Business of the House

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Thursday 29th November 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

My Lords, the Leader of the House has moved that the debate on the Motion in the name of my noble friend Lord Harrison should last for two hours. On the Order Paper, after that, there are, astonishingly, to be two Statements by two separate Ministers on the same subject. This entirely unprecedented action, which is also happening in the House of Commons, has, I understand, had to have the approval of the Speaker of the House of Commons, because it is unique. It has never happened before and the Speaker had to agree to it. You, Lord Speaker, do not have the power in this self-regulating House to agree to such an arrangement, an entirely unprecedented arrangement. The only power lies with us in the House to agree to that. I do not remember, recall or recognise that we have agreed to that. Does the Leader of the House intend to seek the approval of the House for such an unusual and unprecedented arrangement?

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, when he replies to that, can my noble friend the Leader of the House tell us whether the Statements are going to be antiphonal or sequential, and whether the Ministers will be questioned after each section of the Statement or at the end? Can he also tell us in what precise capacity the noble Lord, Lord McNally, is to address the House? Is he speaking as the leader of a political party in this House, or is he speaking on behalf of the Government? If he is speaking on behalf of the Government and my noble friend is speaking on behalf of the Government, what conclusions can we draw from that extraordinary state of affairs?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I am delighted that so many noble Lords are sharp-eyed and have spotted that the annunciator has said that there will be two Statements after the Labour Party debates this afternoon. I am very happy to explain the position to the House. The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, says that this is unprecedented. It is certainly unprecedented in living memory.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

Surely this House is about holding the Government to account, and we have Statements so that we can hold the Government to account—not for people to issue their manifestos on particular issues. Surely the purpose of this House is to hold the Government to account, but we need someone to tell us what the Government’s policy is. We cannot have a pick-and-mix approach to government policy. Are we to find that Ministers speaking from the Front Bench give two answers to the same question? What conclusion can we reach if they give different answers to the same question?

[Lord Cormack]

Is it now not abundantly plain that antiphonal would be better?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I think that my noble friend Lord Cormack is enjoying himself far too much by repeating that word. Actually, I think the whole House is enjoying itself far too much and we really need to bring this very short debate to an end. My noble friend Lord Alderdice had it pretty well. We have a coalition and we are gently feeling our way on occasion as to the right approach.

I do think that the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, protests a little bit too much. I am sure that although from his Front Bench he will make one Statement, he will find a lot of disagreement with what he says from his Back-Benchers in both Houses.

The noble Lord, Lord Dykes, asked when the precedent was. I took a view a long time ago that any precedent from before the Second World War probably was not worth having, so I have not got it at my fingertips. However, I am reliably informed that it does exist. If I thought that we were breaking the rules of the House in doing this I would have said that to the House and then made a recommendation. There is absolutely nothing in the Companion that stops us having an innovative procedure on this, which is precisely what we are doing.

I know that noble Lords—the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and my noble friend Lord Forsyth—are exercised about what, therefore, is government policy. My right honourable friend the Prime Minister set up this inquiry on behalf of the Government. He will make his Statement on behalf of the Government in the House of Commons; I shall repeat it here. However, my right honourable friend the Deputy Prime Minister has taken the opportunity, as I think that both Houses will wish him to do, to make a separate Statement which will represent a view of the second party of the coalition. I think that we have flexible enough rules to be able to deal with that, and I very much look forward to the debate later on this afternoon.

House of Lords: Peers

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Thursday 8th November 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, try as they might to stay here indefinitely, they would find that extremely hard. I am no actuary but we have lost 39 of our number since the general election. It is likely that we will lose a similar number between now and the next general election. I have heard it whispered in the corridors that the House is increasingly keen to debate and discuss some form of retirement scheme, including an age limit. I very much welcome all those who wish to come forward with such thoughts.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, will my noble friend at least give one undertaking to the House: that the Government will not do anything to stand in the way of the Steel Bill should it be picked up by a Back-Bench MP in another place?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, why do we not just wait and see whether it is picked up by a Back-Bench Member?

Arrangement of Business

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Monday 5th November 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Barnett]

My Lords—

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords—

[Lord Richard]

My Lords, with respect, I think that it is this side’s turn. I listened to what the noble Lord, Lord Crickhowell, has just said, but I am bound to say that I totally disagreed with it. I disagreed with it almost absolutely. It is an extraordinary proposition that, if the Government bring in a Bill that allows the Opposition to table an amendment to it, somehow or other, it is unconstitutional for the Opposition then to table that amendment because the Constitution Committee has not been consulted. That is nonsense. If the Government have produced their Bill in the form that they have produced it, and if the amendment is in order, there is absolutely no reason why the Opposition should not table it, why the House should not debate it and why a vote should not take place.

We are making very heavy weather of this. The constitutional position is very clear: there is no Speaker in this House; there is nobody here who can determine whether the amendment is in order; and the clerks are there to give advice. Of course, there is an obligation to take the advice, but there is no obligation to follow it any more than there is an obligation on the Speaker of the House of Commons to follow the advice that he is given by the clerks of the House of Commons. If this House is self-governing, as it is supposed to be, the body that has to determine whether the amendment is in order is this House and nobody else, and certainly not the Constitution Committee.

House of Lords: Working Practices

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Thursday 1st November 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, I am delighted to add my congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Filkin, and to congratulate the new grandmother. I speak as a grandfather.

If we had more time for the debate we could develop these points at greater length. I want to take up the point, however, made by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman. The prime purpose of Parliament is to hold the Executive to account, and we are failing as a Parliament adequately to do that. Indeed, there is time for another Dunning’s motion, moved in the other place more than 200 years ago. Then it was:

“The power of the Crown has increased, is increasing, and ought to be diminished”.

Today it is the power of the Executive that has increased, is increasing and ought to be diminished.

One of the things that we could profitably do is to co-operate more sensibly with the other place. The Executive consists of the Ministers of the Crown. We have some admirable ones in this place and they serve this House and the country very well indeed. But, understandably, the bulk of the Cabinet comes from another place. I am not one of those who believe that Ministers should come to this House from the other place and speak from this Dispatch Box. That would be wrong. But once a month a Cabinet Minister should come to the Moses Room and a group of Members, using the expertise and breadth of experience that is represented on these Benches, should question that Minister. They could make suggestions that are good for the country as a whole.

My noble friend Lord Higgins talked about the programming of Motions. Of course, part of holding a Government to account is improving the legislative proposals they place before Parliament. We are light years ahead of the other place in how we do that, but we could still do better. I agree that pre-legislative scrutiny should be automatic. Post-legislative is arguably even more important, and we should devote proper attention to it. I believe that an admirable opportunity has been presented to us by the reprieve, to which the noble Lord, Lord Butler, amusingly referred, to improve our act and to do that in co-operation with another place. That is because together we are the two Houses of Parliament. In a country where the Executive are drawn from the legislature, it is more difficult than in a country where there is a separation of powers. Inevitably one sees things differently from the Opposition Benches than from the Government Benches; I have experienced that in the other place and, to some degree, in here. But if we could do away with the great gulf between the two Houses, we would be serving Parliament.

One of the things that has struck me over the past two years, and particularly during recent debates, is that far too few people in the other place understand what this House is all about, and far too few people in this House who have not served down at the other end of the Corridor fully appreciate the pressures on Members at that end. So I hope that we could have more Joint Committees and a monthly session in the Moses Room. I hope that we can do other things that will bring Parliament together for the benefit of the people because that, after all, is our fundamental role and task.

Arrangement of Business

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Wednesday 31st October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I am very grateful to my noble friend for his support for the action that I have taken today. I agree with his invitation to noble Lords to reflect and read the advice and thus become informed about the issues. I am also equally keen that we should resolve the issues before us.

It is perhaps worth reminding the House that I have placed a copy of the clerks’ advice in the Library. As to why the amendment is inadmissible, in short, amendments have to be relevant to the subject matter of the Bill. The Bill is about two things: individual electoral voter registration and the administration and conduct of elections. The clerks’ advice, which I endorse, is that the question of boundaries, just like the question of the franchise, is relevant to neither of the purposes of the Bill before us. As to whether the clerks could make it admissible—I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Hart, asked that question when he originally tabled his amendment.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords—

[Lord Wakeham]

My Lords, in my experience there is very little that is new in this House and I have no doubt that inadmissible amendments have been tabled in the past. However, can my noble friend the Leader of the House tell me what the experience in the past in this House has been? Has the House ever voted on an inadmissible amendment and, if so, how often?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Strathclyde]

Yes, my Lords, I confirm to the noble and learned Lord that that is what is laid out in our Companion. However, perhaps I can repeat the words in the Companion:

“The Public Bill Office advises on whether an amendment is admissible and it is expected that this advice will be taken”.

In House of Lords language that is a very strict view that the advice should be taken. As I pointed out in responding to my noble friend Lord Wakeham, it usually is.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, is it not just passing strange that someone who until very recently regarded this House with little short of disdain should now be seeking to use this House for entirely divisive political purposes, in a Bill where the Minister in charge is of the Liberal Democrat persuasion and would have to stand on his head rather than vote?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I do not really know all the ins and outs of the genesis of this amendment. I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Hart, was acting in good faith and encouraged others to support him. As regards my noble friend, I have complete faith in his abilities to take this Bill through.

Iraq: Chilcot Inquiry

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Monday 29th October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, the inquiry has said that it is determined to be rigorous, fair and frank. It soon expects to be in a position to begin this process of Maxwellisation. Once that process is complete, the inquiry will submit its report to the Prime Minister. It is understood that that is unlikely to be until the latter part of next year.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, I share the concerns raised by the noble Lord, Lord Tomlinson. Does the Minister share my hope that at a very early opportunity after publication this House will have an opportunity to debate the report?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I think that the House will have a great deal of interest in it—in fact, not just this House but another place as well. However, it is far too early to jump the gun on this issue. When the report is published, no doubt the usual channels will get together and I cannot imagine the circumstances in which we would not wish to give it a full debate.

Scotland

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Thursday 18th October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, there will be a period of reflection but it will not be very long because we want the Scottish Parliament to get on with it and to set the date and pass the necessary legislation so that we can clear the air in Scotland and get a decisive result at the referendum.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, the agreement says “intelligibility” when it comes to the question, and that begs a question in itself. Can we please make sure that the question is not merely intelligible but that it is not loaded and is entirely unbiased? I do not think that this House or any other should contemplate passing the order unless we are satisfied in that regard.

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, that is precisely the role of the Electoral Commission—to look at the question, to test the various words in it and then to report to the Scottish Parliament as to its intelligibility.

Scotland: Referendum

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Monday 15th October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I very much welcome what the noble Lord said in his closing remarks. He is right to say that all of us, across the political divide, should work together to get a result whereby Scotland feels part of the United Kingdom and wants to continue in what has been one of the most successful, if not the most successful, partnership that the world has ever seen.

The noble Lord asked a variety of detailed questions and I shall try to answer them. He started by saying that this was an historic day. It is; it is the most extraordinarily historic day and one that I never wished to see. I, for one, never thought that the Scottish nationalists would be able to achieve the majority that they did under the electoral system used for the Scottish Parliament, but in May 2011 the SNP won an outright majority; it won 69 of the 129 seats and part of its commitment was that there should be a referendum, even though it knew that it did not have the legislative ability to achieve that.

The noble Lord asked about the franchise. I expect that we will come back to that in the course of this debate. The first and most important thing to say is that the franchise is up to the Scottish Parliament to decide; it is not up to this House to decide.

[Lord Cormack]

No!

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

No!

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I join with the noble Lord in saying that we have come to the right conclusion that there should be only one question. The most important thing in this debate is that we have absolute clarity of result and the only way of doing that is by having a single question with a yes/no answer.

I very much welcome what the noble Lord has said about the Electoral Commission. It is true, as he knows very well, that there was a problem in 2007 and I am sure that the Electoral Commission has learnt many lessons as a result of it. However, his main point was that Ministers should pay close attention to the workings of the Electoral Commission to make sure that this does not happen in this all-important referendum, and on that I completely agree with him.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, unless and until any constituent country in the United Kingdom becomes independent, it should surely be bound by the rules of the franchise which apply in the United Kingdom. Does my noble friend not accept that it is wrong to alter the franchise by the back door? That will be the consequence of our kow-towing—that is what it is—to the demands of the First Minister of Scotland. Can we please have the opportunity at the very least to see this draft Bill before we approve the order? If we do not, some of us may not feel inclined to approve it.

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I cannot give my noble friend the comfort that he wants. There is nothing that we can do to oblige the Scottish Parliament to publish a draft Bill, and this very much depends on the process of the passage of that Bill in the Scottish Parliament.

On the second point on the franchise, such voting already takes place in Scotland. The Scottish Parliament decided that 16 and 17 year-olds who turned 18 during the lifetime of the register would be able to vote in the health board elections. It may be a small example but it is an example of where devolution on the franchise has already taken place. I reiterate that I am not in favour of a change in the franchise but it will be a matter for the Scottish Parliament to decide.

House of Lords: Reform

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Monday 8th October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I think that is a question for which the word “opportunistic” was originally coined. Lords reform was, of course, based almost entirely on Jack Straw’s White Paper from 2008, when the noble Baroness stood at this Dispatch Box. No doubt historians will wish to examine exactly why the Bill fell in another place. My own view is that while the House of Commons was keen on the idea of an elected House, when Members found out what it might mean for them they became less keen. Furthermore, it required a consensus right across the parties in another place and in this House. The Labour Party was not willing to form part of that consensus in a programme Motion, demanding a referendum, the removal of the Cross Benches and the entrenchment of powers. I therefore make no apology for saying that the Labour Party was at least in part to blame for there being no further action on Lords reform.

As to the further legislative programme, Bills will be introduced. However, while there is time currently available in the House for Commons for more legislation, of course we were not expecting the House of Lords Reform Bill until the new year. We expected to be in Committee at least, and perhaps for the Session to continue well into the summer. We will now be able to finish the Session in a normal time. However, I very much welcome any discussions that the noble Baroness would like to have.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, would my noble friend accept that there are many people in this House who are delighted that the Government came to their senses on this issue? Would he assure the House that he has not ruled out the housekeeping measures which are in the Steel Bill? Will he consult with the noble Lord, Lord Steel, the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, and others on what sensible, modest housekeeping measures can be brought forward to make this House even more effective than it is at the moment? Will he also use his very considerable influence within his own party to ensure that, at the next general election, the Conservative Party does not fight on a manifesto that has any reference at all to an elected second Chamber?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, that may or may not be asking too much. Of course I am aware that this House will be very pleased with the news. Ever since the election, in every debate that we have had there has been an overwhelming majority against the proposals in the Bill. As far as the Steel Bill is concerned, this House has passed a Private Member’s Bill in the name of my noble friend Lord Steel. It now languishes in the House of Commons at the back of the Private Member’s Bill queue. It remains to be seen whether a Member of the House of Commons regards it as a priority and decides to pick it up. However, I will just point out that more than over 70% of the House of Commons voted in favour of an elected House. It may be a little difficult to believe that the House of Commons will now move to entrenching an appointed House so soon.

HSBC: Lord Green of Hurstpierpoint

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Monday 23rd July 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I do not disagree at all with what the noble Lord says about the ethics of the industry in which my noble friend was involved. In fact, only last week, this House set up a special Joint Select Committee to look at ethics and many other practices in the banking industry. Surely that is the point. If a Select Committee of this House or another place wishes to ask my noble friend questions, it should do so. My purpose is to reflect on my noble friend’s role in government and to answer on behalf of Her Majesty’s Government.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, does my noble friend agree that anyone who knows the noble Lord, Lord Green, could not doubt his total integrity for a moment?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I agree with that but I wholly accept that questions need to be asked—and are habitually asked—of a Minister to make sure that he is accountable to Parliament. As I said in my reply to the noble Lord, Lord Kinnock, if a committee of Parliament wishes to put questions to my noble friend, it is entirely free to do so.