Rights of the Sovereign and the Duchy of Cornwall Bill [HL]

Lord Forsyth of Drumlean Excerpts

Friday 8th November 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, I suppose you could call that a Duchy original. I know that the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, is a very genial man outside this Chamber, but I have to say this morning he reminded me of that wonderful character from ITMA, Mona Lott, in that it is being so cheerful as keeps him going. What we have had this morning is an extraordinary series of disconnected accusations and observations. He referred to Clause 3 of his Bill and said that legislation was not needed. I would say that legislation was not needed on this particular subject, full stop. While I yield to no one in my admiration for the noble Lord and recognise that he is the last person that anyone would dare to call obsequious, nevertheless I think that today he has got it wrong.

The noble Lord has a reputation for being a fine engineer. I am sure that he is. As a fine engineer, though, he knows that precision is very important. He knows that if you are called out to repair something, you do not go along to repair modern machinery with a bag of wooden tools. That is in fact what he has been doing today.

I would just make a few points to your Lordships in opposing the Bill, which I am delighted to do. Yesterday we were debating Magna Carta and the importance of the rule of law. Earlier, my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth had an interesting debate in the Moses Room on commencement orders, to which my noble friend Lord Gardiner, sitting on the Front Bench, gave a most excellent reply. The theme of that debate was that legislation must be demonstrated to be necessary and designed to solve a specific problem or provide a proper remedy, and then it must be properly enforced. One of the underlying themes of that debate, particularly emphasised by the noble Baroness, Lady Royall of Blaisdon, was that pre-legislative scrutiny was really a necessary precondition wherever possible—one accepts terrorism legislation sometimes, and things like that—for all legislation. If ever there was a need for pre-legislative scrutiny, it is here.

I do not believe that legislation is necessary, and I certainly do not think it should be embarked upon without the most careful examination. I suggest to the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, that what we should be doing is referring some of the matters that give him concern to the Constitution Committee of this House and there should be a proper, thorough and objective examination. Merely to base one’s case on a number of isolated examples, as happened towards the end of the noble Lord’s speech, is no way to proceed to legislation in this House, particularly on a very sensitive matter.

I refer again to the noble Lord’s career as an engineer—a very illustrious and successful one. He knows as an engineer that a delicate mechanism can be thrown completely out of gear by the removal of one apparently insignificant part. One often finds this quoted particularly in the case of clocks and watches. If there was ever anything that was delicate and needed the most careful handling, it is our British constitution. It is not a written constitution. Some may wish that we had one, as some did in last night’s debate, but we do not. We therefore have to look very carefully at what we are doing when we come to constitutional reform.

This Bill is, in a sense, the son of the Succession to the Crown Bill, because during the passage of that Bill the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, moved amendments, referred to his concerns about the Duchy of Cornwall and advised the House that, at some stage in the future, he would seek to introduce legislation. On 14 May, he was as good as his word when he produced a Bill which had its First Reading on that day.

Many of us were concerned about the Succession to the Crown Bill because we believed it had not been sufficiently thought through. There were implications for the Church of England—the established church—which concerned the Bench of Bishops. Indeed, the Minister, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness, who had charge of that Bill in this House and handled it with great skill and sensitivity, was at pains to ensure that, in answer to a Parliamentary Question, certain correspondence with the Roman Catholic church was published.

Those of us who felt that that Bill had perhaps been a little rushed were not against the essential principle about the succession of a woman—of course not—but we were concerned about some of the implications. It was suggested that because the Duchess of Cambridge was with child, it would be as well to get this Bill through quickly. Of course, the child arrived, the child was a boy, there was great rejoicing, and the sense of urgency—if ever there was one—disappeared, so there is no urgency about this. That underlines the point I made a few moments ago, that if these subjects are to be looked at, they need to be looked at carefully and deliberately, and if there is to be legislation of any sort, it needs the most careful pre-legislative scrutiny. The whole issue would benefit very much from the considered observations of the Constitution Committee of this House.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

I have been thinking about my noble friend’s watch analogy. Does he not think there is something of an irony about a hereditary Peer given a life peerage attending a House which is not subject to democratic accountability and in which we are given tax-free allowances complaining about tax privileges and a lack of accountability?

[Lord Cormack]

My noble friend Lord Forsyth, not for the first time, puts his finger on a number of interesting issues upon which the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, might reflect. When he is contemplating the illustrious past of his family, and its contribution to the Kit-Cat Club, the portraits of whose members hang in Brooks’s Club to this day, he might just wonder whether, in fact, he has not been guilty of a little inconsistency.

There is one part of the Bill that I find particularly niggardly. It is the part dealing with travel. The noble Lord wants to restrict those who can have official travel to six members. He bases this on the fact that the Succession to the Crown Bill specifically mentions the six next in line who have to seek the permission of the sovereign to marry. We had debates on this and amendments were moved, including, if I recall correctly, by my noble friend Lord Lang, to extend the number to 12, but the Bill went through with six in it. However, there is no analogy. One has to realise that there are many members of the Royal Family who give unstinting public service and whose presence at public events is greatly welcomed. I do not want to be invidious and give a long list, but I single out particularly the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester. The Duke of Gloucester is punctilious in fulfilling a range of engagements. I have attended a number of engagements which he has attended. The pleasure that he gives by going and the interest that he takes in the people he meets are of enormous value and worth. I believe that it would be niggardly in the extreme to say that only six members of the Royal Family should be allowed to travel to fulfil their official duties at the taxpayer’s expense.

In his concluding remarks, the noble Lord referred with what seemed a less than enthusiastic endorsement to constitutional monarchy. I believe very passionately in our constitutional monarchy. For well over 60 years now, Her Majesty the Queen has served this country absolutely impeccably. I believe that we are all enormously in her debt and that of members of the Royal Family, and I do not believe that now is the time to be nitpicking about the Duchy of Cornwall. The Duchy of Cornwall goes back 600 years. That, in itself, may be a reason to say we should have a look at things, but it is no reason to embark with a rather blunt instrument on an attack on an institution that has served us very well.

It is good to have debate in this House, and it is important that when issues such as this are raised, there is an opportunity to comment on them from both sides of the argument. I do not believe that the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, has this morning made a case for this legislation. I believe it would be hasty and ill considered and that, if we are to look at these subjects, they need to be looked at in detail and in depth, dispassionately, objectively and carefully. All those qualities can be brought to bear by your Lordships’ House. They should be brought to bear. There should be no question of letting this Bill proceed anywhere near the statute book. I am confident that it will not.