UK Constitution: Oversight and Responsibility (Report from the Constitution Committee)

Lord Wallace of Saltaire Excerpts

Friday 4th July 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Beith, for the committee’s work and for his clear and comprehensive introduction today. I thank the committee for taking on the difficult—indeed, impossible—task of trying to find ways, within the limits of its mandate, to prop up a tottering, failing system. I declare my position as a vice-president of the Local Government Association, for reasons I will come back to later.

If we start where the committee starts, paragraph 3 of the report says that the system is “uncodified and flexible”, and cites the Supreme Court from 2019: our system

“remains sufficiently flexible to be capable of further development”.

I am afraid that there is a tone there of protesting too much. The vehemency is a measure of desperation. We are stuck, rather visibly, somewhere between the 16th and the 19th centuries. That is rather acknowledged in paragraph 5, where the committee says that the constitution is

“vulnerable to erosion and challenge, and relies to a considerable extent upon individuals respecting and complying with constitutional norms”.

The noble Lord, Lord Neuberger of Abbotsbury, very clearly set out how much that is not happening.

I begin with a practical example. This week marks the 10th anniversary of the slaughter of Cecil the lion by a vile American trophy hunter in Zimbabwe. That reminds me of a disgraceful evening in your Lordships’ House, on 12 September 2023. A Bill had gone through the elected House with the support of all sides. We saw in this House 12 former public schoolboys drive a cart and horses through what we have always been told are the respected traditions of the House—the unwritten, uncodified rules—to filibuster the Hunting Trophies (Importation Prohibition) Bill. The unwritten rules demonstrably were not worth the paper that they were not written on.

The committee’s report refers to the

“primacy of the Prime Minister in safeguarding the constitution”.

There is an obvious, glaring weakness there if our constitution relies on one person. That is not the way for a constitution to organise a structure. More than that, I point out the position of the Prime Minister. Our current Prime Minister and his party, after a landslide election, have the support of 34% of people who voted in the general election last year. If we look at eligible voters, we find that the Prime Minister has the support of 20% of them. Of course, we do not elect the Prime Minister; we elect MPs. If we look at who elected our current Prime Minister, of the people of Holborn and St Pancras who voted, less than half of them voted for Sir Keir Starmer. We are putting all the weight of our constitution on this one person, on those incredibly fragile foundations.

Is it any wonder—a lot of Members of your Lordship’s House commented on this—that, at the start of this year, there was a Channel 4 poll in which 52% of 13 to 27 year-olds said that the UK would be in a better place with a strong leader who does not have to bother with Parliament and elections. I remind your Lordships that that is where we are today. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, said, a wide range of people now regard the idea of coming into Parliament as poison. That is a measure of the problems with where we are.

How about, instead, we start to think much more broadly? I absolutely do not fault the committee for not doing this—I am sure it did not regard this as within its mandate. How about we think about having a proper, modern, democratic, functional constitution? That is where we have to go, because it is not what we have now. We can see the impact of this in the state of the nation—we could even say in the state of this building. It is easy to blame individuals—and I do, very often—but why do we keep having failing Government after failing Government after failing Government? We have to look at the constitutional and institutional structures.

I come to a more specific point. In chapter 5 of the report, about the Council of the Nations and Regions, the committee says:

“The Government should set out who within the UK Government is responsible for the Council of the Nations and Regions”.


It is clear that this is being taken so seriously that we have no idea who is responsible for something that will meet every six months and bring together elected mayors who represent some parts of the country. Again, we are going to see first past the post elections, with elected mayors who may well be elected with 25% to 30% of the vote. That is who is going to be speaking for their regions. These are devolution plans imposed from Westminster.

I come to a very specific point here. It is interesting that this entire report makes no mention of local councils, which are at least rather more representative local organisations. They are not included in the Council of the Nations and Regions. I point to a ministerial Statement in June, when the Government declared that councils must have a leader and cabinet model. This is Westminster directing how local councils should work. This is supposed to ensure that local communities will have the right mechanism to engage with their council. I have a question for the Minister directly. The people of Bristol in 2022 and the people of Sheffield in 2021, through a grass-roots campaign and a referendum of the whole city, decided that they want committee structures in their councils. Are the Government really going to overrule that basic piece of democracy?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

Probably.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

I hear “probably” from the Liberal Democrat Front Bench, and I fear that that may be right.

Having just been at the Local Government Association conference in Liverpool, I warn the Minister and the Government that there will be resistance to the plans to abolish district councils—the form of government closest to the people. People are going to fight.

I come to my concluding sentence. We cannot rely on good chaps suddenly discovering a sense of responsibility and honesty. Institutional structures do not support “good chap” behaviour. The Select Committee is trying valiantly to shore up something that is not working. We need to think about getting a modern, functional, democratic constitution for the UK.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lord, the UK is a constitutional democracy without a written constitution. It is a very odd constitution. The integrity of our system of government therefore depends on the willingness of those in power to accept the constraints of constitutional conventions: to behave like gentlemen. This report states in its opening paragraph,

“the actions of Ministers and Prime Ministers”

in the last decade have placed “strains” on our constitution —that is a very modest way of putting something about the behaviour of Boris Johnson and Liz Truss. However, that sets the context for the report’s recommendations. Furthermore, evidence from opinion surveys that shows that public distrust of Westminster, Whitehall, Parliament and government is at an all-time high makes it even more important to re-examine the mechanisms for maintaining appropriate and ethical behaviour and the “ancillary structures”, as the report puts it, that provide the constitutional guardrails against inappropriate behaviour.

I found the Government’s response to this report flabby and complacent. It ignores the acute strains that Johnson and Truss placed on our constitutional conventions, and so draws no lessons from them. What we read is a defence of the current messy distribution of tasks across Whitehall with no indication of concern that improvements might be needed. Ten days ago, I listened to a speech by the current “Minister for the Constitution”, Nick Thomas-Symonds, at a Constitution Unit conference. His message was that better delivery of public services would be enough to

“restore the public’s faith in our constitution”,

although he added in passing that we should always be looking at the adequacy of checks and balances.

Some noble Lords will have seen today’s Times cartoon, which depicts President Trump declaring 4 July the day of independence from checks and balances and of getting away from constitutional constraints—I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Hannan, is extremely happy that Trump is behaving in such a fashion.

Reading this report on Wednesday morning and then going into the debate on Report on the hereditary Peers Bill, I was also reminded of the parallels between this and that debate. The noble Lord, Lord Hannan, and the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, argued that a popular democracy should not create bodies of unelected people to hold back an elected Prime Minister, and the noble Lord, Lord Jackson of Peterborough, warned against an “activist judiciary” of unelected judges constraining prime ministerial power. The noble Lord, Lord Hannan, has just repeated that we should not try to constrain future Governments. The whole point of constitutions is indeed to constrain future Governments. I have read much of the many writings of the noble Lord, Lord Hannan, including that wonderful but entirely inaccurate book on how the Anglo-Saxons invented freedom. Actually, the history of the United States in its relationship to Britain is about the invention of constitutional democracy with all the constraints that President Washington, The Federalist Papers and others put on that, which President Trump is now doing his utmost to tear away. The difference between popular democracy and constitutional democracy is important. I stand on one side of it; the noble Lord very clearly stands with President Trump, Viktor Orban and others, apparently, on the other side.

Our unwritten constitution has executive dominance, within context which it is hoped the Prime Minister will observe, and a number of parliamentary, judicial and advisory checks and balances that are intended to strengthen those constraints. Some of those present may already have registered for the Policy Exchange meeting on 16 July entitled “Is Populism the Future of the Right?” I hope that most of us here will say, “We hope not”.

This report refers to the complex framework of institutional guardians that safeguard the UK constitution. It nevertheless notes that since the abolition of the Lord Chancellor’s office, the various bodies within Whitehall have been shuffled around from the Department for Constitutional Affairs into the Cabinet Office on to the ministry for local government and so on without really having the importance which they have.

In their manifesto last year, the Government promised a number of things on which they have not yet begun to deliver. Where is the ethics and integrity commission that we were promised? What is happening to the revision of the Cabinet Manual? It is particularly important that the Cabinet Manual is revised because it was sparked by Gordon Brown in 2008-09, partly because he believed that we might not have a single-party majority in the 2010 election. It was not completed for that, but it was a useful help. It now looks highly likely that in the 2029 election we will have a non-majoritarian outcome. At the moment, we have five parties in England effectively competing, six in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and today we have had the announcement of a seventh. That might well lead us to a messy outcome. When I look at politics in Yorkshire, I can see the party that Zarah Sultana has spoken of winning several seats in Yorkshire under current conditions. We will need an updated Cabinet Manual to guide the negotiations that may then have to follow. I hope the Minister will be able to say something about progress with the Cabinet Manual, which in an unwritten constitutional situation becomes all the more important.

I was interested in the number of Peers who spoke about oaths. As I swear at the beginning of each Parliament to be loyal to the King, his heirs and successors, I wonder whether I should not actually be swearing to obey the constitution and the laws of this country instead. I think that when a Prime Minister comes into office, it would be appropriate for them to swear an oath, perhaps in front of the House of Commons, that he or she will respect the laws of this country. It would be a very good idea for the Constitution Committee to look at the oaths Act 1868—rather a long time ago—and consider how the taking of office of one sort or another in the various parts of the British constitutional machinery should perhaps now be updated.

On the Council of the Nations and Regions, I am one of the very small number of people who have actually read the Gordon Brown report—I see that the noble Baroness, Lady Alexander, has also read her way through it—which put forward the idea of an alternative second Chamber. It would indeed have created a very different, and I think much more constructive, second Chamber than we currently have. It had some relevance to the 2011 proposals that the coalition Government put forward, which I as a then Minister struggled to persuade this House, unsuccessfully, were a good idea.

What we have now in the Council of the Nations and Regions is really almost nothing. It has met twice. We are not quite sure who goes to it nor where the secretariat is. I strongly agree with those who have said that the problem of local democracy in England in particular is a real problem, and it is a constitutional problem. I encourage the Constitution Committee to look again at what is meant by devolution and why we are losing so much of our local democracy within the English part of this country in particular.

Lastly, I want to touch on the role of the monarchy. Over the last few months, watching Trump in the United States, I have for the first time begun to appreciate the usefulness of the ambiguous relationship between the monarch and the Prime Minister. There is no one to say to President Trump, when he wishes to behave without any constraints whatsoever, “Are you sure you’re doing the right thing?”, or, “I’m very sorry but you cannot see me at the moment—perhaps in two or three days’ time”. I well remember that when there was an attempted military coup in Spain, it was the King’s refusal to agree that prevented it. For the first time, in a sense, I see that the role of the monarch and his advisers, as well as of the Prime Minister and his advisers, perhaps forms one of the few backstops we might need in an emergency.

Our constitutional issues are, as we can see from the thinly attended Benches, dry and not of interest most of the time to most people. However, British politics is in a very confused situation. The public mistrust Westminster and Whitehall, and after the next election we are likely to face considerable constitutional confusion. For that reason, the Government need to take constitutional issues much more seriously in order to fulfil some of the promises in their manifesto, which they have not yet done, and to produce, in consultation with the appropriate committees in the Commons and the Lords, a revised Cabinet Manual.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)]

I absolutely did, but I think on this occasion we can suggest that this Government are very clear in their commitment to the rule of law and the people who are in post.

There was a great deal of discussion about good chaps—I like to think chaps and chapesses—at the heart of which, as touched on by my noble friend Lord Pitkeathley, was the culture of stewardship that we have a collective responsibility to deliver with regard to our constitution. We all have an extraordinarily privileged position in sitting in your Lordships’ House and being part of our constitution. Therefore, the onus is on us to make sure that we work as members of the Government and as Members of Parliament to deliver on it.

I will write to the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, about Bristol City Council. I went to school in Bristol, so I have a particular interest there. The noble Lord, Lord Bates, gave us a masterclass; I loved his historical comparisons and imaginative use of ChatGPT. I speak in your Lordships’ House on many different issues, and AI always manages to get into the debate. I did not think it would do so today, but I appreciate the ingenuity.

My noble friend Lady Alexander made a fascinating and very important point on the devolution settlement and the role of the Lord Chancellor. It is a position we have discussed in great detail in recent days and which I will reflect on, given the responsibilities we place on it. I am proud of the work that our party has done to drive the devolution agenda to deliver for people. We will continue to do so through the English devolution settlement and by making sure that devolution continues to work.

The noble and learned Lord, Lord Bellamy, raised a very interesting point about ensuring deeper public understanding of our constitution. As I said, there is an onus on all of us to do that; it is incredibly important for all citizens and lots of parliamentarians do extraordinary work to support public understanding. I will take away his suggestion, but I am not sure that a single programme led by government on promoting the constitution would be effective.

Having said that, the noble Lord, Lord Norton, touched on active citizenship. Citizenship is on the national curriculum. We are currently undertaking a review of the national curriculum and I hope that when we get the outcome of the review, we will be able reflect on this and other issues related to citizenship.

The noble Lord, Lord Hannan, knows that I genuinely enjoy his oratory in your Lordships’ House, not least because it forces me to question my own opinions every time to make sure that my views are in line with my values as much as his align. It will not surprise him, therefore, that although his speech was fascinating as ever, I still believe in the role of the Human Rights Act in ensuring that there are safeguards for the operation of government and the other safeguards that were touched upon by the noble Lord, Lord Wallace.

Returning to the noble Lord, Lord Norton, I thank him for his decades of work on constitutional protections. The Government have well-established parliamentary and devolution capability programmes for civil servants, but there is always more to be done. I will go back and look at exactly what we need to do and the suggestions we need to follow.

I can reassure the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, about the current political environment. I remind noble Lords there are four years until the next general election, and we will see how many political parties we will be facing in four years’ time, but I do reflect upon the seven that are now in existence. Noble Lords who are aware of my own personal travails will be aware of what I think of the establishment of the most recent of those political parties. His suggestion regarding the 1868 oaths Act is an interesting one, and I will have a conversation about it in the department. I also thank him for reminding us of the important role the monarch plays within our constitution, but also the subtle way that conversations can be had that give a level of importance to the Prime Minister.

To the noble Baroness, Lady Finn, I say that the Cabinet Secretary’s filing system sounds all too familiar and similar to my own. All members of the Government should reflect on our own filing systems, in both our emails and on paper. She had interesting thoughts on the Propriety and Constitution Group, and I would welcome a further conversation with her outside your Lordships’ House to consider what next steps we might need to take and possible areas of reform. I reassure all noble Lords that members of the Propriety and Constitution Group are accountable to the relevant Ministers, as is normal for all civil servants. For a moment during the noble Baroness’s speech, I thought she was about to suggest that we need another arms-length body, and I was amazed, but absolutely not—she did clarify that that was not something she would welcome.

The noble Lord, Lord Beith, also raised a point about the Propriety and Constitution Group. I reassure him that while the union and devolution teams have moved from and back to the Cabinet Office, the Propriety and Constitution Group has consistently been in the Cabinet Office. This gives us the opportunity to preserve institutional memory, as was touched upon by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Neuberger.

On the Cabinet Manual, the Government are focused on delivering the commitments outlined in our manifesto. We know the importance of the Cabinet Manual and while we do not currently have plans to update it, we are keeping it under review.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

I ask for an assurance that when the Cabinet Manual is renewed, there will be consultation with the appropriate committees in both Houses before it is published.

[Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)]

I am going to say yes, and we will see how much trouble I have just got myself in.