Recall of MPs Bill

Lord Tyler Excerpts

Monday 2nd March 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howarth of Newport (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours for persisting with this theme, and for bringing this issue back once again at Third Reading however forlorn the prospect of acceptance of his compromise amendment may seem to be—and it is. As other noble Lords have said, the issue that it deals with is one of very great importance for the House of Commons. I believe, in any case, that by introducing these provisions for the recall process, the House of Commons has demonstrated a catastrophic lack of self-confidence. Specifically, the means of policing its own affairs that the House of Commons has traditionally used is the operation of the Standards Committee. Through the provisions in the Bill, and particularly through the amendment brought in by the Labour Party to reduce the period of suspension from 20 days to 10 days, which would trigger the recall process, the effect will be greatly to reduce the practical capacity of the Standards Committee to perform its proper function.

If the House of Commons is to rehabilitate itself in the public esteem, it must be seen to be able to take responsibility, and to provide effective means to take responsibility, for matters of internal discipline and for disciplining Members of Parliament who transgress or commit serious wrongdoing. In so reducing the realistic scope for disciplinary sanctions that the Standards Committee can recommend to the full House, the House of Commons has portrayed a lack of self-confidence and done itself a deep disservice.

So I add to the plea from my noble friend Lord Hughes of Woodside that the Front Bench will accept the amendment simply to allow Members of the House of Commons to think again about this. Very few of them participated. Very few of them voted in the debates. Many of them did not realise the import of what was approved by the House. They ought to have that opportunity to think again, in their interests and in the interests of parliamentary democracy. I think that we in your Lordships’ House are fully entitled to offer our advice to them on this matter. As another House of Parliament, and as citizens, we have an interest in the integrity, good name and good functioning of the House of Commons.

[Lord Tyler (LD)]

My Lords, I am very sympathetic indeed to Amendments 1 and 2 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, for the very specific reason that I have followed the progress of the Bill throughout its stages in both Houses and I can confirm to your Lordships that a whole number of implications which have arisen in this House were not addressed there—for one very simple reason: all the votes were on a free vote. I am very enthusiastic about free voting in both Houses, but of course when there is a free vote there is not the same guidance from the parties about the full implications of the measures in front of the House—whether it is this House or that House.

I can confirm absolutely the point made by the noble Lords, Lord Hughes of Woodside and Lord Howarth, that this issue of what could easily happen—in the terms that have been so forensically analysed by the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours—in the Standards Committee, simply were not addressed in the debate in the other place. I suggest to my noble friend Lord Forsyth that if the recall mechanism was in place, for example, I do not believe that party leaders would feel that it was appropriate to appear to prejudge the outcome of an inquiry by removing the party Whip. I think that they would be inclined to leave it to the commissioner, the committee and then to the recall process—and eventually, of course, to the electorate, as is the intention behind the Bill.

On those grounds, I hope that my noble friends on the Front Bench will be prepared to think very carefully about how we must give the House of Commons another opportunity to think through the implications of this part of the Bill.

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, I have felt all along that this is a very ill conceived, ill thought-out Bill, and one that does no credit to Parliament in general or to the House of Commons in particular. I have briefly made similar points to those made by the noble Lord, Lord Howarth of Newport, in previous debates.

I feel that this is such a bad Bill that it is, frankly, unimprovable and unamendable, but I salute the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours. He is sometimes a controversial figure but nobody can deny that he is a parliamentarian of real status who is deeply concerned about the reputation of Parliament. He is trying very hard with this amendment and, in so far as anything could improve the Bill, it is probably this, if it were passed, because it would give that chance for another place to think again.

What concerns me more than anything else—I alluded to this a few seconds ago—is the status and standing of Parliament. This great and free country of ours depends above all on two things: the rule of law and the sovereignty of Parliament. In eroding the sovereignty of Parliament, we do no one any service. This Bill is in fact the erosion of the sovereignty of Parliament Bill. This House is clearly not going to stand in the way of the elected House, but it does behove us constantly to remind the Members of that elected House that by their lack of confidence in themselves they are doing no one any service.

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[Lord Campbell-Savours]

My Lords, this amendment was born from an undertaking given by the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, in winding up in the last debate on Report, at col. 1144 of the Official Report of 10 February 2015, when he said that he would consider my Amendment 6, which dealt with the issue of lay membership of the Standards Committee. My amendment draws on a report of the Procedure Committee on lay membership of the Committee on Standards and Privileges from November 2011. The report states that the Procedure Committee in the Commons concluded that,

“if lay members were to be given voting rights, legislation should set the matter beyond a doubt. The Committee believed that appointing lay members in the absence of such legislation would carry a ‘strong element of risk’, in that it could ‘lead to conflict between the House and the courts and might have a chilling effect on how the Committee conducts its work even before such a challenge emerged’”.

That comment in the report came in response to a Commons resolution of 2 December 2010 inviting the Procedure Committee to bring forward proposals from the Committee on Standards in Public Life for lay membership to be appointed to the Standards and Privileges Committee, which, indeed, is precisely what has happened.

However, the voting aspect is not a new issue for the House of Commons to consider. It was first considered in 1876, when Sir Thomas Erskine May, then Clerk of the House of Commons, argued that it was not an illegal act to appoint lay members with full voting rights to committees on Private Bills. However, since then, I understand that both the Clerk of the Commons —I think in the last Parliament, but perhaps even earlier in this Parliament—and the Joint Committee on Parliamentary Privilege opposed lay members being given the right to vote. I have therefore tabled this amendment to give the Government the opportunity to clarify their position on that matter.

I consider that this is an important issue. That is why I am moving this amendment. On 10 February, at col. 1131 of the Official Report, I argued for a very different approach to the handling of complaints by the Commons Standards Committee based on a majority lay membership—which I support—with a right to recommend, but not vote, and with its recommendations being either accepted or rejected by a committee minority of elected Members of Parliament—as elected Members of Parliament, they would enjoy full parliamentary privilege—as against the majority lay membership. If the Minister has difficulty addressing all the points I am making on this matter, I will perfectly understand if he wishes to write to me after the debate. However, it is very important that at some stage in the near future—certainly in this Parliament—we establish the Government’s attitude to lay members of the Standards Committee being given that right to vote. I beg to move.

[Lord Tyler]

My Lords, I speak to Amendment 5, which is linked with the amendment just moved by the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours. I am delighted to follow his forensic and forceful analysis of the very serious issues arising from this part of the Bill and have considerable sympathy with his views.

Ever since Second Reading, the noble Lord, and indeed noble Lords on all sides of the House, have rightly raised concerns about the effects of the Bill on the fragile, non-partisan nature of the Standards Committee in the Commons. I think that many Members of your Lordships’ House remain concerned about that. Indeed, it was a theme of the debate we have just had on previous amendments. I note that a number of prominent former Members of the Commons expressed those concerns, particularly those who, like me, have had to deal with the Standards Committee in a variety of official roles.

In the same vein, and right from the start of this Bill’s passage through Parliament, beginning in the other place, there have been cross-party endeavours to ensure that the process for triggering a recall petition is independent of MPs and is seen to be independent of MPs. My noble friend Lord Norton raised this issue in the early stages of the Bill’s consideration here, and it was the theme of the important report of the Constitution Committee of your Lordships’ House. In my view, and that of my colleagues across the House, it remains the one crucial weakness at the very heart of the Bill, and it has been the subject of widespread concern in both Houses.

Ministers have been open throughout to suggestions for improvements and I am extremely grateful, as are my colleagues, to them and officials for being so ready to discuss changes that might be made. The Minister in charge of the Bill, Greg Clark, made a promise at the end of the Commons stages that,

“the Government were clear on Second Reading that we are open to ways to improve the Bill and we stand by that commitment”.—[Official Report, Commons, 24/11/14; col. 681.]

He has been true to his promise, and there has indeed been constructive engagement in your Lordships’ House. However, I am sorry to report that attempts to find another route for triggering recall that would have obviated MPs and the Standards Committee altogether have failed. We tried but it has not been successful.

In the interim, the Standards Committee has produced an extremely thoughtful, positive and authoritative report on its own future and role. As Members who were here on Report will recall, the report was published that very morning. It is therefore not surprising that few of us were given the opportunity to read it in detail. For that reason, I hope that I will be forgiven for reading a critical paragraph of the report, paragraph 34 on page 40, in full:

“A number of criticisms are levelled at the House of Commons disciplinary system both by outside observers and parliamentary insiders: MPs sit in judgement on themselves; the Commissioner is not truly independent; there is incomplete separation of powers with the Commissioner acting as investigator, prosecutor and to some extent adjudicator; the system is disproportionate; the rules are not clear; MPs cannot get advice; the sanctions are insufficient. It is these criticisms which this Report considers and, where appropriate, makes recommendation for addressing”.

Every Member of your Lordships’ House who has been following the progress of the Bill must recognise that that paragraph and the whole report are critical to the way in which the recall Bill is supposed to proceed; they are vital. That is why we have tabled new amendments to make sure that there is a direct linkage between action that is taken to fulfil the recommendations of the Standards Committee and the implementation of this part of the Bill.

The Standards Committee also says in terms that it needs a more robust, more sizeable independent element. This is why it links so well with what the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, has just been saying about the lay members. The committee’s recommendation at paragraph 90 is:

“After considering various Committee sizes we recommend a marginal increase in Committee size from thirteen to fourteen, with seven lay and seven elected members”,

thereby building the independent role of those lay members in all matters that would be relevant to the recall Bill. The report, and that specific recommendation, is the inspiration for Amendment 5, for which I am grateful to have the support of my noble friends Lord Norton and Lord Lexden and the noble Lord, Lord Alton.

It is in that specific section of the Standards Committee report that we should be putting our faith, trust and confidence if we are to make sure that the Bill has any credibility in the outside world, let alone fulfils the full obligations of the committee and deals with the problems to which so many Members of your Lordships’ House have been referring. Our amendment would ensure that the committee’s key recommendation was implemented before the Committee on Standards was asked to get involved in this potentially invidious way in the recall process. Alongside the other committee recommendations, such as that,

“the body of any Report makes clear whether or not the lay members agreed with the Report”,

this change would at least be a start in showing that the recall process is reasonably independent from MPs, and is seen to be so.

I hope that my noble friends on the Front Bench will be able to respond positively to this amendment. Although the composition of the committee is of course a matter for the whole House of Commons, I understand that the Leader of the House and his colleagues are taking this matter of the relationship between these proposals and the Recall of MPs Bill extremely seriously. Surely we can now have a firm assurance from the Government that they would not want to see this recall mechanism operated by a committee with an insufficient number of independent lay members sitting on it.

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[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

Yes, we will make exceptions in some cases—particularly for the sons of Church of England clergymen.

Standards have developed and moved, and we are discussing how we would advise the House of Commons and how the Government should respond to the House of Commons on its proposals to move the Standards Committee further. The recent report calls for an increase in the number of lay members—we have had three lay members since 2013—and in their representation as a proportion of the committee. The Government already have a high regard for the lay members of the Standards Committee and appreciate the very important role they play in the work of the committee. The three lay members who currently serve have clearly made a valuable contribution and add an important level of independence to the process.

The Standards Committee report has only very recently been published and the Government have not found time to agree a formal response—the matter is, after all, in principle for the Commons itself. If I may say as clearly as I can, the Government can see no reason at all why there should not be an increase in the number of lay members of the committee, as proposed in the Standards Committee’s report. The disciplinary procedures of the House of Commons are, in principle, a matter for that House as a whole. It is for the Government to facilitate a debate in which the report of the Standards Committee can be considered in detail and consequent changes agreed.

I would urge this House to ponder carefully any course of action that might be interpreted as pressuring, influencing or leaning on the other place to make such a significant change to its disciplinary procedure. After all, we come up against issues of parliamentary sovereignty and parliamentary privilege.

[Lord Tyler]

I am grateful to my noble friend and recognise that he is in a difficult position for the reasons he has just enunciated. We do not want to look as if we are telling the House of Commons when it should take its business, but can he at least, say, on behalf of the Government, that it would be the hope and intention of the business managers for the extremely important report from the Standards Committee to be addressed and, I hope, action taken before the Dissolution of this Parliament later this month? May I appeal to the Minister to ignore the pleas from the ultra-conservative tendency in this House, represented by the noble Lords, Lord Howarth and Lord Cormack, who I think have not read the report of the Standards Committee which addresses very carefully the issues of parliamentary sovereignty and parliamentary privilege?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I also give way to the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours.

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[Lord Tyler]

My Lords, I think this is a sensible compromise. I, too, supported the view that the excessive period was unnecessary. Once we had in place the flexibility on places for signing to take account of geography and demography in areas such as the one I know and the one the noble Baroness knows, it was a very sensible thing to move. I do not accept that a further, more drastic reduction to three or four weeks would really have been very practical. After all, this is not going to be an anticipated event in the same way that a general election is. There will be an extension of postal involvement in the process, and therefore six weeks is a reasonable period. A further reduction would be wrong. This is a good compromise, and I am grateful to my noble friend.

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town]

I add my thanks to the Minister for tabling this amendment, to which we have added our names. I also congratulate my noble friend Lord Howarth of Newport, who argued persuasively both on Report and today. Given the move from four to 10 signing places, we really did not need the lengthy period of eight weeks. I hope that, for costs and other reasons, there will now be less need for people to apply for postal votes, and it will be easier for people to arrange to meet one of the signing places. While we would not want to rush the petition, we think that both the MP and the constituents deserve to have as swift a result as possible so that the MP is not taken away from their normal parliamentary duties for an inordinate period, as has been outlined by my noble friend Lord Howarth. We see six weeks as being an improvement on eight and look forward to this amendment passing shortly.

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[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab)]

My Lords, my noble friend Lady Hayter of Kentish Town and I have also put our names to the amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, on the role of the Electoral Commission. As the Minister has described, the amendments have the effect of requiring the Electoral Commission to take a greater role in the scrutiny of recall proceedings, which is to be welcomed. As a general principle, the Electoral Commission needs to move on from its present position of offering advice and guidance to more specific areas that it is responsible for, and to be held account properly by Parliament for its work in those areas. That is my position, although it is a matter for another day.

The specific amendments address the points that I have argued were lacking throughout the Bill. I am grateful to the Minister for mirroring the amendments that we on these Benches put forward in previous stages of the Bill. The first set of amendments to Schedule 5 ensures that all returns by campaigners are subject to checks by the Electoral Commission and delete the phrase “on request”, thereby requiring the petition officer to deliver a copy of all the recall petition returns when they have been received. We strongly disputed the Electoral Commission’s view that these would be little local events with a local feel. I took the view that that was a silly claim by the commission; we all know that these will be national events attracting enormous media attention. The commission is best equipped to look at the work being done with returns, as it has both the resources and the expertise at its disposal. I did not accept the commission’s note on this when it said that it may need additional resources to make this work. We all hope that these provisions will be enacted very rarely, and I am very confident, as a former commissioner, that this extra work can be done from existing resources.

We believe that these amendments are particularly important, given that the Government have not accepted our concerns about the potential loopholes that have been left open with regards to donations and expenditure received by both accredited and non-accredited campaigners. This at least goes some way towards ensuring that the financial circumstances of campaigns are subject to some level of scrutiny. Although we are disappointed that the Government have failed to address what we from these Benches regard as the inherent unfairness in the equality of arms of accredited campaigners, as well as the lack of safeguards on permissible donors, we are at least glad that we have managed to persuade Ministers that it is paramount that donation returns are checked.

It is hoped that this will go some way to providing confidence in the financial aspects of recall campaign procedures, which we on this side of the House believe could be open to abuse. The Government’s other amendment to Schedule 5 is a technical amendment, which clarifies the Bill, and we support it. The amendments to Schedule 6 require the Electoral Commission to produce a report on the recall petition proceedings once they have been completed. As I said previously, given that this is an entirely new facet of campaigning, I believe that an independent assessment of the process would be greatly welcomed, not only by constituents but by those affected or involved in the process, and by everyone else involved.

In conclusion, the amendments made in your Lordships’ House have been small but significant in making it more workable for all involved. Perhaps the most important inclusion in the forthcoming regulations will be the requirement on the petition notification card to inform electors of the fact that they are signing what could become a public petition. Given that the Government rejected our judgment that this was de facto a public petition, this is at least something to address the issue of secrecy and the availability of the marked register, the details of which still have to be worked out.

Regrettably, little attention has been given to such practicalities or even the principles of the recall process, which explains why so much has been left to regulations —fairly inexcusable, given that the Government have had an entire Parliament to draft a 25-clause Bill. Despite this, the help that we received from the noble Lords, Lord Wallace of Saltaire and Lord Gardiner of Kimble, was much appreciated, and we welcomed it very much. They were willing to meet us to discuss the detail and the principle, so I record my thanks and those of my colleagues on these Benches for their hard work. Also, I join them in supporting and thanking the Bill team for their hard work; they have been courteous and helpful throughout the process.

I thank my noble friend Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town. We were friends for many years before we came into the House—we came in on the same list nearly five years ago. It is always a pleasure to work with her. Her leadership and hard work on this are much appreciated by everyone involved. I thank my colleague Helen Williams from the opposition office for her contribution; though it was behind the scenes, it was very much appreciated by me and my colleagues here. I also thank noble Lords on all sides of the House for their work. We have done our job as a revising Chamber, and I am grateful to everyone involved.

We have all expressed the wish that the Bill will never need to be used. However, it is right that it should be as fit as possible in case it is. The Minister knows that we remain concerned about the possible intrusion of big money into the consideration of whether an MP should continue in Parliament. I hope that he is right and we are wrong in worrying about this. That apart, we have made the Bill a bit better than when it arrived in your Lordships’ House. I hope that it can now be moved on so it is an Act of Parliament very soon.

[Lord Tyler]

I wish to comment briefly on these amendments. Since the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, signed them, I felt it was only right that he should be allowed to go first, but I endorse everything he said; these are useful improvements. When the Bill first came to your Lordships’ House there was a certain mood that somehow we should not be making improvements to it—not that it was incapable of improvement, but that somehow we should not be looking at such internal matters as those with which the Bill is concerned because they are so clearly matters that intimately affect the Commons collectively and individual MPs. I am delighted that through the whole of the debate, at all stages, that apparent lack of confidence in the role of your Lordships’ House has fallen away and we have had very serious, helpful and, I hope, positive discussions about how to improve this legislation.

It would be ironic if, simply because the Bill affected so intimately the self-interest of Members of the other place, somehow we felt we could not take any view on it, when as a Parliament we clearly have to take a view both about the reputation of Parliament as a whole and about the intricacy and effectiveness of individual proposed legislation. I share the concern of the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, that it may well be that this turns out not to be entirely fit for purpose. Presumably, it will be tested when, or if, it is used, and that will be an obvious moment for us to review the situation, as my noble friend Lord Norton and I said in a previous debate. If we had accepted the view that because it was of such intricate, direct self-interest concern to Members of Parliament then somehow or other we had to withhold our views, that would surely have given credence to the idea that the form of your Lordships’ House could not be a matter of concern to the other House of Parliament, which would be patently ludicrous. I am pleased that in fact that situation fell by the wayside and no one has pressed that.

I share with the Minister and the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, my thanks as an individual Member of your Lordships’ House to all those who have taken such trouble within the Government to try to make sure that we had the best possible opportunities to influence the way in which this legislation came before us. In particular, I thank my noble friends Lord Wallace and Lord Gardiner for the impeccable way in which they have treated us, giving us every appropriate opportunity to try to improve the Bill. It is slightly improved, but I suspect that some of the issues that we were dealing with earlier today will come back to haunt us before too long.