the Joint Committee, in so far as it is drawn from this House, should reflect the views of this House and, therefore, the views of the wider public, which is perhaps more important. As the hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon) mentioned in her intervention, none of the Committee members chosen by the Committee of Selection is from Northern Ireland, Scotland or Wales; they are drawn exclusively from England.

Fortunately, thanks to the auspices of the Backbench Business Committee, we know exactly what this House’s view is on the matter, because on 10 February 2011 it held a debate on the subject. After a full and lengthy debate that lasted most of the day, 256 right hon. and hon. Members took part in the Division, with 234 voting in favour of maintaining the status quo and 22 voting in favour of changing it. Therefore, over 91% of the Members who voted supported the status quo, which I think very much represents the view across the country. It is therefore fair and reasonable that the country would expect any Committee of this House to reflect those views.

[Lady Hermon]

Would the hon. Gentleman be so kind as to put on the record whether the Government abstained or voted in that key vote last February?

[Mr Nuttall]

As far as I am aware—I do not have the voting record in front of me—no members of the Government took part in the Division. Either deliberately or by accident, the Government abstained; it was predominantly Back-Bench Members who took part. That is noteworthy, because it removed more than 100 Members from the vote, so I submit that the figure of 256 is probably relatively representative of the views of the House as a whole. Even if a larger number of Members had taken part, the result would still have reflected the 91.4% against 8.6%.

I want to make it absolutely clear for the record that I have no objection in principle to any of the Members being put forward by the Committee of Selection. Indeed, I have spoken with them privately and expressed my view that that is not why I support the amendment. Rather, what we know is that of the six Members who have been put forward through the Committee of Selection’s convoluted procedure—it is certainly not transparent—only two took part in the Division on 10 February 2011. One voted in favour of the status quo and not giving prisoners the right to vote and the other, who was acting as Teller—I think that is correct—voted in favour of changing the status quo.

We do not know what the views of the other four were, and that is where there is a problem. If the Government wanted balance on the Committee, that may not occur because the other four are all in favour of the argument or—I know not—are all against, in which case the Committee certainly would not be representative of the views of this House. Either way, there is a problem with the proposal before us. If it were indeed the Government’s view that there should be balance, then perhaps the logic of that argument would be for the six members of the Committee to have been drawn exclusively from those who showed an interest on that occasion back on 10 February 2011, and equally from those who voted for the motion and those who voted against it. Clearly, however, that is not what has happened.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) said, this is a unique situation. There are grounds for changing what has happened in the past. In response to the point that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House made a few moments ago, the fact that not only the Chairman but other members of the Procedure Committee have signed and supported the amendment shows that there is a feeling within that Committee that it is sensible and demonstrates the right way forward. On that basis, I am pleased to support the amendment.

Amendment negatived.

Main Question put and agreed to.