Queen’s Speech

Lord McFall of Alcluith Excerpts

Monday 1st June 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord McFall of Alcluith (Lab)]

My Lords, this will be a Parliament dominated by constitutional issues: the Scottish question, the European question and that of human rights. A casual approach to any of these could fatally undermine the union. If we are to learn anything from the situation in Scotland, it is that a sloppy approach from Westminster has resulted in a badly destabilised union, to the extent that the question we face today is: can the centre hold? Some would say that it is too late—that there comes a time when the decay of the political parties inevitably is followed by the decay of the power structures in which they function. We have to accept that in Scotland, the SNP largely has both the momentum and the trust of the Scottish electorate—so, as the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, says, this is a precarious situation for the union. However, there is not an inevitability regarding independence.

In my anecdotal evidence from going around for the general election, I remember knocking on a door and saying to the woman that I was calling on behalf of the Labour Party. She said, “Oh, son”—by the way, that was the first compliment I got and I was happy to receive it—“we used to be Labour but the whole household, half a dozen of us, is now SNP. We’re going to give them a chance and I think that Nicola deserves as good a chance to get into 10 Downing Street as any of the others”. The unreality of the situation in Scotland hit me right in the face as a result of that. We—I speak here as the Labour Party, but it must apply to other opposition parties—have lost the capacity to converse with the electorate in Scotland. Permission for us to engage was denied by the electorate. From the Labour Party point of view, we have a cultural problem to resolve about how the party speaks and the way that it pitches its appeal to the electorate in Scotland. I guess that that goes for other opposition parties as well.

Despite the SNP being full of contradictions, its voice is dominant in Scotland. But let us not forget that 50% of the electorate there voted for the SNP and it secured 56 seats, while 50% of the electorate in Scotland voted for those parties that support the union and we have three seats. It is a very divided country but all is not lost. There is still a substantial majority in Scotland in favour of the union, yet we must address a number of important issues if we want to preserve it.

First, we need a serious, considered and engaging approach by the UK Government and the Westminster body politic. We should never repeat the folly of having a two and a half year referendum campaign without a backward glance, and allowing the positive case—yes—to be made for separation. We need to have a positive narrative for the union—not just something in the negative sense—and it has to be made robustly here.

Secondly, the UK Government need a single-focus devolution mechanism to replace the present fragmented structure, where there are six separate Whitehall centres for devolution policy. We have three Secretaries of State, the Department for Communities and Local Government, the constitutional group of the Cabinet Office and the Treasury’s devolution team. It is a recipe for disaster. The Labour Government, during their time in office, considered a Secretary of State for the nations and regions. They ducked that but it is time for the Government to look at that issue again.

The third issue is civic engagement across the entire countries and regions of the UK. Accompanying that there must be a structural road map to progress constitutional development. As others have said here, devolution policy has been ad hoc, piecemeal and rushed to the point of recklessness. Last Thursday, the Scotland Bill was published, based on the Smith recommendations. The core basis of this agreement has to be implemented. It was endorsed unanimously by all Scottish parties but it is clear that proposing further powers for Scotland creates a need to satisfy the desire for further devolution in England and Wales, and for the political reform of this Parliament. So there is an overwhelming case for a proper constitutional convention to examine carefully, and for the first time, UK-wide devolution implications.

The work of the former Political and Constitutional Reform Committee in the other place on a new Magna Carta points a way to options for reform. However, as one who was involved in the Scottish Constitutional Convention preceding the Scotland Act 1998, I say that it represented the best template for a constitutional convention. It brought together Labour, the Liberal Democrats, the Green Party, local authorities, the Scottish Trades Union Congress, the churches, the Federation of Small Businesses, ethnic minority representatives and the Scottish Women’s Development Forum. The only one absent from it was the Scottish National Party—and, sadly, it has thrived as a result. But that broad-based participation resulted in a report that formed the basis of the 1997 Labour Government White Paper, Scotland’s Parliament. The Scottish Constitutional Convention was very successful. It had a defined remit and covered all the angles which a proposal for a Parliament needed.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

While agreeing with the noble Lord on the need to have some sort of constitutional convention, surely he is not arguing that the asymmetric devolution which resulted in Scotland has led to success. It has led to the disastrous position that we are in now.

[Lord McFall of Alcluith]

The noble Lord always likes to look backwards. I am not going to engage in looking backwards. He should work with me and others to ensure we are forward looking, given that his speech said that the union is in a perilous state. I am sure that he will agree with that, so let us move on and be positive; let us not be negative.

Any idea that the latest round will provide an enduring settlement is illusory. If we are to achieve a proper balance, it will take a long time. That is why a constitutional convention representing the peoples of all parts of the United Kingdom is important. In that convention, a legitimate question will be: how much further can the UK go and remain stable? Is it the intention to maintain the political, social and economic union? If so, there is tricky terrain for us there, not least in the areas of tax, welfare and pensions.

The general election answered the question, “Who is to govern the United Kingdom for the next five years?”, but left open the question of whether there will still be a UK to be governed. If we do not realise the gravity of the constitutional situation facing the UK and do not adopt a serious, coherent, all-embracing, long-term approach, perhaps in five years there will not be a UK to be governed. That would be a tragedy for all the people of these islands, and we must do our best to ensure that it is not the case.