Prime Minister (Replacement) Bill

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Friday 29th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I entirely accept that the scenario my hon. Friend describes is different from the events of May 1940 or the resignation of Margaret Thatcher. Luckily, not many Prime Ministers have died in office. Spencer Perceval was assassinated in the Lobby, a few feet away. As my hon. Friend may remember, Campbell-Bannerman died in office. He was replaced by Herbert Asquith in a perfectly normal way, and from my reading of the history books, I do not think that anybody at the time suggested that the procedures for appointing him were in any way wanting. He was a man of outstanding abilities, albeit he was a Liberal—I know that that is a severe disadvantage in my hon. Friend’s eyes—but for all that, there does not seem to have been any difficulty about his appointment.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

As I recall, Campbell-Bannerman did not die in office, but he did die in Downing street. Asquith allowed him to stay in Downing street after leaving office because he was so seriously ill, but the leadership had changed.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

It is a severe mistake to refer to any aspect of history when my hon. Friend is in the Chamber. I talked only this week to David Campbell Bannerman, who is an MEP—he was in UKIP but is now, I am glad to say, in the Conservative party—and he told me that story. Campbell-Bannerman was of course a very sick man and could have died at any moment, but he died in Downing street a week, I think, after he resigned as Prime Minister.

I accept that my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough is making a brave thrust at a very unfortunate and very rare situation, but I assure him that such playing around with our constitution is very dangerous. I have to tell him that it is what we would expect from our Liberal friends. I would have thought better of him, and that he would have trusted in the good sense—

--- Later in debate ---

[Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

Is it not nice that Fridays have got back to normal, Madam Deputy Speaker, and that we are able to debate these important constitutional subjects in calm and splendour, rather than with the freneticism that there might have been earlier?

Today reminds me of 14 July 1789. My hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) comes to this House as a revolutionary, intending to upset a part of the constitution that has served us well since the office of Prime Minister was first filled by Sir Robert Walpole. We have had a wonderfully functioning, effective means of selecting our Prime Ministers that has found some of the greatest people our country has ever produced.

Think of the 18th century and who was selected then: Sir Robert Walpole himself and the great pair of Pitts—Pitt the Elder and Pitt the Younger. Think particularly of Pitt the Younger, who was called forth to serve his country by George III when he was little more than a schoolboy—a brave decision that was made possible only because of the existence of the royal prerogative in the selection of Prime Ministers. No crude list then to say who should come next, to decide and determine, to bind down the royal prerogative and prevent somebody of that stature from being celebrated as Prime Minister.

Think through to the following century and the great Prime Ministers we had then: Lord Liverpool, that wonderfully long-serving high Tory figure, great man that he was, who governed us with such aplomb; Canning and Wellington, another pair of the greatest magnitude—Wellington, that great hero of the nation who saved us from being invaded or taken over by the French and who, as Prime Minister, set his face firmly against reform in a most admirable style that we should all rejoice in. There was even a not-half-bad Liberal Prime Minister in the form of Lord Palmerston. Lord Palmerston would know what to do about Gibraltar at the moment, would he not, Madam Deputy Speaker?

Because we do not necessarily have the advantage of using the royal prerogative in getting the people we want and because, according to my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough, we now have to go through some list, we could not conceivably get figures of the stature of Lord Palmerston or Disraeli, great flatterer of monarchy that he was.

[Mr Brooks Newmark (Braintree) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

Of course I will give way.

[Mr Newmark]

In listening to my hon. Friend’s—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)]

Order. The hon. Gentleman does not appear to have a tie on. That is a requirement of the House. If he goes outside and comes back dressed appropriately, I am sure that the hon. Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) will give way again.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I am so sorry, Madam Deputy Speaker; I had not noticed that my hon. Friend was in fancy dress today. I am glad that proper sartorial standards are being upheld. What would our sovereign think if her Prime Minister were not properly dressed? Perhaps a debate for anther day is whether court dress should be reintroduced for Prime Ministers when they have audiences with Her Majesty. While I am on this subject, it is a great disappointment to me that the Prime Minister, when listing his engagements on Wednesdays, always fails to say that he has an audience with Her Majesty, as his predecessors always used to do. It seems to have dropped out of usage.

[Mr Newmark]

rose—

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

The colour, good heavens!

[Mr Newmark]

The colour of my tie has perhaps given me inspiration for my question. Can my hon. Friend envisage a “Kind Hearts and Coronets” scenario in which we run out of every character on the list of my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone)? Also, might we even consider putting the Speaker himself on it to take full command of the House and the country?

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that crucial point, because I was shocked to discover that advice had been given that the Speaker could not be included on the list. Parliament can put anyone on a list.

[Mr Bone]

For clarification, I wanted to put Mr Speaker immediately after the Deputy Prime Minister, in third place, but I was told that the House could not contemplate such a thing.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I am very worried, given that this is a major constitutional point, that someone is suggesting that Bills introduced into this House can be limited. As long as the sovereign has consented to our considering matters pertaining to Her Majesty’s prerogative, we can put anyone on the list. We could put a lottery winner on it, if we wanted. The House has a right to legislate as it sees fit and not to be held back. There are examples of Speakers going on to be Prime Minister. One thinks of Addington and remembers the little ditty:

“Pitt is to Addington as London is to Paddington”.

It was said rather disparagingly of Paddington, which was thought not to be much of a place in the early 19th century, but which is now a grand place, of course, with a wonderful railway terminus. None the less, Speakers have gone on to be Prime Minister, so I see no reason not to include Mr Speaker on the list.

I have concerns about the list itself, however, partly because it does not refer to people by their proper titles, which I think is an error, and partly because it does not include people in the right order of precedence. The Deputy Prime Minister is in fact the Lord President of the Council, and though he calls himself “Deputy Prime Minister”, there is nothing in the constitution that makes that a proper post. It is just a title given out by Prime Ministers when they face a little political awkwardness and to keep their party on board. I think it was first given to Rab Butler when he needed a sop to cheer him up. It was then given to Lord Heseltine when John Major thought it was a good thing—

[Sir Edward Leigh]

Geoffrey Howe.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

Oh, I was forgetting about Geoffrey Howe, who was given it when he fell out with the great, almost divine Margaret Thatcher. It didn’t work anyway; it didn’t cheer him up, and he resigned in a huff not much later. It was then given to the noble Lord Prescott to keep the left of the Labour party on board. It is not really a proper constitutional position, whereas the Lord President of the Council—well, he is the fine fellow who makes us regulate the press and goes along to get royal charters introduced.

I am also very disturbed that the Lord Privy Seal is not referred to correctly. In my view, he should be particularly high up the list, because we have such a fine Lord Privy Seal. It is worth bearing it in mind that the title of “Leader of the House” used to be held by the Prime Minister himself, which is a reminder of why that position is of such fundamental importance. Control of the programme of the House is essential to government, and the man or woman in charge of that is a most senior figure in the Government—as I say, it used to be the Prime Minister—so I should like the Lord Privy Seal to leapfrog all the way up, probably ahead even of the Deputy Prime Minister, in recognition of the reality and seriousness of the role.

[Mr Bone]

I do apologise. My hon. Friend is right about the proper titles and about the Leader of the House. I forgot him when I did the list, which is why he is 20th, but I invite my hon. Friend to table an amendment in Committee. I would accept it.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend.

There is another lacuna in the Bill. It refers to

“the Secretary of State with responsibility for Business and Innovation”,

but that great man, that right hon. Friend of mine, wonderful figure that he is, is in fact President of the Board of Trade. He is a very important figure is the President of the Board of Trade. That board, on which also sit people such as the Archbishop of Canterbury, meets very infrequently; it has met a couple of times in the past couple of hundred years, which is about as often as we need most government as far as I can tell.

Then there is the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Since 1714, of course, the post of Lord High Treasurer has been in commission and the First Lord is customarily the Prime Minister and the Second Lord is the Chancellor. If the Prime Minister were incapacitated, the Treasury would remain in commission; it would not need the Second Lord to take on the role of the First Lord—