Scotland Act 1998 (Modification of Schedule 5) Order 2013

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Wednesday 16th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Tankerness]

As I shall come on to explain, it is very much part of the Edinburgh agreement. The Electoral Commission is crucially and centrally involved in the oversight of this referendum.

[Lord Cormack]

I am most grateful to the Minister. According to the agreement, all the commission has to determine is whether the question is intelligible. It is not a matter of whether it is fair, or loaded, but whether it is understandable. Is that sufficient?

[Lord Wallace of Tankerness]

My Lords, the position is that the Referendum Question Assessment Guidelines published by the Electoral Commission in November 2009 set out its approach to reviewing questions for intelligibility. These guidelines state:

“A referendum question should present the options clearly, simply and neutrally. So it should: be easy to understand; be to the point; be unambiguous; avoid encouraging voters to consider one response more favourably than another; avoid misleading voters”.

That is the Electoral Commission’s guidance to the intelligibility question which my noble friend raised; those are the criteria I expect it to apply having regard to weighing up and assessing the question that has been submitted by the Scottish Government to the Electoral Commission. With regard to this question, we have sought to put the position of the role of the Electoral Commission and the role of the Scottish Parliament on exactly the same terms as would be the case if the United Kingdom Government were proposing a referendum, where we put the referendum to the Electoral Commission for its assessment on the same criteria. I will come on to that in a bit more detail in a moment. It will report to Parliament and ultimately Parliament will decide. We are seeking to put the Scottish Parliament in exactly the same position, vis-à-vis the question and the Electoral Commission, as the United Kingdom Parliament would be in any referendum which the United Kingdom Government were proposing.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wigley]

I am very grateful to the noble Lord. If indeed the Electoral Commission were to come out and say in categorical terms that this is a leading question and is totally unacceptable, and that that is clear cut in its opinion, then that opinion must be taken on board by the Scottish Parliament. I have no doubt that it would take good note of any such recommendation. I have faith in the democratic process in Scotland. However, to say that whatever the Electoral Commission says, the Scottish Parliament must accept its ruling as opposed to the decision of elected representatives, is surely one step too far. Be that as it may, I support the draft order that is before us today. I hope that the House will give it a unanimous backing so that we can move forward to the next stage of this process and, ultimately, secure a referendum, whatever the outcome, that is a credit to democracy.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, whom I am very pleased to call a friend, said that his would probably be the only voice advocating independence. Mine appears to be the only English voice in this debate today. We have heard two from Wales and the rest from Scotland. I particularly wanted to take part because this is not a Scottish issue. This is an issue that affects the whole United Kingdom. As I have said in this House before, we all have varied backgrounds, and it is very difficult to isolate the pure Scottish from the pure English. I consider my identity as English, and yet the background of my family is Scottish for centuries. My elder son lives in Scotland with a Scottish wife, and my two grandchildren go to school in Edinburgh. My son considers himself Scottish, so Scottish indeed that he acted as the election agent for the daughter of the noble Lord, Lord Steel—because he has gone Lib Dem—in a recent election.

[Lord Steel of Aikwood]

Successfully?

[Lord Cormack]

Yes, indeed, successfully. That, of course, in its simple way illustrates the fact that within this Chamber and within this country, there are very few of us who can say that we are wholly this, that or the other. It is therefore important that there be English voices in this debate. After all, England is by far the largest country in the union, and we will all be affected for generations to come if, on the anniversary of Bannockburn, the Scottish people vote to sever their links with the United Kingdom.

My noble friend Lord Forsyth made an absolutely splendid speech. He has been taken to task by one or two people for being too personal. I would like to dissociate myself from personal attacks but also to agree with the substance of what he said. I know Alex Salmond very well. I met him on the first day that he came into the other place. Quite by chance, my wife and I and our family found ourselves for successive years taking holidays on the beautiful island of Colonsay at the same time as Alex Salmond, and having many an agreeable conversation at the bar. He is an engaging man. Personally, he has many delightful qualities. However, he is one of the two most skilful politicians in the United Kingdom at the moment, the other being Boris Johnson. We underestimate his political skill, dexterity and ability at our peril. We must take him very seriously, and we cannot assume that the referendum will go the way that most of us in this Chamber would like it to go.

As I listened to my noble friend Lord Forsyth, and as he was almost convincing himself that he was wrong not to press this to a Division, so he was almost convincing me. Of course I accept his judgment and I will not attempt to divide the House. However, the agreement that was negotiated was not so much an agreement as a capitulation. The Prime Minister, for whom I have high regard, and the Secretary of State for Scotland had Mr Salmond running rings around them. They conceded far too much. It is a great pity that the Parliament of the United Kingdom in its two Houses will not have a greater say in these crucial decisions that will be taken. The Scottish Parliament will be judge and jury when it comes to deciding the question.

We all know what the question to the Scottish people is. It could be framed in the simple terms, “Do you wish to leave the United Kingdom?”. However, what is being proposed at the moment is certainly, as has been said, a leading question. It invites the answer that Mr Salmond would like. That is why over these next months—we have less than two years—it is important that the series of papers that has been referred to is produced not only by the British Government but by the cross-party alliance that is being spearheaded in Scotland by Mr Darling—an admirable choice, I believe. It must be spelt out to the Scottish people, whose decision this ultimately is—I am not one of those who advocates every citizen in the United Kingdom having a vote—just what they will be losing and what they will be leaving.

I was delighted that the question of the votes of Scottish service men and women, who serve our country, often in extremely dangerous circumstances, was brought up in this debate. They of all people, wherever they are temporarily domiciled, must have the opportunity to cast a vote on the future of the country for which they are prepared on a daily basis to lay down their lives.

It is going to be an extremely interesting and, I hope we can say, good-humoured period. However, the stakes are extremely high. The noble Lord, Lord McConnell, pointed to the dangers of bitterness creeping in. Of course, he did so with his background knowledge—knowledge that we all have—that of all wars, the bitterest are always civil wars. This will be a civil war of words, to a degree. It is crucially important that we try to keep it good-humoured. That is why, although it is right to talk about the political skills of our opponents, we do not seek to denigrate them personally as individuals.

I very much hope that there will be an opportunity during the coming 18 months for those of us who have Scottish links, Scottish roots and Scottish branches of our family to play a part in this debate. We need to say to the people of Scotland, “You are a fundamental and integral part of the United Kingdom, and we need you because we need each other”. The United Kingdom is far more than the sum of its individual parts, and there is no individual part that has made a greater contribution to our history and success as a nation than Scotland. We do not want to lose that.

There is no point in resurrecting all the arguments over devolution. I remember them well because I was in the House of Commons when the very first Scottish National Party Member, Donald Stewart of the Western Isles, came—he was a lovely man. I saw all this, and took part in debates in the early 1970s and throughout that decade. Big mistakes were made by both major political parties. The biggest mistake made by the Conservative Party was neglecting to recognise the reality of the first devolution vote. It failed because it did not clear a parliamentary hurdle but it indicated aspirations in the Scottish people. During those 18 years, I was one of a group who went to see Mrs Thatcher, as she then was, to beg that something be done: perhaps we should start having the Scottish Grand Committee sitting in Scotland regularly and frequently; or there should be a consultative assembly of Scottish local authorities. Sadly, she did not want to listen. That was a great mistake.

I will never forget travelling up to Scotland on the sleeper and having a dram or two with Donald Dewar in 1996. I said, “What would have happened, Donald, if we had done that in 1979 or 1980?”. “You’d have shot our fox”, he said, “but it’s far too late now”. We are, as they say, where we are. We have a United Kingdom. There are cracks and fractures and it is our duty collectively to repair them. I am sorry that the order is phrased as it is. I am sorry that so many concessions have been made, but those of us who believe in the United Kingdom all have a duty to fight for its integrity in the year ahead.