House of Lords: Reform
Lord Davies of Stamford Excerpts(13 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Davies of Stamford
My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord MacGregor, who is my old boss from many years ago and for whom I have always had the highest regard. It is impossible to address this subject without taking note of the extraordinarily contradictory behaviour of the Government in relation to the fundamental principles of this Bill over the past few months. One of its main purposes is to reduce our size from 800 to 300 Peers. But the Government have been making unprecedented increases in the numbers in this place over the past year. I recognise that I am one of them, of course, but that does not change the argument. In other words, the Government have massively contributed to a problem, which they now say needs to be urgently redressed. There is something slightly peculiar about that.
The Government have brought forward the EU Bill, in which some of us have been taking part. It provides for at least 56 referenda on different matters relating to our membership of the European Union and including such esoteric questions as whether or not we have qualified majority voting to decide the future of the public prosecutor’s office in the EU. Is it not extraordinary that the Government, who say that they want up to 56 referenda on those sorts of subjects—although a lot of people do not take it very seriously—do not provide for referenda on major constitutional reforms of the kind now being proposed? The only logical explanation is that the Government think that the change that they propose in the House of Lords is less significant than the use of qualified majority voting on the public prosecutor’s office in the European Union. That does not seem very convincing.
There are some difficult issues here. They might be the result just of confusion, hastiness or lack of thought, or of something slightly more sinister. It has become a pervasive suspicion in the country as a whole, which is very regrettable in terms of people’s confidence in our system, that the only reason for bringing forward this very important and momentous constitutional measure is to give Mr Clegg a boost to his amour propre after the humiliations of the past few months. I hope that that is not true. I believe that I will carry the whole House with me when I say that constitutional legislation above all legislation needs to be considered extremely carefully. It must not be brought forward hastily or wantonly, let alone cynically. It must be brought forward reflectively and with an eye for the long term.
Although I do not agree with all aspects of the Bill, as I shall explain, I am not against an elected House of Lords. I have always been in principle in favour of an elected second Chamber and I have become more in favour of such a Chamber since I have served here for nearly a year. The reason for that is simple. I am not sure whether election would increase the legitimacy of this House with the public as a whole. As far as I can see, there does not seem to be much wrong with the legitimacy of this House in the eyes of the public as a whole. But I am convinced that it would increase the legitimacy of this House in our own eyes. It would give us the courage of our convictions. I have been very struck by the extent to which we do not have the courage of our convictions. When it comes to ping-pong with the other House, after one or two sessions we throw in the sponge and we say, “Oh, we have to give way to the elected House”. I do not quite know why we do that because we are observing conventions like the Salisbury convention, which were offered up at the end of the 19th century as a substitute for statutory parliamentary reform, or perhaps to head off statutory parliamentary reform.
When we had the reform, which the House of Commons wanted, imposing the rules that it decided—that is, the restrictions on financial discussions, the time limitation in which we could hold legislation and so on—we had a set of rules imposed on us with which the House of Commons was happy. There is no reason not to observe those rules, which we have to, and to give up the previous conventions. It is an anomaly that we observe those conventions as it is but I am convinced that that anomaly would disappear if we were an elected House.
When I asked why we were not being a bit tougher and a bit more robust about standing up to the Commons, I was told, “Oh, but it is an elected House. Therefore, we feel that we cannot”. That is a very important reason and on that basis I am very happy to have an elected House of Lords. But I have some conditions for that. The first is that it would be a fully elected House. I cannot conceive of anything more absurd than legislating on the principle that you require election for legitimacy and then having 20 per cent of the House that, by definition in terms of that governing principle for the Bill, are illegitimate. That seems to me to be an extraordinary anomaly, which could not be justified for a moment. The House must be 100 per cent elected.
Secondly, the House should not be elected by PR, which is the worst possible form of election if you want to maintain the independence of the House of Lords. Of course, it is vital that we do so. Thirdly, for the same reason, I am opposed to the idea of allowing Members of the House of Lords to be Ministers. The offer of the potential of ministerial jobs is far and away the most constraining factor limiting the independence of Members of the House of Commons. I had experience of it myself. I knew when I voted against John Major over the Scott report that I was completely removing any possibility of my joining that Government. I was very upset about that and it was a very difficult issue. I was much less worried about deselection or being defeated at the next general election. I was confident that I would be able to explain what I was doing to my constituents and to carry them with me. If we want to have an independent House, we should exclude the Ministers. The idea of having temporary Ministers here, as the Bill proposes, is appalling. They really would be the placeman of the 18th century writ large.
There is a fundamental contradiction in the Government’s mind about whether you can be elected and not have representational functions. Yesterday, I heard several statements from the Government which implied that they thought that it would be possible to have an election and then for the elected Members of the House of Lords not in any way to conflict with the House of Commons in their representational functions. That is unrealistic. Once you have been elected, you cannot possibly turn around to those who have elected you and say, “Thank you for electing me. I am now going to enjoy my salary for the next 15 years but I’m not interested in your problems at all because I am not standing again for re-election, so you can get lost”. If there was a contribution that we could make to ensuring that we really undermined confidence in our democracy in this country, it would be exactly that. It would be to say, “Here is a class of politicians who have no responsibility to the people who sent them there and take no interest in their problems or their representations”.
Of course, once you start taking an interest in people’s problems and representations, you are obviously conflicting with the House of Commons. I am not offended by that but we should face that fact. Just as in the United States you can talk to your Congressman and if you do not get any help there you can talk to your Senator, exactly that situation would prevail in this country. I am happy with it but we have to face up to the fact and be honest with the House of Commons and say that there would obviously be a conflict. There is no mileage at all in trying to pretend schizophrenically to those who want election, “Yes, that’s fine, we can provide you with election”, and to those who are worried about a conflict with the House of Commons say, “Don’t worry. There will be no conflict with the House of Commons”. We have to be honest about this. Clearly, representation follows election. That has always been the case and it would be the case in the future.
Baroness Brinton
My Lords, yesterday my noble friend Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon made arguments for legitimacy through democratic elections. I believe his arguments are unanswerable and I wish to echo the sentiment. A noble Lord commented afterwards that all Liberal Democrat candidates would write down his speech and deliver it in hustings over the next few years. There have also been comments that nobody outside this House is interested in possible reform.
When the coalition document was published last year, I had not just telephone calls but an irate voter in Watford, where I had stood for Parliament, knocking on the door to say that the coalition document was not strong enough on reform of the House of Lords. I hasten to point out that this was not a Liberal Democrat member but a member of the public who had heard me espousing the reasons that this Chamber should become fully elected at various hustings; it also came up during questions at those hustings. For some people—more than we suspect, I think—reform is an important issue.
I wish to make clear that my personal view is that I support 100 per cent elected, and I agree with the sentiments expressed earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Stamford. However, I am more of a pragmatist than him and suspect that the draft Bill’s proposal of 80 per cent will move us in the right direction while retaining the expertise of the Cross-Benchers. I will come back to that in a minute.
The noble Lord, Lord Davies of Stamford, also referred to the issue of constituencies. It is important to recognise that with any list system on a regional basis, the constituency work of MEPs is very different from the constituency work of MPs in the other place. It is simply the nature of the geography: if you are a Member for a large region you will not have the close contact that you do with constituents in a smaller constituency.
Lord Davies of Stamford
Does the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, agree that the difference is that MEPs are elected to handle issues falling under the jurisdiction of the EU? In the case of the Lords and the Commons—or in the future, elected Lords and the Commons—the jurisdiction will be the same, and the issues will be the same. Therefore, there would be the conflict which I drew attention to.
Baroness Brinton
The point I am trying to make is that it is not purely about jurisdiction, it is about the practical application of having a constituency of 5 million people as opposed to 75,000.
I turn now to issues of diversity in a future House that is either partially or wholly elected. In an elected House, we need to ensure that recommendations from the Speaker’s Conference to improve the diversity of the other place are taken into account by the scrutiny committee over the next two years. In our present format we do not represent the country in all its diversity. Some of the appointments in recent years have attempted to deal with that, but, partly because there is no retirement, we still do not reflect the country that we represent.
There is also an issue about the geographical diversity that is needed. If we looked at where most Peers come from, I suspect that we would find a heavy southern bias. I was speaking with colleagues in the north-east the other day who feel that they do not have access to many Peers; they have some, but not the same as those who live among the large concentration in London and the south-east.
As for the conventions governing the relationship between the two Houses, we all agree that those are not absolute. I do not take the view that they will stand still, and my noble friend the Leader of the House must have been right yesterday when he said that the conventions will evolve and that the relationships between the two Houses may change. However, that is nothing new. Conventions have evolved over the years and the relationship between the Houses changes with time.
This House is much more muscular than it was a few decades ago. For example, in the decade up to 2000 the Government were defeated 155 times; in the decade up to 2010 the Government were defeated 422 times—nearly a threefold increase. Granted, cause and effect cannot be proved. It may be that the change in government in 1997 was influential and the reforms which saw the departure of the majority of the hereditary Peers should be noted.
However, we have not seen this House attempting to depart from any of the conventions since then. Furthermore, Clause 2(3) of the draft Bill makes it clear that the conventions governing the relationship between the two Houses are to remain unaffected, and there is no reason to suppose that that aim will not be achieved. However, if a future Parliament were of the view that the conventions needed to be explicitly codified to protect their efficacy, legislation could be brought forward to bring that about, as was proposed in the 2005 Labour manifesto.
I am concerned that a House of 300 could deal adequately with the workload of the House, particularly if there were to remain some who are not full-time politicians. I suspect that many in this House, and the public at large, regard the presence of some who are not full-time as one of the strengths of this House. The pride that is rightly taken in the House’s expertise derives largely from having here many who are active in other spheres, and I am not sure that it is intended that we should sit on many more days than we currently do.
Pride in the expertise of the Members of this House does not derive solely from the presence of Cross-Benchers, much as I respect their expertise. It is unfair to assert as a generality—and I have heard it said—that those who are unelected or without party affiliation hold a monopoly on expertise. A glance around this Chamber certainly proves that wrong.
As for the system of election, as a committed supporter of STV for parliamentary elections I nevertheless feel that—in the larger constituencies that will be appropriate for proportional elections to this House of, say, 80 to 120 new Members across the country at each election—an open list system has much to commend it. In particular, we would be far more likely to achieve a membership that is more diverse, as I mentioned earlier, and more representative of Britain as a whole with an open list system than we might with STV. That is why we should consider that system for elections. However, whatever the system of election, a democratically legitimate upper House, as part of a democratic Parliament of the United Kingdom, is a goal that we should pursue and achieve.
Clerk of the Parliaments
Lord Davies of Stamford Excerpts(13 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Davies of Stamford
My Lords, I am sure that the whole House is extremely grateful for the fine and well deserved tributes which Michael Pownall has just received. We all know how genuine are the feelings that have been expressed on behalf of us all about Mr Pownall. That makes it particularly unfortunate that Mr Pownall is, I believe, the first Clerk of the Parliaments for centuries—I have been unable to discover how many centuries—to be retiring without a knighthood. I happen to think that that is extremely unjust to him personally, as well as being undeserved and unreasonable. I also happen to think that it is very much not in the interests of Parliament.
As we know, Parliament, the House of Lords as much as the House of Commons, depends absolutely on the high calibre of our Clerks and on being able to attract into the cadre of Clerks young men and women of the greatest ability. They do not get much opportunity for public tribute to be paid to them, but the tradition that whoever rises to the top of this profession receives a knighthood is one way that enables us to make quite clear the esteem in which we hold the profession as a whole. Perhaps I may ask the Leader of the House to have a word in the right place to see whether this matter can be rectified.
Earl Ferrers
My Lords, only the very best of the best become Clerk of the Parliaments. I am taken back to the time when the late Lord Soames was Leader of the House and was then made the Governor of Southern Rhodesia. As a result, I found myself being made the acting Leader of your Lordships’ House. I was set up in the room that the Leaders use, a very large and frightening place, but I was there and got used to it.
The then Clerk of the Parliaments, the late Sir Peter Henderson, asked whether I would interview a young man who he thought would be good as the private secretary to the Leader and the Chief Whip. I said, “Of course I will”, because I could not really say anything else. “Send the young pup along”. The young pup who came along was, of course, Michael Pownall. After the interview, Sir Peter asked how I got on. I said that Michael Pownall was a charming and delightful person, but that he had not said very much. Sir Peter, in defence of his newfound protégé, rounded on me and said, “Nor would you because that is the most frightening room to be interviewed in”. I knew it was, but on that occasion I was on the other side of the table.
As Michael Pownall’s progression went on, I am glad to think that my modest intervention of a non-offensive nature resulted, some 30 years later, in a Clerk of the Parliaments who has been one of the best, the nicest, the most courteous and dignified Clerks who we have had the good privilege to see. We are all very grateful to him for that.
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Lord Davies of Stamford Excerpts(13 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Soley
Briefly, I support my noble friend on this amendment. I agree entirely that it would be better if the Government chose to go for the 10 per cent rule option, which would take a lot of the sting out of this Bill and reduce the dangers of long-term gerrymandering. One of the things that constantly troubles me about the Bill is that, although we might not like the amount of time it is taking, it is allowing a situation where, after every Parliament, a Government come in and change the rules on boundaries and numbers in the House of Commons in a way that suits their party-political advantage. Down that road lies gerrymandering and I really do not recommend it. They really need to think again but, if they are not going to move on the 10 per cent rule, the proposal being put forward by my noble friend is a good one.
I have a couple of points on this amendment. First, last night I raised the issue of “may” in paragraph 5 of the proposed new schedule in Clause 11 as opposed to “shall” which, as the Committee will know, has a much stronger legal meaning. It would therefore state that,
“the Boundary Commission shall take into account”,
instead of “may”. That was on an amendment put forward by my noble friend Lord Kennedy. Unfortunately, the Minister replying at that time was not able to respond because he was rather sadly taken ill, as we know. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace, tried to deal with it in passing but if we were to have that in, along with my noble friend’s amendment today, it would give the Boundary Commission not only greater flexibility but the strength to say that there are certain geographical or other factors, as listed in paragraph 5, that would allow it to override the rules in the four points of the allocation method.
I do not want to spend too much time on it, but I draw attention to this; the Committee has heard quite a bit, over the past day or so, of the problem of large, rural areas and the drawing of their boundaries. I really do not want to go into the details of my previous constituency, or others, but at times—and this would have applied to my constituency and to many other inner-city ones too—the Boundary Commission is faced with particularly difficult situations on areas which have suffered as a result of a development there which has divided the community in some way. It might be a major road, a shopping site or whatever. The Boundary Commission needs to have the ability to take that into account. That is why I would prefer the stronger wording in paragraph 5 to allow the Boundary Commission to say, “We regard this as being of such importance that it must override the four points otherwise”.
There are many examples; the geographical ones are probably the best, inasmuch as they deal with both rural and urban areas where the geography changes significantly. For example, the building of the Westway in London divided communities very significantly, which had a big effect on my constituency. Obviously, in rural areas it would be mountains, rivers, estuaries or whatever. That geography example is very important. To put the Boundary Commission into a position where it is, in my noble friend’s words, tied in to such a degree that it cannot be flexible is a big mistake. The same applies to headings (b), (c) and (d) in paragraph 5(1). All of those will come up from time to time and the Boundary Commission will be faced with that decision.
As I indicated yesterday, I would prefer a situation where we change the wording in the proposed new Schedule 2 to read “shall” not “may” and, at the same time, to accept my noble friend’s amendment. The better alternative is to accept the 10 per cent rule but the Government seem thoroughly dug in on that, for many wrong reasons. It is one of the things giving us so much trouble on this Bill, because of its long-term implications for the political structure of our Parliament. The Minister is always very thoughtful on these things. I appreciate why the noble Lord, Lord McNally, could not answer the point about “shall” and “may” last night but perhaps the Minister could bear this in mind when he sums up: my noble friend’s amendment, combined with the use of “shall” instead of “may”, which therefore gives the Boundary Commission greater authority and strength in its decisions, would benefit the Bill. It would be a small step forward and I recommend it to the Government.
Lord Davies of Stamford
My Lords, this is a good moment in the Committee to look quite clearly at the contrast between the provisions in the 1986 Act, which currently apply, and those which the Government are trying to bring forward in this Bill and, against that contrasting background, to evaluate the amendment being put forward by my noble friend Lord Lipsey. The 1986 Act is really pretty clear; it establishes the rule about not crossing county boundaries as an absolute rule. In paragraph 4(1)(a) of Schedule 2 to the 1986 Act, it first says that,
“no county or any part of a county shall be included in a constituency which includes the whole or part of any other county or the whole or part of a London borough”,
and under heading (ii) that,
“no London borough or any part of a London borough shall be included in a constituency which includes the whole or part of any other London borough”.
That is absolute, subject only to the phrase:
“So far as is practicable”,
with regard to rules 1 to 3, which predominate. Those rules are that the number of constituencies should be 613, then that:
“Every constituency shall return a single Member”.
Then there is the rule about the City of London. We have already discussed the City of London and the issue of its single Member does not seem to be controversial in the modern world. In effect, the only real limiting provision on that rule in the 1986 Act is the requirement that the number of constituencies should particularly be 613.
What happened in the 1986 Act was that the recognition of the importance of county boundaries was stated as an absolute rule and the Boundary Commission has to look at it as such. Then at paragraph 6 of that schedule to the 1986 Act, the commission is told that it is given a let-out from an absolute rule. The rule is stated as absolute, subject to the conditions that I mentioned. Then there is this let-out:
“A Boundary Commission may depart from the strict application of rules 4 and 5 if special geographical considerations, including in particular the size, shape and accessibility of a constituency, appear to them to render a departure desirable”.
Our predecessors in 1986 thought that there was an absolute importance in having county boundaries respected and an absolute importance in having a particular number of constituencies, but the county boundary rule could be broken if there was an unreasonable outcome in terms of the size of constituencies. The Government have changed this completely in the Bill, in which the absolute criterion is not a total number—a different number, as it happens—of constituencies, but the 5 per cent rule; that the electoral quota must be observed, or must not vary by more than 5 per cent. That is stated as an absolute rule. Then, in paragraph 5 —we dealt with this yesterday—the Bill says:
“A Boundary Commission may take into account”—
there is no encouragement, let alone compulsion to take into account—
“special geographical considerations … local government boundaries … local ties … inconvenience”.
That is in paragraph 5 of the new Schedule 2 on page 10 of the text before us. That has been the shift that has occurred between 1986 and now, and the real importance is that the Government now think that the criterion of uniformity of number, or near uniformity of number of constituencies, is the only important thing. In fact, the phrase,
“A Boundary Commission may take into account”
is almost dismissive. There is hardly any suggestion that the Boundary Commission needs bother too much about that particular consideration.
My noble friend Lord Lipsey has brought forward a third model, which is that, while the uniformity of numbers point, the 5 per cent rule, remains enormously important, the Boundary Commission may waive that on one condition; that it states that these other considerations are of exceptional importance. That requires a very explicit decision by the Boundary Commission and would be something which the Boundary Commission would have to defend. Presumably it would have to be defended at judicial review—there is not going to be any parliamentary debate on the subject nor, if the Government have their way, any public inquiries.
Nevertheless, if there was some bar before which the boundary commissioners had to defend themselves, they would have to state very clearly how they came to conclude that these consideration were of exceptional importance. It is a very high threshold and any public body would be very cautious of stating that something was of exceptional importance—it is a very major judgment to make and one which potentially exposes them to a great deal of criticism, so they would be quite reluctant to make it. However, if they really felt persuaded that these other considerations were so important that a real scandal and injustice would be created, or real damage done to the fabric of our electoral system if, let us say, some local government or county boundary was not respected, they would, at least, have that let-out.
So it is a very small concession that the Government would be making if they were moved to accept my noble friend’s amendment. In most cases, it must be very much less than likely that the Boundary Commission would want to use this provision. By definition, they cannot say that everything is exceptional; they cannot say that most things are exceptional—if they stated that, they would be contradicting themselves. In practice, therefore, it is only on very rare occasions that they would be able to use this provision.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I was here last night and I heard those interminable statistics. The point is that this is not what we are debating at the moment; we are debating parliamentary constituencies. I have enunciated a principle that the Government consider important for this part of the Bill, and one that we believe would be seriously undermined by the proposal that is implicit in the amendment.
In addition, as the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, acknowledged in response to a question from the noble Lord, Lord Howarth, this also overrules rule 1, and the Committee has debated at considerable length the question of the size of the House of Commons and the fact that the Government’s position is that there should be a House of 600.
The current situation is that there is no hierarchy of rules and there is a flexibility to move away from the aspiration, which is there in the current rules, that the Boundary Commission should go as close to the quota as possible. It was clear from the exchanges that took place in the debate that in fact there is that flexibility to move away that has led to the kind of wide variation that I have just illustrated with the difference between Manchester Central and Glasgow North, and indeed has led to a steady increment over many years, almost invariably in an upward direction, in the number of seats.
Lord Davies of Stamford
I have followed the noble and learned Lord’s course, and I am going to try to be helpful. He is worried that the amendment put forward by my noble friend would conflict with rule 2 on parity; he has made that point and I understand it. Not for the first time, I shall put to him a possible compromise. Would he be prepared to have a provision under which there was a 10 per cent divergence from the electoral quota that was an absolute ceiling and could not under any circumstances be exceeded or broken through, but the Boundary Commission would have the right to breach the 5 per cent ceiling up to 10 per cent in the event that it gave the assurance—the text of which is in my noble friend’s amendment—that it had considered that there were matters of “exceptional importance” that justified that move outside the 5 per cent band?
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
That is not far away from the amendment that we debated almost exactly a week ago. Indeed, I have already had discussions with at least one of the noble Lords over this, and I believe that other discussions have flowed on from that between Mr Harper and representatives of the Opposition.
Lord Davies of Stamford
I think there is a misunderstanding. What is new about what I have just said, as against the proposal that we discussed before, would be the incorporation of the phrase “exceptional importance”, drawn from my noble friend’s amendment.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
I hear what the noble Lord says, but the point that I was on at the moment is not just that there is no limit on the 10 per cent—I shall come on to the question about exceptional circumstances in a moment—but that the number of 600 could be reached. I think that it was my noble friend Lord Eccles yesterday who raised the question of 630, which is the target aspirational number. Even that varies, though. With the one exception of when the Scottish seats were redistributed following devolution, the number has gone up after every Boundary Commission review.
The noble Lord, Lord Soley, asked about “shall” and “may”. The fact that it is at the Boundary Commission’s discretion whether and to what extent at present it should take into account the factors in rule 5 does not mean that it is able to decide simply to ignore a relevant factor on a whim. The commission cannot just dismiss it. I shall give two reasons why “may” is preferable to “shall”. First, and this reflects back to what I was just saying, the 1986 Act currently has conflicting rules. The British Academy said that,
“the rules set out in the Bill are a very substantial improvement”,
because they are clear and not contradictory. Our fear is that changing “may” could reintroduce conflict between the rules. Secondly, it is important that the independent Boundary Commission has the freedom to use its discretion. Many of the noble Lords moving amendments similar to this have talked about the importance of giving the commission flexibility. I fear that by using “shall” rather than “may”, one takes away with one hand what is perhaps sought to be given with the other.
Lord Davies of Stamford
There is still confusion here. On that matter, there is a great difference between individual political parties arguing that their cases are of exceptional importance—the noble and learned Lord is absolutely right: they will all say that—and the Boundary Commission sitting in a quasi-judicial capacity and allowing itself to be seduced into accepting that something is exceptional in a majority of cases. That could never happen; the Boundary Commission would not do that. It would be too jealous of its own credibility and integrity to allow a procedure that could be justified only in exceptional circumstances being used in anything more than a very small number of circumstances. There is a great difference there between the impact of this word on the Boundary Commission and the likely arguments—about which I quite agree with the noble and learned Lord—that individual litigants and representatives will make to the Boundary Commission.
Lord Wallace of Tankerness
My Lords, even if one puts aside for a moment the question of public hearings, there is still opportunity under the Bill for representations to be made. The minute you import words such as “exceptional importance”, however the case may be presented, you can bet your life that organised groups such as political parties would find some means of suggesting exceptional importance in almost every constituency. Some have argued that the constituency boundaries should be drawn on the basis of population. We have heard that argument; it was suggested earlier that it would be one way of dealing with the situation, but I hope we have dealt with that in times past.
The noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, said that this is a modest amendment. However, some of the key principles that the Government have enunciated about what is important in the Bill—for example, that there should be no increase in the size of the House of Commons beyond 600—could be undermined by this amendment. Even if we set aside the question of whether there is a 5 per cent or 10 per cent variation, the amendment would allow for a variation that goes beyond even 10 per cent. That would override the parity of one vote, one value and would almost certainly inhibit the Boundary Commission’s ability to report that it had ensured that the new boundaries were in place for the May 2015 election. It is against the background of these different points being undermined by this modest amendment, as the noble Lord called it, that the Government cannot accept it and I ask him to withdraw it.
Lord Howarth of Newport
I shall speak briefly, but with strong conviction, in support of the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Myners. I have never been resident in Cornwall, nor have I had the privilege to represent a Cornish constituency in the other place. However, I have frequently visited Cornwall, it has been an important part of my life, and it has been a source of deep pleasure to me.
I had the opportunity to gain some insight into the distinctive culture of the people of Cornwall when I was a Minister responsible for heritage. I spent two days in Cornwall at a time when we were reconsidering the listed status of nonconformist chapels in the county of Cornwall. That is a remarkable heritage. They are beautiful buildings whose main fabric and furniture were constructed with extraordinary craftsmanship that derived from the boat-building skills of local people. Those skills are something of which Cornish people are very proud indeed, and are emblematic of a distinctive vigorous culture that ought to be respected.
It is not that the people of Cornwall have been introverted. It is not that they are seeking to retreat into some kind of bunker by demanding that their parliamentary representation should be contained in whole constituencies in the county of Cornwall. The noble Lord, Lord Tyler, spoke of incursions by Cornishmen into Devon. I believe that it was Cornish miners who brought football to Mexico. The influence of Cornwall throughout the world has been powerful and beneficent. I simply make the point again in this context, as I have in many others.
Lord Davies of Stamford
Before my noble friend leaves his personal reminiscences of Cornwall, will he tell the House—we are all full of suspense—what ministerial decision he ultimately took on the heritage status of the nonconformist chapels of Cornwall?
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill
Lord Davies of Stamford Excerpts(13 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Soley
I answered that question before, but in a different way. I said, and I say again, that what matters is that, if you change the constitution in a way that reduces the chances of a political party winning an election, you cannot reverse what the Government have done. Removing hereditary Peers from here did not change the opportunity for a party to win an election. It is an important difference. That is why I make the case that one has to look at constitutional Bills differently. Of course, constitutional Bills about removing hereditary Peers or judges are very important, but when you change the composition of a House, which alters the ability of a major party to win an election, that party can no longer assume that it is in a position to reverse what the previous Government have done. That makes all the difference.
Lord Davies of Stamford
The noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, has thrown in our face the deal done in 1997 or 1998 over the future of hereditary Peers. I hope that my noble friend will agree that that, surely, was a fine example of negotiation—a very delicate and complicated but very successful negotiation. I believe, indeed, that the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, played a not-undistinguished part in that very successful and historic compromise. What we have this evening is a complete absence of any desire to even talk, let alone have a negotiation or a compromise. Surely that is the fundamental difference between the two situations.
Lord Soley
My noble friend is quite right and he has reminded me of something. I remember being in the Corridor outside when the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, had had talks with the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, or with his office, and William Hague, the then leader of the Conservative Party, had got to hear about the deal that my noble friend refers to. I happened to bump into William Hague as he came back down the Corridor having seen the noble Lord. His face was as black as thunder. I only heard a bit of what he was saying, but it certainly was not complimentary about the deal that had been done. I diverge, but the point is right. There was a negotiation.
Lord Lipsey
That would be a possible outcome of a Speaker’s Conference. It might also decide that the way to deal with the particular problem that he is advancing is by increasing the tolerance allowed in the size of constituencies, and that is a matter to which this House will return.
In order to have a look at whether a Speaker’s Conference is the right way forward, I devoted a happy Sunday to examining the records of past Speaker’s Conferences. Funnily enough, that is not as easy a task as you might think, partly because there is no agreement on how many Speaker’s Conferences there are. I started off with British Political Facts, which is the bible on all these matters, and it said six, but I then found a speech made by Jack Straw in another place—Official Report, Commons, 12/3/98; col. 781—in which he listed two Speaker’s Conferences not listed by British Political Facts in 1908-10 and 1930. There is also the ambiguous case of the 1919 Speaker’s Conference on devolution, which was chaired by Mr Speaker Lowther, and nobody seems to be able decide whether it was a Speaker’s Conference. Let me confine myself to the six Speaker’s Conferences that everybody agrees on and the progress that they made.
There was the Speaker’s Conference on electoral reform of 1917, which is my favourite. It not only advocated extending votes to women but—prize of prizes for the Lib Dems—it recommended STV. This, alas, was subsequently voted down by seven votes in the House of Commons. There was a Speaker’s Conference on electoral reform in 1943-44, which dealt, for example, with Welsh representation. The 1944 Speaker’s Conference was notable, incidentally, for including three Peers of the realm. It set out lasting principles for redistribution and directions to the Boundary Commission, which endured well. Sixty of 71 quite controversial recommendations by the 1965-68 conference on electoral law and procedure, under Mr Speaker Hylton-Foster, were accepted.
The 1973-74 Speaker’s Conference was under Mr Speaker Selwyn Lloyd. I am sorry the noble Lord, Lord Maclennan, is not present because I believe he sat on that as an MP, as did the noble Lord, Lord Pendry. That brought about an increase in election expenses, which otherwise would not have come about, for the February 1974 election. There was the 1977-78 Speaker’s Conference, under Mr Speaker Thomas, on Northern Ireland representation. I see my noble friend Lord Radice is with us evening but the noble Lord, Lord Molyneaux, who also sat on that conference, is not present. That managed to solve the question of increased representation for Northern Ireland, although not everyone got everything they hoped for out of that. Then there was Gordon Brown’s Speaker’s Conference on electoral turnout and women and ethnic minorities in Parliament. It is not a flawless record but it is a considerable one, covering some of the most difficult problems that have faced this country’s constitution.
Lord Davies of Stamford
Does the conference on the future of home rule, which took place in the summer of 1914 at Buckingham Palace, and was certainly presided over by the Speaker, not count as a Speaker’s Conference?
Lord Lipsey
I do not know whether it should but it does not count in Mr Straw’s list or in British Political Facts. If my noble friend wishes to inform the House further about that, I am sure it would be immensely valuable to our proceedings this evening.
Lord Davies of Stamford
My Lords, my noble friends Lord Soley and Lord Lipsey have done a great service to the House by bringing forward their two amendments this evening. I think that they have also done rather a good service to the Government, although I am not sure that the Government realise it yet, because they may have provided a way out of this situation that would enable the Government to get substantially what they want with the general consent of the Committee.
I am trying to act according to what I think should be the principles of the House of Lords—that is, in good faith, with good will and with a genuine openness to compromise. I think that those are important values, particularly in a Second Chamber, or revising Chamber, as this House is. Therefore, I say straight away in that spirit, and at the risk of shocking some of my noble friends, that I accept that the Government have a democratic mandate to reduce the size of the House of Commons. Unfortunately, the Tory party and the Liberal Democrats won the election. Both parties had in their manifestos a commitment to reduce the size of the House of Commons and that must constitute a democratic mandate. We do not necessarily like that—some of us dislike it less than others—but I think that in all honesty we have to accept that.
However, what the coalition parties sure as hell do not have is a mandate to reduce the number of MPs in the House of Commons to 600. A different figure was given in the two manifestos. The coalition parties can change their mind, as I hope we are all allowed to do, but the fact is that the mandate does not cover the number; it covers the principle. Therefore, by definition, the number must be open to debate and discussion. It is totally legitimate for us to go into that debate and discussion to see whether we can find either the ideal number—which, for reasons that I shall explain, I do not think we can or will find—or an alternative mechanism for ending up with the right solution. That is clearly what we must do.
On this side of the House, we should be honest enough to recognise that the Government have a mandate to reduce the size of the Commons, and the Government should be honest enough to recognise that they do not have a mandate for a specific figure and that, therefore, the debate on the figure must remain open. The Government have already changed their mind about the number and, as I said, they have a perfect right to do so, but perhaps they will change their mind again in the light of the debate that is taking place. That would not be in any way humiliating for the Government; it would be very sensible and democratic for them to listen to the debate and then come to a more mature conclusion.
Again, I may find that I am in disagreement with some of my noble friends on this side of the House, but I am not, and never have been, against the principle of reducing the number of MPs in the House of Commons. I do not feel particularly strongly about the figure of 650, although I think that we would all accept that there must be a limit to the size of the reduction that can responsibly take place.
I enjoyed what I considered to be an important contribution to the debate by the noble Lord, Lord Maples, although I am sorry that he is not in his seat at the moment. However, I disagreed with him very strongly when he said, “Well, it’s all right if Members of Parliament have more people to deal with—more constituents, more electors and a greater population, whether registered or not registered—in their constituency, because they can use their staff to look after them”. Having served in the House of Commons for 33 years, perhaps I may say to the Committee that I do not think that that is a good argument. Of course, I had staff—I had very good staff—and I used them to deal with constituency cases, to verify the facts, to look at possible solutions and ways forward, and of course to follow up cases, which is always a very important aspect of a constituency MP’s work.
I also used my staff to draft letters, but I always signed them myself, and I always made sure that I knew the considered advice that I was giving my constituents. It was always I who sent a letter to the authority, local authority, Minister or quango, or whoever I needed to contact to try to resolve the question. It is extremely important that Members of Parliament continue to take direct personal responsibility for that kind of action—responsibility both to the constituent who has appealed to him or her and to the organisation or perhaps colleagues in government to whom one appeals on behalf of the constituent.
I am absolutely horrified at—as has been referred to already in the Committee this evening—the habit of Congressmen in the United States, who allow their staff to draft letters and send them using an automatic signature machine so that it looks as though the Congressman has reviewed the case when he has not. That is deeply shocking. I would be appalled if that habit came into this country. However, if you talk to Congressmen, you begin to understand, because they typically have 250,000 or 300,000 electors, which is far more than anyone here is proposing.
There must be a dividing line somewhere. For most of the time that I was in the House of Commons, I had a constituency that came close to having 75,000 electors, so I would not be shocked by that figure—if the Government had wanted to make it 77,000, I am sure that I could have coped with that, too. However, there is a limit, and we should be aware of the trade-off between having a more cohesive House of Commons, with fewer people there, and being able to offer a personal service to, and have a direct relationship with, those who send Members of Parliament to Westminster, which is such an important part of our democracy.
We have to look at how we achieve that solution and trade-off and how we optimise or reconcile those two different considerations. It is extremely doubtful that this or the other House could ever come to a resolution on that; we would never be completely happy with such a solution. There is no perfect, idealised, atomic number somewhere in the air that, if only we were clever enough, we could identify. The only practicable solution for achieving a majority of a particular number in this House or the other place would be for the Government to take up that number and push it through via the Whipping system. That would be highly undesirable.
I shall not accuse the Government of gerrymandering, as I do not believe that the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, would be a willing party to that. I am sorry that the gerrymandering issue has arisen, but I have to tell the Government in all honesty that any Government who at any time start directly to determine things such as the number of Members of Parliament will open themselves to suspicions of gerrymandering. That is very dangerous. Gerrymandering is like corruption. It is so awful and so damaging to the legitimacy of our—or any other—democracy that not only should we not get involved in it but we should conduct ourselves in such a way that there is not the slightest suspicion that we might be getting involved in something of that kind. That means that we have to take the determination of the number away from the Floor of this House and the other place.
My noble friends Lord Lipsey and Lord Soley have produced alternative solutions—very much for the reasons put forward by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, so I need not repeat them. I prefer the solution of my noble friend Lord Soley. I tell him now that, if he is minded to press Amendment 59 to the vote, I shall be happy to follow him into the Lobby. In other words, it is far better to allow the Boundary Commission or some independent body to determine exactly what the number should be.
Lord Renton of Mount Harry
It surprises me that the noble Lord and others have said that an independent commission should decide on the right new number for MPs. What makes anyone think that we would agree with the result of an independent commission? We would surely disagree for one reason or another. For that reason, I firmly think that it is right for a majority in the Commons to decide on what the number should be, as they did by a vote of 321 ayes to 264 noes, because they are in a far more rightful place in history to make that decision than any commission will ever be.
Lord Davies of Stamford
I disagree with the noble Lord. I am quite surprised to hear him advance that position, because I know him well and believe him to be a man who believes not only that we should be guided by the political wisdom of the past, by history and by tradition but that we should not ignore that past and should be very cautious in doing violence to the traditions that have served us so well in British parliamentary democracy for so long. I know that there are many other contexts in which the noble Lord would be entirely with me.
We have heard figures given this evening—I do not remember them entirely—for the way in which numbers in the House of Commons have varied during the past 100 years. That has been a reflection of the Boundary Commission’s decisions, not of decisions taken by the House of Commons or this House to go for a specific number. Those variations have been a consequence of decisions made by the Boundary Commission when it has conducted its responsibilities, as it regularly does every decade or so, to look again parliamentary boundaries in this country.
Lord Campbell-Savours
There is another example. The Liberal Democrats will remember it very well; we had arguments about it in the last Parliament. It is the Electoral Commission. There were many times when the Liberal Democrats objected to our objections to aspects of Electoral Commission reports and recommendations, so there is a tradition of accepting independent body judgments when it comes to issues of elections and boundaries.
Lord Davies of Stamford
I am grateful for my noble friend’s support. That, indeed, is the right answer to the noble Lord, Lord Renton. In practice we have accepted these decisions. Part of the consensus on which British politics has been based is that we do not interfere with the Boundary Commission. We let it get on with its job, and we respect its decisions and its independence. It is deeply conscious of its responsibility in the light of the trust placed in it by Parliament and the public. When it has concluded its work, we accept the umpire’s decision. That is in the best British tradition, if I may say so.
Lord Anderson of Swansea
Is not the problem with what the noble Lord, Lord Renton is saying that he is arguing that the majority in the other place should be sufficient for the time being? That majority might change after an election. I can imagine the roars of disapproval at that new majority if we in opposition became the majority, and the roars of opposition from the other side. After a change of government, we would have as much legitimacy in changing the numbers as the current majority has if there were no interposition of some independent body, whether it be a Speaker’s Conference or some other form of independent commission.
Lord Davies of Stamford
I very much hear what my noble friend says. Of course, he has said similar things in the debate this evening, and he said them very well. I repeat that I was saddened and surprised to hear the noble Lord, Lord Renton, take the line that he took. I know he is very conscious of the history of this country and the history of the world. He just has to look at the history of other European countries over the past 100 years to see the terrible things that arise when Governments allow themselves to use a momentary parliamentary majority to change the rules of the game and change the constitution of the country. That is a very dangerous road to go down. If you compare the degree of legitimacy, public support and stability that we have enjoyed in this country for centuries with some of the histories of countries whose parliaments have not had that sense of moderation, limit and self denial in the exploitation of the momentary majority, I think you conclude that we have been very blessed by those traditions. It would be a very sad day if we were to overthrow those traditions and go down the road which the Government appear to be leading us tonight.
Lord Kinnock
On that point, does the noble Lord not agree that at this juncture we need an independent commission to assess and recommend the effective size, given the objective realities of parliamentary service and representation? We need an independent commission to provide advice that would be accepted consensually, as, under the terms of this Bill, the Boundary Commission, which has provided us for 61 years with a fundamental protection against any suspicion of gerrymandering, is to be railroaded and provided with parameters for its operation. Whatever else happens, it must conclude with recommendations that result in a House of Commons of 600 Members. Given the inexact nature of that, and given the absence of science or the absence of objective rationale supporting the figure of 600, is not an independent commission of wise people a fundamental essential?
Lord Davies of Stamford
I wholeheartedly agree with my noble friend. The most succinct way in which to put this issue is as follows. The Boundary Commission, charged with its very delicate task, as we know from debates this evening and from our own experience of determining a fair pattern of electoral districts and constituencies in this country, has to manage three variables. They include acceptability, which is very important and which means the degree to which the parliamentary constituency boundaries correspond to local people’s feelings of self-identity and community and perhaps how much they coincide with local government boundaries and boundaries involving other health authorities, travel to work areas and economic and social factors of that kind.
That acceptability has always been a major consideration in the mind of the Boundary Commission, which has always made great efforts to ensure that its recommendations are accepted as far as possible. That is part of making a democracy legitimate and accepted and therefore work happily, and that is why the commission has always placed great emphasis on the opportunity to have public inquiries on its recommendations. It has not run away from that at all. As I am sure the Leader of the House will remind me if I go on any further, that is a subject of further amendments, so we will have other opportunities to discuss that very important matter. The Boundary Commission has always recognised that acceptability is a very important aspect of their work.
The second issue is the extent of the uniformity of numbers. The Boundary Commission has always felt that, other things being equal, it was always desirable that constituencies should have the same numbers. Other things are not always equal, and so it has often made recommendations that do not involve very equal numbers in constituencies. Nevertheless, that has always been a principle at which it wanted to aim.
There is a third criterion, which the Government are introducing now—the actual number of seats that emerge. We all know that there is a trade-off between these things, and that if you have greater acceptability you will have greater variation in numbers because the commission will be more elastic in accommodating local susceptibilities, but at the expense of having some constituencies that have different numbers of electors than other constituencies. Equally, if you enforce a particular ceiling such as 600, you very much restrict the ability of the commission to achieve either of the other two purposes—uniformity of numbers or acceptability. There are three variables, and there is a trade-off between the three. That is inevitable; any system that you had would involve a trade-off between the three. The question is whether you honestly recognise those trade-offs or whether you do not.
My own view is that of these three criteria, two are recognisable general principles. Acceptability is a general principle. It is something that we can all say is right in theory and principle. We want to aim towards it; it is part of the good in our constitution, not part of the bad or dysfunctional. Equally, it is very desirable that we should as far as possible have constituencies of equal numbers, so that everyone has the same weight in terms of their representation in Parliament. Again, that is a general principle. It is part of the good in a constitution, not part of the bad or the dysfunctional. I put it to the Committee that a particular number is not a general principle. Six hundred or 650 is not a general principle, and neither is 525 or 535—whatever the Liberal number was. These are just pragmatics and incidentals. They are the result, or should be, of achieving the optimum trade-off or reconciliation between the two general principles.
My noble friends Lord Soley and Lord Lipsey have actually helped the Government, because they have provided a way by which they could achieve what the Government really want—what all of us really want: a system that is as acceptable as possible and that as far as possible involves constituencies of equal numbers. We could do it by leaving it to the Boundary Commission to come, as it always did, to the consequential conclusion as to what numbers of seats should emerge. If necessary—and I agree with my noble friend Lord Soley here—we could set an absolute maximum and give it some parameters. Fine; I would not object to that, as long as the parameters are wide enough for it to do its job without undue distortion and thereby to achieve, as far as possible, the implementation of those general principles to which all of us in this House must ultimately attach the greatest weight and importance.
Lord McAvoy
I wish to speak to my noble friend Lord Soley’s amendment, but before doing so I shall briefly draw attention to the comments made earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Garel-Jones—he is, unfortunately, not in his place. The noble Lord comes down from the mountains bearing great prophecies of doom because of alleged filibustering on this side of the House. Before I start on the detail of the amendment, perhaps I might give some detail from an answer obtained from the House of Lords Library by my noble friend Lord Kennedy of Southwark on the time spent on Bills in the last Parliament between May 2005 and April 2010. The Marine and Coastal Access Bill had 19 days, the Coroners and Justice Bill had 16 days, the Identity Cards Bill had 16 days, and the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill had 15 days. It really is a pity that the noble Lord, Lord Garel-Jones, is not here—