Royal Albert Hall Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts and Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town

Tuesday 10th September 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)]

I want to say a few words before we move to accept the Motion, which I fully support. It is right that the House knows a bit of the background. This appears as an unopposed Bill, but in fact objections were submitted to it so an Opposed Bill Committee was set up, on which I had the privilege to serve for the first time under the chairmanship of the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Hale. However, when we met, the Bill’s promoter, the Royal Albert Hall, contested the bona fides of the objectors to have any say, as they did not meet the very narrow definition in our rules of who has the right to be heard on a private Bill. The surprise—to me, at least—was to discover that the general public had no right to be heard.

To some extent that is mitigated by the Attorney-General’s duty to put his or her view to the Opposed Bill Committee. In this case, the then Attorney-General expressed considerable disquiet about elements of the governance of the Albert Hall, as had the Charity Commission on a number of occasions, but she found no compelling reason to object to the Bill subject to the removal of the most contentious clause, which would have increased the number of privately owned seats whose owners would then be entitled to vote at general meetings and to elect members of the charity’s council.

On the issue of procedure, rather than the merits of the Bill, our Opposed Bill Committee was forced to conclude that the objectors did not meet the somewhat strict criteria as to who could have their voices heard. Thus the objectors effectively disappeared, and with them the rationale for our committee, which was promptly dissolved as the Bill became an unopposed Bill and went straight to an Unopposed Bill Committee, which comprised the Senior Deputy Speaker sitting with counsel.

On 22 May he heard from representatives of the Albert Hall and agreed the Bill as amended by the removal of the contentious clause, which would have increased the number of privately owned seats that the owners can sell on the open market for performances. On that very day, but before the Bill had the chance to return to your Lordships’ House for Third Reading, the election was called. The Motion before the House today is to permit the Bill to continue on its passage rather than start de novo. If agreed—and I hope it will be—there will be a Third Reading on a date yet to be set.

However, in the light of the debate in the then Opposed Bill Committee, led by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Hale, its membership decided to draw the wider matter to the attention of your Lordships’ House by way of a special report published on 25 April. This allowed us to put before the House the part of the Attorney-General’s letter that expressed her

“disappointment that the Bill is not more ambitious”

and does not deal with the potential conflict between the private interests of seat-holding trustees and the hall’s charitable objectives, an issue of concern to the Charity Commission. The Attorney-General had earlier urged the hall to resolve these conflicts, hence her regret that the Bill did not do so.

However, the Attorney-General cannot insist on changes to the Albert Hall’s governance, and it is refusing to make the changes desired by the Charity Commission and others—an “impasse”, as our committee noted. Today is the only opportunity for the committee to have these voices heard, which is why I am standing today. We concluded that

“these matters should be drawn to the attention of the House and of the Government”,

including at further stages of the Bill,

“so that a way forward can … be found to address the concerns raised”

by the then AG.

As we said:

“The Royal Albert Hall plays an iconic part in the life of the nation and there is a strong public interest in ensuring that its governance”


is

“consistent with its charitable status”.

That matter is not one for debate today, and I hope the Motion will be passed for the Third Reading of the Bill to take place. I have been advised that there is no Report stage—the amended Bill is, in fact, the report—and the Bill will come to your Lordships’ House for Third Reading on a date to be agreed.

I thought it right to bring the matters raised by that committee to the attention of the House today, but I hope noble Lords will support the Motion.

[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)]

My Lords, I had the pleasure of sitting and watching the noble Baroness’s committee in action over a lengthy period, and perhaps I may take up the story. I was not a member of the committee, but I have had a long-standing interest in the affairs of the Royal Albert Hall. I, along with other Members of your Lordships’ House, am very concerned about the central problem of the governance of the Royal Albert Hall—not the operation of the hall, which is a great cultural institution, as the noble Baroness said, but the way it operates.

The group of which I am one is a cross-party group. There is no party-political angle on this; all parties agree that it needs careful further examination, as the noble Baroness said. No less significantly, we are supported in our endeavours by the Charity Commission, the sector regulator, which has been trying for some years to get the Royal Albert Hall to consider, reflect on and address this problem, so far without success.

The Royal Albert Hall has been a charity since 1967. A central tenet of charity law is that you should not benefit personally from the decisions you take as a trustee of a charity. The hall has a governing body of 25, 19 of whom—three-quarters—are seat-holders. It is they who decide which concerts the seats are to be retained for. They may then either use the seats personally or sell them externally for whatever price the market will bear. It has become an exceptionally profitable activity. For example, Members of your Lordships’ House might like to attend this Saturday’s Last Night of the Proms, for which they will pay up to £1,000 for a £100 ticket. If your enthusiasm takes you to want to buy a seat, which will have another 700 years to run on the lease, they are currently selling for about £300,000 each. This is a charity.

The Bill before us, which we will discuss in detail later, will not address any of these issues. In fact, some argue it will make them worse. So, the group of which I am a member will be tabling some amendments for discussion, to address the issues, as far as we can, within the provisions of the Long Title of the Bill, at Third Reading.

To conclude, I am astonished that the promoters of the Bill have decided to bring it back. It received an exceptionally rough ride at Second Reading on 19 October last year. The then Attorney-General in her report on the Bill expressed disappointment that more had not be done to resolve the conflict issue in this new Bill. As the noble Baroness said, our own in-house committee reported extremely unfavourably on the way the proceedings were handled. Those arguments are for another day, but in nodding the Bill through, I would like the House to be aware that a significant number of your Lordships are very concerned about what lies behind it.