Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill

Lord Elystan-Morgan Excerpts

Wednesday 28th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn (Con)]

My Lords, this has been a radical debate in the profound sense of getting to the roots of things. We have been talking about the open society and its enemies, and the Government have rightly identified the enemies of the open society as armed terrorists. But who are the friends of the open society? Clearly, we are speaking about free speech and academic freedom. I think that the Government, in seeking to constrain the enemies of the open society, are wrong if they take steps that constrain free speech and academic debate. The debate this evening has very much highlighted those difficulties.

The noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy of The Shaws, spoke of the difficulties of administrating these procedures if they were passed into law. They would indeed be difficult to administer in a university. I fear that they would not be very well administered in most universities if universities were invited to apply them, because the sort of bureaucracy that can develop in a university would be ill suited to the task. So I feel very strongly that another approach has to be found, and there is a very strong case for excepting universities, as has been argued so well. I declare an interest as a former master of Jesus College, Cambridge, and a former professor. Universities are places where free speech should flourish and should be constrained as little as possible.

This year is the 200th anniversary of the Cambridge Union Society. That may be a small matter in these grand considerations, but I cannot see how a society like the Cambridge Union Society could flourish with the constraints applied to it in the draft guidance, some of which were mentioned by my noble friend Lord Macdonald of River Glaven. Therefore, I very much support the amendment and I hope that the Government will give it very serious consideration, because very high principles are at stake and, indeed, at risk.

[Lord Elystan-Morgan (CB)]

My Lords, I shall speak briefly to Amendment 104. In so doing, I declare a past interest, as I was for 10 years a president of a Welsh university and the chairman of its management council.

I shall deal first with a technical constitutional point that is not a thousand miles away from the matter raised by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead. Universities and higher education in general in Scotland and Wales are, of course, devolved functions. Therefore, one could easily react in a rather crude and barbaric way and say, “This is not a matter for Westminster to intervene in”—although I certainly do not take up that argument.

Nevertheless, one should bear in mind that there are conventions in existence in the relationship between this House and the devolved assemblies. This is the Mother of Parliaments, and it stands to reason that it has the sovereign authority to cancel or amend in any way that it wishes any area of devolution that it has endowed upon it. But it will not do that and does not intend doing that wrongly. We have the Sewel convention in Scotland and a similar convention in Wales to the effect that such interference will not take place save in the most unusual—if not unique—circumstances. It would take place when either the devolved assembly requests that it should happen—the point essentially raised in relation to Section 43 of the 1986 Act by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope—or there is a situation that is utterly unique. One can imagine one or two where there would be justification for such action.

It is clear to me that another principle overwhelms that; for although higher education has been devolved to Scotland and Wales, counterterrorism has not. That surely must take precedence in every way because it involves the security and, at the end of the day, the very existence of the state itself. I raise the matter not to show off any understanding of constitutional matters but to raise a point in relation to what should happen in this unique situation where we have a devolved function being clearly brought under the microscope of Westminster. The Bill accommodates that possibility very clearly in Clauses 23 and 25. In Clause 23, it is in relation to adding an authority to the list in Schedule 3; in Clause 25, it is in relation to giving a direction. However, the Bill states in each case that there has to be consultation between the Home Secretary and Welsh Ministers, and that is the point that I seek to raise.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)]

My Lords, I shall certainly not repeat what has been said—I am sorry; has the noble Lord not finished? I thought that he had.

[Lord Elystan-Morgan]

My Lords, I have a little to go.

Perhaps I may end in this way. The motivations of the Government are probably very decent, proper and understandable, but the way in which they are going about them is extremely naive and in many respects barbaric. Let us imagine that, before a person can speak at a university, notice for 14 days has to be given. A sketch of the content of that speech has to be produced. Just imagine how three people, all of them now dead, would react to that were they alive. One would be Bertrand Russell; another would be Bernard Shaw; a third would be a 30 year-old Winston Churchill. Do you think that they would have accepted the invitation? Do you think that they would have felt themselves bound by that stricture? It is a situation which, at best, is ridiculous and, at worst, can be extremely dangerous and counterproductive.

Most Members of the Committee will have heard at some time or another quoted the immortal words of John Philpot Curran, who in 1795 said, if I remember rightly:

“The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime and the punishment of his guilt”.

We can, by overemphasising vigilance, destroy the very thing that we seek to protect.

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick]

I shall not weary the Committee by using all the arguments that have been so well advanced by noble Lords on all sides. They have been much more eloquent than I could possibly be. I support the amendments proposed by my noble friend Lord Pannick and Amendment 104 because I do not think that the Government have made a very convincing case for moving from a voluntary to a statutory basis. They are quite right in wishing to see all higher education institutions taking the Prevent strategy seriously and co-operating with it but they have not given any evidence that this voluntary approach—reinforced perhaps by a bit of naming and shaming—cannot bring everyone voluntarily within this framework. They have said little about the efforts they have made to do that, except to admit, which I very much welcome, that the majority of universities are actually doing this already. Therefore, I do not think that the case has been made for moving from a voluntary to a statutory basis.

There is a bit of a mixture in this grouping, ranging from a carve-out for universities and other proposals that fall short of that, which would leave universities within the Bill but would mitigate the problems from it. I hope that the Minister will address some of the other amendments—Amendments 105, 112 and so on—which would achieve that mitigation. It is extremely important that that should appear in the Bill.

Finally, I have a point to make about the guidance. The consultation on the guidance with universities, if I understand it rightly, concludes at the end of this week. Frankly, that guidance is pretty horrifying. It has caused a great deal of the concern that has been expressed around this Committee by the nature of its prescriptive detail, its intrusiveness and the absolute impossibility for most universities to carry out these provisions. Next week, on Report, the Minister could make clear in the most formal way the changes to the guidance that will be introduced before it is promulgated. I hope that the Minister will take that seriously. If he cannot agree to remove universities from this Bill, which would be my preference, he should accept some of the amendments that would mitigate the effects of it, make quite clear that the guidance will be radically altered and explain how it will be altered. He should explain, above all, some of the points that he put in his letter about the positive things that the Government are happy to continue to see happening in universities and not just give a long list of the negative things that they are going to try to clamp down on. I hope that can be taken to heart before we come back on Report.