Business of the House

Lord Framlingham Excerpts

Thursday 4th April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood (CB)]

My Lords, pace the noble Lord, Lord Warner, not in his place, the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, and now my noble friend Lord Bilimoria, and recognising that I shall not be making myself popular by this, I start by strongly regretting today’s succession of guillotine Motions. I believe that this dramatic expedient for halting all further debate is a radical and exceptional device, as the speaker each time seeks to remind us, suitable for, but only for, obvious filibustering contributions when no cogent position is being advanced or defended, not for an afternoon such as this, where truly serious questions underlie the debate. It is one thing to have deployed it, as recently by the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, on the Grocott Bill about by-elections for hereditaries. There, it was purely for killing amendments with, I certainly accepted, no substance. To do it here, I suggest, is really not, I hope, a precedent for the future.

I turn very briefly to the Motion, with one or two sentences only. Although the Bill passed late last night after a much abbreviated debate by a single vote, we, as an unelected House, obviously have to be wary of being thought to thwart the will of the elected Chamber. That said, surely we would have to be very certain indeed of the critical need for the Bill, which is essentially promoted as an insurance policy against the risk that the Prime Minister may somehow dramatically let us down and breach her promise to us. We would have to be sure too of the urgent need for the Bill to be passed today, rather than on Monday, to justify so dramatic a curtailment of this House’s ordinary, vital scrutiny functions.

I cannot resist the beginning—alas, I can never remember more than two lines—of a spoof letter to the Times from some 70 or 80 years ago, perhaps by AP Herbert: “Sir, I crave a tiny portion of your valuable space, To record my stupefaction at the follies of our race”—if anybody could finish it, I would be enormously obliged and readily buy them a drink. I today feel stupefied that we have reached a point which begins to look ever less necessary, and would echo the suggestion made an hour or two ago by the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, for a double consensual approach to try to inject some time into this process. I simply repeat: postpone Committee and Report until Monday, and extend the time left today for the Second Reading speeches through the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, graciously forgoing—as I understand he has already agreed to do—his two debates which otherwise were to be heard before this Bill proceeds. If that were arranged, we could bring this whole matter to an end and start the Second Reading debate. In 20 minutes, everybody could get tea, agree to that and then proceed to Second Reading.

[Lord Framlingham (Con)]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brown, and I agree entirely with his remarks—particularly his final recommendation. The one thing of which he cannot be accused is being a member of the ERG, which is very refreshing. I shall be brief, because, as always in these debates, much has been said. However, I claim the right to say what I think on important occasions such as this.

The noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, started off by saying that unconventional times require unconventional measures. I could not disagree more. In unconventional times, you need conventional measures to keep your bearings and know where you are. Otherwise, if you are not careful, you descend into chaos. Not many days ago we had a debate in this Chamber revolving around statutory instruments, dealt with by my noble friend Lord True. I will repeat the point he made again and again: we must always draw huge difference between the great issues which we want to discuss—the things that divide us and about which we get very worked up—and the framework within which we discuss them. Today we are destroying the framework. If we do that, there is a danger of descending into chaos. Some outside this Chamber may say—the people of this country are starting to say—that it is chaos that we between us have created.

This is a momentous decision, and it needs time. It seems to be generally accepted in the country that we will rubber-stamp it; that the Bill will take a little while today, but then go through. The media treat it that way. But we cannot be seen as a pushover, a rubber stamp or a mere formality. Otherwise, as has been said by many, we have no justification to continue to exist.

In days gone by—quite a while ago, I remember, when I was a Member of the House of Commons—time used to be the Opposition’s main and legitimate weapon. Yes, it meant that things were sometimes strung out, but it also ensured scrutiny without time limit. That meant proper scrutiny in real depth; you did not make the same degree of mistakes. To cut the debate short in those days, which was rare, there was such a thing as a guillotine. Over the years, the guillotine became “programming”, which is the modern word for it. The House of Commons now guillotines things routinely, with the result that, like a sausage machine, we get half-thought-through legislation from down the Corridor, which we have to deal with by the bucketload. This is just part of the same thing. Surely we must maintain our right to correct if need be or to look carefully at what they do, and, if need be, to ask them to think again.

The Bill itself is an abuse of the parliamentary system. To ram it through in one day like this would be to compound that abuse. The truth is that it is all part of the plot to stop us leaving the European Union—I am not afraid to mention that. The noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, just intervened on somebody in the debate; he now spends night and day working to stop us leaving the EU. I find it hard to take remarks from people in this Chamber when I know what their motives are. There has been a huge amount of dishonesty over the last two and a half years, not least from the gentleman who is burbling from the Opposition Back Benches.

[Lord Bilimoria]

Is the noble Lord accusing me of dishonesty?

[Lord Framlingham]

Not at all; on the contrary, I accuse him of honesty. He is honest all the time: he wants to stop us leaving the EU and is working night and day to stop it happening. That is what I said, and if he can deny that, I will give way to him again. I do not want to impugn; it is dangerous to get into this, as it gets very emotive, and I know that we do not want to—

[Lord Finkelstein (Con)]

I listened to my noble friend and thought to myself, “But isn’t your objective that we should have no-deal Brexit, and you are pretending that it is about the constitution?” That seems like an extraordinary accusation to make, when my noble friend knows that very well.

[Lord Framlingham]

I will be perfectly honest: if I had my way, we would have a no-deal Brexit and would be out in a few days’ time. We would have the certainty the country is crying out for, and businesses and companies would be able to get on with the job they have been told will need to be done. We would save ourselves £39 billion. It would be refreshing—we would be on our way. There is no doubt about that at all. But how we get there is a different matter, and today we are talking about the difference between what I want and how you achieve it through the structures of politics.

[A noble Lord]

No, we are not.

[Lord Framlingham]

Yes, we are. If the noble Lord does not understand that—he has been here longer than me—he understands nothing at all.

In truth, as I said, it is all part of the same thing. The House did not like it last time I warned it of the damage we will do to ourselves if we are not careful. Some people think that by taking time to look at this today, we are somehow damaging our reputation. People out there know what is going on. Most people either voted leave or now want to leave or want us to get on with it. They do not want any more protracted negotiations and discussions. They know today which side they are on in this House. I contend that there is a grave danger of too many Members in this House not understanding what the people really want, and in the long term that is a danger not just with regard to this issue but for the House itself.

[A noble Lord]

My Lords—

[Lord Framlingham]

I want to press on. I will be accused of filibustering again in a minute, and that is the last thing I want.

A relatively small number in this House—those of us who think like I do about how we deal with our constitutional affairs and such issues, and I link that to the whole EU debate—speak for the people outside this House. I believe that, and that is why many of us feel we have to do what we are doing.

We should remind ourselves that the Commons passed the Bill by a majority of one. Half the Commons did not want to do it. Surely we must look at it extremely carefully. It is our duty to do that. I echo the words of the noble Lord, Lord Owen, earlier today, when he said that if we use our structures and machinery to block what the people have voted for, shame on us. I believe that it will be a shame on us and will have serious repercussions for the future of your Lordships’ House.