Standing Orders (Public Business)

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Thursday 22nd October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Chris Bryant]

I have read the House of Commons Library summary, but if the hon. Gentleman looks carefully, he will see that it does not lay out all the processes. It lays out only half the processes—[Interruption.] I note that the hon. Gentleman has picked something up from the Library and feels that on the back of that he can come in to the Chamber and be awfully clever—[Hon. Members: “Ooh!”] There we are; the debate is lively enough now, isn’t it, Madam Deputy Speaker?

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

rose—

[Chris Bryant]

The hon. Member for the 16th century is so tempting.

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[Mr Rees-Mogg]

The hon. Gentleman’s point about two classes of MP is important and one that we should tread very carefully towards. I wonder whether this is not the same as MPs serving on a Committee, which is limited in number, meaning that not all MPs can be present, yet can still be overruled by the whole House through, in this instance, a suspension of Standing Orders rather than having a legislative method, which would make it much more complicated.

[Chris Bryant]

This is good, because the hon. Gentleman agrees with me. He is absolutely right to do so, but I do not think he has followed it through to its logical conclusion. He is right. For centuries, when the House has sent a Bill into Committee, it has decided that certain Members should sit on that Committee for the line-by-line consideration of the Bill. That is absolutely the sensible thing to do. In the past, it was done by those who were most interested in the subject, and then it was decided that it would be done by party political balance. Now, there is a suggestion that if the Bills are exclusively English-only, there should be English-only membership. I have absolutely no problem with that; the hon. Gentleman and I are as one. He should therefore support our amendment this afternoon, as I agree with him.

My second problem is that these measures will politicise the Speaker—[Laughter.] [Hon. Members: “Oh!”] This is a Paddington bear stare—[Interruption.] All right, calm down—[Interruption.] You broke my leg; calm down.

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[Chris Bryant]

I will not, if the hon. Gentleman does not mind.

The Commons has not refused such a request for 104 years. And I am not going to take any nonsense from the Leader of the House about their lordships telling us what to do about Standing Orders. This is a major constitutional change. Devolution was brought in after a cross-party constitutional convention, a referendum, a draft Bill and a Bill. In this case, what do we get? The longest-ever amendment to Standing Orders—742 lines in all—driven through on a Government majority. That ain’t no way to treat Parliament. Nor will I take any lectures about the unelected Lords. I have always voted for reform. It is the right hon. Gentleman’s leader who has appointed nearly 10 times as many barons to the other House since he came to power in 2010 as there were sitting around Runnymede in 1215.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

rose—

[Chris Bryant]

I have already given way to the hon. Gentleman. Much as I enjoy what he has to say, there are others who need to speak.

The honest truth is that this is not a conservative set of measures. It is quite a dangerous set of measures. It is a bureaucratic nightmare and hon. Members will regret it. As Lord Forsyth said last night in the House of Lords, it is like an Uber driver without a sat-nav. It is not a unionist set of measures, either. It is as if the Prime Minister had decided to fashion a new grievance for Scotland—God knows the Scots have never needed a new grievance—because he wanted to antagonise them.

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[Mr Walker]

There are thousands of lawyers in this country, and they all have different views—that is how they earn a living. I am sure that Lord Hope’s views are sincerely held, but I disagree with them, as I am sure does my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg), who served with such distinction on the Committee. Is he seeking to intervene?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

indicated dissent.

[Mr Walker]

I was trying to be generous to my hon. Friend.

We are where we are. The former Prime Minister, Tony Blair, has said that he did not give enough consideration to the impact of devolution on England in 1998. What we are debating today is, in my view, the least worst option on the table. Would we start from this point in a perfect world? No, we would not.

Madam Deputy Speaker, I had a long and distinguished speech to give, and there are many things that I would like to say, but I am not going to do so on this occasion, because 50 Members wish to speak and we need to hear from as many of them as possible.

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[Mr Rees-Mogg]

It is most important that the proposal does not create a second-class tier of Members of Parliament. Given that it comes under Standing Orders, in the event of there being a Government who are dependent on Scottish votes for their majority, they could repeal the Standing Order. Therefore the basis of the authority of each MP remains identical.

[Pete Wishart]

I have a lot of respect for the hon. Gentleman’s views, but he is quite simply wrong. The basic principle of the plans is that I and my hon. Friends will be second-class citizens in the unitary Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. That is unacceptable.

Scotland is watching this debate and the mood is darkening. If this is an exercise in saving the Union, the Government could not have contrived a more inept way to do so. Support for independence is increasing. The Conservatives got 14% of the vote in Scotland at the general election. It was an historic low. They have not secured such a vote since the 19th century. Once this has been done to Scottish Members of Parliament—our elected representatives—just watch their polls continue to plummet.

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

My starting point is that the price of the Union for England is asymmetric devolution. England, by virtue of being more than 80% of the population and the richest part of the Union, must accept that devolution to Scotland, to Northern Ireland and to Wales cannot be equalled in England because if it were England would overwhelm the rest of the United Kingdom. That would be the greatest risk to the Union, which I want to preserve. I welcome these proposals because of their modesty, because they make the change through Standing Orders and because they maintain the equality of every Member of Parliament. Their modesty means that they are not seeking to create an English Parliament—

[Ian Blackford]

rose—

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

Talking of modesty, of course I give way to the hon. Gentleman.

[Ian Blackford]

We understand on the SNP Benches that there must be fairness for the people of England and we fully support it, but we are faced with a situation in which the English will exert a veto on us when we have come to this place with the support of the Scottish people to deliver home rule. That is what the people voted for, yet in the debate on the Scotland Bill the veto was used against us every time. Why is it right for the English Members of this Parliament to continue to have a veto against us?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention, but he seems to forget that there was a referendum last year that decided quite decisively what would happen.

I think that Members have been ignoring the detail of the Standing Order changes. They provide that the English-only lock can take effect only if the matter both applies exclusively to England and, crucially, is in the competence of the Northern Ireland Assembly and the Scottish Parliament. If either side of the coin is not there, every MP continues as before. It is a minimal move to ensure that those matters that are devolved elsewhere are subject to a special stage for English MPs only. Crucially, it is done by Standing Order.

The right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) gave us an interesting view on Lord Hope’s opinion that our laws could be challenged if they are made using this procedure. I am afraid that is an eccentric position to take, because our laws are made in the House of Commons according to a mix of convention and Standing Order. We have First Reading, Second Reading, Committee stage, Report stage and Third Reading because of convention and Standing Order, not because of legislation.

Indeed, there are only two bits of legislation that say how we must make laws: one is the Parliament Act 1911, which is there to provide an override for the democratic House; and the other, rather obscurely, is a 1968 law concerning Royal Assent, the ceremony for which was so elaborate that it had to be simplified, and that needed to be done by legislation. [Interruption.] My hon. Friend the Member for Northampton North (Michael Ellis) says that was a shame, and I have no doubt that he has consulted Her Majesty on the matter.

Otherwise, we always legislate by convention and Standing Order. That is absolutely crucial, because the last general election could easily have returned a result that meant that the Government would be made up of Labour Members who were dependent on Scottish Members for their majority. It would then have been quite proper for them to suspend the Standing Orders in order to ensure that the Government were able to function. That is something that those of us who support these changes to the Standing Orders must accept; it is weak, and therefore it can be overturned, with a political cost, to ensure that the Queen’s Government can be carried on. Those words—“that the Queen’s Government can be carried on”—is a backbone of the Tory view of how the country should be run.

I will conclude my remarks by addressing the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) on the Lords message. The Lords are once again trespassing on our privilege when they ask for a Joint Committee on our Standing Orders. The Bradlaugh case established very clearly that each House is responsible for its own procedures. They might want a Joint Committee on how devolution for England works, but it was an impertinence of their lordships’ House to ask for a Joint Committee to discuss our Standing Orders. We must vote the amendment down with a big majority to reassert the rights of the House of Commons, and we may have to remind their lordships of something similar on Monday.