Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

Debate between Tristram Hunt and Richard Shepherd

Wednesday 1st December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Tristram Hunt]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman and with the fundamental basis of his analysis, which is that the constitutional reform programme is driven by the immediate necessities of the Government in the context of this Parliament. We are making major decisions that will have wide ramifications in the functioning of the constitution of the United Kingdom, based on a political programme and timetable. That is never the best way in which to develop deep consensus thinking about the constitution.

I would finally raise a point that the Clerk of the House has also raised. As he put it in a note to the Committee in the other place,

“given that a draft Parliamentary Privileges Bill has now been announced, why deal in advance and separately with a matter affecting the proceedings of the House of Commons in legislation”,

if it is not for the specific political purposes of the current Government?

[Mr Shepherd]

I am more and more puzzled about the Bill as we go on, but there are two propositions in this group of amendments. I support amendment 6, in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash), and I am grateful for the important contribution of my hon. Friend the Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman). Indeed, I was elated at the time of the election to hear that Jesse Norman had been elected to the House. I spent six months seeking out that fantastic opera singer—I got the wrong individual, as you will appreciate, Ms Primarolo, and I am very grateful to have encountered my hon. Friend on the Floor of the Committee.

Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

Debate between Tristram Hunt and Richard Shepherd

Wednesday 24th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Tristram Hunt]

I could not agree more with the hon. Gentleman, and I will come to the Supreme Court in a moment. I do not want to interfere with his amendments on the Speaker’s certificate, which are absolutely correct. My hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham (Ian Lucas) referred to the Digital Economy Act 2010, and the Hunting Act 2004 was also reviewed in court. Yes, the court ruled that it could not interfere with the Act, but it had to go to the Law Lords for that supposedly self-evident truth to be confirmed. Even there, the judgment was hardly a ringing endorsement of parliamentary sovereignty, which is what amendment 33 seeks to retain.

[Mr Shepherd]

The process of getting to the courts takes time, and obviates the timetables in the Bill.

[Tristram Hunt]

The hon. Gentleman is of course correct. There will be extra layers and extra opportunities for lawyers to intervene. It was no wonder that Lord Steyn commented in the light of the Hunting Act 2004 that it

“is not unthinkable that circumstances could arise where the courts may have to qualify a principle established on a different hypothesis of constitutionalism”.

I think that in plain English that means they would be interested to get their teeth into the proceedings in this place.

Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

Debate between Tristram Hunt and Richard Shepherd

Tuesday 16th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Shepherd]

There is a simple amendment which the hon. Gentleman did not table, and which was not discussed in the lengthy and closely read speech of the hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards). That amendment would state that the general election must take place on, let us say, the first Thursday in October. That would meet the point for which the hon. Gentleman argued at such great length—that he should not have to deal with the coincidence of elections on the same day. He did not table that simple amendment, however, and as it is not on the amendment paper I cannot speak to it.

I find Professor Blackburn a most interesting speaker on the constitution. In the evidence he gave in a memorandum on electoral law and administration, he makes the following point:

“In the UK, there can be little doubt that the period between general elections should be four years.”

That is what we are debating now, and it is arguable. He continues:

“The proposal for fixed term Parliament as a whole should fit as closely as possible into existing constitutional expectations, and the idea that four years is about the right length of time between elections is very prevalent. It was the period expressly approved of as being normal in practice, when the Parliament Act set the period of five years as a maximum.”

That is a reference back to Asquith. Professor Blackburn goes on to say:

“In an ideal democracy it may be that there should be elections as frequently as possible—even annually as supported by the Chartists in the eighteenth century”.

The hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Austin Mitchell), who is present, has tabled an amendment proposing a period of three years, and we could refer back to the Chartists, so it is clear that these arguments were not unfamiliar at different times in the history of this country. There was an argument that we should have annual elections; that was a powerful movement in the early 19th century. It was thought that Parliaments and Governments must not move too far from the opinion of the public and the electorate.

[Tristram Hunt]

Professor Blackburn’s speech is particularly interesting, because he goes on to say—[Interruption.] Well, I will let the hon. Gentleman read it out then, because the key point is in the following paragraph.

[Mr Shepherd]

I have lost my place as a result of the hon. Gentleman’s intervention, so let me recap what Professor Blackburn said:

“It was the period expressly approved of as being normal in practice, when the Parliament Act set the period of five years as a maximum. In an ideal democracy it may be that there should be elections as frequently as possible—even annually as supported by the Chartists in the eighteenth century—but a government must be allowed a sufficient period of time in which to put its programme of public policies into effect before submitting its record of achievement, or otherwise, to the voters. Three full legislative sessions, and certainly four, is sufficient for this purpose.”

I believe that that is correct.