Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

Eleanor Laing Excerpts

Wednesday 24th November 2010 Commons Chamber

Early parliamentary general elections

[Mrs Eleanor Laing (Epping Forest) (Con)]

I beg to move amendment 33, page 1, line 22, leave out from ‘if’ to end of clause and add

‘on an address presented to Her Majesty by the House of Commons praying that a day be the polling day for an early parliamentary general election, Her Majesty appoints this day by proclamation to be the polling day for such an election.

(2) No motion shall be made for such an address except by the Prime Minister acting with the agreement of—

(a) the Leader of the Opposition; and

(b) each member of the House of Commons who at the time of the motion being made is the registered leader of a registered party that received more than 20 per cent. of the total votes cast at the previous parliamentary general election.

(3) An early parliamentary general election shall not otherwise take place.

(4) Subsection (1) applies for the purposes of the Timetable in rule 1 in Schedule 1 to the Representation of the People Act 1983.

(5) In this section—

“Leader of the Opposition” means the person who is the Leader of the Opposition in the House of Commons for the purposes of section 2 of the Ministerial and other Salaries Act 1975;

“registered leader”, in relation to a party, means the person registered as that party’s leader in accordance with section 24 of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000;

“registered party” means a party registered in a register of political parties maintained by the Electoral Commission in accordance with section 23 of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000.’.

[The First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Nigel Evans)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Amendment 21, page 2, line 2, leave out ‘early’ and insert ‘immediate’.

Amendment 4, page 2, leave out lines 3 to 7.

Amendment 34, in clause 3, page 2, line 28, leave out ‘(6)’.

Amendment 35, in clause 4, page 3, line 15, leave out ‘(6)’.

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[Mrs Laing]

Once again, I bring to the Chamber the apologies of the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen), the Chairman of the Select Committee on Political and Constitutional Reform, for his absence. He is, unfortunately, unable to be here, but I assure hon. Members that he is probably watching proceedings and that he will be better soon. He is still carrying out his duties as Chairman, but it is difficult for him to be here in the Chamber.

I am pleased to move the amendment tabled by the Select Committee, or at least some members of it. It concerns the House’s procedure for determining the way in which an early election can be called. I, personally, do not support its wording and I shall not insist on putting it to a vote, and if others do so, I shall not vote for it. There is nothing wrong with that, as I am merely moving it. It forms an important part of the Select Committee’s pre-legislative scrutiny of the Bill and, as such, it should be put before the Committee so that it can be properly discussed.

The amendment reflects some of the arguments that were heard during the Select Committee’s inquiry into the Bill. I simply wish to ensure that hon. Members have the chance to examine these important issues. The amendment proposes an alternative way of bringing about what the Government seek to achieve in clause 2. It does not oppose the Bill’s aims in any way, but simply proposes an alternative that hon. Members should consider.

As an alternative form, the amendment would have three advantages. First, it would avoid the risks involved in implementing the Government’s proposal that a two thirds majority should be required for a vote to have effect. Secondly, it would avoid what the Committee described as the “uncertain” consequences of the provisions in the Bill on motions of no consequence—[Laughter.] That was a visual rather than a grammatical problem, and if the Committee will forgive me, I shall try again. I meant to say motions of no confidence, which would include the possibility of a Government

“subverting the purpose of the Bill by tabling and voting for a motion of no confidence in itself in order to trigger an early general election without the need for a super-majority.”

Thirdly, the amendment would largely deal with the concern of the Clerk of the House, articulated to the Select Committee, that this part of the Bill would infringe the House’s “exclusive cognisance” over its own proceedings—its right to decide for itself how its business should be done, and the concomitant principle that the courts will not interfere. When the Clerk told us of his concerns, we shared them, so tabling the amendment allows us to consider those real and well-founded concerns. I am aware that other amendments that we shall discuss this afternoon would deal with the situation in different ways, but amendment 33 proposes a simpler way of getting around those concerns. It would ensure that an early general election could take place only with cross-party support.

[Mr Richard Shepherd (Aldridge-Brownhills) (Con)]

I am sorry to intervene at such an early stage of my hon. Friend’s comments, but I notice that proposed new subsection (2)(b) states that

“each member of the House of Commons who at the time of the motion being made is the registered leader of a registered party that received more than 20 per cent. of the total votes cast at the previous parliamentary general election.”

Those are the people who are supposed to decide whether there will be a confidence motion. What does my hon. Friend feel about the fact that the proposal will disfranchise the representatives of between 3.5 million and 4 million people?

[Mrs Laing]

I appreciate my hon. Friend’s point, and I find myself in some difficulty. I am happy to respond to it, but of course I agree with it. I am proposing the amendment not because I am passionate about it, but simply so that the Committee can discuss it. He is right to raise one of the issues that should be discussed. I take it that he means people who are represented by parties such as the nationalist parties. In that respect, if the amendment were accepted by the Committee and by the Government and if it became part of the Bill, I would find myself wishing further to amend it, to the effect that the parties concerned should be those that received more than 20% of the vote in the nation in the United Kingdom where their candidates stood for election. I hope that answers my hon. Friend’s question. However, I do not think we need to go into that in much greater detail.

The amendment provides that an early general election would take place only when the House agreed by a simple majority to a motion in the name of the Prime Minister, tabled with the agreement of the Leader of the Opposition and the leader of any political party that had received more than 20% of the national vote at the previous general election, with the extra proviso that I have just added in response to my hon. Friend’s well-made point.

[Thomas Docherty (Dunfermline and West Fife) (Lab)]

The hon. Lady may not be aware of this, but my recollection is that the Scottish Conservatives did not receive 20% of the vote in Scotland at the last general election. Is she saying, therefore, that the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland, the right hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell) would not be able to take part in that process?

[Mrs Laing]

No, not at all. I appreciate the political point that the hon. Gentleman seeks to make, but that would make no difference because the Conservative party throughout the United Kingdom as a whole obtained considerably more than 20% of the popular vote, and in some places, such as Epping Forest—I am very pleased to say—a mere 54%. The hon. Gentleman makes a perfectly good point, but it would be a pity to take up the time of the Committee looking in detail at the percentages involved. My purpose in putting the issue before the Committee is to address the serious concerns relating to exclusive cognisance, which were put to the Select Committee by the Clerk, whose opinion on the matter we take very seriously. The Committee, too, should esteem the Clerk’s opinion and recognise his concerns, and this is an opportunity for Members to consider them.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

Is the hon. Lady aware of the various bids for independence from Conservatives south of the border made from time to time by Conservatives in Scotland? The point made by the hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife (Thomas Docherty) might hold: the proposals could lead to the exclusion of the solitary, lonely Scottish Conservative figure on the Government Benches.

[Mrs Laing]

It is kind of the hon. Gentleman to stand up for my right hon. Friend, as I do frequently, but my right hon. Friend is not, of course, the leader of a political party in the House. The Prime Minister is leader of the Conservative party, with a large proportion of the popular vote throughout the country behind him, and undertakes that task very well indeed.

[Mr George Howarth (Knowsley) (Lab)]

I am filled with admiration at the extent to which the hon. Lady is managing to disagree with herself. Could she return to the question put by the hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr Shepherd), and the legitimate point that there will be parties that receive significantly less than the threshold that she proposes, and will thus have no voice in the process? That cannot be democratic.

[Mrs Laing]

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. He is right, too, in his first point:

“Frailty, thy name is woman.”

I can disagree with myself or anyone else when called to do so. If it is my duty, I can be—well, I think we will leave that aside.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

Methinks the lady doth protest too much.

[Mrs Laing]

I appreciate that line from Shakespeare, too.

The right hon. Member for Knowsley (Mr Howarth) is correct. There is some difficulty with the arithmetic threshold set out in the amendment, but there is also a matter of principle, and on this point I will argue with myself—or rather I will, as an individual, disagree with the relevant part of the Select Committee report. I think the correct democratic process is to consult the House as a whole, not merely the leaders of particular parties in the House. There is then a problem in defining how the democratic process should work when the House is considering consulting the leaders of political parties. If there was a party that had only one Member, one leader and a very small proportion of the vote, it would be ignored and that does not quite work.

[Sir Peter Soulsby (Leicester South) (Lab)]

I commend the hon. Lady for the excellent job that she is doing in putting forward an amendment with which she is not in entire agreement. As she told the Committee, she is making it on behalf of the Select Committee, of which I am also a member, and it expresses the concern that we heard from the Clerk about the way in which the Government’s proposals might be subject to challenge in the courts, were they to go forward unamended. Will she join me in hoping that when the Minister responds, he will be able to give an assurance that the Clerk’s concerns have been taken into account, and that any process that was followed under the Bill would not be subject to such challenge?

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[Mrs Laing]

That is precisely the point. I thank the hon. Gentleman both for putting it so succinctly, and for putting his name to the amendment so that I am not alone in disagreeing with myself. The point that he made is the crux of the matter, and I am sure the Minister has picked that up and has already considered it. I have every confidence that he will respond to it in a short time.

[Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)]

To reinforce the hon. Lady’s opposition to her own amendment, it should be pointed out that under proposed new subsection (2)(b) of the amendment, it is not necessarily the case that the registered leaders of all the registered parties are Members of the House. The First Minister of Scotland and the First Minister of Northern Ireland, who are the registered leaders, are not Members of the House. That is another reason why the amendment is flawed.

[Mrs Laing]

Indeed. I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. Once again, the details of proposed new subsection (2)(b)—that is not

“To be, or not to be”

—we are going back in again! I do not think we need any more Shakespeare, and I will be called to order if I go any further down that road.

The matters identified by the right hon. Gentleman would have to be considered in more detail if the amendment were to become part of the Bill. I predict that the Minister will not accept it. As I said, I hope not, because I would have to vote against it and as the Committee knows, I am uncomfortable voting against my Government and the Minister. The amendment does not have to become part of the Bill, but the points made to the Select Committee by the Clerk of the House are serious and important, and the Committee will wish to be reassured that the Minister has considered them.

[Mr Shepherd]

Is not the difficulty for my hon. Friend and those on behalf of whom she is promoting the amendment that they have put it in a statutory form, whereas the Clerk’s solution was that it should be in the form of Standing Orders of the House? To read across is not possible. On the face of it, the amendment looks absurd, so I am puzzled why it is even before the Committee.

[Mrs Laing]

Let me explain further. The Select Committee rushed through its pre-legislative scrutiny process, because of the timetable for the publication of the Bill, Second Reading and Committee. Inevitably, the Select Committee had to take evidence and consider matters quickly and briefly. It is important that the issues considered by the Select Committee are put before the Committee. I have every confidence that the Minister will assure the Committee in due course that he and his colleagues have considered all the points made in the pre-legislative scrutiny report by the Select Committee.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

This is not about subsection (2)(b). If it would assist the hon. Lady in arguing against her own amendment, does she recognise that other amendments that she has tabled, such as amendment 37, if accepted, would create a serious problem in relation to amendment 33? That rests on the Prime Minister discharging a particular function, whereas under amendment 37 there could be circumstances in which there was no Prime Minister to discharge that function.

[Mrs Laing]

Indeed. The hon. Gentleman is right. We will debate amendment 37 in the next group, and I am sure I will be called to order if I go into the details of it at this point.

Once again, I am not seeking, and the Select Committee was not seeking, to put forward a coherent succession of amendments in an attempt to change the Bill. I want to make sure that the Committee has an opportunity, as it has now had, to consider the issues of exclusive cognisance and the way in which the Standing Orders of the House will be affected by the Bill. That is why I hope the Committee’s Chairman will excuse my arguing against myself, while putting the points that the Select Committee wished to make here. It is important that the results of the pre-legislative scrutiny that we undertook should be put before the Committee.

[Sir Peter Soulsby]

On pre-legislative scrutiny and the point made by the hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr Shepherd), does the hon. Lady agree that the fundamental problem with the amendment is that it was tabled in the absence of time for adequate pre-legislative scrutiny, and that it is very much a second-best? The point about the preference of the Clerk for the matter to be dealt with in the Standing Orders of the House ought to have been given more time and more consideration, and there should have been an opportunity for the Committee to consider that as an alternative to the amendment.

[Mrs Laing]

Yes, the hon. Gentleman is correct. I recognise that that is why he put his name to the amendment. It is a pity that we have not had an opportunity in some other way to go into these matters. However, I reiterate that the Committee has an opportunity now to consider matters relating to exclusive cognisance and the Standing Orders. I hope the Committee will take that opportunity, but I have every confidence that the Minister will also take the opportunity to reassure us. Amendment 33 is merely an alternative that I put before the Committee for consideration.

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

Since my elevation to the Back Benches six weeks ago, I have put a number of supplementary questions by way of interventions. This is the first time that I have spoken from the Back Benches in 23 years.

It is a delight to follow the hon. Member for Epping Forest (Mrs Laing), who represents my home area, Loughton in Essex, where from a very early age I used to be sent out delivering leaflets and canvassing against the local Conservative party, never to any effect. My mother continued to represent the area in which we lived, first on the district council and later on the town council, until she was in her 80s. Thankfully, she is still alive.

I have witnessed many occasions when a Member has moved an amendment that they do not understand. Indeed, I can think of one occasion 30 years ago on the Finance Bill when I moved an amendment that I did not understand—an embarrassment made worse by the fact that it was I who had drafted it. For the life of me, I could not work out what it meant, although I am pleased to say that officials in the Treasury, as it turned out—the Minister later showed me his briefing—had gone through all sorts of intellectual contortions to guess at that piece of total gibberish. Never before have I heard an hon. Member from either side of the House move an amendment with which they profoundly disagreed, but I admire the way in which the hon. Lady very loyally made the case for the group’s lead amendment while ensuring that her own reservations about it were put on the record.

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[Mr Straw]

Of course. I was going to come on to that, but I am grateful to my hon. Friend for leading me down that path. There is no reason to rush through legislation for a fixed-term Parliament, because, even if we do not have the Bill, there is no prospect of a general election being called, in almost any circumstances, within the next three years.

The Liberal Democrat and Labour parties were committed by their manifestos to the principle of a fixed-term Parliament, but the Conservatives’ proposal ran directly counter to that, because it stated that a general election should be called within six months of any change of Prime Minister, meaning that, if the Prime Minister had suddenly passed away or something else had happened to him and he was no longer in office, we could have had a general election within a twelvemonth.

We know, however, that the structure of the Bill and the rush derive not from the pursuit of a sensible idea for which there is all-party support, but from narrow, partisan reasons related to the internal chemistry that both parties feared and, I think, still fear could be explosive in difficult circumstances.

[Mrs Laing]

indicated assent.

[Mr Straw]

I am glad to have the hon. Lady’s endorsement.

As we know, that was precisely the reason why, miraculously, of all the numbers that the coalition partners could have chosen, they originally alighted on the trigger level of 55%, because it would have given neither partner the ability to force an early general election against the wishes of the other.

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[Chris Bryant]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for echoing a point that I made three minutes ago. I still agree with the point that I made three minutes ago, and I now agree with the hon. Gentleman, which is great. We are gathering support in the debate, which is very exciting. I hope that he will support the same amendments as me.

My problem with amendment 33 is that it places all the power in the hands of the party leaders. That is a profound problem, as I hope we are moving into a period when Parliament finds more opportunities to take its destiny into its own hands. I hope various measures that have already been introduced will help in that, and will revitalise the role of Back Benchers and therefore make it possible for not everything to be decided by the party leaders. That is an important principle, and it is why we do not support the amendment—although I realise that the hon. Member for Epping Forest will not press it to a Division in any case.

[Mrs Laing]

I simply want to say that I agree with the hon. Gentleman; he makes a very good point.

[Chris Bryant]

I wonder whether I can carry the hon. Lady a little further into even greater acts of agreement. Bearing in mind the stricture she has set herself of not opposing anything that is in the coalition agreement, she should feel free to support us in respect of later amendments on the two-thirds majority, unless she has found some other reason not to do so.

We have tabled one amendment to clause 2: amendment 21. The clause provides for the calling of an early general election, but it does not specify what “early” means in that context. It does not state whether the motion that could be moved in the House would say, for instance, “This House calls for a general election in the autumn of next year,” and if so whether that means the general election would be held next autumn or prior to that, as current legislation still allows for the precise date of a general election to be set by royal proclamation, which would obviously be on the basis of advice from the Privy Council, and therefore would in practice come from the Prime Minister.

Therefore, the Bill as currently drafted lacks clarity in this respect. That is why we have suggested that the clause should refer to an “immediate” rather than an “early” general election. That fits with amendments we have tabled to other provisions saying the power to determine the precise date of the general election should not be left to the Prime Minister, and that instead the date should be set.

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[Mr Harper]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right, in the sense that this is an Act of Parliament and can be repealed, but the difference is that it will then engage the other place, in which the Government do not have a majority—and in which we will still not have one when the new peers have been introduced. We think that putting the provision in legislation is preferable to putting it in Standing Orders because the Government then have to get the Bill through both Houses of Parliament, in one of which they do not have a majority—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Tristram Hunt) says that the Government will have a majority, but no. Even when the new list of working peers has been created, the two governing parties together will not have a majority. There are Cross Benchers in the Upper House, which he keeps forgetting.

For those reasons, I think that amendment 4 is flawed. If it is pressed to a vote, I urge my hon. Friends to oppose it. The Government’s position is very clear. We want fixed-term Parliaments but we want there to be two circumstances in which there can be an early general election: when there is a traditional motion of no confidence, in which a simple majority is enough to say that a Government have lost the confidence of the House; and when the House uses its new power to force an early election, which is decided by two thirds of the Members of the House. The same provision is in the Scotland Act 1998 for the Scottish Parliament. I should say that it is the same provision, because in Scotland it is two thirds of all Members, not just those voting. The hon. Member for Rhondda did not get that quite right.

Whichever of the amendments is pressed to a vote, I urge hon. Members to reject it. We can then move on.

[Mrs Laing]

It was the Select Committee’s intention to give the House an opportunity to debate these important matters and that has certainly been a success. I am pleased to have given the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) his first opportunity to address the House from the Back Benches for more than 23 years. I am grateful to my colleagues on the Select Committee, the hon. Members for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Tristram Hunt) and for Leicester South (Sir Peter Soulsby), for their support for—or rather opposition to—the amendment, which none of us wants to see become part of the Bill but which we are all grateful to have had the opportunity to debate this afternoon. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Amendment proposed: 4, in clause 2, page 2, leave out lines 3 to 7.—(Mr Cash.)

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[Mrs Laing]

The issue was raised at a Commonwealth Parliamentary Association conference in Portcullis House last week. Currently, there is something of a constitutional crisis in Canada over exactly the same questions: what is a vote of confidence, when is a vote a vote of confidence, how is it defined and who has the power to make that definition? Surely, it would be wrong if our Parliament got into the mess that Canada is in.

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[Chris Bryant]

The last moments of the speech of the hon. Member for Stone (Mr Cash) sounded a bit like a trailer for the next debate. If he does not mind we will stick with this one for the moment, although he is absolutely right to say that the way in which all the different elements of the Bill tumble together in a concatenation will make for a fairly dangerous precedent if we are not given further clarification.

It is important that we establish some basic first principles on no confidence motions. First, the Government should at all times enjoy the confidence of the House of Commons. It is important to state that that should be a matter solely for the House of Commons, no matter whether we change the composition of the House of Lords in future, as I hope we do. I note that motions of no confidence have been tabled and debated in the House of Lords, but that is inappropriate. The elected House of Commons, the primary Chamber, should determine whether the Government enjoy the confidence of Parliament.

Secondly, it is important to say that just because the Government lose a vote, they do not necessarily have to fall. That is an important principle because I think that there are only two Prime Ministers since the second world war who have not lost votes at some point. Even Churchill lost one vote in his period as Prime Minister after the war. Attlee lost four, even when he had a majority, and Wilson lost 31, six in his first time as Prime Minister and 25 in his second. Callaghan lost 34, none of which did for him—well, obviously one did in the end. It is a sign of a healthy relationship between the Executive and Parliament if the legislature is able to defeat the Government on occasion on bits and pieces of legislation.

Obviously there comes a point at which a Government might not be able to continue, for instance because they have not been able to get their Budget through in any shape or form, or because they cannot take through some major piece of legislation. In practice, as the hon. Member for Stone mentioned, what has normally happened is that the Government have brought forward legislation and then lost a vote on an amendment or some motion. Often, the Opposition have then tabled a motion of no confidence the next day.

The convention of the House—I note that it is only a convention—is that the Government automatically give precedence to a motion of no confidence, so that it can be debated immediately. It is obviously in the Government’s interests to resolve the matter of whether the House has confidence in them. I merely note that now we are putting elements of the matter into statute rather than depending on convention and Standing Orders, there is no provision to ensure that a motion of no confidence is guaranteed precedence and can be debated swiftly, one would hope the next day.

Governments have lost large numbers of votes since the second world war and before, and that is important. Some of them have been finance votes, and it is perfectly satisfactory for some finance votes to be lost, for instance on stamp duty or the rate of income tax. On 16 July 1974, the Government lost a vote on a Liberal amendment to the Finance Bill. On 8 May 1978 the Conservatives moved that income tax be cut from 34% to 33%, which was carried against the Government’s wishes. On 10 May that year another Conservative amendment to the Finance Bill was agreed to, and the Government lost another motion the next day in relation to sending the Finance Bill off to Committee.

I do not believe that such losses should of necessity mean that the Government should fall, or indeed that they have lost the confidence of the House in its totality. I also do not believe that a motion to censure an individual member of the Government should, of necessity, lead to the fall of the Government, a new general election or to inciting the provisions in the Bill. There have been occasions in the past, when, effectively, a motion to censure an individual member of the Government has been so considered. The last occasion when a Government who had a majority of seats in the House of Commons lost a motion of no confidence was in 1895. The motion was on reducing the salary of the Secretary of State for War, Mr Campbell-Bannerman, by £100 because he had not provided enough cordite to the troops. The motion was carried. Even though Campbell-Bannerman was probably the most popular Member of the Government at the time, he resigned and the Prime Minister decided that he would consider it to have been a motion of confidence, and the Government resigned. The incoming Conservative Government decided to seek a Dissolution and hold an election and the Conservatives came to power.

[Mrs Laing]

Does the hon. Gentleman not agree that there are rules and conventions about when a motion before this House is a confidence motion and when it is not? Twenty years ago this week, I recall the then Prime Minister, now Baroness Thatcher, saying that she was going to stand down as Prime Minister. The Opposition then tabled a motion of no confidence in the Government, which was quite rightly debated as such on the Floor of the House because we were at a point of crisis. The Government, headed as it still was by Margaret Thatcher, won that vote very distinctly, but it was a motion of confidence. There are strict rules about when it is and when it is not.

[Chris Bryant]

I do not think that the hon. Lady is right about the strict rule. Her memory of the occasion is right; it was Thursday 22 November 1990. The motion was very clear. It said:

“That this House has no confidence in Her Majesty’s Government.”—[Official Report, 22 November 1990; Vol. 181, c. 439.]

The debate was led by Neil Kinnock, now Lord Kinnock, and the motion was defeated by 367 votes to 247. The hon. Lady makes my point for me. The rules have been very nebulous except where the words are very clear on the Order Paper. Very often, the words on the Order Paper have not been clear.

[Mrs Laing]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way again. I made a mistake when I talked about a “strict rule”. I beg the hon. Gentleman’s pardon. The point is that there are rules and there are conventions, but they are not sufficiently clear, so I agree with the hon. Gentleman on this point.

[Chris Bryant]

I am delighted that we agree because I am sure that that will mean that the hon. Lady will join me in the Division Lobby in a wee while.

Clearly, conventions have operated in this House, but they have wandered with the age. There was a period when there were frequent motions of no confidence and the Opposition thought that it was a good way in which to transact business. For the past 15 years or so, we have not had motions of no confidence, largely because the Government have enjoyed fairly large majorities. Another reason, I suspect, is that there is nothing worse than losing a motion of no confidence and the Government tend to unite in their confidence in themselves. I will come later to discuss one of the dangers of this nebulous relationship. All too often, as the hon. Member for Stone said, the Prime Minister of the day starts saying, “I really want to get this piece of legislation through. If we don’t get this through, there will be a general election and I will have to resign. Effectively, it’s a motion of no confidence.” All too often, pieces of legislation or votes are carried because of the threat of the no confidence motion. It would be better if one had clarity in statute as to what constituted a motion of no confidence.

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[Mr Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con)]

This is my first opportunity to speak on the Bill. Before I deal with the specific clause and amendments, I want to say that I generally support the idea of having fixed-term Parliaments because it will promote the basic concept of electoral fairness, end some of the deal-making and lack of scrutiny we have seen inherent in the wash-up procedures, improve electoral planning for the Electoral Commission and avoid some of the return to hype and confusion that we saw dominate the last three years of the previous Parliament.

In one area, however, I have to reserve my unequivocal support. That concerns the consequences of a successful vote of no confidence in a Government. It must be right for such votes to continue to be decided by a simple majority. If a Government cannot command the support of a simple majority of elected representatives, they should fall. I welcome the Government’s withdrawal of the qualified majority provision that was previously under consideration. However, clause 2(2)(b) sets out a novel and rather anomalous parliamentary procedure.

Reference has been made to this country’s practice, which is that a successful mid-term vote of no confidence leads to an immediate election. In the last century, there were just two examples of that, both of which led to the announcement of Dissolution the following day. The exception—I stand to be corrected if I am wrong—was after the election of December 1923, which the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) mentioned. A minority Conservative Government led by Stanley Baldwin switched to a minority Labour Government led by Ramsay MacDonald. However, that took place immediately after an election, so it arguably reflected rather than ignored the shifting will of the electorate.

Practice therefore shows that this convention is reasonably clear, yet clause 2(2)(b) undoes it. It provides a window of up to 14 days after a no confidence vote before a general election must be called. I stand to be corrected again and ask the Minister for some clarification, but the aim appears to be to allow the formation of an alternative Government without an election. The mechanism appears almost explicitly designed to facilitate a third party leaving a coalition in order to form an entirely new Government of an entirely different character—mid-term and without seeking a democratic mandate for such a profound change. I see no sound reason or any good justification for such an inherently undemocratic device—even one formulated in permissive terms. I see only the risk of this clause being used for political expediency, sidestepping the democratic process.

It might be said that the existing arrangements already allow for this to happen, but they do not encourage it and they do not institutionalise it. At best, this provision is unnecessary; at worst, it is undemocratic. I would therefore be grateful for some further explanation and clarification from Ministers of the explicit purpose of this window— and, indeed, of why it is necessary at all.

[Mrs Laing]

Amendments 36 and 37 were also submitted by the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee. I am pleased to say that, unlike the last group of amendments, these are amendments with which I agree. I apologise again on behalf of the Chairman of the Committee, the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen), who would have liked to be here to speak on the Committee’s behalf. I am pleased that other Select Committee members are present, along with other hon. Members who have supported the amendments.

The purpose of amendments 36 and 37 is to improve the Bill and help the Government to clarify a very important issue. There cannot be anything more important than knowing when the House is facing a motion of confidence in the Government and when it is not. This is not a matter that ought to be left open to speculation. When we face a confidence motion we need to know that it is a confidence motion, and—as has been said by Members on both sides of the Committee—it should not be used by the Whips as a tool to coerce people to vote for a particular issue lest their Government fall if the vote be lost. A motion of confidence is not a tool of the Whips; it is a very important convention of our constitution.

Amendment 36 is designed to address the Select Committee’s finding in our pre-legislative scrutiny report that, under the Bill,

“the requirement that the House would need to show that it had confidence in any alternative government within fourteen days to avoid an early general election could be made impossible if the Government ensured that the House was adjourned or prorogued for any substantial length of time.”

The amendment would prevent the incumbent Government from using the prerogative power of prorogation to frustrate the formation of an alternative Government, which they could do under the Bill as it is currently drafted. At present, the Government could get around the provisions in clause 2 by simply proroguing Parliament.

[Chris Bryant]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. This is one of my biggest worries. Ministers may say that the Prime Minister would never do that—that he or she could not possibly choose to use such an evil power—but the truth is that the power to prorogue lies completely, utterly and solely with the Government. I think it important for us to remove that power from Government and put it in the hands of the House, just as the power to adjourn the House for recesses lies with the House.

[Mrs Laing]

Indeed, and that power has been used by the Government many times. I have noticed over the past 13 years that there have been very long recesses when it suited the last Government for the House of Commons not to be sitting and able to hold them to account. It is within the power of the Government to do that, and although I have accused the last Labour Government of behaving in a way that could be described as dishonourable in that respect, I would be the first to say that other Governments have been able to use the power in the same way.

[Thomas Docherty]

As I am a new Member, will the hon. Lady tell me which Government introduced the September sittings to break up the very long summer recess?

[Mrs Laing]

I concede that point to the hon. Gentleman. It was right to introduce September sittings. When I was a new Member, serious events were occurring in Northern Ireland in, I think, 1998 and the House was recalled in September. We flew in from all over the world—well, from Millport and similar places. We all flew back from far-flung places, even Essex. It was realised that having a very long summer recess means the Government are not being held to account and that this House is not the forum and focus for national debate that it should be.

However, I put it to Members that there is an even worse possible outcome from these proposed measures. I know the current Government under the current leadership of the current Prime Minister and the Minister who is currently sitting on the Front Bench would never behave in a dishonourable fashion, but that is not the point. The point is that legislation passed by this House should make sure that no Government can ever use their prerogative power of prorogation—I have got better at saying such tongue-twisters during the day—to frustrate the formation of an alternative Government.

[Chris Bryant]

The hon. Lady is right again, and she is very good at saying the “prerogative power of prorogation”. The additional power the Government currently have is the power to decide whether a motion gains precedence on the Order Paper or not. One of the difficulties with the current draft of the Bill is that there is no provision to ensure that a prospective new Prime Minister trying to form a Government would be able to table a motion of confidence.

[Mrs Laing]

Yes, the shadow Minister is correct. I am sure the Minister will have very good responses to these questions when he replies, but it is important that the House addresses them, and that is why the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee has tabled these amendments as a result of its pre-legislative scrutiny report.

Amendment 36 would, in essence, encourage the incumbent Government to keep the House sitting, and not use the prerogative power of prorogation for purposes for which it should not be used.

Amendment 37 reflects the Committee’s findings that the Bill still leaves to unwritten convention the requirement that a Government should resign if they lose the confidence of the House. The Deputy Prime Minister said to the House in July this year that the Bill would

“strengthen the power of this House to throw out a Government through a motion of no confidence”—[Official Report, 5 July 2010; Vol. 513, c. 32.]

However, although that might have been the Deputy Prime Minister’s intention, the Bill does not do that. Amendment 37 would require the Prime Minister to resign within seven days of a motion of no confidence being passed, and to advise the Queen to appoint a new Prime Minister who had the best chance of securing the House’s confidence.

The Government’s response to the Committee’s report appears to show that they do not intend that an incumbent Government faced with a successful vote of no confidence should be required to resign. The response states:

“A Government is able now, and would be able under the Bill, to remain in office after a no confidence motion and contest a general election.”

That is a very serious state of affairs. The Committee carefully examined the consequences of the Bill before putting that in its report, but the fact is that the Bill will allow a Government to remain in office after a no confidence motion and to contest a general election.

That raises a number of constitutional questions, and I wish to put four to the Minister. First, do the Government intend that the incumbent Government should be able to force an early general election following a vote of no confidence even where an alternative Government with a potential majority in the House are clearly waiting in the wings?

My second question relates to a matter that my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) referred to: have the Government considered that an incumbent Government might engineer a vote of no confidence in themselves, requiring only a simple majority, and then simply sit it out for two weeks to force an early general election? Once again, although I have every confidence that the current Government and the Minister at the Dispatch Box would not behaviour dishonourably, the Bill gives a future Government the power to do that.

As I mentioned in an intervention on my hon. Friend the Member for Stone, some Members of the Canadian Parliament raised this issue at a Commonwealth Parliamentary Association conference held here last week. There is a constitutional difficulty in Canada at the moment, because more than one vote of confidence has been held at the instigation of the Government. My hon. Friend said that he is not particularly interested in examples from other countries, and I agree that just because something happens in Canada does not mean that it will happen here. However, Canada’s constitution and Government are constructed similarly to ours and we ought to learn lessons or at least look at the warning signs from a place whose legislature is so similar.

Thirdly, have the Government considered that an incumbent Prime Minister whose party has narrowly lost a general election might refuse to resign and instead choose to face the House of Commons, as Stanley Baldwin did in January 1924—the shadow Minister referred to that—and as the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown) could, in theory, have done this May? A vote of no confidence in those circumstances would give the incumbent Prime Minister the choice of either resigning or forcing another general election.

An incumbent Prime Minister would not be able to exercise that choice at the moment, because the convention is that the monarch, under her existing prerogative powers, would almost certainly not agree to dissolve Parliament so soon after an election where there was a viable alternative Government. Nevertheless, the Bill, as drafted, would leave the question open, and it is our duty as a Parliament not to put the monarch under pressure to make a decision; we should never have a situation where the monarch has to exercise her prerogative power in order to keep the incumbent Prime Minister in line, as it were.

This is another matter that could easily be dealt with by amendment 37, which states:

“Where the House of Commons passes a motion of no confidence in Her Majesty’s Government, the Prime Minister shall tender his resignation to Her Majesty within a period of seven days of the motion being passed.”

The amendment is quite simple and, again, is not intended to run a coach and horses through the Bill—far from it. As I have said on many occasions, I support the Bill and I want it to go through, because it is necessary for the stability of the Government and of the coalition at a time when we need stability. What the Select Committee is trying to do through these amendments is simply assist the Government to improve the Bill.

My final question to the Minister is on how the Bill strengthens the power of the House to throw out a Government by a motion of no confidence. The Select Committee considered that question as carefully as we could in the time given for pre-legislative scrutiny and there is a general opinion that the Bill does not strengthen the power of the House to throw out a Government on a motion of no confidence. I would argue, however, that the House has at present a pretty good power that it can exercise to throw out a Government on a motion of no confidence. I do not believe that the Bill strengthens that position and the Deputy Prime Minister ought not to say that it does when it does not.

[Mark Durkan]

With the exception of amendment 5, the amendments basically try to make the Bill more complete and more cogent by ensuring that there is less ambiguity about convention. That is particularly the case with amendment 25, which would remove from the Prime Minister and the Whips the ability to whisper confidence and no confidence in people’s ears, to play the question like a joker that is wild and to use it in relation to any issue that is uncomfortable for the Government or on which Back Benchers are exercising their consciences and discretion.

I gave the example in an intervention earlier of the way in which that process was used with the then Counter-Terrorism Bill. Labour MPs who had said that they would vote in good conscience against 42-day detention were prevailed on with the threat of its being a matter of confidence or no confidence. The then Prime Minister said to me that he would not even table a motion of no confidence if he lost that vote, but that he would deem it to be a vote of no confidence and would go straight away. In the first conversation, he said that the vote would have been followed by a no confidence motion but later on, he said that he would not even bother with a no confidence motion and would go straight to an election. I know that that threat brought some Back Benchers into line and they voted against their consciences and against their stated intentions.

If we are serious about altering the balance of the powers in the hands of the Executive and the Whips, we should support amendment 25, which states that a no confidence motion for the purposes of the Bill must explicitly be a no confidence motion in either the Prime Minister or the Government. Making it clear and explicit in those terms removes the ambiguity and bullying element and restores clarity.

The hon. Member for Epping Forest (Mrs Laing) has made strong arguments for amendments 36 and 37. They would remove possible ambiguity and abuse as well as a lot of confusion and speculation that might arise about otherwise serious circumstances. I commend all those amendments to the Committee.

Another virtue of amendment 25 is that it would go some way to mitigating many of the concerns about the Speaker’s certificate and the challenges and questions that might be raised about it, which are legitimately the subject of subsequent amendments. Because I care for the issues raised by those subsequent amendments, I would make the point that amendment 25 is relevant in containing the problems with the Speaker’s certificate that they aim to address.