English Votes for English Laws

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Tuesday 13th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Leader of the House of Commons (Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg)]

I beg to move,

That Standing Orders Nos. 83J to 83X (Certification according to territorial application etc) be rescinded and the following changes be made to Standing Orders:

(1) in sub-paragraph (3)(b) of Standing Order No. 12 (House not to sit on certain Fridays), leave out “Consent Motions under Standing Order No. 83M (Consent Motions for certified England only or England and Wales only provisions) and of”;

(2) in paragraph of Standing Order No. 39A (Voting by proxy), leave out “or in any legislative grand committee”;

(3) in paragraph of Standing Order No. 51 (Ways and means motions), leave out “or, in the case of a motion to which Standing Order No. 83U applies, forthwith upon the announcement of the Speaker’s decision with respect to the motion under that Standing Order”;

(4) in Standing Order No. 63 (Committal of bills not subject to a programme order) leave out paragraphs and (6);

(5) in Standing Order No. 64 (Notices of amendments, &c., to bills), leave out “, of Consent Motions under Standing Order No. 83M (Consent Motions for certified England only or England and Wales only provisions)”;

(6) in Standing Order No. 73 (Report of bills committed to public bill committees), leave out “or the Legislative Grand Committee (England)”;

(7) in Standing Order No. 83A (Programme motions), in paragraph (9), leave out “up to and including”;

(8) in Standing Order No. 83B (Programming committees),

(a) in paragraph (1), leave out “or in legislative grand committee or on reconsideration or consequential consideration” and

(b) in paragraph (5), leave out “or in legislative grand committee or on reconsideration or consequential consideration”;

(9) in Standing Order No. 83C (Programming sub-committees),

(a) in sub-paragraph (5)(e), leave out “up to and including”,

(b) in sub-paragraph (12)(b), leave out “up to and including”, and

(c) in sub-paragraph (14) leave out “up to and including”;

(10) in Standing Order No. 83D (Programme orders: conclusion of proceedings in public bill committee or in committee of the whole House, etc.),

(a) in the title, leave out “, etc.”, and

(b) in paragraph (1), leave out “, in the Legislative Grand Committee (England) when exercising functions under Standing Order No. 83W(6)(a) (Legislative Grand Committees)”;

(11) in Standing Order No. 83E (Programme orders: conclusion of proceedings on consideration up to and including third reading),

(a) in the title for the words “and up to and including” substitute “or”,

(b) in paragraph (1), leave out “up to and including”, and

(c) leave out paragraph (5);

(12) in Standing Order No. 83F (Programme orders: conclusion of proceedings on consideration of Lords amendments), leave out paragraphs to (11);

(13) in Standing Order No. 83G (Programme orders: conclusion of proceedings on further messages from the Lords),

(a) in paragraph (5), leave out “, subject to paragraphs (6) and (7),”, and

(b) leave out paragraphs (6) to (9);

(14) in Standing Order No. 83I (Programme orders: supplementary provisions), in paragraph (1), leave out “or in legislative grand committee”; and

(15) in Standing Order No. 86 (Nomination of general committees) leave out sub-paragraph (2)(iv).

The motion in my name on the Order Paper would rescind Standing Orders Nos. 83J to 83X and make related changes across the House’s Standing Orders to remove the English votes for English laws—EVEL—process from the legislative process.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

Will the Leader of the House allow me?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

My Lord, my right hon. Friend has come in very early! Yes, of course I give way to him.

[Sir Desmond Swayne]

Am I to assume from the motion that the Leader of the House does not have an answer to the West Lothian question? Or does he take the view that it does not deserve one and that it was impertinent of the late Tam Dalyell of the Binns to have asked it in the first place?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

The West Lothian question has not had a very satisfactory answer since it was posed by Tam Dalyell, who was a most distinguished Member of this House, but if there were an answer, EVEL would not be it.

The EVEL measures were first proposed by way of a counterpoise to the extension of devolution, which saw further legislative powers handed to the devolved Administrations and their Parliaments in the wake of the 2014 once-in-a-generation Scottish independence referendum. The argument put forward then, as some Members may recall from a Chequers summit held at that time, was that an English votes for English laws process represented an honest attempt to answer the West Lothian question.

Proposals for Standing Order changes were not brought forward until after the 2015 general election, during which the potential influence of Scottish MPs on English matters featured especially prominently. Some Members may remember a rather marvellous election poster, depicting the then Leader of the Opposition tucked into the pocket of Mr Alex Salmond in the place of a pocket handkerchief. Once the initial excitement over the proposals’ introduction had abated, it quickly became obvious that their practical implementation would prove unwieldy and—dare I say it?—even baffling.

The procedure amended the legislative process to provide MPs representing English constituencies—or English and Welsh constituencies—with the opportunity to have an additional say on matters that applied to England only or England and Wales only. The procedure also applies to legislation introducing a tax measure that affects only England, Wales and Northern Ireland, which must be approved by a majority of MPs representing constituencies in those areas.

[Mark Tami (Alyn and Deeside) (Lab)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I hope that the right hon. Gentleman has been following.

[Mark Tami]

I represent a border area and many of the specialist hospitals that my constituents go to are on the English side of the border. Indeed, the Countess of Chester Hospital was built as a Welsh and English hospital to serve the residents of Deeside in Wales and Chester in Cheshire. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that it was unfair that I could not effectively vote or express a view on that whereas someone from the south-east of England, who had no interest in that matter, could?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

As the majority of taxation is set on a United Kingdom basis and the Barnett formula ensures that the level of spending provided for services is proportionate to decisions taken by the Union Parliament, I do not think that is as unreasonable as the right hon. Gentleman suggests. Sometimes the West Lothian question’s significance gets exaggerated.

Last week, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster told the House that the Government believe that the procedure has added complexity and delay to the legislative process. Slightly over 10% of all our Standing Orders are taken up with enabling EVEL-doing and its additional parliamentary stages, notably the Legislative Grand Committee, which is held on the Floor of the House between Report and Third Reading. In theory, that allows English MPs to veto provisions, but not to propose them. In practice, it has resulted only in short-lived and poorly attended debates that have always concluded with English MPs, or English and Welsh MPs, giving their consent to England only, or England and Wales only, provisions.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I know that the hon. Gentleman has been waiting with bated breath. His breath is now unbated.

[Pete Wishart]

Does the Leader of the House recall who has made the most contributions to the Legislative Grand Committee? Perhaps he could tell the House how many contributions that Member made.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I have a sneaking suspicion that we may get the accurate statistics from a careful consultation of Hansard that took place earlier this afternoon by the hon. Gentleman himself. May I point out that I made a speech on the matter in 2011, when I outlined all the difficulties that the system would have? I therefore predate the hon. Gentleman in that I opposed EVEL before it had even been proposed. As a good Catholic, I would be expected always to oppose evil.

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend explain why the Government think that England uniquely of the four main parts of the United Kingdom should have no devolved powers at all?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I am loth to disagree with my right hon. Friend, who understands these issues very well, and had a better scheme of his own, which would have been called EVEN—English votes for English needs—rather than EVEL. We could be having a very different debate this evening had EVEN been adopted rather than EVEL.

There is of course devolution within England, but it is different. It is not to England as a country, because England makes up 85% of the total of the United Kingdom. As far as I am aware, there is no federal system in the world where one part makes up such a great proportion. The size of England—and of course the influence that comes from that—would unbalance any settlement we tried to create.

It is not just the ability of this place to legislate effectively that has been constrained. More fundamentally, the EVEL procedure has undermined the role of Parliament as the Union Parliament in which all parts of the United Kingdom are represented equally. The hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) has made that point very eloquently, and I greatly agree with him that there should be equal representation of all Members. I have spoken elsewhere about the ways in which the UK Parliament has become a more important place in our national life following the return of powers from the European Union. Since our departure, we have once again begun legislating properly in areas touching on devolved matters, including trade, health and safety, employment laws and state aid. All of these are now powers returned to the United Kingdom, and we are able to legislate properly because all MPs are equal once again in a Parliament that considers the matters put before it from the broadest possible Union perspective.

Rather than returning to an unhappy, asymmetric answer to the devolution question, the evolving operation of this Parliament has made this much less of a black and white issue than it would have felt in 2014. That is good news, because it reflects the way in which Brexit has strengthened the Union. We have now restored authority in this Parliament to address the problems of voters in every part of the United Kingdom. That is in all of our interests, because our country is much more than the sum of its parts. Just as George III gloried in the name of Britain, so do I, for our global influence together is far greater. Take, for example, our security relationships; the nuclear deterrent, based in Scotland; our shared history as brothers in arms; the economic successes that we have had; or the global reach of the empire builders. One may visit Argyle Street in Hong Kong, the Glencairn suburb of Cape Town, the Aberdare national park in Kenya, or even sunny Cardiff-by-the-Sea in California to see our past shared influence writ large across the world.

[Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)]

Will the Lord President give way?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

Of course; it would be a privilege.

[Harriett Baldwin]

The Lord President is making a magnificent speech, as one would expect, but how would he feel if hypothetically, the outcome that was depicted back in 2015—with Alex Salmond having the shadow Business Secretary, the right hon. Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband), in his suit pocket—had come to pass, and the Lord President’s constituents in North East Somerset faced a situation in which they were having laws made for them without there being a majority view in Parliament in England?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

We are one country, and I accept that voters in Gloucestershire can have an influence on what happens in Somerset—that is a much greater thing for me to confess to than that voters in Scotland should have a say. We are one nation, and I accept the basic principle of democracy that the overall will of that nation must be observed. However, I put it to my hon. Friend that that poster had an effect in the campaign, because it made people think about what the consequences of voting Labour could be, and they did not particularly want to be ruled by Alex Salmond.

I have mentioned all those places around the world that are named after places in the United Kingdom, and I have not yet had the chance to mention Belfast. There are many Belfasts around the world, but there are many English place names, too: there are 22 places in the United States called Somerset, in addition to the one in Wisconsin, and there is also a Somerset in KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo, Bermuda, and of course Pomeroon-Supenaam. There are Somersets everywhere; there are Scottish place names everywhere, Welsh ones and Northern Irish ones, as part of the success of our country as global Britain before the term “global Britain” was invented.

[Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I am sure that there are many places called Bath, and on that basis, I of course give way to the hon. Lady.

[Wera Hobhouse]

Can I remind the right hon. Gentleman that there are many streets in this country called Hanover Street, which is my home town in Germany?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right, and we should be very proud of all that the Hanoverians did in this country, not least providing us with a royal household that served with great distinction.

We have had great success as a United Kingdom across the globe, and after our EU exit, we can work together to do more to increase prosperity across the whole country. Members need look no further than the Subsidy Control Bill or the United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 for examples of us making good use of competencies taken back from Europe. In that context, the tiresome and ineffectual EVEL process seems less of a priority, particularly given the ease with which Governments can make changes to Standing Orders of this kind to suit them—a point that will not be lost on those of us elected in 2010 or before, who are now spending time trying to unpick the poorly thought through constitutional changes made by previous Administrations. The Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 is already on its way to the knacker’s yard.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I am grateful to the Leader of the House for giving way, because he has made reference a number of times now to powers that are being repatriated subsequent to our departure from the European Union. Does he not accept that when it comes to matters such as agricultural payments and fisheries management, we now have the highly unsatisfactory situation where the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, for example, acts as a UK and an English Ministry? Does he not think that that makes the case for devolution within England?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

There is a case for devolution within England, and that is part of the Government’s approach—there are the mayoralties in London, in Manchester and so on—but no, we are also a United Kingdom. It is important that we operate as a United Kingdom and ensure that powers are used where they will be most effective, and it is natural that most, though not all, powers that came back from the European Union should be used at United Kingdom level.

[Mr Carmichael]

The Leader of the House is being generous with his time. Surely the logic of his position is that if it is unsatisfactory for this House to be at the same time a UK and an English Parliament, the same thing must apply to the Executive.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I do not think that is quite what I am saying. I am saying that this Parliament is the Parliament for the United Kingdom and is therefore able to take a broad swathe of decisions. It also takes decisions that affect only England, and it has votes from people from outside England affecting them. The Ministers are United Kingdom Ministers who, like this House, also make decisions for England, but they are held accountable by Members from across the whole of the United Kingdom, and I think that that is a perfectly rational constitutional settlement, considering that 85% of the population of the whole of the United Kingdom live in England. They are not, however, necessarily English.

[John Redwood]

I want to try to clarify this, as the Leader of the House is saying that our Ministers are United Kingdom Ministers. When the Government are consulting the Scottish Government, the Welsh Government and the Northern Irish Government, who then speaks for England so that it is a fair consultation?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

Ministers have their different areas of responsibility. Within Ministries some areas are devolved and the Ministers will obviously consult with devolved Ministers; it is important that we have a good relationship with them. Other areas are not devolved and remain the competences of the UK Government, and those matters are decided by the Ministers themselves on behalf of the whole of the United Kingdom. This system is quite well known and understood.

The House will be delighted to note that I am now coming to the end of my speech. The right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) said that I was being generous with my time, but I am not really; I am being generous with the House’s time, and I am aware that this debate is time-limited. The motion seeks to make the process of legislating on matters that deliver for everyone in the UK just a little easier, and it is on that basis that I commend the motion to the House.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

There will obviously there will be a limit of three minutes on Back-Bench speeches, but as Members have already worked out, most will not have the opportunity to speak. I see that they are dealing with that by making interventions, which is fine because that is what a debate is all about.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I am grateful to the hon. and right hon. Members who have contributed to the debate—to my hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont), who called for EVEL to be put out of its misery; my hon. Friend the Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Andrew Bowie), who reminded us that, for about 50 years, Northern Irish MPs had a vote in this House when they had a devolved settlement, without any complaint; and my hon. Friend the Member for Aberconwy (Robin Millar), who said that we needed clarity in our arrangements and should emphasise the sovereignty of Parliament, points with which I wholeheartedly concur.

I am also grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (John Redwood) and my hon. Friend the Member for West Worcestershire (Harriett Baldwin). There are few people I listen to more closely than my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham. When he makes a point and raises concerns about the constitution, I think a wise Government listen, and some of the points he makes are extremely fair. Devolution was lopsided and the constitution has become unsettled, and it has had too many variations to it in recent decades that have not improved or enhanced the unity of the nation.

I do not agree with my right hon. Friend that removing EVEL is an attempt to appease the Scottish nationalists. I think, in fact, that it shows we have confidence in our Union Parliament. Perhaps I am most confident in returning status quos ante. That is to say, both by abolishing the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 and by removing EVEL, we are trying to restore the beauty and the uniformity of our constitution so that it will work properly.

My hon. Friend the Member for West Worcestershire quite rightly reminded us of the debate in 2011. I also had an exchange with the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) when these proposals were put forward in 2015, when I said that I was very strongly against any idea of a divided parity of MPs and supported the measure only because we could repeal it—which, Madam Deputy Speaker, we are doing.

Question put and agreed to.

Ordered,

That Standing Orders Nos. 83J to 83X (Certification according to territorial application etc) be rescinded and the following changes be made to Standing Orders:

(1) in sub-paragraph (3)(b) of Standing Order No. 12 (House not to sit on certain Fridays), leave out “Consent Motions under Standing Order No. 83M (Consent Motions for certified England only or England and Wales only provisions) and of”;

(2) in paragraph of Standing Order No. 39A (Voting by proxy), leave out “or in any legislative grand committee”;

(3) in paragraph of Standing Order No. 51 (Ways and means motions), leave out “or, in the case of a motion to which Standing Order No. 83U applies, forthwith upon the announcement of the Speaker’s decision with respect to the motion under that standing order”;

(4) in Standing Order No. 63 (Committal of bills not subject to a programme order) leave out paragraphs and (6);

(5) in Standing Order No. 64 (Notices of amendments, &c., to bills), leave out “, of Consent Motions under Standing Order No. 83M (Consent Motions for certified England only or England and Wales only provisions)”;

(6) in Standing Order No. 73 (Report of bills committed to public bill committees), leave out “or the Legislative Grand Committee (England)”;

(7) in Standing Order No. 83A (Programme motions), in paragraph (9), leave out “up to and including”;

(8) in Standing Order No. 83B (Programming committees),

(a) in paragraph (1), leave out “or in legislative grand committee or on reconsideration or consequential consideration” and

(b) in paragraph (5), leave out “or in legislative grand committee or on reconsideration or consequential consideration”;

(9) in Standing Order No. 83C (Programming sub-committees),

(a) in sub-paragraph (5)(e), leave out “up to and including”,

(b) in sub-paragraph (12)(b), leave out “up to and including”, and

(c) in sub-paragraph (14) leave out “up to and including”;

(10) in Standing Order No. 83D (Programme orders: conclusion of proceedings in public bill committee or in committee of the whole House, etc.),

(a) in the title, leave out “, etc.”, and

(b) in paragraph (1), leave out “, in the Legislative Grand Committee (England) when exercising functions under Standing Order No. 83W(6)(a) (Legislative Grand Committees)”;

(11) in Standing Order No. 83E (Programme orders: conclusion of proceedings on consideration up to and including third reading),

(a) in the title for the words “and up to and including” substitute “or”,

(b) in paragraph (1), leave out “up to and including”, and

(c) leave out paragraph (5);

(12) in Standing Order No. 83F (Programme orders: conclusion of proceedings on consideration of Lords amendments), leave out paragraphs to (11);

(13) in Standing Order No. 83G (Programme orders: conclusion of proceedings on further messages from the Lords),

(a) in paragraph (5), leave out “, subject to paragraphs (6) and (7),”, and

(b) leave out paragraphs (6) to (9);

(14) in Standing Order No. 83I (Programme orders: supplementary provisions), in paragraph (1), leave out “or in legislative grand committee”; and

(15) in Standing Order No. 86 (Nomination of general committees) leave out sub-paragraph (2)(iv).