House of Lords: Reform

Lord McNally Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd June 2011 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord McNally)]

My Lords, I had a boyhood dream that one day I would stand at a Dispatch Box as a government Minister facing Members of a hostile House and, an hour later, purely on the basis of my oratory and eloquence, I would have turned them round on to my side. I heard a voice say. “Dream on”. However, I shall have a go and, as your Lordships have been so disciplined, I see that I do not have only an hour but two-and-a-half hours to convince you. I can get my speaking notes out now. Some of us have dinner appointments so I will not use all of that time.

I congratulate my noble friend Lord Strasburger on his travels. He should not worry about the teasing of the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, that, since he entered the House, he has travelled a short distance in his opinions about its reform. Some noble Lords on that side have travelled miles and miles and miles.

The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, now claims to know what I am thinking about him even without my saying a word. I hope he will be really insulted by that thought. However, even he confessed that he had once been in favour of reform, that he had come into the House and now was no longer in favour of reform. I think the technical term for that is “the foreman’s job at last” syndrome.

One thought about “Apocalypse Now” prompted me to share with you a short quote from a book that was given to me by the noble Lord, Lord Willoughby de Broke, who I do not think is in his seat. His grandfather was the leader of the “last-ditchers”, who tried to stop the 1911 Act. There are two quotes that are worth reading:

“And what was the final decision of the Constitutional High Court of Appeal, or rather of that proportion of its members who dared to deliver the verdict? The numbers were read out, but those who knew Willoughby and saw him as he entered the Chamber had no need to lengthen their suspense. All was settled and over. By seventeen votes the Parliament Bill had been accepted, and was now the law of the land”.

It was his thoughts about that that were more interesting:

“From the night of the 10th August 1911, when a great principle was sacrificed to expediency; when the right course was departed from for fear of the consequences, the Conservative Party received a shock from which it has never really recovered”.

I am merely pointing out that those speeches we have heard today that predict only the most terrible consequences for radical reform can be very, very wrong indeed. As historians such as the noble Lord, Lord Hennessy, continue to point out, the following century for the Conservative Party was one mainly spent in government. I also find it extraordinary to hear suggestions from the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, and others that the Deputy Prime Minister has been somehow high-handed in his approach to this legislation. No senior politician has given Parliament more chance to consider these measures, has shown more flexibility or offered more opportunity for genuine reflection.

I am not sure which parts of his own White Paper the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, tore up during that extraordinary speech. However, he says with pride that they never produced a draft Bill. So you never did—shame on you that you did not.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, I am grateful for him raising this issue again. The purpose of producing a White Paper is to allow for debate and discussion and that is what we did. The Government would have done better to have had a widespread public consultation and debate before producing a draft Bill.

[Lord McNally]

This again from a Minister who produced a White Paper that produced no such debate. They sat on reform for a decade. When we talk about consistency, I was on the Cook-Maclennan committee prior to the 1997 election, where my party and the Labour Party both committed themselves to a raft of constitutional reform, including reform of the House of Lords. My party has been consistent for the last 14 years on our proposals. The Labour Party has performed somersault after somersault after somersault and there is no way they can get out of it—that is the record.

[Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton]

I remember well the noble Lord, Lord McNally, standing as leader of his party in your Lordships’ House and stating categorically that an elected second Chamber would never threaten the primacy of the House of Commons. At that point he was leader of the Liberal Democrats. How does he tie that in with the speech made by his noble friend Lord Ashdown, who said that this Chamber—if reformed in the way that the noble Lord, Lord McNally, is advocating—would and should be able to challenge the Commons on issues such as going to war and finance?

[Lord McNally]

Is the noble Lord, Lord Cunningham, in his place? No, he is not. When I was on the Cunningham committee, there was great bemusement because I said, as I still believe, that the House of Lords has the right to say no. That is an essential part of the relationship between the two Houses. I honestly wish to God that this House had voted on the Iraq war and that Ministers had read this House’s debate on the matter, but we will not go down that road, not because I do not believe it but because, even among the red herrings that the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, usually streaks across this debate, I am not going to pursue that one.

[Noble Lords]

Oh!

[Lord McNally]

You will get your full two hours if you carry on like this. [Laughter.]

[Lord Grocott]

I knew that in the first five minutes of his speech the Minister would be Mr Nice. He has now turned inevitably to the Mr Nasty phase. He needs to explain to the House that if the new, elected second Chamber were to have essentially the same powers and functions as the present one, as his own White Paper and draft Bill say, how on earth could this Chamber veto absolutely crucial matters that would be determined by the primary House?

[Lord McNally]

I never said that this Chamber should have a right of veto; I said it had a right to say no. There is a difference. Usually in this House somebody is allowed to develop an argument, and I will cover the whole question that was raised. I am not trying to be nasty to the noble Lord, Lord Grocott. I am very affectionate towards him. There were a number of thoughts that passed through during the speeches. I liked the phrase used by the noble Lord, Lord Davies, of a House of grandparents appointed through patronage. I think that is one to reflect on. I liked another one by the noble Lord, Lord Hennessy, who said,

“we must avoid what de Tocqueville called a ‘perpetual utterance of self-applause’”.—[Official Report, 21/6/11; col. 1194.]

We did not entirely manage that over the last two days.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

While my noble friend is very entertaining, does he plan to answer some of the serious questions that have been put in this debate?

[Lord McNally]

You have to be patient. You are behaving as you used to do in the House of Commons. That is why wind-up speeches in the House of Commons take so long. This has been a long debate. I am not going to answer every question in 100 speeches, partly because, as I have already pointed out, this is the start of a process of consideration. I think many of the questions that were raised quite rightly should be addressed by the committee to be chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and I will make further points on that. However, I must remind this House—this unelected House—that all three parties fought the last election advocating direct elections as part of their plan for reform of the House of Lords. Those policies presumably went through a decision-making process in all three parties. I wonder how many of the speeches made from the Labour Benches would go down at a Labour Party conference, or how some of the speeches made from my own Benches would go down at a Liberal Democrat conference.

My party leader and my party took a great deal of criticism when they appeared to go back on a manifesto commitment concerning tuition fees. The noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, made great hay of that during his contribution. However, this is a threefold commitment that the government proposals reflect. As far as I am aware, no one has put proposals to continue with an unelected House before a party conference or put them into an election manifesto. As the noble Lord, Lord True, suggested—

[Lord Cormack]

I am most grateful to my noble friend, but what does he say to the statement made earlier today that no party won the general election and that the one that came closest to doing so—the Conservatives—had the most lukewarm sentence in its manifesto?

[Lord McNally]

All three parties had it in. I have to say that that is a kind of car salesman’s excuse. Let me make it clear that I am not anticipating changing many minds during this speech. However, I am also very well aware—more than this House seems to be aware—that this is not a perfect reflection of opinion in the country. That should be the warning to this House.

[Lord Grocott]

My Lords—

[Lord McNally]

No, not again, Brucie.

[Lord Davies of Coity]

My Lords—

[Lord McNally]

No, I am not taking any more interventions.

Much has been made in this debate of the recommendation in paragraph 61 of the Cunningham committee report, which says:

“Our conclusions apply only to present circumstances. If the Lords acquired an electoral mandate, then in our view their role as the revising chamber, and their relationship with the Commons, would inevitably be called in to question, codified or not. Given the weight of evidence on this point, should any firm proposals come forward to change the composition of the House of Lords, the conventions between the Houses would have to be examined again. What would, could or should be done about this is outside our remit”.

As a member of the Cunningham committee, I was happy to sign that paragraph. The conventions between the two Houses were examined on a regular basis throughout the 20th century and to say that they will be re-examined is no more than a statement of the obvious. What is equally obvious is that how they should be examined and with what outcome was outside the remit of the Cunningham committee. The idea that the Cunningham committee is somehow holy writ and that the conventions and relations between the two Houses would fall like a portcullis at the time of the passing of the Bill is simply absurd.

What is clear is that the relationship between the two Houses has always evolved and will continue to evolve in the future, particularly over the transitional period. The fact remains that the relationship between the Houses is underpinned by the Parliament Acts and the conventions. The House of Commons remains the primary Chamber; nothing in this draft Bill changes that. Nor are we suggesting any short, sharp shock in these proposals; rather, there is what old Fabians will recognise as “the inevitability of gradualness”.

I am interested in the points made by the noble Lords, Lord Wills, Lord Davies, Lord Brooke, Lord Kakkar, and others, about whether codification is necessary. I hope that the committee chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Richard, will look at that issue and take evidence. But there will be a lengthy transitional period of two Parliaments, which will allow transfer of knowledge. Noble Lords would not be prevented from standing for election or being considered for appointment to the reformed House.

[Lord Wills]

As the noble Lord mentioned my name, I would be grateful if I could intervene. I want to be clear on this point on codification. Am I right in thinking that the Government are not ruling out such codification?

[Lord McNally]

We are sending the matter to a committee that will take wide evidence. I hear my noble friend saying that we are ruling it out, which is not an entirely helpful intervention at this stage of the evening, but I do not think that you can set up a commission under a chairman of the independence and distinction of the noble Lord, Lord Richard—and I am delighted that he was willing to take this chairmanship—and then tell him in advance what he can look at. I will go no further. I am sorry. I see the noble Lord, Lord Sewel, who always tries to give a spurious kind of veneer of intellectual credibility to—

[Noble Lords]

Oh!

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord McNally]

Is there anybody I have not insulted yet? Please form an orderly queue. In among the insults, there are some facts. One fact is that it was at times a bit like sitting in the North Korean Parliament. I have often wondered what that was like. Speaker after speaker even had to make the kind of praise that Kim Il-sung had every so often—in this case, it was of the noble Baroness, Lady Boothroyd.

[Baroness Boothroyd]

I wonder whether the Deputy Leader would allow me to bring some semblance of order into this very interesting debate. Perhaps he would answer a serious question which I put yesterday. I am still waiting for an answer and I am sure that we would all be interested in it. In what way would the nation benefit and parliamentary proceedings be enhanced by the abolition of this House of experts and experience, and its replacement by a senate of paid politicians? I am sure that if we came back to answering questions which were being put in the debate, we would all be much happier.

[Lord McNally]

Of course we would. First, there are no proposals to abolish this House. Secondly, the difference between what I am putting before the House for debate and consideration is that this has gone before the electorate in manifestos, while what my noble friend Lord Steel is proposing is an escape hatch. It would mean that we would go to the electorate next time and say, “By the way, that elected House that we promised you is not going to be delivered. We have fixed it so that we are now going to have a wholly appointed House for as long as anybody can see”. I do not think that is a particularly democratic way and that is the difference between what you are proposing and what I am proposing.

[Baroness Boothroyd]

This Government have done so many U-turns, they could do another one.

[Lord McNally]

A most unusual intervention from a Cross-Bencher—you are lucky that we do not have a Speaker. I did at one stage support the Steel Bill. I wanted it because it was the best on offer after the Straw-Hunt proposals were put on ice. The noble Baroness, Lady Royall, knows full well that she could have had the Steel Bill in its entirety in the previous Parliament and that we constantly promised her our votes for it. Yet again, we are dealing with things where the Labour Party, with 13 years to do something about them, did precisely nothing.

[Baroness Royall of Blaisdon]

My Lords, I will skip to my own defence because ultimately, while I agree that it was too late and regret that we did not take it earlier, we did take up most elements of the Steel Bill in the CRaG Bill. In the wash-up, however, those were taken out by the Conservative Opposition of the time.

[Lord McNally]

More mea culpas. The fact is, as well, that one of the benefits for those who like some aspects of the Steel Bill is that the proposals of that Bill are all now in the draft Bill before the House: a statutory Appointments Commission; ending by-elections for hereditary Peers; permanent leave of absence and dealing with those convicted of serious criminal offences. In addition, noble Lords will be considering next Monday the recommendations of the Procedure Committee to provide for permanent voluntary retirement.

However, the proposals in the Bill of my noble friend Lord Steel are in the context of a wholly appointed House, whereas the Government are committed to a wholly or mainly elected second Chamber as set out in the draft Bill. It is unrealistic to believe that any proposal for incremental reform of this House, such as the provisions in my noble friend’s Bill, could be sped through this House without controversy, even with the support of the Government. Moreover, it would be completely unnecessary to do this when the Government have published detailed, comprehensive proposals for full reform.

I turn to the Joint Committee. As I have said before, I have tremendous respect for its chairman. I hope that he will keep an open agenda in terms of the evidence that he takes. The committee that the Deputy Prime Minister chaired tried to bring forward proposals and had a certain degree of consensus. I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, will agree that we worked on and looked at the case for reform based on our manifesto commitments and that the case for reform should be by election. We are setting up the Joint Committee with 13 Members from this House, including a Bishop and a Cross-Bencher. The House agreed a Motion on 7 June that the Joint Committee should report by the end of February 2012.

Giving a target date to a Joint Committee is normal practice. If the committee needs more time, Motions can be put to both Houses to extend the date; but it should not be seen—as some Members, with nods and winks, have suggested—that the committee will have a licence to promote open-ended delay. Reform of this House is an issue that will be debated long and hard both inside and outside the Joint Committee over the coming months. The Government look forward to those discussions. We will listen to the arguments and adapt our proposals. However, we intend to introduce a Bill so that the first elections to this House can take place in 2015.

I end on a personal note. I have given way to no one in my affection and respect for this House—what it does and what it stands for. I greatly regret not grasping the opportunity for reform offered by the Wakeham committee, on which point the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, was absolutely right. If we had, we would be further down the road to a lasting reform than we are today. If we miss the opportunity presented by this Bill and procedure, a House that has won much respect—not least in its willingness to defend civil liberties and human rights and to stand up to the over-mighty power of the Executive—will lose respect as it looks increasingly out of kilter with the spirit of the age.

The proposals that we have made give this House and the other place the opportunity to carry through a reform as significant as the one passed by the Liberal Government a century ago. This is no time for noble Lords to join the last ditchers. There are those who say that, at a time of economic crisis—the worst in 80 years—this is not a time to divert our attention from the central challenges of our day. I would rather invoke the spirit of the last great coalition Government, which launched the Beveridge plan, the Butler Education Act and won a world war. Government is not a one-trick pony. The battle to right the economy is no reason to delay a much needed and long-overdue reform of this House.

On accountability, I am interested in the suggestion that it might be two terms of perhaps seven years. I do not know. Again, I invite the noble Lord, Lord Richard, to look at that. The 15-year term has some weaknesses in democratic accountability that have been pointed out. However, it takes the breath away when speaker after speaker, all of whom have been sent here for life, start lecturing us about the dangers of somebody being sent here for a limited 15-year term. As the Prime Minister made clear in the other place, the Government’s actions to date in producing this draft Bill have been based on trying to work for consensus. The Government are ready to listen; we are prepared to adapt; but we are also determined to act. The Bill, when introduced, like any other piece of government legislation, will be scrutinised, carried through, debated, discussed and passed in the same way.

I have been asked about the Parliament Act. I do not think that you start a piece of legislation by brandishing the Parliament Act, but, especially after some of the passionate debates in favour of the supremacy—the primacy—of the other place, I ask Members of this House, “If the clear and settled view of the other place is for reform, are you going to veto it?”. I think that we should be told.

Other noble Lords raised a number of detailed questions. The Government have set out their views on these issues in the draft Bill and the White Paper. I am sure that the Joint Committee will consider all these issues in very careful detail. My suggestion is that Hansard for the two days of this debate, the Wakeham report, the Cunningham report, the Jack Straw White Paper and the White Paper accompanying this Bill be the Joint Committee’s summer reading. We should now all wish it well and let it get on with that work.

Motion agreed.