House of Lords Reform

Lord Forsyth of Drumlean Excerpts

Tuesday 15th September 2015 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Stowell of Beeston) (Con)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken this evening and for the contributions they have made. I will certainly try to do justice in responding to the debate. I echo something that the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, has just said. Like him, I am very proud to be a Member of this House, and I am even prouder to be the Leader of this House. I know that that pride is very much echoed around this Chamber by the way in which everybody has made their contribution tonight.

I said at the outset that our discussions should be about our core purpose, but the way in which the noble Baroness the Leader of the Opposition responded calls for me to be even clearer about what I mean when I talk about purpose. The noble Lord, Lord Greaves, is absolutely right: all of us understand that we are here to scrutinise legislation and to participate in debates about public policy. We do that by holding the Government to account and by complementing the work of the House of Commons. We scrutinise and they, in the end, have the final say. The key thing for me about purpose is not so much what we do but why we do it. I said at the start of my remarks today that this is about how we can best give the public confidence in the laws that Parliament makes. For me that is why we are here. That is why we do all this scrutiny. At the end of it all, that is what we are trying to do: to give the public confidence in what Parliament ultimately decides. It is that clarity of purpose—giving the public confidence—that I feel should very much drive our considerations, whether it is, as I said earlier, about when we attend, how we contribute, when we retire or, indeed, about issues that we have been discussing tonight, such as the size of the House. I think that that has been reflected very much in the debate tonight.

I also pay tribute to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Lichfield on his valedictory speech. We all thank him for his contribution and wish him a successful retirement and certainly look forward to welcoming the new women bishops later this year.

Unsurprisingly, a range of views have been expressed this evening. I am glad to hear support from all Benches for making progress on this important issue. In trying to respond, I might start by picking up on some of the remarks that have been made about the Prime Minister and appointments to your Lordships’ House. The noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Bolton, asked me a specific question, as did others. I should be absolutely clear that the Prime Minister and this Government are not seeking to create a majority in your Lordships’ House. We are not seeking to do that whatever. Some noble Lords referred to the comments that my right honourable friend made about party balance. On that, there has been some misunderstanding of what he was trying to say. He was certainly not suggesting that he was seeking any kind of formal arrangement to reflect the general election results. As the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, acknowledged, we are not in coalition now. This is a Conservative Government and our Conservative manifesto was clear about our intention with regard to the House of Lords. It is worth bearing in mind that when the Prime Minister referred to party balance—noble Lords should believe me; I am not seeking to make any political point—he was reflecting on the fact that the Conservative Party won the last general election, and, as has been customary in recent years, that is something for Prime Ministers to be very much mindful of when they are thinking about their own legislative programme.

My noble friend Lord Strathclyde and the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, had an exchange earlier. The noble Lord referred to the Conservative Party in opposition and its success in defeating the then Labour Government. Noble Lords might be interested to know that during the last Labour Government—and indeed historically over decades—the average rate of government defeats, certainly in the 2005-10 Parliament, was running at about 33%. In the period since the general election this year until the Summer Recess, the defeats suffered by the Government have run at about 60%. There is therefore a distinct difference at the moment in those rates of defeat.

I share other views expressed by noble Lords in this debate that the issue of government defeats in this House is not the only important thing. It is also important to note that the Government listen to the arguments and debates and respond constructively to the legitimate work that this House does in scrutinising legislation and coming forward with amendments. That is what this Government intend to do. During the last Parliament, 21,000 amendments were tabled in your Lordships’ House, 6,000 of which were accepted in legislation by way of either government amendment or other amendments that we accepted. We therefore very much recognise the role of this House and that it is important that it is effective and in a strong position to do its important work.

As has been mentioned, the Prime Minister feels that it is right and understandable that this House would like to address the issue of its size. He feels it is right that we as a House should come forward with our own proposals for change because that is a tried and tested method. After the 2012 Bill failed to proceed out of the House of Commons in the last Parliament, it was measures drawn up in this House by Private Member’s Bills that were successful. Those incremental steps—whether it was the Bill originally in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Steel, or the Bill in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman—were measures to address important matters that came out of this House and, with government support, succeeded in becoming Acts of Parliament. I therefore absolutely reject any idea that this Government have some kind of hidden agenda for the future of this House. What we and I want to do is ensure that I, as Leader of the House, along with my government colleagues, support the House in making the changes that we feel are right in order for us to be effective in the important work that we do.

Let me respond to some of the specific points that have been made about appointments. Some noble Lords have argued—most sincerely; I recognise that—for what I might describe as giant leaps that I fear may be overambitious as a starting point. Examples are: starting to look at criteria for appointments to your Lordships’ House; setting formulas for its composition; and introducing a cap or conditions on the way in which the Prime Minister is able to make appointments. As I have already said, progress will be made through incremental reforms, and our recent experience bears that out. We have a lot of work to look at already, whether the work done in the past by groups chaired by my noble friends Lord Hunt and Lord Wakeham or the work of other groups currently looking at these issues.

Reference was made to putting the House of Lords Appointments Commission on a statutory footing. Again, I feel that that is a big step at this time and certainly one that I consider overambitious. However, I am pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Kakkar, contributed to today’s debate. It is important that we recognise that the commission does exemplary work in scrutinising the probity of appointments to your Lordships’ House, and there has never been a Prime Minister who has ignored the very important advice it puts forward.

We need annual appointments to this House. They are an important way of our refreshing ourselves and ensuring that we have modern and relevant expertise alongside the wealth of experience that sits on your Lordships’ Benches.

I do not want to get into a long discussion about special advisers, but so many comments have been made that it is important that I at least make a couple of points. On the guidance and advice for special advisers, the practice followed is that followed by the previous Labour Government in the appointments that they made of special advisers. However, most importantly, I think we need to be careful that we do not attack people before they have had a chance to make decisions about their own career and future. These people have not yet been introduced. Very few of us make our maiden speech within days or weeks of arriving; there is usually a bit of a lag. We do not know yet what decisions some of these people are going to make. Let us give people a chance to reflect on their contribution before we rush to judge them.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

As my noble friend knows, I raised the issue of the special advisers who had been appointed on the basis that they would be able to come here but only to vote and not to speak. It was not a personal attack on the individuals or their decisions; it was on the question as to whether or not it is right to appoint people to this House with a condition that they are not able to speak. That could be seen as the Government simply using people as lobby fodder.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I have addressed that point in the remarks that I have just made. I am going to move on from appointments to what was said about addressing the size of this House and our membership.

Several noble Lords suggested a preferred number for the membership of this House. At this stage, I do not want to get distracted by talking about a specific target. What is most important is the effective ways for us to proceed. I have acknowledged, and am very serious about the fact, that we need to make progress in this area and address the size of the House. At the moment, I want to ensure that we proceed with a process that will achieve some improvement in this area without fixating, right now, on a specific end target.

On some of the ways forward proposed today, the noble Lord, Lord Steel, led us by referring to some specific limits. He mentioned age, with some exceptions around that. Several noble Lords expressed support for that measure, but perhaps others expressed some concerns. There was support also for specific term limits; others again expressed some concerns. As time is tight, I shall not go through and name-check everybody who was for or against. What I will do after this debate is study carefully all the arguments that have been made. As I said earlier, this area attracts some serious consideration.

Another idea, put forward by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace, and referenced as well by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, was that we might take a more mathematical approach to slimming down the House, with each group leader agreeing a set proportion from their number to leave the House by either election or another means of their choosing. That could certainly merit further thought as we proceed if it is something that all parties support, and especially if it can be disentangled from some of the other measures which I might describe as adding to the complexity of this kind of arrangement—or, to quote my noble friend Lord Elton, unnecessarily stirring up a hornets’ nest.

I note that my noble friend Lord Strathclyde suggested that if we were to look at that kind of approach the small parties should be exempt from such a process. I noted as well the exchange between my noble friend Lord Ridley and the noble Lord, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, in specific regard to UKIP.

Such an approach, as has been already acknowledged, is not dissimilar to that followed by the hereditary Peers when it was decided to reduce their number. I take this opportunity to pay tribute to the hereditary Peers who are Members of your Lordships’ House. They make a very important contribution to our work. Any idea of removing the hereditary by-elections is a fundamental question about our composition which should be considered in the round as part of a wider approach to reform.

As to encouraging more Members to retire and the progress that we have made there, I pay tribute to the Lord Speaker. It has been rightly acknowledged that she has done a lot in a very sensitive fashion to encourage retirement. It is right that retirement becomes a fundamental part of our culture, because it should be recognised as a decision of public service when noble Lords feel that the right decision for them is to retire, when they can no longer contribute in the way they feel the public have a right to expect. I agree with my noble friend Lord Naseby that retirement is working. Thirty-five noble Lords will have retired very soon if we include those two noble Lords listed as having given their notice.

Other noble Lords put forward different ideas. The noble Lord, Lord Low, referred to attendance limits. The noble Lords, Lord Stone of Blackheath and Lord Desai, and others talked about withdrawing allowances as a way forward. They are all interesting ideas. I should be explicit that I categorically cannot support the idea of the noble Lord, Lord Lee of Trafford, that there should be some financial incentive from the public purse for noble Lords to leave your Lordships’ House.

My noble friend Lord Caithness raised some important points that contribute to our effectiveness and the perceptions that people have of us. My noble friend Lord Astor reinforced the importance of the Salisbury/Addison convention, which is so important to maintaining our legitimacy as an unelected House. I was very pleased to hear the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, state that the Liberal Democrats now respect the Salisbury/Addison convention. That is good news indeed.

I will not get into the detail of some of the ways in which our function as a House is affected by size, except to say that I agree with my noble friend Lord Strathclyde and others who made the point that, as we are right now, we are doing a good job. We often do ourselves down about how we are operating. Although I will not rattle through the various statistics, contrary to what some people say—certainly my noble friend Lord Attlee—if we look at 2013-14, when average attendance was at its largest, our average speaking time in Questions for Short Debate was seven minutes and more than 10 minutes in balloted debates. So it is not quite always as people would have us believe.

Although I say that, I was also pleased to hear the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, acknowledge that she agreed with my sentiments, expressed when opening the debate, that the gap between the headline figures in terms of our size versus our average attendance is muddying the public understanding about our work. That is important.