Business of the House

Lord Blencathra Excerpts

Thursday 4th April 2019 Lords Chamber

Tabled by

[Lord Blencathra]

At the end to insert “but the House shall not resolve itself into a Committee on the bill until at least 24 hours after a report from the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee on the bill has been laid before the House.”

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Lords, first I assure the House that I have been present for every minute of the debate, although not in this place, in my wheelchair at the Bar of the House. Secondly, I inform your Lordships that the last time I spoke in this House on Brexit or Brexit-related matters was 26 February 2018. That was 14 months ago, and I have not said a cheep since. So I am not one of those who has been participating in what has seemed like weekly debates on Brexit in this House, and I will not speak on Brexit now, nor later this evening. If the House will bear with me and in light of the new information I have just received, I hope not to force my amendment to a vote.

However, I shall speak about the bypassing of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, which I have the privilege of chairing. I am speaking in a personal capacity, because I have not had the time to consult my committee on this speech.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

Does my noble friend agree that the failure to consult his committee provides further evidence, if any were needed, that those who most protest their allegiance to parliamentary democracy are actually doing the most to undermine it by ramming this Bill through your Lordships’ House in one day?

[Lord Blencathra]

My noble friend makes a fair point; I will leave him to make his own point in his own way later in today’s proceedings.

I do not wish to read the whole report, although it is very short and I will cut out the introductory paragraphs. The House might be interested if I cut to the chase. If I can do that, then I propose to not press my amendment to a vote.

We say in our report:

“In the Government’s original European Union (Withdrawal) Bill, which became the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 … exit day was wholly a matter for regulations without any named date on the face of the Bill. The regulations were subject to no parliamentary procedure at all, whether of the negative or affirmative type. The Bill allowed Ministers to decide on exit day and set it out in law without recourse to Parliament. We objected to this, arguing for the affirmative procedure, meaning that both Houses were required to debate the regulations before they could be made. The principal reasons were the political and legal significance of the date that the UK left the EU, and the allied public interest in the matter. The Government accepted our recommendation.


The principal justification for clause 2 of this Bill is that it might be necessary to legislate at speed next week to change exit day. The affirmative procedure might cause delays, with the risk that exit day in domestic law might not be aligned with exit day agreed under EU law.


There is some force in this argument, but we are not convinced by it on grounds either of principle or pragmatism. The date of the UK’s exit from the EU remains a matter of the greatest political and legal significance. It is right that the matter be debated in Parliament before the current date of 12 April is changed in our domestic law. The Government have previously changed exit day from 29 March to 12 April, and they did so by a statutory instrument subject to the affirmative procedure. The Government have the time to do the same again, having afforded Parliament the scrutiny required by the 2018 Act. Negative resolution scrutiny is necessarily scrutiny after the event (that is, after exit day has already been changed in law). Scrutiny after the event is best avoided in a matter as significant as this, not least because the consequences of a successful prayer against the instrument would lead to the new exit day being legally invalidated (albeit with prospective effect only) perhaps some weeks after it has taken effect.


Clause 1 of the Bill would, in certain circumstances, give the House of Commons a vote on a proposed exit day at EU level, making it perhaps less pressing for them to have one on the consequential change to UK domestic law made by the relevant statutory instrument. But clause 1 does not apply to the House of Lords, meaning that the House of Lords would be prevented from participating in the process of approving a new exit day at EU level. It is correspondingly more important, therefore, that the House of Lords can scrutinise the relevant statutory instrument before it is made, rather than after the event, again arguing for the affirmative procedure (which is the current position). For the reasons set out above, we recommend that clause 2 should be removed from the Bill, thereby restoring the affirmative procedure to statutory instruments amending exit day”.


There you have it. I therefore urge the House to have Second Reading today, let us all—those in favour of it and those who disagree—study my committee’s report and come back to Committee, or a later stage, no later than Monday. That will give us a chance to table amendments implementing, if the House wishes, what my committee recommends. There is nothing in the Bill that justifies us casting aside the procedures we have followed for 27 years and ignoring the Delegated Powers Committee, which every Member of this House says does an excellent job.

I inherited a committee with an outstanding reputation and, not through any skill of mine, it still has an outstanding reputation. We are on a slippery slope if we decide to cast aside our procedures when we do not have to. Whenever we use the excuse of national emergency or crisis, we inevitably get bad legislation. The Bill may be perfectly okay or it could have unexpected consequences. It gives considerable power to the Prime Minister—in view of her work and behaviour over the last few weeks and months, is the House willing to give her that unfettered power? That is a decision only the House can make. Again, it is not what the Prime Minister says she will do but what the law would permit her to do that worries me and my committee.

Last night in another place, the Secretary of State for Exiting the EU said of the Bill:

“There are problems with the speed of its passage, the constitutional principle of it and the way it will interact with any decision reached by the Council that differs from the earlier decision taken by the House. I hope that the constitutional experts in the other place will address some of the Bill’s flaws”.—[Official Report, Commons, 3/4/19; col. 1146.]


I leave it to others to address the Bill’s flaws, whatever they may or may not be. My concern today is that we follow our normal procedures and give due consideration to my committee’s report and meet tomorrow if necessary, as the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, says. Give us time to study the report; let us table amendments, if that is what we wish to do, to correct the serious flaws in the Bill. I urge the House: let us do our job; let us report in ample time so that the Bill can get Royal Assent next week in ample time for the Prime Minister to go to Brussels on Wednesday.

Lord Blencathra’s amendment to the Motion not moved.

Palace of Westminster: Restoration and Renewal

Lord Blencathra Excerpts

Tuesday 6th February 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, particularly his enthusiasm for selling this magnificent project. It was also a pleasure to listen to the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. I could add a whole chapter of horrors and, indeed, humiliations about the difficulties of getting around this place in a wheelchair. One of the reasons I stagger in here on my stick is, first, to make sure I do a bit of walking and, secondly, I hate sitting in the middle of the Floor to make a speech, but that is a personal matter.

I am delighted to support this Motion because it brings to an end the first stage of an initiative I am proud to boast that I started in 2007. I served on the House of Commons Commission from 2005 to 2010 under the excellent Speaker Martin—the noble Lord, Lord Martin of Springburn. Early in 2007, the Serjeant at Arms briefed us on the essential works which the Palace would require over the next 25 years: replacement of the electromechanical system and the cast-iron roof slates, asbestos removal, et cetera. He ended by saying that in any normal organisation we would decant out to do the repairs but that was not possible in Parliament. Immediately, Jack Straw and I pounced on that remark, and it was suggested that I go off and write a paper on it.

I left the commission meeting and consulted the Serjeant at Arms, the security co-ordinator Peter Mason and the Metropolitan Police superintendent in charge of Westminster—I did not have the authority to consult Black Rod. I asked those three officers to give me their input on what had to be done, what would be good to do and radical, blue-sky thinking—innovations which we could do if the Palace were closed and we had made substantial cost savings in the process. They came up with excellent ideas. I have all the papers from 2007. I presented a paper at the April 2007 commission meeting, but colleagues thought that it was a bit too radical, which I confess it probably was. However the commission agreed that the Serjeant would consider the potential cost savings of my plan and report back.

The Serjeant reported in July 2009, and I shall quote from my report to the commission criticising his paper. I said:

“This paper is disappointing because it misses the opportunity to undertake a complete refit of the Palace and bring in essential modernisation.


Aggressive maintenance (the first time this mysterious expression has arisen) may fix the roofs, the asbestos and the electrical and mechanical systems but does nothing for the other essential changes we need.


We know that we must:-


Remove the so called temporary Terrace Marquees and replace them with a legal permanent structure.


Install about a dozen new lifts with proper disabled access serving all parts of both houses”—


I could walk when I said that.

“Re-organise the internal flow of vehicles - possibly linking in with some sort of Parliament Square pedestrianisation.


Install a complete wireless system throughput the Palace.


Modernise the Commons Committee Rooms (like the Moses Room in the Lords)”.


I went on:

“These things are not maintenance. Does anyone seriously doubt but that they will have to be done in the next ten - 20 years?


Then there are all the opportunity works which we could do when we save enormous space in the basement by removing the large boilers and moving out the telephone exchange from above the Chamber.


Each year we see the Commons facilities dying and being deserted as MPs all congregate in the atrium of Portcullis House. We have to reenergise our facilities in the old palace.


We have to create glass-roofed atria in some of our squares — like Speakers Court and the court between the Lords Dining Room and their Content Lobby.— and make the old building an exciting, more open place to eat, meet and welcome the public.


Portcullis House is now the centre of the Parliamentary universe—it is bright and airy. Too many of the old Palace dining rooms are in the bowels of the building and dingy.


We should amalgamate”—


this was rather radical for the commission at the time, too—

“the Common’s Library with the Lords and keep the three reference rooms only. The other six Library rooms should become our best and magnificent meeting or committee rooms. We no longer need the nine Library rooms taking up so much prime space and with the new hours we no longer need them for sleeping in either.

We should implement all the other ideas in the note from the security co-ordinator and the Sgt at Arms”.


I will not read out those details here; it would not be appropriate to do so. That is what I said in 2009, but the political climate then made it impossible to do anything. We were deep in recession and, no matter how much we saved or how badly the Palace was deteriorating, the media would have portrayed us as spending £3 billion on luxuries for MPs, and we would have been crucified, even without the expenses scandal. The commission’s decision was to conduct further studies and so, two or perhaps three studies later, here we are and I am still as enthusiastic to do it as I was in 2007 and 2009.

Although I am enthusiastic to do the decant, I have a few major concerns. First, let us be honest: government and Parliament are utterly incompetent at procurement. Architects and builders know that the way to rip us off is to encourage us to ask for design changes just as work is about to begin. That was the racket on Portcullis House, which the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, referred to, and it is what happens to every ship we commission for the Navy as well. It also happens when committees of MPs and/or Peers are in charge whose membership changes annually.

It is vital that, once Parliament approves the design specification, the sponsor board and delivery authority drive it through on time and on budget without a single change. They must not accept any parliamentary representations on design changes because I know what will happen. We have seen it before: half way through, MPs and Peers will say that the contractors must now use this or that wonderful new environmental gismo or will cancel the contract for the carpets since the company has not ticked the box on maternity pay. The sponsor board must not be given the authority to tweak or twiddle with the contract. Like my noble friend Lord Maude, I hope that my noble friend Lord Deighton plays a leading role in this and that he is absolutely ruthless in driving it through. Whatever option we select, let us be honest: the costs are going to go up about 50% whichever option it is, but changing the design specification and adding bells and whistles after a contract has been let adds enormous extra costs with massive delays which builders and architects love to exploit.

The final point is this: much as I hate giving money to our legal friends, on a contract of this size we may have to spend up to £100 million or more on the best contract lawyers in the world. When we had the Cromwell Green new search point contract shambles, we could not sue any company, the architects, the builders or anyone else for their sheer incompetence, for the grossly inflated price or for the delays because our parliamentary contract with them was rubbish and the builders had get-out clauses for all their failings. One of my abiding memories in Parliament is not being present at some great occasion or memorable debate but climbing on to the roof of the Cromwell Green security building with Speaker Martin as he personally inspected and then condemned the appalling welding on the so-called stainless steel which was rusting after two years. We need a contract which will impose massive and enforceable penalties if it is one day late or one penny over budget and with hundreds of millions of pounds held back for a few years until all the snagging work is done and the building is working perfectly.

I ended my report to the House of Commons Commission in 2009 by saying:

“Of course a decant takes a lot of planning and it will be a hassle but we will not get a Parliament which will last another 150 years unless we do it.


This is a time for boldness and imagination, not timidity”.


I said that in 2009. It is even more true today.