Alcohol Consumption

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Tuesday 27th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jolly]

I am not quite sure. I can tell noble Lords about licensing. We are actively working with Public Health England on the practicalities of how health-related objectives for the licensing of premises selling alcohol would work at a local level.

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe (Lab)]

My Lords, while we welcome the reduction in the amount of alcohol being sold in certain areas, is it not true that growth is taking place in other areas? In particular, the drinks industry is trying to get its brands into the heads of young people. Is the Minister content to see supermarkets now selling alcoholic lemonade that is stronger than many beers? Is she content to see them selling ginger beer and other soft drinks with more alcohol than is contained in many beers? Should we not be doing something about that?

China: United Kingdom Trade

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Popat]

The noble Baroness has made an important point. We are addressing the issue of intellectual property and we now have legislation in place. We are asking our Chinese counterparts to comply with our regulations on intellectual property.

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Lord Popat]

My Lords, I am afraid that I did not hear the question.

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe]

Can the noble Lord tell the House how many additional flights from Heathrow to China have been introduced since this Government came to power?

[Lord Popat]

My Lords, some 39 flights depart from Heathrow to China every week.

House of Lords: Membership

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Thursday 28th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Lord Hill of Oareford)]

My Lords, I think that we have a good debate and that the outlines of the issues that the House will want to consider are already clear. The points that have been made very forcefully by a number of noble Lords have been well made; obviously I have heard everything that has been said. Although I recognise that I am new to this job, one issue on which I can be in little doubt about the opinions of this House is that which we have been debating today. Noble Lords have already been extremely generous—I might say unstinting—with the advice they have given me at every possible opportunity. I am glad to say that I have had a chance to discuss these issues with many noble Lords who have already spoken today and I will continue to do so in future, because I think that that is the right way to take the matter forward.

Coming new to the subject, I cannot have the great expertise and history that many noble Lords have on this matter. We have seen it again demonstrated by the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, and my noble friend Lord Tyler. These issues go back a long time. However, I do at least bring a fresh pair of eyes to some of these issues. Given that the underlying issue to which all noble Lords have referred is the size of the House, I thought that I should start by going back to look at the figures to see by how much the House has grown. This is what I found.

The House that Tony Blair inherited on taking office in 1997 had 1,067 Peers eligible to vote. Of course, that was before the removal of most of the hereditary Peers following the 1999 reform. The House that Gordon Brown inherited on taking office 10 years later in 2007 was smaller: there were 738 peers eligible to vote. As of this week, there are 761 Members of this House eligible to vote; that is 23 more than in 2007. We have had some discussion about the proportion and size of the number who have been introduced, so I looked at the numbers for the Conservative, Liberal Democrat, Labour and Cross-Bench Peers in particular. In 2007, 698 Members sat on those Benches and were eligible to vote. I accept that the equivalent figure today is higher: today it is 704, which is six more than in 2007. Those figures come from the House of Lords Library note of 27 June 2012; for this week’s figures, I consulted the online House of Lords registry.

Given that the overall number of Peers eligible to vote is not so different from five or six years ago, that brings me naturally to the important question raised by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, about the exercise of restraint in new appointments to the House, which is referred to both in his amendment and in my noble friend Lord Steel’s Motion.

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe]

My Lords, would the noble Lord be kind enough to give us the details of the average attendances from 1997?

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

I am coming on to talking about attendance and participation, which I recognise as an important issue. As far as the exercise of restraint is concerned, the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, refers to the Leader’s Group recommendation on the creation of new Members of this House. That read:

“Whilst we cannot recommend that there should be a moratorium on new appointments to the House—since, while the purpose of the House is to provide expertise, we must ensure that that expertise is refreshed and kept up to date”—

a point, I think, on which all noble Lords agree—

“we do urge that restraint should be exercised by all concerned in the recommendation of new appointments the House, until such time as debate over the size of membership is conclusively determined”.

I would argue that this recommendation has been followed and that the Prime Minister has indeed shown restraint. Since the well publicised lists of May and November 2010, a total of eight new peers have been created, six of them on the Cross Benches; 42 life peers have, sadly, died. I suggest, therefore, that the Prime Minister’s record is consistent with the recommendation from the Leader’s Group, both in terms of exercising restraint and in ensuring that expertise is refreshed and kept up to date.

I now come to the point about which I was asked. The real issue is not so much the absolute number of those entitled to vote but attendance. Surely we all agree that attendance and participation are good things that we ought to encourage. That is one of the reasons why I am extremely keen, as a new Leader, to try to find new ways to help a wider range of Members to play a greater role in this House. That is why, as an early priority, I shortly plan to put proposals to the Procedure Committee that will provide more time and opportunities for Back-Bench Members to lead debates. My intention is to build on the work of my noble friend Lord Strathclyde, who, with the support of the Liaison Committee and the House, initiated a modest expansion in our Select Committee activity to include more pre-legislative and post-legislative scrutiny as well as a greater emphasis on single-session committees. I am keen to do that in order to ensure that a wider range of Members have the opportunity to serve on our Select Committees.

Noble Lords have raised the matter of Question Time. I welcome the fact that the Procedure Committee is due to come forward with some revised proposals on how we might make it easier for a wider range of Members to table Oral Questions. There is also the question of how we might encourage more Members to come in on supplementary questions and broaden participation. I am acutely conscious of how crowded the Chamber is during Question Time, just as it is at PMQs in another place. When you spend as much time as I now have the pleasure to do in your Lordships’ House, it is clear that, at other times of the day, this House is not as crowded as it is during Question Time.

As well as talking about the need for restraint, the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, reiterated the support of this House for the proposals in the Bill introduced by my noble friend Lord Steel of Aikwood. Indeed, the House has already made its position clear. We passed the Bill without a Division and sent it to the other place last summer. It contains measures which my noble friend Lord Steel described as “housekeeping” and for which it is clear that there is widespread support in this House. I know that my noble friend is keen that the Government should take the Bill forward. As he said, he made his case directly to the Deputy Prime Minister earlier this week; he was the right person to talk to, as he is the Cabinet Minister responsible for this matter. Despite that, the Government’s position remains that we do not wish to facilitate the passage of the Bill. I understand that the Deputy Prime Minister made clear why that is the case. As my noble friend Lord Tyler said, it is because the House of Commons voted overwhelmingly last year in favour of an elected House of Lords. With that in mind, no Government could credibly support a package of measures that could be perceived as anointing an all-appointed House.

House of Lords: Reform

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Thursday 21st June 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayman]

My Lords—

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe]

My Lords—

[Noble Lords]

Cross Bench!

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe]

My Lords, is the Leader of the House aware that some Members of this Chamber believe that the present composition is unsustainable and needs reform? Is he also aware that it is my birthday today too?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I am very glad that it is the noble Lord’s birthday. I am surprised that we have had no questions on age limits being introduced in this House. I join him in being one who thinks that the House should be reformed.

Draft House of Lords Reform Bill

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Monday 30th April 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe]

My Lords, I declare an interest as a supporter of the Campaign for a Democratic Upper House, and as a long-standing member of the Labour Party—a party which, within its DNA, has sought to reform the House of Lords and to move towards an elected second Chamber in this country. That is not to say that I am in agreement with everything that the Campaign for a Democratic Upper House has been saying in this context over the past few weeks and in its submissions, any more than it means that I supported the Government’s White Paper and draft Bill when it first came out. Indeed, when it did I was quite critical in a number of respects, particularly in regard to Clause 2. I was unhappy about the 15-year term and the absence of accountability which I believe this House needs to have introduced.

I have been in this House since 1997, and when I first came in I believed that the House should be reformed. Much as I have come to love the place and the people in it, and to respect the very significant contribution that it makes to society through its work, knowledge and expertise, I have over the years felt the embrace of the House on me to shift my position. The noble Lord, Lord Steel of Aikwood, has left the Chamber, but I have been almost seduced to switch my position by the efforts that he has made with his several Bills. However, I have not shifted it. In that respect, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and his committee for reaffirming my position.

I want first to say that over the past months I have watched people trooping through the Lobbies who for many years were opposed to what they were voting for in regard to health and social care—and that is what the public see, too. They were people who for many years had fought for benefits, particularly for the disabled, but who were voting in a manner quite contrary to anything I had previously seen. I am thus reaffirmed in the view that the public are entitled to have a say on who is in this House.

I express my gratitude to the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and all the members of his committee for the report which has been produced for us. It has not been an easy task, as we all recognise, but they have moved us forward. This momentum has been under way since the 1990s, and it will not stop. In particular, I am pleased that a majority of them embraced the circumstances in which we, as representatives, cannot resolve this issue and find a consensual approach, and have recommended that the people should decide what should be done with the second Chamber. On that there was, fortunately, a very substantial majority in the committee.

I am pleased that my leader in this House has reaffirmed in the Lords today the Labour Party’s position in favour of a referendum. We indicated that in our manifesto. However, I was disappointed earlier to hear the Leader of the House, when speaking on behalf of the coalition, say that the Government saw no case for it. I hope that the Government are going to reflect on that and change their minds, that that will not become a point of dissent between and within the two Chambers, and that we can move forward and let the people have their say. When they have had their say, it should rest with a House of Commons, whose primacy we want to see maintained, to take a decision on the composition and powers of the House of Lords. That was a big change and is a big step forward, and I thank the committee for it very much indeed. In a sense, if the proposal goes through, the committee will have taken it away from the warring factions, which have so far been unable to move forward on it.

Finally, I want to say something on Clause 2, which I have been very unhappy about. I have long been an advocate of the Government working on codifying our conventions. They have resisted doing that so far, and I have looked at the arguments that they have advanced when they have gone before the committee, but I still believe that those issues need addressing—as do other topics that are still left over. We need a dispute resolution procedure beyond that which has been presented by the Government, and further work on codification or addressing the conventions of the House. When we examine the report which the noble Lord has produced, we see that within it there is an answer to most of the problems which have been presented hitherto by those who are opposed to us shifting on this ground: that the primacy of the Commons would be challenged.

I urge noble Lords to re-read the report because it provides us with a foundation on which we can build in moving forward. It also provides for those, perhaps particularly on the Cross Benches, who are fearful about the possible attack on that primacy from the Lords if we had elections. There is a scheme within it to cover that. I suspect that the minority on the Joint Committee have realised that there is quite a lot in this report, sufficient to have moved them to provide an alternative. The noble Lord, Lord Cormack, has done his best today to make sure that everybody reads it. Again, I urge people to read it fully, because it is a very useful document, although in some areas it does not quite represent the full position.

In conclusion, I will pick up a point from the alternative report. In its executive summary it says that the Government’s Bill “purports” to set out a system of an elected second Chamber that will not challenge the primacy of the Commons, but it fails to do so. I asked noble Lords to ask themselves: why should a Government—indeed, why should the previous Labour Government—whose power depends upon their position in the House of Commons set out to do any such thing to undermine their power and primacy? Why should they do it? Nobody has looked at or answered that question. The simple fact is that the Commons will continue to have their power there. Governments will want that, whether they be Labour, Lib Dem, Conservative or coalition. That is the way they will want it, and they will make sure that the laws of the land are structured so that that primacy is retained, even if they have to change it en route.

I look forward with great interest to seeing where we end up with the Bill, when it comes to us. I look forward, too, to the people taking a decision on this. I will be one of those canvassing and fighting hard to make sure that those people who have the right to make the law are there through the votes cast by people who have to live under those laws. We will then see where we end on the primacy issue. If the Commons come out with a majority in favour of change, as seems likely from the way that the voting has gone within the Joint Committee, this House should be willing to accept it.

Arrangement of Business

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Thursday 26th April 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Mackay of Clashfern]

I cannot see any difficulty in having the Prorogation ceremony fairly late on Tuesday. In fact, I have been a participant in Prorogation ceremonies that have taken place quite late. I do not remember the latest occasion, but they were certainly late in the evening. I can therefore see no difficulty in having a Prorogation ceremony on Tuesday, but still allowing substantially two days for this debate at this stage, before we know what is in the Queen’s Speech.

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe]

My Lords, if the Sunday trading Bill goes through without any great difficulties, will the noble Lord tell the House what time he is planning to hold the Prorogation on Tuesday?

[Lord Strathclyde]

I am unable to do that but we will be making an announcement shortly. I am glad that all my noble friends have been so helpful on this. The plain facts are these: if we had never had a debate in your Lordships’ House with 63 or 65 speakers, and had not managed to complete it in a day, I would completely understand what the House was saying. The point is that time and again we have had debates with even more than 63 or 65 speakers in a day. It is therefore perfectly well precedented to do this. The very significant point that my noble and learned friend Lord Mackay of Clashfern made is entirely right. None of us should pre-empt the Queen’s Speech, least of all me; but in the eventuality that there was an announcement, it was entirely right—and again this is well precedented by successive Governments—to put down the subjects of debate for the subsequent debate on the humble Address. We are doing nothing new, nothing adventurous and nothing dangerous, if I may say so. My noble friend Lord Forsyth is certainly not naive on these matters. If we are taking so much time today to discuss how much time we should devote to the debate on the Joint Committee report, one can only imagine what it would be like if we were ever faced with a Bill itself.

Procedure of the House (Proposal 1)

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Tuesday 8th November 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hamilton of Epsom]

My Lords, I am absolutely staggered that any Member of this House who has served in the other place—or the House of Commons, I am pretty agnostic on what we call it—should be advocating greater authority for our Speaker. I fear that I do not remember the halcyon days of the noble Baroness, Lady Boothroyd. I remember her authority being constantly challenged on totally bogus points of order. You have only to pick up a Hansard from yesterday, which will be like any other Hansard from the House of Commons. It will show that after every Question Time, people leap to their feet with points of order which are not points of order. They are people who missed out on Questions—they have not managed to get in, so they ask their question anyway—or they bring up some constituency matter that happens to concern them. That is all completely bogus. The authority of the Speaker is constantly challenged in the House of Commons, and it will be challenged here if we give authority to our Lord Speaker. We do not want to go down that path; it is a very retrograde step. We should learn from the House of Commons and stay with a system that works very satisfactorily as it is.

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe]

My Lords, I am finding this a very strange debate indeed. I always thought that when we had a Leader’s Group, the Leader of the House was on the group and presented the report to the House. Then it went back to the Procedure Committee. The Procedure Committee then went through the report and then presented its report with recommendations which it unanimously backed. We knew precisely where we stood then and had very strong leadership. Times change, and the report has been presented today in a very different way, in a neutral fashion. I have been waiting to see who will speak on behalf of whom in defending the current position or advocating change. It looks as if we have a new style of neutrality, which we have not had before. In those circumstances—and I say this as someone who saw the House regulating itself well when I first came in, with civility, courtesy and discipline; and no doubt I am now as much part of it as anyone else—it has changed. We should recognise that we have changed, and move on. I have again heard criticism of the Leader today, saying that he does not intervene in the way that Leaders intervened in the past. I am moving then to say that I am going with the change, and I am hard pressed on this. I do not like the state that we have got ourselves into, and therefore if changes come, I have got to go with them—unless, of course, somebody will stand up firmly and say “No, we are stopping it. We are going back to what it was like before, and I am the individual who will ensure that that happens”. I do not know who that individual is in the House, and who is going to say it. But the question I pose to the Leader is: is he going to speak this afternoon?

Companion to the Standing Orders

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Tuesday 25th October 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I can confirm that my noble friend is entirely correct.

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe]

My Lords, if there is an agreement between the usual channels to breach the Companion, should we not have an arrangement whereby the agreement of the House is sought?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, it is an intriguing idea. I have very recently proposed in a paper to the Procedure Committee that, in tightening up the rules at Third Reading, we should think of mechanisms whereby the House itself agrees to them so as to give those decisions greater power.

House of Lords: Working Practices

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Monday 27th June 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe]

My Lords, I, too, welcome the proposals of the group and, like others, extend my congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Goodlad, and his colleagues, on such a comprehensive review. I also extend my gratitude to the Leader of the House for keeping to his word and establishing the Leader’s Group. Some of us thought at one time that we might lose it but he has happily redeemed himself.

I will say little on the legislative processes because previous speakers have said far better than I ever could how best the recommendations can be taken forward, but I will comment briefly on working time. The Leader opened the debate by saying that we must make better use of our time. We all like to develop evidence-based policy but one of the issues that struck me was that I do not know how we use our time. I know the number of days that we attend in the year. My noble friend Lord Grocott, probably from his previous government experience, knows about the number of hours that are worked overall, but I do not think the House knows. When we come to review how we are working, we ought to know the number of hours we work and an attempt should be made to divide the number of hours that go to the Government, Back-Benchers and party politics. That would help us to ensure that we are developing evidence-based policies that we fully understand.

Speaking from an opposition point of view, I would say that one of the few things we have is time, or an opportunity to try to influence the way in which time is used, in the Chamber, Grand Committee, and so on. We need to have better knowledge on that. In this instance, I am not sure whether the Government or Back-Benchers are the major gainer, or whether the Opposition lose. The Opposition now seem to be prepared to accept that more legislation should go into Grand Committee but I recall the Leader, when in opposition, being very reluctant indeed to let more legislation go into Grand Committee. He was fearful of losing the opportunity to have Divisions, and I suspect that a similar problem may arise again if we let that go too easily. I would like more facts when we come to address these topics.

On the role of the Lord Speaker, I broadly agree with the experiment we have before us, but I fear that unless somebody is prepared to have a look at the fundamental problem that is causing difficulties in the Chamber, the Lord Speaker, whoever they may be, will be in trouble in the future. We need clarification and we need to get back to the former practice we had when we were in government, where you had a government speaker, then someone from the Opposition and then, if they wanted to come in, someone from the Lib Dems and then a Cross-Bencher. We now have the problem with the coalition Government that there is a misunderstanding, certainly on this side of the House, about whose turn it is next. Should the Government have one speaker or two speakers? My view is that we should go back to the past practice and there should be one speaker only for the Government. I believe it is important that clarity on this is secured fairly soon in this experiment; otherwise, the Speaker, whoever he or she may be, will be in trouble with the House. I earnestly hope that the usual channels, or whoever may be appropriate in this instance, will take an early decision on this.

This is a minor issue, but I welcome the proposal that Select Committees should elect their chairman. I am sorry that the group has not gone a stage further. I would have thought that, having taken that democratic decision and given confidence to the chairman, the chairman should have the role and responsibility of answering directly to the House, on the Floor, whenever the committee produces a report. The chairman should respond to any questions that might arise during the course of the debate on the committee’s reports.

Of course, that would mean that we would no longer need the Chairman of Committees to perform the functions he performs at the moment. Do we really need a Chairman of Committees in the changed circumstances that we are moving into? Should the committee or the usual channels have a look at whether we will need the Chairman of Committees in future, given that we have not done the job we should have done on the Speaker’s role by examining fully what they are doing and where they may go in the future and recognising that there are opportunities for the Lord Speaker to take on more duties in the areas where the Chairman of Committee undertakes a number of functions at the moment? I hope that those issues may be looked at.

One benefit of those proposals would be that we would save a minimum of £150,000 a year. I looked at the section dealing with costs. It is a nice saving for the Leader of the House to secure, if he so wishes. That £150,000 could go towards using what is the most innovative piece of work—if we get it put into place—which is the introduction of post-legislative scrutiny. That would be a major breakthrough for the House in parliamentary terms, and I believe that if we do it, before long, the Commons would, in due course, endeavour to follow on similar lines. It should also be linked with deregulation, which would certainly make the business case for its effectiveness and the cost-effectiveness.

Those are my comments on the report. Overall, I am very pleased with it, but I hope that the two or three points that I have made will be looked at urgently.

Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Wednesday 26th January 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Woolf]

My Lords, I support this amendment on the grounds already put before the House by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, in opening this debate. My main concern is the effects on the courts of the removal of inquiries and the consequences that that could have for the proper workings of the Boundary Commission. I should acknowledge that that point was drawn to my attention by the right honourable Mr Straw in the other place who, of course, has been recently the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice. As I understand it, he shares the same concerns as I will advance.

Before I do that, I feel that I should advise the House, on the basis of my general experience and my responsibility at one stage of my career at the Bar, of when I appeared quite regularly for the Government in inquiries which were going wrong. The problem was that the public felt that those inquiries, although they were local inquiries, did not give them the opportunity to express the strength of feeling that they had on a governmental proposal. In considering this amendment, the Government would be wise to take that possible unforeseen consequence into account. I am pleased that the proposed amendment deals with some of the problems that could arise in regard to the ability for local inquiries to take place.

The first matter was delay. I hope that the suggestion made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, for dealing with that will be considered to be satisfactory. Certainly, it seemed to me to be a constructive proposal. However, the most important reason for preserving this power for the Boundary Commission to hold a local inquiry in the form that will exist in law if this amendment is accepted is the fact that the Boundary Commission is given the key to the door as to whether there should be a local inquiry. It would have a discretion and, although there are thresholds, those thresholds do not bite on the discretion. The only situation when there would be an inquiry is where the Boundary Commission thinks that it is necessary, which, surely, is an important point that is made in this amendment.

If there is no provision for an inquiry I anticipate that there will inevitably be an increase in applications for judicial review. Applications for judicial review are a plague so far as the Government of the day are concerned. They are also a problem for the courts, albeit that the courts take great pride in the way, over the past decade and more, they have developed the ability of the public to seek the aid of the courts where they think their rights are being infringed. If this amendment is not accepted, the issues that will be sought to be raised on applications for judicial reviews are ones which the courts will find peculiar difficulty in dealing with. It is a very important part of our constitution—unwritten though it be—that there should be a relationship between the courts and Parliament which avoids Parliament trespassing on the proper province of the courts and avoids the courts trespassing on the proper province of Parliament. Matters dealing with constituency boundaries, it seems to me, are the very sorts of matters which the courts should not be required to deal with if there is a way of avoiding it. The best way of giving the public the ability to express their views is by public inquiries being held whenever the Boundary Commission considers it is appropriate.

On the basis of those two points, I urgently encourage the Government to look with sympathy on this amendment, which has so carefully been drafted to meet possible objections but achieve a very valuable safeguard for the public. It is in accord with the Government’s policy, as I understand it, of allowing the public to have a say on matters of such importance.

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe]

My Lords, I support the amendment of my noble and learned friend Lord Falconer. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, said, we trust that the Government will be prepared to look on it with some sympathy.

I was very surprised indeed when I saw that, particularly from our Liberal Democratic friends, there was support for a change of this nature. I will say a few words about what I would class as being one of the most democratic exercises in which I have ever participated. I was on the Select Committee dealing with the hybrid Bill on Crossrail. We spent six months meeting four days a week with hundreds of businesses, taxpayers, ratepayers and individuals who had the opportunity of using the public process of petitioning against the way that the plans had been laid down for developing Crossrail. We listened to them all very carefully indeed and the noble and learned Lord the Minister will have considerably more experience than I do of petitions, with his experience in Scotland. To me it proved to be the most democratic public participative process that I have ever been involved with since I came into the House back in 1997. At the end of the day people went away. They did not necessarily get their way. In fact, the number of concessions granted was relatively small but the important point about the exercise to me was that people had had the chance to have their say, they felt they had been listened to carefully and we understood that many of them, even though they did not win their point, felt that democracy had not only been seen but had been seen to be at work and that they had had their chance.

I was surprised when we saw that, effectively, this major part of the process of our democracy is scheduled to be quite unilaterally guillotined. There has been no public consultation whatever, no Green Paper and no scrutiny across the two Houses, but we have a major change before us. My noble and learned friend Lord Falconer has bent over backwards in crafting the amendment to try to meet all the problems that were enumerated when this was debated in the other place. It is a pity that we do not have many people present in the Chamber, given that we have been told that we are filibustering and that we are not dealing sensibly and reasonably with the issues before us. If the Chamber had been full, I am sure that no one could have raised any criticisms about the way that this side of the House has endeavoured to try to meet the needs that have been expressed by the coalition Government. I hope that a very careful ear will be given to the arguments that have been advanced, and more particularly that, for the first time, there will be an indication of some movement in negotiations, which would go some way towards what we are looking for.

The other side of the coin is that if this is forced through so that public inquiries are abolished and prohibited, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, indicated, there is the distinct possibility that a very substantial number of calls for judicial review will be made in due course to try to counter the fact that people have not been given an opportunity to input their views into the way that the legislation has been developed. I should also like to hear, particularly from the Minister, a response to the point about judicial reviews: whether it is anticipated that they will arise if the Government go ahead, the scale of what may take place and how that in turn might interfere with the programme that has been set out. But I hope that the Minister will not have to address those points because he will, very sensibly indeed I trust, give a much more positive response to the amendment.