English Votes for English Laws and North Wales

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 1st July 2015 Westminster Hall

[Ian C. Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Guto Bebb]

I will take only one intervention, because of the time.

[Ian C. Lucas]

What is an English-only law?

[Guto Bebb]

That is a key point. We have to have some confidence in the ability of this House and Parliament as a whole to come to a conclusion and define a specific law as English, English and Welsh, or UK-wide. The hon. Gentleman has highlighted a crucial point: we are talking as if a deal has been done, but the detail of the Government’s proposals has not yet been announced—

[Ian C. Lucas]

Give us an example.

[Guto Bebb]

In my view, it is clear that many Bills will be categorised as English and Welsh. In many cases, they will be categorised as UK-wide. Nevertheless, we have to accept that there is a principle that needs to be dealt with.

Finally, my hon. Friend the Member for Eddisbury (Antoinette Sandbach), who was previously a colleague of mine in North Wales, made an important point: anyone who believes in devolution cannot be very pleased with how the Welsh Assembly has worked, because it has sucked power into Cardiff. I want to stress, however, that that is not necessarily a failure of devolution; I would argue that it is a failure of how the Labour party has dealt with devolution in Wales.

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[Mr Hanson]

I only have a short time and I want to ask the key question: who decides what is a Welsh issue? Under the proposals, the Speaker is supposed to decide. What openness, transparency and representations will there be? How will the Speaker determine what is an English-only matter, particularly when the Government have said that they will extend the principle of English consent to financial matters? Who decides, and what does that mean for not only votes but key questions in the House of Commons? Will I be able to table parliamentary questions in the House of Commons as an equal Member? Will I be able to speak in Westminster Hall as an equal Member? Will I be able to ask for a meeting with the Minister of an English-only Department about matters to do with the fire service, the police, health, schools or employment in my area?

[Ian C. Lucas]

We don’t know.

[Mr Hanson]

Will I be able to undertake—[Interruption.] The answer to the question, as my hon. Friend said, is that we do not know. We do not know as yet, because the proposals are not there. We need clarity.

Finally, this issue is important to the unity of the United Kingdom. I cannot believe that the Conservative and Unionist party has made such proposals. I made this point in the main Chamber the other week: Gordon Brown represented a seat in Scotland and was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom; Jim Callaghan represented a seat in Wales and was Prime Minister; and Andrew Bonar Law and Alec Douglas-Home represented seats in Scotland and were Conservative Prime Ministers. Are we saying that no such Prime Minister can ever stand at the Dispatch Box again, or that they would say, “I’m very sorry, I can’t answer that question, because it is devolved to Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland”? If that is the position of the Conservative and Unionist party, it has come an awful long way from the Conservative party I once knew.

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[Ian C. Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

I will be brief, Mr Crausby. The definition of an English-only law is crucial to this debate. The problem is that the Government are leaving us completely in the dark. We are having this debate only because my hon. Friend the Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen), whom I congratulate, initiated it. I tabled a question for the Secretary of State for Wales about what consultation he had had with the people of Wales on proposals for English votes for English laws. That question was transferred to the Leader of the House. I believe that virtually no consultation has taken place.

[Guto Bebb]

rose—

[Ian C. Lucas]

I do not have time to give way, as the hon. Gentleman well knows.

Not only has the Secretary of State not consulted the people of Wales, but he has not consulted Members of Parliament. There has been no discussion whatever with MPs on the issue. That is a crucial point. Mr Speaker will need to have the wisdom of Solomon to determine what is an English-only law. The first thing he should do is visit North Wales and Cheshire. Our region is unique in the United Kingdom and exemplifies why this question is so difficult.

I expect nationalists to divide, separate and try to have a culture of blame between each part of our country. I do not expect those of us who believe in the United Kingdom to argue in favour of division or separateness. Whatever our political background, we should stand together to work out a proper way of doing this, with consultation. That is what we need.

I will make a proposal. There are Members from North Wales who take a sensible approach to the matter. Representatives of the Mersey Dee Alliance are here in Parliament today. We need an all-party group for the Mersey-Dee region, to put the case in Parliament for a cross-border economic and cultural environment. We have that opportunity within the context of this debate. We need the Government to start to listen. Their ignorance is palpable, and they have closed their ears.

[Mr David Crausby (in the Chair)]

I ask for a very short contribution from Paul Flynn.

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[Dr Coffey]

I shall address some points that have been raised in the debate. If I have time at the end, the hon. Gentleman may well be able to intervene then.

The hon. Member for Ynys Môn said that we need a proper convention and that the proposals are a sticking plaster. Not only did the House not support that point of view last month in a vote, but I suggest to him that it would be a handbrake on making progress with a Wales Bill and the Scotland Bill. We are making progress with the Silk commission and, as he knows, we intend to introduce a Wales Bill, and it is important that we do not add unnecessary delay to those things.

The hon. Gentleman and some of his hon. Friends have suggested that they are being denied a voice on many issues, but there is nothing in the proposals published by the Conservative party to that effect. Although there will be many points of detail that we will discuss and debate in due course, I genuinely assure him that many of the points raised today will, I am sure, be addressed when we publish our detailed proposals, which will happen soon, and there will be time for scrutiny.

In the meantime, I will set out some points of principle that will underpin our approach, as set out in the Conservative party’s manifesto on which we won the election, including gaining a seat in North Wales—I am glad to see my hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Clwyd (James Davies) in his place. I should point out that this idea is nothing new. It was also in our 2010 manifesto, and the hon. Member for Ynys Môn contributed to a debate on the issue in 2009, so it is not novel.

In changing the way the House of Commons legislates, we have to balance the need for the Commons as a whole to express the voice of our entire United Kingdom with the need for English and Welsh MPs to express their voice on matters affecting England and Wales only. Our proposals will reflect that need and respect that balance by ensuring that all MPs continue to take part in the legislative process, but that relevant measures must also have the explicit support of a majority of MPs representing constituencies in England, for an England-only matter, or in England and Wales, as the case may be.

In that way, we will resolve the current position, which has become increasingly untenable, that English or English and Welsh laws can be made without the explicit consent of the MPs whose constituents are affected. It is particularly right to progress with these proposals so that we can rectify the situation whereby hon. Members from outwith England could have a decisive impact on legislation on English constituents, not only on subject areas for which they cannot vote for their own constituents, but contrary to the views of the majority of English MPs.

[Ian C. Lucas]

Will the Minister give way?

[Dr Coffey]

I will take interventions in a bit, including from the hon. Gentleman.

I hope that the hon. Member for Ynys Môn reflects objectively on the situation I have described. Our proposals will recognise that many laws apply to England and Wales and that the West Lothian question is as relevant in Cardiff as it is in Carlisle—I suppose it could become the Delyn or the Denbigh dilemma. That is why English and English and Welsh laws will require the explicit approval of the MPs whose constituents are affected by them.

As has been set out repeatedly by hon. Members today, and as I recognise, constituents often access services across the border, as well as councils and other trade bodies that, as we have heard, work very well together. The border is not a barrier, as the hon. Member for Alyn and Deeside (Mark Tami) recognised, and I assure hon. Members that proposals that we will introduce soon will not stop access to services for constituents nor hinder the ability of any MP to hold the Government to account or stop them voting on legislation that affects those services. This is a popular policy, and not just in England. A study in January 2015 in Scotland found that over 50% of people supported the concept of English votes for English laws.

Let me turn to some other points made today. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Aberconwy (Guto Bebb) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd West (Mr Jones) that this is an important point of principle. I recognise that, as the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders) said, close working across the border matters. My right hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd West alluded to a potential issue, but I honestly encourage the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston to raise existing problems directly with the Welsh Assembly Government or with his Labour colleagues who are representatives in the Welsh Assembly.

As for the points made by the hon. Member for Aberdeen North (Kirsty Blackman), and stretching somewhat into those made by the Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart), I do not agree that what is proposed will create a second-class status for MPs. The hon. Lady referred to being barred from being able to help constituents, but she should recognise that she is barred now from voting to help her constituents on devolved matters. Indeed, in the last Parliament, I think the Education Bill was an England-only Bill, and I think I am also right in saying that SNP Members decided not to vote on the Second Reading of the Education and Adoption Bill. I would have thought that given the similar approach and the consistency that the SNP has shown, hon. Members should be genuinely assured that we are not seeking to do something different in that regard.

[Ian C. Lucas]

Does the Minister not find it extraordinary that she is calling in aid a nationalist approach to legislation within the United Kingdom to justify the approach that she is taking? Does that not mean that she is advancing a nationalist argument in favour of her case, because this is a nationalist proposal?

[Dr Coffey]

I disagree with the hon. Gentleman; I do not see this as a nationalist proposal. Devolution is now supported on both sides of the House, but this addresses the imbalance that English constituents feel about what has happened on the journey of devolution. I do not know why the Labour Government chose not to address this issue. Perhaps the reason was that when Tony Blair was leader of the Labour party, it won elections with a majority of MPs in England and so perhaps felt unable to do that.