House of Lords: Lord Speaker’s Committee Report

Lord Butler of Brockwell Excerpts

Tuesday 19th December 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Tyler (LD)]

My Lords, I should like to return to one of the points made by the noble Lord, Lord True, later in my speech. In the meantime, I confess that I was filled with amazement and admiration when the noble Lord, Lord Burns, took on this job. He is obviously a glutton for punishment because he has chaired so many difficult groups which have come to some important conclusions. I do not envy him having to respond to 93 contributions during this morning and this afternoon’s debate. I am not going to attempt to do so but I want to try to pick out one or two themes that I think deserve a little more emphasis. I will certainly not just reiterate the points I agree with—if I did that, we would be here all night.

Many Members of your Lordships’ House have indicated today—and previously—that they are full of admiration for the ingenuity of the proposals put before our House by the noble Lord and his team. This is indeed a cunning plan but, like many other cunning plans, it has some problems. While we on these Benches broadly welcome the proposals, I want to touch on these problems because I want to ensure that the House is in accord in facing up to them.

Understandably, the committee decided to avoid any recommendations that would involve primary legislation. This self-denying constraint, while intensely practical in this particular Session, has two important consequences. First, there is a near-unanimous view in the House that, without a cast-iron guarantee—I think that was the phrase used by my noble friend Lord Newby—that No.10 will accept the full scheme recommended, all the work of his team and our discussions here in this House today and in preparation for this debate, will just have been a waste of time and effort. That, in the words of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris, is the grim reality. This has been a consistent and persistent theme of the whole debate throughout the discussions today and, indeed, in the discussions that took place before this debate. I have lost count of the number of contributions today that have made that point—I think that over half the speakers have.

Unless the Prime Minister is willing to abide by this constraint, we might as well give up now, and without a statutory scheme her successors cannot be held to her agreement in law either. We would have to insist that in the event that she or any future Prime Minister broke out of this constraint, the whole scheme would be null and void.

[Lord Butler of Brockwell]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord. I go along with what he said but I find the phrase “a cast-iron guarantee” unnecessary. Surely all that is necessary is for the Prime Minister to accept this report and to act on it. She can always break out of it, just as any successor can, but if she will act on it, she will set a precedent that is likely to become established and go a long way to solving this problem.