Debate on the Address

Dominic Grieve Excerpts

Wednesday 27th May 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Gillan]

My hon. Friend has an impeccable record of providing services, but if he could provide me with my step-free access, I would be even happier.

I was pleased to see that the valuable work of the Silk commission is being taken forward in this Session, but I hope that the long overdue boundary changes and reduction in the number of MPs will also be taken forward. The Labour Government reduced the number of Scottish MPs when the Parliament received primary law-making powers, and that should have happened also for Wales when the National Assembly received its law-making changes. We are keen to rebalance the economy between north and south and east and west, but we also need to rebalance the representation in this House. An English MP’s work remit is arguably considerably different from that of the MPs for Scotland and Wales, who have Assembly Members and Members of the Scottish Parliament to carry out a proportion of the work that we do as English MPs. I very much hope that the changes to Standing Orders will deal with the perennial problem of the West Lothian question, which has still not been answered.

I could not speak in the debate without mentioning my pet project, of which I am a great fan—HS2—as high-speed rail is mentioned in the Queen’s Speech. In the previous Parliament the final compensation scheme was announced, but after five years the current scheme is still falling short of the fair and generous settlement that the Prime Minister promised. Constituents are having their lives and finances dissected and investigated in the sort of detail that could be said to be normally associated with bankruptcy or criminal proceedings. Even decisions on whether the Government should purchase their properties sometimes seem to be subject to lifestyle judgments being made by officials. In addition, the residents commissioner who was appointed last January has yet to agree to a meeting with me and has not published her quarterly report that was promised.

However, hope springs eternal. I was delighted that in our manifesto the Government will be maintaining the national protections for areas of outstanding natural beauty, national parks and sites of special scientific interest. As only 45% of the Chilterns AONB is currently fully tunnelled, leaving 11.4 km of the widest area of the AONB destroyed by shallow cuttings and so-called green tunnels, I feel sure that the fully bored tunnel which will protect the entire AONB must now be firmly on the Government’s agenda. In my view, this is the only way of mitigating damage to our rare habitat and fulfilling this vital commitment in the Conservative manifesto.

[Mr Dominic Grieve (Beaconsfield) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Mrs Gillan]

Forgive me—I have only a short time.

If there is to be more legislation on high-speed rail, I hope this Government will learn from their mistakes, many of which have been made in our constituencies in Buckinghamshire.

I, like many real Conservatives, am delighted with this Gracious Speech, so I am proud to give it a warm welcome. It is just the entrée for what is coming. We will have the Budget, and I know that many of our votes in this House will be close and hard fought, so our attention will always be demanded in this House. Lord Prescott may not have understood the meaning of aspiration, but perhaps I can help him. I feel that this is a Queen’s Speech of high hopes—high hopes for individuals, families, businesses and this United Kingdom. It gives me great pleasure to give it a warm welcome.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Dominic Grieve (Beaconsfield) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman), and also to follow the introduction to this debate by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns) and my hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray).

I approach this debate with some slight misgivings—I realised that the last time I participated in a debate on the Gracious Speech from the Back Benches was my maiden speech in 1997, and worse still, the themes of that maiden speech were devolution for Scotland, the future of the Union of the United Kingdom, and human rights. Despite my best endeavours, I seem to be unable to escape any of them this evening. However, some issues which arise were not present then. The economic crisis that has beset the western world and this country particularly in the past few years was not present when I made that maiden speech in 1997. The state of the world as it existed then was nothing like as fragile and dangerous as the world seems to be today. We face dramatic challenges, to which I shall return briefly at the end of my remarks.

I greatly welcome the continuation of the Government’s economic policy, as laid out in the Gracious Speech. I have no doubt that the reason why my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister was returned and the Conservative party was elected to office was the public’s appreciation of the difficult decisions that had been made in putting the economic recovery of this country on a reasonable footing. In saying that, I am mindful of the fact that there will be some pretty dramatic challenges ahead. Having served in government and having watched the difficulties, for example, of reducing the budget of the small Department over which I presided for four years and the Crown Prosecution Service being reduced by one third, I recognise that there will be some complex issues of prioritisation as we take matters forward.

In that context, I welcome the remarks of the Lord Chancellor who, I understand, when he first went to address the staff at the Ministry of Justice, pointed out his awareness of the importance of access to justice and of maintaining an adequate justice system as one of the key priorities of Government. I entirely endorse that.

I welcome the fact that we are to have a referendum on European Union membership. In my view, this is an area where there is a substantial democratic deficit that has beset our politics for far too long. It is fairly well known that nobody has yet succeeded in persuading me of good arguments why we should leave the European Union, but I recognise from my time as Attorney General that there are many aspects of the EU which are seriously dysfunctional. If my right hon. Friend can, in the conduct of his negotiations, succeed in improving the way in which the EU functions not just for ourselves, but for the other member states, he will have performed a signal public service, and I believe he will then be in a position to come to the electorate of this country and ask them to endorse it.

[Sir William Cash]

Does my right hon. and learned Friend therefore agree with my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister in his statement of 23 March that apart from reform, we need a fundamental change in our relationship with the EU?

[Mr Grieve]

It seems to me that the key will be providing the necessary reassurance that the United Kingdom, which will remain outside the eurozone, has the necessary guarantees that that will not be to its disadvantage. That is the key issue and the one on which we should concentrate, although there are other aspects which will need to be looked at.

[Geraint Davies]

Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman give way?

[Mr Grieve]

I shall make progress, if I may.

On matters concerning the Union of the United Kingdom, I am a Unionist to my fingertips. I could not be otherwise, with my family’s Scottish heritage. It has always seemed to me that the key to the Union of the United Kingdom is that the interests of an elector, be it in Belfast, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow or indeed where my family comes from, in Hawick, must be of equal importance to me as that of my own electorate in Beaconsfield, but the forms which the Union can take may be diverse. To that extent, I entirely welcome the fact that further devolution to Scotland and to Wales will take place, and I look forward to participating actively in the debates on that.

I listened carefully to what was said from the Scottish National party Benches about SNP Members’ concerns that constitutional change might take place by changing the Standing Orders of the House. This is a somewhat esoteric constitutional law point, but there are arguments that that is probably the only adequate way in which it can be done. If I can provide some reassurance, it seems to me to be central to any such change—the point was well made—that the interests of Scotland, both directly and indirectly, have to be respected, and it can apply only to those matters which pertain strictly to England, England and Wales or other parts of the United Kingdom. I look forward to having that debate, listening carefully to hon. Members’ participation and trying to make sure that we can put together a structure which is durable and, above all, fair—fair to them, but also fair to my constituents, for whom this is an issue which matters quite a lot as well.

I note the Government’s enthusiasm for continuing with high-speed rail. I am mindful that the House has expressed a determined view on this point. It is not one which commends itself much to my constituents, and the cost-benefit analysis of it has always eluded me. Nevertheless, I shall try to ensure, on their behalf, that the mitigation that they seek is provided, and in particular that there is a rigorous analysis of the costs of tunnelling under the River Colne, as opposed to the viaduct—a difference in value which seems to be narrowing by the day. I hope I may be able to interest the House in that.

Before moving on to my main topic, I want to touch briefly on the communications data Bill. In my view it is absolutely required. During my time as Attorney General I had a great deal to do with the agencies, and I am satisfied that they try to operate to high ethical standards. I am also satisfied that the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 is inadequate to meet the needs of the modern age. However, I am also mindful of the fact that the public require reassurance in relation to civil liberties. I believe that it will be possible to do those two things during the Bill’s passage.

[Mr David Davis]

How does my right hon. and learned Friend reconcile that with the fact that our primary ally, the United States, with its National Security Agency, which entirely mirrors GCHQ, is as we speak moving away from the block collection of data and treating that as wholly unconstitutional?

[Mr Grieve]

I have to say to my right hon. Friend that I do not believe that GCHQ has been engaging in the block collection and retention of data for the purpose of subjecting it to examination at a level that intrudes upon privacy. If he reads the comments made by Sir Iain Lobban when he gave evidence, he will see that it is clear what they were about. That said, my right hon. Friend makes an important point, and one that we will have to address. If there are other ways in which it can be better addressed, I for one would be only too happy to see those being looked at. However, I am also mindful, from my own experience in government, that some of the comments made in that regard seem rather far-fetched.

Let me turn to one of the key issues in the Gracious Speech: the suggestion that we will replace the Human Rights Act with a British Bill of Rights. At this stage I will simply make two or three points. First, I welcome the fact that the proposal has not been set in stone, fortunately, and that it appears we will be having a consultation. The proposal will be very difficult to implement in practice, and the reputational damage for this country could be disastrous. Let us start with the first and most obvious point, which is the fact that the devolution settlements in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are underpinned by the Human Rights Act—it might be an inconvenient truth for some, but it is still a truth—and, in the case of Northern Ireland, by an international treaty with the Irish republic. I do not see how we can effect a change without first achieving a consensus that involves those parts of the United Kingdom, even if we have the power to do so, because it seems to me that to proceed without it would threaten the Union, which I was sent to this House to uphold.

Secondly, if we are to proceed down this route, the EU dimension needs to be considered. My hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) has waxed eloquently against the charter of fundamental rights. I cannot think of anything more calculated to see the intervention of the European Court of Justice—not the European Court of Human Rights—than if we end up being non-compatible with the convention and EU citizens end up bringing claims against the United Kingdom Government that cannot be adjudicated under the convention in our own courts or in Strasbourg.

Thirdly, the United Kingdom has been at the forefront of the development of human rights on our planet; it is one of the things of which we can be most proud. If we are going to dilute those rights and present the British public with something that is, in fact, the convention shorn of some of the protections it affords citizens, the consequences for the convention will be catastrophic. But other countries that have previously been willing to improve their human rights records, as a result of our leverage, will cease to do so, and one of the most powerful tools for improving human rights on our planet will have been irrevocably damaged. I find it impossible to see how that can be in our national interest.

Having said those things, I also recognise that there are flaws in the way in which the Court in Strasbourg has operated. I have many criticisms of some of its jurisprudence, and there was a period in recent years when it was quite seriously off the rails. However, one point that needs to be borne in mind is that we have recently carried out a major reform of the way the Court operates, thanks to the efforts of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke). Our judiciary has changed its stance and approach to the Court, so there is now a much more robust dialogue. Consequently, the Court has substantially changed many areas of its approach. The ultimate irony is that we might be in danger of fighting yesterday’s battle, or indeed of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. I therefore very much hope that there can be a full consultation so that all these matters can be aired.

[Mr Graham Allen]

Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman, with all his history in this field, tell us what he believes is the best way that Parliament can engage in that consultation? We have been told that we are not going to have a political and constitutional reform Select Committee, which would have looked at this, so would he suggest a special Committee created by the House to look at this at some length so that we avoid some of the pitfalls he has outlined?

[Mr Grieve]

The hon. Gentleman’s suggestion sounds like a very good one, and I certainly intend to engage in the debate as and when proposals are brought before the House.

I mentioned at the start of my remarks that we are living in a much more dangerous and difficult world than we were in 1997. Of course, one of the challenges facing the Government is prioritising what really matters. I have made the point that human rights matter because their promotion is so important, particularly in view of Russia’s behaviour in Ukraine and Crimea, so that ought to be a top priority. In the same way, I think that defence will have to be looked at again, and I am pleased that we are going to have a strategic defence review. Ultimately, some hard choices might have to be made, because at the moment I am left with the sensation not that the previous Government did things wrong over defence, but that it might need to be given a greater priority than it has at the moment.

Finally, the one thing that I picked up on the doorstep during the election was the sense that the electorate are fed up with presentational politics—the politics of the gimmick and the soundbite. They want debate, and they want debate here. One of my experiences is that if a Member is prepared to sit through a debate in this place, they will understand a lot more at the end than they did at the beginning. As I am now free of the constraints of office, I commit myself to doing just that. I look forward to debating with other Members of this honourable House, in so far as I can, on what I think are some of the major issues and challenges that face us all.