Arrangement of Business

Lord Barnett Excerpts

Monday 5th November 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Crickhowell]

My Lords, like the noble Lord, Lord Hart of Chilton, I am a member of the Constitution Committee and I have always held him in the highest respect—I do not think that we have ever disagreed about a matter of substance during our discussions in the committee. I had not intended to speak today; I had hoped that the matter would be resolved; but it is necessary to say that there is another reason why we should be very cautious about moving in this way—it does not arise from the procedures, though I think that they are important. In my view, the tabling of this particular amendment to this Bill in the way proposed flies in direct conflict to every single criterion and bit of advice that the Constitution Committee of this House has proffered. It is in contradiction to what we advised as being the proper process for constitutional change in a report that we produced in the previous Session. Indeed, in the report that we produced on the Bill that we are supposed to be debating, we congratulated the Government on having in an exceptional way followed the advice about the manner in which constitutional issues should be debated; that is, they should be debated with plenty of notice and the opportunity for wide consultation and consideration. To table at the last moment an amendment to another Bill that has been more widely considered in this House than almost any legislation in my time here and widely supported, without any opportunity for prior consideration—or, if it had been tabled on the day in question, without the importance of the matter being drawn the attention of the House—is an appalling way to conduct a significant constitutional matter.

In the normal course of events, if a piece of legislation comes forward which has constitutional implications, the Constitution Committee is given the opportunity to consider it, to take the advice of its extremely capable advisers and to produce a report to this House so that it is fully aware of what it is doing before it debates the matter. This has not been possible on this occasion; the Constitution Committee has not had the opportunity to consider and report; and so, quite apart from the importance of the procedural matters that the Leader of the House has drawn attention to, I believe that there are other, very important reasons why we should not go down this route. This is not the way to carry out constitutional change.

[Lord Barnett]

My Lords—

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords—

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I mean no disrespect at all to the noble Lord, and no doubt what he has said will be debated when we get to the Bill, but I wonder if the time might have come for us to proceed with the business of the day.

[Lord Barnett]

Before the noble Lord the Leader of the House sits down, I have one brief point to make. I have some fellow feeling with him because I too was once accused of being discourteous to the House—as he will no doubt recall because he was the one who accused me of it, and then apologised privately and personally in a very kind letter. The important thing here is that, as has been made quite clear, it is for the House to decide, so let him put this business on the Order Paper and it can do so. Why has he not given us an adequate reason for removing the business? We know that some slight disagreement between his fellow coalition members might be a problem, but the House can decide—that is what we are here for. Why will he not bring it back?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, there is really not much more that I can add to what I have already said.