Parliamentary Democracy and Standards in Public Life

Lord Whitty Excerpts

Thursday 11th January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Whitty (Lab)]

My Lords, as the final Back-Bench speaker, I will try to say something original. It is difficult, but I will try. Much of what has been said about the attitudes of the population to politicians and the political process is true. The noble Baroness, Lady Prashar, has just said that it is at an all-time low, which I am not sure is quite historically true. Even I was not here then, but the politicians of the 19th century were held in pretty low esteem, which is why we had the Great Reform Act, although that never fully affected the House of Lords. Nevertheless, at times we have had to change our system.

What has been missing from the debate is the fact that we have to recognise what is going on in society. It is true, as the noble Baroness, Lady Featherstone, and others have said, that some of the lack of respect for our system and individual parliamentarians is due to the mistakes of recent Administrations and recent scandals such as the Post Office one, but much of it is due to changes in society itself. Deference and respect are no longer there in society. It is easier to access all sorts of information thanks to changes in technology, the growth of social media and more scandal-orientated mainstream and social media. All of this means that issues which were never really known to the public have become very well known, sometimes exaggeratedly so. That societal change has its drawbacks, but by and large I approve of a society that is that sceptical and that questioning of its so-called betters.

What is lacking is an effective response by the legislature, in particular, to those changes in society and those questions which society now raises. The bodies that government and the legislature have set up are inadequate to meet these concerns. I note the description given by the noble Lord, Lord Pickles, of why ACOBA does not have adequate powers. I pay tribute to the noble Lord and his predecessor, the noble Baroness, Lady Browning, and to the staff who service the committee, on which I sat until last year, for all the systems that they have devised for making sure that potential jobs for retiring politicians and senior civil servants are not subject to corruption, potential corruption or the perception of corruption.

At the end of the day, ACOBA and the other bodies do not have the powers. Unless they are put fully on a statutory basis—let us say that those terms are written into the contractual terms of Ministers and senior civil servants—they will not have those powers. There will be no enforcement or penalties, and those sanctions need to be there. I hope that when we move to consider the constitution and indeed the reform of this Chamber, as I hope we will, we recognise that there is a special responsibility of the second Chamber, whatever its form, to ensure that the constitutional priorities as well as the personal priorities are met, and that there is a way of enforcing the standards in public life.

United Kingdom–European Union Parliamentary Partnership Assembly

Lord Whitty Excerpts

Monday 12th July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe (Con)]

My Lords, the Government are wholeheartedly in favour of dialogue between Parliament and the European Parliament, but, as the noble Baroness knows, the primary impetus from the UK side for establishing a parliamentary partnership assembly needs to come from both Houses of Parliament, which is why Members of both Houses are working on a proposal. Reporting back to the House by the PPA, once it is established, is something that the PPA itself will need to decide upon in due course.

[Lord Whitty (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, the treaty itself specifies that these arrangements should be set up—this is a responsibility for Government and not to be offloaded on to Parliament. Are the Government not encouraging the Leader of this House and the Leader of the House of Commons, for example, to immediately engage with the European Parliament so that we have a proper operation up and running by the time we return in the autumn? The Government cannot entirely dodge responsibility and shove it on to parliamentary procedures; it is in a treaty signed by the Prime Minister.

[Earl Howe (Con)]

My Lords, as the noble Lord has said, the UK-EU trade and co-operation agreement—the TCA—makes explicit provision for a parliamentary partnership assembly, but on a permissive basis. It is implicit in the wording that this must be for the two Parliaments to establish. However, I can tell the noble Lord that, at the very first Partnership Council meeting, both the UK Government and the EU encouraged the establishment of the parliamentary partnership assembly. At a government level, we look forward to seeing the final proposals from both Parliaments and to providing support to the process where we can.

Civil Procedure (Amendment No. 4) (Coronavirus) Rules 2020

Lord Whitty Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Whitty (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Ponsonby’s proposal that the court should have discretion to consider all the circumstances in relation to eviction orders in this terrible time. I also support the creation of an effective landlord-tenant mediation service and the kind of emergency funding that people have referred to in this debate.

The Government were clearly right to impose an evictions moratorium and to extend it. However, we now have the worst of all worlds, with the combination of the lifting of that moratorium and a tightening of general restrictions, the ending of the furlough scheme and an increase in business closures, all of which will mean more lost jobs and precarious incomes.

We are faced with tens of thousands of evictions of renters in the pipeline, a large proportion of whom have never previously been in rent arrears or engaged in anti-social behaviour. Many will inevitably swell the ranks of the unemployed. Therefore, my noble friend Lord Ponsonby’s Motion is the one to support here, but there are also, of course, longer-term and fundamental issues. The structure of social security under universal credit—and the interplay between the various elements—is clearly not fit for purpose in this context.

On the housing market, I note that the absence of more secure alternatives to private renting has meant a massively increased reliance on that sector, enhanced by the tax advantages of buy to let, which has created a range of amateur landlords who cannot afford or do not know how to take account of their tenants’ precarious incomes. Other countries with a high dependence on private renting have stronger legal protection and significant institutional elements in the market. Like the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, and others, I am in favour of a big increase in council housing, but the objective should also be to professionalise and institutionalise the private rental market.

Business and Planning Bill

Lord Whitty Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 6th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Whitty (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I can support many parts of this Bill and reluctantly go along with some other parts, but it is hardly a recipe for economic recovery. I have two main points.

First, I find it bizarre that the first few clauses of the Bill—which is designed to promote rapid and productive economic recovery—are all about ensuring we can all drink more alcohol for longer periods and in more places. Like the noble Lords, Lord Paddick and Lord Randall, and others, I will focus on Clause 11, the late-night drinking aspects and the pavement licensing.

I am not being puritanical about this. I like a pint and have a yearning for café society, but drinkers spilling out on to the pavement in our inner cities, drinking off-sales outside premises that have an on-sales licence—which in central London can be until 2 am, 3 am or even 6 am—will not only cause pedestrians problems but cause serious anti-social behaviour.

The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, outlined the situation in Soho in central London, where Westminster City Council has already given some temporary licences. The Met has had to break up several street parties, engage in arguments with pub staff about the extent of the tables on the pavement and deal with significant cases of drunkenness, disorder and anti-social behaviour. We also have to remember that most public toilets remain closed.

I hope the Government can review Clause 11 in particular and give the local authorities more powers—indeed, more duties—to take measures that will not lead to this kind of effect. I am particularly concerned about the inner cities and the centre of our towns.

My second point relates to the planning provisions. I am afraid that some of them are really designed to fulfil the Prime Minister’s “Build, build, build” mantra without constraint. I accept that we need more housing; indeed, I have long advocated more council housing and affordable housing. I support some of the infra- structure projects, although I feel it is probably the right time to drop HS2, massive road-building programmes and the third runway at Heathrow and use the money for more socially, economically and environmentally desirable expenditures.

On housing, it should not be just a question of numbers of new dwellings. Developers, big builders and the tax system are combining to encourage demolishing buildings where refurbishment, in particular for energy-efficiency purposes, would be a better option. Developers are using new developments to blight neighbourhoods where buildings really need to be in keeping with the surroundings and the natural environment.

The Prime Minister’s reported aversion to the planning system’s alleged tenderness for endangered newts seems to apply to almost all protection of wildlife and biodiversity in planning. It is in contrast to his support for inebriated newts in the first part of the Bill.

This is inevitably a rushed Bill, but in some respects it is also an ill-thought-out Bill that will have negative effects on the quality of life in some of our cities and towns and on the quality of our countryside. Parts of this Bill need a serious rethink and, in the limited time we have, only the Lords proceedings can press the Government to deliver that.