House of Commons Governance

Valerie Vaz Excerpts

Thursday 22nd January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Valerie Vaz (Walsall South) (Lab)]

It is always a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso). He will have read in the evidence we heard the tributes paid to him for the work he has done.

This year, we are celebrating the huge anniversary of Magna Carta—for the benefit of the Prime Minister, that is the “great charter”—and this week we celebrated the de Montfort Parliament. Today is the day of the Straw Committee. I am not sure we will be celebrating this document in quite the same way as those other anniversaries, but it is nevertheless an important document. It was important not to think of the individuals in the posts that we were discussing. If Members of the House do that, they will probably understand why we came to the conclusions and recommendations on the evidence that was before us. I want to touch on the Committee, the Commission, the two separate roles—the appointment of the Clerk and the director general—and security.

Starting with the Committee, all of us took the task the House gave us very seriously. We did not want to go over the background to why we were there, but to find ways to move forward. We were set a task by our excellent Chair, and I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) for his stewardship, and to each and every one of the excellent Committee staff at every level—I can see some of them here, dotted around the Chamber. The Committee met three times a week, with Committee Clerks picking up on what we wanted and implementing it.

To start with, I was not aware of the views of the other members of the Committee. However, the hon. and learned Member for North East Hertfordshire (Sir Oliver Heald), as a former Solicitor-General, brought his legal experience to bear. The hon. Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr Heath), whom I wish well in his future endeavours, is a former Deputy Leader of the House and brought his experience. The hon. Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman) had his own pressures, because he has a very special constituent—the former chief Clerk. The hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley) served the Committee well—I think he was one of the only members who attended every single meeting—while he was still grieving for his father. The hon. Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) brought his experience of boards and being an active Member of the House, and was an excellent co-chair at the staff session. By the way, he has his own copy of “Erskine May”. The hon. Member for St Helens North (Mr Watts) fitted in his other commitments with his assiduous Committee work and gave us wise advice. I also want to thank all those who took the time and effort to put their views to us, both in writing and orally.

What we heard is that there is not another institution like this. We therefore felt there could be some creativity in what we could come up with. We heard that learning from the private sector, which we can, cannot make this place corporate: the public sector instils that unique sense of public duty and acting in the public interest that we see everyday from the people who work here.

One of the major planks of the report is to streamline the governance structure. Many Members have touched on this. The Commission sets the strategic framework for the delivery of services to Members, staff and the public. Many Members have mentioned the organogram—it rapidly became one of my favourite words—which is set out on page 89. From the confusion of lines of reporting, accountability and action, it is clear that not much could get done very quickly. I hope you will agree, Mr Speaker, that the new structure cleans this up, and it is much more streamlined on page 88, with the four elected members given the status of Select Committee Chairs. That is right, because it is difficult for them to concentrate on the work of the House. I take the point that they need to be remunerated and given status so that they know they are doing important work. We cannot have four Committee members doing separate things, with two getting an allowance and the other two not. All four have to play their part on the Commission.

The non-executives do not have voting rights but, to clarify an issue mentioned by the Leader of the House, it is not a question of just moving them from the Management Board up to the Commission. We have recommended that there should be a fair, open and transparent selection of the non-executives and the two officials who will also sit on the Commission.

That brings me to the two separate roles. As is well known, we decided as a Committee that we should have the two separate roles. The Clerk’s role is unique and the skills required are extremely important—giving advice to the Speaker and the Deputy Speakers. I am sure we all agree that we are well served by the Clerk’s Department. However, it is too much to ask one person to undertake the responsibility of the other aspects of the House relating to its management and liaison with the other place—a necessary and important requirement.

I changed my mind many times on who should be in charge overall. We heard from those who had run large corporations that we need to know where the buck stops and who has a grip on what is going on. Where is the Gantt chart of work to be done, and who is responsible for the delivery? Ultimately, it must be the Speaker, elected by Members, but with the support and the challenge from a board—the Commission. The staff, too, had a variety of ideas, and the meeting with them at all levels of the organisation was unique—and I hope that will continue.

If Members care to look at paragraph 68, they can see the variety of views expressed to us. In the end, the Clerk’s role is preserved as head of the House service, but the director general is autonomous and is responsible for resource allocation and delivery across the House service. There were organisations that said that in cases ranging from Sir David Higgins, formerly at the Olympic Delivery Authority to the National Audit Office—my right hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn touched on this—two people have been in charge and they have been able to make it work. I believe that it can work. While the Clerk is head of the House service, the executive committee is chaired by the DG: both have a direct line to the Speaker;

Let me move on to the appointment of the Clerk. We have heard that in previous times, a piece of paper was passed up to the Speaker and two names, or even just one name, were given to the Speaker to choose. That cannot be right in the 21st century. Judges used to be appointed by a tap on the shoulder, and sometimes solicitors and barristers were asked to apply to be judges. That has changed to a much more transparent system. We are moving away from appointing people in the image of their predecessors, and we are looking at different and transferable skills.

I feel that some explanation should be made of how the process will work. There will be a sifting panel—I hope many people will apply, and I have talked in terms of hundreds—that will sift things down to a manageable number. The panel that interviews must shortlist. That provides consistency and continuity, and it has to be done under any equal opportunities proposals. The panel will have a discussion at the shortlisting stage about why they have scored candidates in the way they have against the job description and whether they can draw out certain aspects of the applications that will apply to the job or whether transferable skills are relevant. In my view, the person working most closely with the Clerk and the DG has to sit on the shortlisting and selection panel—and that is the Speaker. That is all set out in paragraph 192 and agreed in the report. The new Clerk will be part of the panel for the DG, as they have to work together.

Let me touch on security aspects, which are also included in the report. We wanted to reassert our rights as Members. While the security of Parliament is of fundamental importance, we need clear governance arrangements to ensure that, except in an immediate emergency, security concerns should never override a Member’s constitutional right of access to Parliament or any other privilege. Protections must be in place to ensure that Members’ communications are not subject to interference, including surveillance and interception. We consider that the governance of security arrangements should be subject to approval by both Houses and that security policy should be a regular item on the agendas of the joint meetings of the Commission and the House Committee. Between those meetings, whenever they happen, there should an effective executive oversight body, as set out in paragraph 129.

In conclusion, this is a place of work that should be accessible to those who need to understand it and who send us here—but sometimes it is not accessible. We should be able to conduct our work on behalf of our constituents in an efficient and timely manner. I thank the people who have been acting up in their role in the absence of the chief Clerk while the Governance Committee has been meeting. It is important that there is a framework in which Members and staff know the limits and know what is required, what action needs to be taken and what the outcome will be, so that things are just not left to the whim of a manager—there must always be accountability to the Commission and, ultimately, the Speaker and Deputy Speakers who are the public face of the House.

We have evidence showing where you have intervened, Mr Speaker. When the pay deal was stuck, the trade union leader appealed to you and that moved things forward. I also want to mention the idea of screening “12 Years a Slave” with the director, Steve McQueen, actually standing in Speaker’s House. That is remarkable, and it happened following a request from the diversity group, which was agreed by you, Mr Speaker.

I hope Members find this report workable—and workable now. There is a will to change and the staff now expect something to be done. We heard from Mark Hutton, the Committee Clerk, that there has been an extended print run, and I understand that it is selling faster than the books by my right hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn!

I feel that I have learned about this place, and heard from Members and staff alike that we will all rise to the challenge and make this an even more historic week. I thank my colleagues on the Committee for their support, and I commend the report to the House.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

I begin with an apology, as I may have to leave early to attend the repeat of the Simon de Montfort Parliament in the chapter house of Westminster Abbey.

I join other members of the Committee in thanking the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw), who was an absolutely brilliant Chairman and incredibly smooth in getting us to agree when there were bits of disagreement and in bringing people together. As a Member who was elected only in 2010, I was interested to watch someone who is an expert in his craft. He operated the Committee incredibly well.

I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz), who was a terrific member of the Committee. Although I will not mention every member of the Committee, I hope that she will take it as a compliment when I say that she was very much the grit that allowed the oyster to produce a pearl. While our Chairman was doing his silky stuff, for which other members of the Committee might have fallen slightly more easily, the hon. Lady ensured that we were kept up to the mark and that things were rigorously questioned and not just accepted. Her membership was crucial to our unanimously agreed report.

The report was important because we were tackling complex issues. The fundamental purpose of this place is to be a legislature, but we must be run in as efficient a way as possible. We have a duty to the public purse; we should not spend money carelessly. We have to ensure that we are run efficiently so that members of the public can come here. It is a very important constitutional right that our constituents can turn up in Central Lobby on any day of the week when the House is sitting and demand to see their Member of Parliament, to ask their MP to behave in a particular way. That means that the general operation needs to be smooth running in admitting people and providing some element of hospitality.

We also have to get legislation through, which I sometimes regret, saying that an awful lot of legislation is bad and it would not necessarily be a bad thing if we were a little less efficient. On the other hand, the Government need to be able to get their business through the House, and they need the authority and expertise that is brought to them by the Clerks.

I hold the Clerks in the highest regard. They were referred to in some of the evidence that we received as a “priestly caste”, and I rather like that view of them. As a Catholic, I have always been taught that one should not criticise or question priests unduly, because they have that high authority. Oddly, in the priestly class of Clerk, that is important. There are 650 Members of Parliament, all of whom, individually and jointly, think that they know best. They think that, having read one page of “Erskine May”—which is about what I have done—they have suddenly become experts on every aspect of procedure, and are willing to challenge Clerks with 40 years’ experience.

Those bewigged figures have an authority through their learning, their length of service and, indeed, their appearance—an authority that is accepted by Members, and that allows the business of the House to progress—and anything that we did in our report had to preserve that. However, we had also observed that some aspects of the House were not running as efficiently and as smoothly as might have been hoped, partly because of the absurd burden that was placed on someone who was performing the job of both Clerk and chief executive.

I happen to dislike the title “chief executive”. I think it is part of a title inflation that has affected every organisation. Even in a two-man band, one of the two has to be the chief executive. It has become part of a culture of flattery, and of raising things that do not necessarily need to be raised, which I find broadly disagreeable. None the less, the title had been introduced, and it meant that one person was expected to do absolutely everything. For instance, people would contact him if they were upset about the gymnasium. I must confess that nothing has ever worried me about any gymnasium at all. I never go near such places. I think that raising one’s hand to hail a taxi is quite enough exercise for any individual day.

[Valerie Vaz]

You should walk.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

That sounds far too energetic, but never mind.

The fact that a chief executive was being bombarded with petty requests meant, inevitably, that the job was becoming unmanageable. The number of people who were coming in, and the growth in the business that was going on, meant that the role needed to be divided. However, as we observed while the Committee was sitting, there are occasions when matters that we think are completely routine and entirely administrative suddenly become constitutional.

I was a member of a private Member’s Bill Committee. When I turned up, I found that the Committee Room had been hired out for—I don’t know—a tiddlywinks contest; certainly not for any parliamentary activity. Although everyone knows that the business of legislative Committees takes priority over any other business that is going on in a Committee Room—which is quite right—dealing with that is a clerkly role, not an administrative role. The more one thought about it, the clearer it became that it was impossible for the head administrator to be above the head constitutional person, but also that the head administrator needed to have enormous authority and clout in order to get things done.

One of our fascinating discoveries—this happened when I was talking to members of staff with the hon. Member for Walsall South—was that no one actually knows how anything is decided in this illustrious place. I had a great conversation with a gentleman from Portcullis House, which, as some of us know, is that remote office space that takes us away from the Chamber, about a room booking. He said that one person had told him that drink could be served but not food, another person had told him that neither could be served, and the Speaker had said that both were allowed. I said to him “Well, who did you follow?” You will be glad to know, Mr Speaker, that he quite rightly replied “Mr Speaker, of course.” For all the governance that may be put into this place, there are authorities which are not necessarily written down, but which carry—rightly, in my view—a great deal of weight, and the director general needs to be in that position.

The right hon. Member for Blackburn mentioned that we had bandied about titles when we were discussing what the director general ought to have been called. I had various favourites. I went through the list of titles in the Royal Household from which I thought we might be able to learn. We briefly considered “comptroller”, with a “p”, but that was rejected, eventually and somewhat reluctantly, after I had a discussion—with the leave of the Committee—with a journalist, the great Brendan Carlin of The Mail on Sunday. [Interruption.] I believe that it is traditional not to recognise the Galleries, but never mind.

I asked Brendan Carlin whether we would be teased if we used the title “comptroller”. He immediately said to me “fat”, and I am afraid that the image of Thomas the Tank Engine diverted us from “comptroller”. My other favourite was “grand bailiff”, but I regret to say that “grand bailiff” got no takers. So director general became the title: a title that carries implicit authority, power and prestige, but does not confuse the operation of a Parliament with an intrusion of the private sector that is entirely unnecessary.

This place cannot have a chief executive. When the chief executive of BP—and goodness, Lord Browne’s evidence was impressive—says “Go”, his minions “goeth”. When the chief executive of the House of Commons says to a Member of Parliament “Go”, the Member of Parliament—however new, however humble, however diffident—says “Why?” If 650 employers, effectively, are not willing to be told to go, a very different role is needed: a role that requires more tact and subtlety and understanding. The private sector comparisons were therefore not the correct ones. I think that we have got this big task absolutely right. We have made the role manageable, but we have maintained the primacy of Parliament and the primacy of the legislative process.

As for the other aspects with which we have dealt, it is not, I suppose, that unusual for a mini-crisis to lead to a process that uncovers matters that can be significantly improved. The administration of the House of Commons, although in the hands of very impressive and capable people, was an enormous mystery to anyone who had not served on the House of Commons Commission. I agree with the hon. Member for Walsall South in that regard.

When we looked at the organogram—which is an ugly word, to be honest—we had no idea who was reporting to whom about what, and I think that one of our major tasks is to cut that structure down so that it is understandable. That is not just important to Members of Parliament, because it is very easy for them to have their views heard. They have opportunities to question the Leader of the House, to send messages to the Speaker, and to speak directly to the Clerk. A Member of Parliament has access to where authority lies. However, the employees of the House—the staff of the House—need to know who makes a decision, and whether that decision is authoritative or merely a suggestion made by someone higher up in the pecking order than them, but not high up enough to make the decision authoritative. I think that if we cut down the administration and simplify it, we will have clear lines of command that everyone will be able to understand, and better engagement with the people who work in the building.

I want to make one point on the relationship with the other place—with the noble Lords. I understand why their lordships are very nervous about this place trying to grab power from them. If I were in that place rather than in this place I would take the same view: that the House of Commons—by virtue of ultimately controlling the purse strings and by having the democratic mandate—is always in a position to peer over at what their lordships are doing. Although the champagne story may have been legendary if not mythical—anyway, I think their lordships ought to drink the highest quality of champagne; after all, if you’re a Lord, you must have some privilege of peerage—their lordships need to maintain their independence because they do not want to be a subsidiary Chamber. They are a second Chamber—the second Chamber—but not a subsidiary Chamber. In their procedures, and sometimes in aspects that do not immediately seem procedural but may have procedural implications, their lordships will want to keep their independence. We as the lower House must be incredibly tactful and diffident in how we deal with them. It is not for us to tell them what to do; it is for us to make tactful and polite suggestions. If we do that, we may, I hope, be able to maintain a good working relationship, but we must ensure that we do not appear to be engaged in a power grab.

I am honoured to have served on the Committee, which was very good and worked speedily. I am glad that today we are debating our report and that the Leader of the House and First Secretary of State is so generously allowing us time. He does not allow us time for some other things, but he is being very good in this respect. It is a happy coincidence that the former Clerk of this House, Lord Lisvane, was introduced to their lordships’ House earlier today. If he has read this report, I hope he thinks it is up to the standard of the reports issued when he was still in office.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Alan Haselhurst (Saffron Walden) (Con)]

I join all those who have contributed to the debate in thanking members of the Committee, particularly its Chair, and congratulating them on the quality of their work. I am astonished that the report was completed in the time that was taken without sacrificing quality and thoroughness. I had suspected, with my right hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso), that extensions might be needed, as has sometimes proved to be the case in the past, so I contribute to the unanimity of praise.

I welcome the direction of travel outlined by the Committee. I shall comment on one or two details in a moment. The Committee has provided an elegant solution to the immediate problem which triggered its being set up. I have come to the conclusion slowly and perhaps reluctantly over the years that it was time that we separated the responsibilities of the Clerk from those of the chief executive. We must put Parliament first. That is the core reason for our existence, but running this place has become an enormous business. We need someone of great skill and experience to take charge of the business side of the House of Commons.

The former Clerk, Sir Robert Rogers, still believes that the two posts could be combined, and I agree with him that whoever takes the job of the director general must very quickly understand the House of Commons. I have found over the past few years that there has been suspicion and sometimes anger among colleagues about what is happening around them. They sometimes feel that the position of Member of Parliament has been downgraded, that they do not have a chance to make their voice heard on particular matters, and that decisions are taken and they have to put up with them. That has not been the happiest of circumstances.

I warmly welcome the report because it has gone further than the initial task by offering a joined-up system of governance, which may help to overcome the difficulty that I have just described. On the basis of my experience over the past four and a half years, I believe we need a joined-up system among the professionals who serve us, and a joined-up system among the management side and Members and everyone else with an interest in this place.

I think of the Cromwell Green entrance, which is a saga in itself. It was designed with a capacity that quickly proved inadequate, and had more money spent on it to increase that capacity. It is approached by a ramp which is uncovered. The lack of capacity has meant that visitors to this place, a substantial proportion of whom are the electorate who put us here, have been kept waiting for inordinate lengths of time in all weathers. We are told, whether by Westminster city council or by English Heritage, that as things stand we may not cover that ramp—yet this is a sovereign Parliament. It is a ludicrous situation. Why was that not thought of from the very beginning and the construction done in such a way that there could have been a cover that would not offend English Heritage or others?

I think of the roof of Portcullis House, which is a much more recent construction. We were advised that those who planned it were looking to have a building that would last for 200 years. Unfortunately, they did not secure a guarantee that the glass roof would last anything like that length of time in service. That has, I am afraid, given rise to problems that should have been anticipated, with guarantees obtained. It is beautiful, but unfortunately it has shown some weaknesses.

The joining up between our managers and Members is important, without our getting into ridiculous situations of micro-management. If we have good professional people, at some point or other we have to respect their judgment and hope that the framework is sufficiently robust that we have a strong guarantee that that judgment is sound.

This is about more than ensuring that the arrangements—the mechanics—allow us to achieve sensible decision making. We have to accept that this is an extraordinarily difficult place to govern because there are so many different interests on the Estate to begin with. Members, understandably, see themselves as foremost. The hon. Member for Walsall North (Mr Winnick) referred to the status that having been elected to this place as a representative of the people gives a person as something that surely has to carry some weight within the order of things in this building. But of course we respect the fact that the needs of our own personal staff helping us to do our work are different from those of the Members they serve. There is the huge parliamentary staff, at all the different levels, on whom we depend. Conflicting arrangements have to be thought about. Members cannot necessarily always say that everything must be called to their tune.

We also have to take account of the electorate. It is our policy to welcome the electorate here. Unlike in days of old when the Member of Parliament made an annual visit to his constituency to be fully briefed on what was going on before coming rapidly back to London, we are now welcoming tens of thousands—hundreds of thousands—of our electorate to Westminster. Unfortunately, that creates certain difficulties of access that do not appear to have been completely successfully thought through.

Beyond that, there are the general visitors. Apart from being an iconic palace and a world heritage site, we have the distinction of claiming to be one of the leading visitor attractions in London. People want to come here, and we should be flattered by that fact. Indeed, we should be flattered by the fact that people want to come to London. We therefore have to think how, without in any sense lessening the dignity of the place, we can facilitate the interests of the people who want to come and see what they regard as the mother of Parliaments at the very heart of representative democracy.

Mention has been made of the other place. I absolutely agree with the line of argument in the Committee’s report that we have to seek further co-operative measures and perhaps unify more of the services. I have enjoyed a very cordial and constructive relationship with my opposite number, latterly the noble Lord Sewel. There are undoubtedly certain things that one can achieve for general convenience, although not everybody knows what they are. For example, Members of the House of Commons do not seem to realise that they are able to book a table in the Barry Room in the House of Lords if they are looking for an alternative type of meal to that which they might find in the Commons side of the building. We need to go further than that, and very realistic questions have been asked.

Bearing in mind all the different demands on the palace, we always have to think of security. It has been ramped up at various times in the past few years, which can create considerable difficulties in satisfying the free movement and protection of Members and those who work here, while at the same time allowing us to give freedom of access to our constituents and visitors in general. Some very difficult management decisions have to be taken, and I suspect that, if we are going to square the circle, it is inevitable that more expenditure will be involved.

I have the odd quibble. There has been absolutely no collusion between me and my right hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso), but I agree with the two particular points he made and I am slightly surprised that he pinched the analogy that I was going to use. More thought might have been given to the determination of roles for the other two proposed Commons commissioners. I disagree with my right hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Sir George Young), because I think that a clear distinction can be drawn between the role of the portfolio holder for administration and that of the portfolio holder for finance: finance is about determining budgets, while administration tries, within those approved budget heads, to work out the details of how to go about meeting the requirements that have been set.

Remuneration is also an issue. If two Commons commissioners are going to receive a stipend and two are not, that is a slightly inelegant situation. Many Members know of my interest in cricket, and it occurs to me that if two commissioners are going to receive a payment and two are not, that invokes the distinction between gentlemen and players that existed in the world of cricket until 1962.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross drew an analogy with the Panel of Chairs. I had a great deal to do with the introduction of remuneration for Members who joined the panel. They are required to be available at any time to chair a Committee. It might last five minutes or two and a half hours, but they have a duty to be there so that the functions of the House can be completed, and those who take on the chairmanship of more complex Public Bill Committees are committed for weeks to that particular task. They receive remuneration, so the proposal under discussion seems odd. I know it is possible to say, “Other anomalies would be created if you did that,” and I know that we would expose ourselves to the argument that we are just trying to find ways to spend money, but the question should be asked in order to make sure that we get this right.

[Valerie Vaz]

Perhaps I should offer a clarification. All four will be equal members of the Commission. Two of the roles have been allocated specific tasks and the other two will also be given tasks, one of which could be restoration and renewal and the other human resources. All four are of equal status and they will all get remuneration and have tasks allocated to them. They were going to be allocated those tasks by the Commission, but now, according to the motion, two of them will be elected separately. Nevertheless, all four have equal status.

[Sir Alan Haselhurst]

I do not dispute the fact that they have equal status; it is just that it is possible that they are not going to get equal remuneration. The portfolios could end up being different from those the hon. Lady has just instanced; my right hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross, for example, made some suggestions. All I said was that the issue might be given further thought. I certainly do not disagree with the general set-up.

Finally, we must recognise that a huge gap has to be bridged. There is a lack of understanding among many different groups of people about what can be done and what is available in the House. It sometimes takes years for a Member to realise what things can be done and how to do them. Decisions are not communicated very effectively, and we have not found the best ways of communicating them.

If our communications within the House are poor, those outside it are lamentable because we are not exactly assisted by the press. They are willing to put out stories that are good to read, but do not necessarily bear any resemblance to accuracy. I find it extremely irritating that what they give as facts are simply untrue, yet are repeated and repeated in a way that denigrates this place.

I am proud that we give our work force the opportunity to have meals and refreshments that are to some extent subsidised, because that practice is commonplace in many other institutions, both private and public. To be sneered at because there is a cost to the public purse is to diminish Parliament and all those who work here with great dedication.