House of Commons Hansard Debates for 30 Mar 1990

Mr. Dykes : I knew that you would say that, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I am grateful to you for reminding the whole House of that fact. That is the spirit of most of the amendments and it is interesting to note that they have mostly been proposed by Conservative Members. My colleagues take a great interest in this subject. I wish that more Opposition Members had been here today to support the motion. A number of the amendments would produce significant improvements in legal, juridical and operational aspects of the Bill. That end could have been served if the Bill had been handled correctly so far. There is still time for the Committee stage on clause 12 to take place. It need not take up much time. We could then make further progress and I am strongly in favour of that.

12.45 pm

Mr. Richard Shepherd : I have seen a number of damascene conversions in the course of my membership of the House and I have watched my hon. Friends' activities with enthusiasm today. They have identified two procedural problems and they are right to do so. I do not think that any hon. Member can complain when hon. Members use procedural techniques in relation to measures that they wish to oppose, but I wish that there were a little more even-handedness. It is not unfamiliar to my memory that the Government occasionally make cock-ups, but our natural instinct is to appreciate that a measure is important and that we should therefore try to find ways to move the business of the House forward.

The question before us is whether we continue with the Bill. That is really what it is about. I judge from debates in Committee, on Second Reading and today that there is a body of my colleagues who do not like the Bill. They feel that it is fundamentally flawed. I am not trying to apportion blame or credit but to observe that that has a relevance to whether we should debate the motion now.

I have watched the Whips, with their usual vigour on a Friday morning, scurrying around to point out observations and arguments which might be of use in prolonging the debate. I have watched the hon. Member for Brigg and Cleethorpes (Mr. Brown), who was Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Minister in Committee, trying to further the argument on the procedural debate about whether the Bill should proceed. I judge from all those activities, and from the curious statement by my hon. Friend--

Mr. Bellingham : I should correct my hon. Friend on the role of my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Cleethorpes (Mr. Brown). I assumed that he was Parliamentary Private Secretary to the hon. Member for Gainsburgh and Horncastle (Mr. Leigh).

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Mr. Shepherd : My hon. Friend's eye roved further. The hon. Member was extending the role of a Parliamentary Private Secretary to give counsel to others.

When we weigh up whether it is appropriate to continue with the Bill and the amendment on the Floor of the House we should weigh the various forces that have contributed to the present position and whether it is worth supporting the motion.

I have come to the conclusion that the Minister was deeply opposed to the Bill from the beginning. He felt that it was not appropriate to make that argument about the details and areas of error straight out, but he was fundamentally opposed to the Bill. To bring it to an end, he used a technique--I make no complaint because I, too, have tried to move a Bill through the Chamber--which elicited a response less characteristic of the traditions of the House but which achieved the same object.

The Minister takes the view that the Bill must not proceed. He tried to talk it out, but the House decided, through the procedural motions in Second Reading, that the Bill should go to Committee. Then the Minister sat through Committee giving neither guidance nor help despite the extraordinary generosity and kindness of the promoter of the Bill who always wanted to know in what way he could meet the objections. The Official Report of the Committee proceedings shows that amendments were passed. The promoter of the Bill attempted to address those questions in Committee. The Minister must have been aware for some time that a money resolution would be required. I regret that I was unaware of the fact that a money resolution would be needed. The question is whether we should be discussing it now. The use of procedural devices will ensure that the Bill does not proceed today, so it is doomed.

Mr. Forth : Can my hon. Friend say what, in his judgment, led the promoter of the Bill to table amendments Nos. 133 and 134 which seek to delete the major part of his own Bill?

Madam Deputy Speaker : Order. Before the hon. Member for Aldridge- Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd) and the Minister go down that road, I must emphasise that the only question before the House is whether the House should resolve itself immediately into a Committee of the whole House. I hope that hon. Members will address the very narrow question that is before the House.

Mr. Shepherd : I am trying to keep within those narrow confines, Madam Deputy Speaker. If the House agreed to that motion, we should be unable to raise many matters. I do not know on what basis the Government have raised such fundamental objections to the Bill, but they have led the entire Whips Office to gee itself up and scuttle around today, which means that the Bill is doomed. However, the Government have not put forward their arguments openly. I regret that we have been unable to discover what the Government's objections are--other than the fact that people outside this place, who have not been named, fear the Bill. As they would not come up front and discuss the matter, it is fruitless to consider the Bill now. The Minister has made it clear that he does not intend to allow the Bill to pass. We should therefore not continue to discuss it but acknowledge the means by which the Minister made his point and got his way.

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Mrs. Gorman : I came to the House this morning--as, I am sure, did many other hon. Members--and gave up a number of constitutional engagements in the hope that we would reach the Tax Relief for Household Employers Bill, which I introduced to the House under the ten-minute rule. Had I had any inkling that the House would spend such an inordinate amount of time on the Consumer Guarantees Bill, I should not have bothered to come. My morning could have been spent more profitably.

The Bill that I introduced has attracted a great deal of attention throughout the country. I cannot speak to it now ; that would be out of order. However, the drafting of the Consumer Protection Bill must have been incompetent ; as a result of which we are spending an enormous amount of time on a procedural matter.

The National Consumer Council is receiving £2 million of taxpayers' money to fund its activities, and it has persuaded the hon. Member for Clwyd, South-West (Mr. Jones) to promote the Bill. Surely, therefore, if it knows its job, it should have thrashed out all these points--

Madam Deputy Speaker : Order. I dislike having to be heavy-handed when I am in the Chair, but this is a very narrow motion. All that we are debating is whether clause 12 should be immediately considered in a Committee of the whole House.

Mrs. Gorman : As one of the hon. Members whose Bill is listed for today, I am sorry about that, because it means that those of us who had attended for other purposes will be crowded out.

Mr. Bellingham : I have said that I feel strongly that the Bill should go back upstairs into Committee, so that it can be properly considered and all the important matters can be examined. I should like to ask my hon. Friend the Minister exactly what the position will be if the House decides that the Bill should go back upstairs so that all these matters can be thrashed out. I came here this morning with a view to supporting the Bill.

Mr. Forth : My understanding is that the House has made a decision of principle to recommit the Bill to a Committee of the whole House. The only decision that we have to take is whether we do that now or subsequently. I hope that that helps my hon. Friend.

Mr. Bellingham : It helps me enormously. Obviously there will not be time to conduct the Committee stage of the Bill on the Floor of the House. Is there any possibility of a way being found to get the Bill back into Committee upstairs, as we have come across a number of serious pitfalls?

Mr. Squire : Is not the reality of what we have just heard from my hon. Friend the Minister that, if we do not debate the Bill today, my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the House will need to find another time for the whole House to debate it?

Madam Deputy Speaker : Order. This is a private Member's Bill ; therefore, it is debated in private Members time.

The only decision we are taking now is whether we proceed with the Bill in Committee here. That is the narrow decision we are taking now.

Mr. Bellingham : I am sorry for causing a slight side track.

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I came here hoping to go through some of the arguments on Report. As I have said on a number of occasions, I support many aspects of the Bill. I support it in principle as there is a great deal of good in it, but I am saddened by the complications that have been thrown up today.

It goes without saying that, had the Government found themselves in the same predicament with one of their less controversial Bills such as the Water Bill or the Bill dealing with the poll tax system, as my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister described it the other day, Opposition Members would have been going berserk. They would have been going haywire and seizing every possible opportunity to filibuster and reprimand the Minister and his officials for not spotting that discrepancy. Opposition Members cannot complain about hon. Members such as myself, who came here this morning hoping to participate and to play a constructive part in the debate only to find total chaos and that people evidently have not done their homework.

I hope that we can find some way of proceeding constructively so that we can examine the Bill in detail with the right amount of time. If we try to rush it through this morning, we shall be issuing hostages to fortune and setting a very bad example indeed.

Madam Deputy Speaker : Order. May I make it quite clear to the House that our only concern this morning is whether we immediately resolve ourselves into a Committee on the Bill to debate clause 12? That is the only thing that we are discussing.

Mr. Gale : On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Is it not also the case that the decision to commit the Bill to a Committee of the whole House has been taken, so that the only question is whether that is done now? If it is not done now, is it not the case that it will not happen at all?

Madam Deputy Speaker : Yes.

Mr. Edward Leigh : I wish to oppose the motion, and take as my text the words on the flysheet of the twentieth edition of "Erskine May" which are addressed not to the current Speaker but

"To The Right Honourable George Thomas, MP Speaker of the House of Commons, and to The Speakers of the Commonwealth, within whose hands the priceless heritage of Parliament is securely held".

It is strange that in the current edition of "Erskine May" those words have been changed to :

"The Speakers and Officers of Commonwealth Parliaments, all of whom guard the precious heritage of Parliamentary government." "Priceless" is much stronger than "precious".

I oppose the motion because of the word "now" and because written notice has not been given. As a result, colleagues have not had an opportunity to study the issue or come to the debate. To convince the House of my view, I have researched all such motions since 1945. I hope that the House will forgive me if I refer to what has happened in the past, but it is germane to our decision whether to approve the motion. I apologise to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, if you do not have the 20th edition of "Erskine May". No doubt your Clerks can find you a copy.

1 pm

We can exclude two groups. There are motions, of which there were apparently many before the 1960s, to recommit a Bill at the beginning of its Report stage to a

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Committee of the whole House in respect of specific amendments. Apart from the fact that that practice was discontinued in the 1960s, it does not cover this matter. The second group of recommittal motions can also be discounted as they concern the recommittal of hybrid Bills, and we are not talking about one today.

In deciding whether we should commit the Bill to a Committee of the whole House now, we should consider that written notice has not been given. I address my remarks specifically to why we should not commit the Bill because written notice has not been given. A Bill may be recommitted

"to enable a new clause to be added to the bill when the House, on report, has passed the stage at which new clauses are taken." That has happened in the past and we could proceed along those lines. New clauses are taken at the beginning of report stage before any amendments to the Bill.

Such a recommittal motion would require written notice. In the past, such a procedure has been used to recommit a Bill, but in this case no written notice has been given. Because of that, it would not be fair to rely on that purpose.

Secondly a Bill my be recommitted

"to enable the committee to take advantage of an instruction from the House to make amendments which would otherwise be outside the scope of the bill."

We are not talking about amendments outside the scope of the Bill, so this does not fall into that procedure. I understand that, again, the recommittal motion would require written notice so that the House could be properly informed of the amendments. No written notice has been given.

Madam Deputy Speaker : Order. The House has agreed the recommittal motion. The hon. Gentleman should stop referring to it.

Mr. Leigh : Surely we are now talking about whether the motion should take effect now. I am coming to that point.

Finally, a Bill may be recommitted

"to enable the committee to reconsider amendments they had previously made."

We could perhaps use that procedure now. "Erskine May" cites the Education Bill 1970, when the Opposition defeated the Government in Standing Committee on the motion, That clause 1 stand part, thus effectively crippling the Bill. The Government moved to recommit the Bill to the same Standing Committee with a permissive instruction to the effect that it had power to put back clause 1. Once again, notice was given.

I rest my case on that. We should not allow this part of the Bill to be debated now, because no written notice has been given. I have gone through the precedents and, as far as I can tell--I am not a constitutional expert and others in the House know considerably more that I do--there is no precedent to recommit a Bill to a Committee of the whole House, which is what we have just done, or any precedent for this motion. No doubt, Madam Deputy Speaker, you can be advised by your Clerks, but that is the worrying point.

This matter is serious because a number of other Bills have been listed for consideration after this one. As well as that I have tabled a number of amendments to the Bill. If we were to discuss the matter now it would take up a great deal of time. A large amount of public money is involved and, given that it is past 1 pm, there is virtually no chance of the Bill reaching Report Stage. If that were the case, I would have no opportunity to discuss my amendments. For those reasons, and the procedural motions I have

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discussed, I believe that we should not deal with the Bill now. We should allow written notice to be given and come back to it on another Friday.

Mr. Forth : The matters that we are discussing are important, and it is right for them to deserve the attention of the House. We are reminded this morning that the Bill obtained its Second Reading because more than 100 people were here to support it. That point was reinforced by my hon. Friend the Member for

Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd), who has always been a supporter of the Bill, who voted for it on Second Reading and who participated in its Committee proceedings.

It is interesting that, this morning, on the vote on the recommittal to a Committee of the whole House, only 85 hon. Members went through the Lobby in support. Many of them must have been my hon. Friends, because there have been precious few Opposition Members present all day. It looks as though enthusiasm for the Bill is declining. As it has proceeded through its different stages, it appears that fewer people have been prepared to be present to support it. That probably reflects the level of support and interest it has commanded outside the House. If the evidence of the postbag is anything to go by, there is little support for the Bill. That has given me comfort in my less than enthusiastic support for it--again noted by my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills. We must decide whether the House should now resolve itself into a Committee to deal with the important matter of clause 12. I can appreciate why my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Highgate (Sir G. Finsberg) believes that we should let the Bill go through now so that we can get on to more important things.

Sir Geoffrey Finsberg : I am sure that my hon. Friend will not mind me saying that, given the bad acoustics, it would be easier if he addressed Mr. Deputy Speaker rather than talking to me. The acoustics are so lousy that I cannot hear much of what he is saying.

Mr. Forth : What a pity that we can no longer look at the colleague to whom we are addressing our remarks. I am conscious of what my hon. Friend has said, so, if he will forgive me, I shall talk out of my right ear so to speak in the hope that he can follow my remarks. My hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Highgate asked why we could not let the Bill go through now. However, problems associated with the late appearance of the money resolution, referred to earlier, as well as problems associated with clause 12, must be considered. We must consider whether to go into Committee now so that we can address those matters, especially as we have yet to consider the money resolution in any detail given that it received its formal approval last night.

We must decide whether we are able now to deal with the money resolution and everything that flows from it. My hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough and Horncastle (Mr. Leigh) has already asked whether other hon. Members could now participate in a Committee of the whole House. Do they know that that is about to happen? Apart from anything else, we do not have a Treasury Minister present, but we may well want such a Minister to advise us on the implications of the money resolution. I could do my best on behalf of the Government, but I am

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not completely confident of dealing with all the matters that might arise as a result of that money resolution in the absence of a colleague from the Treasury.

Mr. Martyn Jones : If the normal procedures had applied, the money resolution would have been considered after Second Reading, and the Bill would then have been considered in Committee. As a member of that Committee, the Minister would have taken advice from a Treasury Minister and brought it to the attention of the House. I should have thought that the Under-Secretary of State would anticipate this circumstance, as he tabled the motion last night, which was passed nem. con. The Government had an opportunity then to vote, in effect against the Bill, but they did not. I should have thought that the hon. Gentleman would now have the advice from his Treasury colleague and could make those points to a Committee of the whole House.

Mr. Forth : The hon. Gentleman makes a perfectly fair point. I remind him that the money resolution was laid before the House in the name of my hon. Friend the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, as is right and proper in these circumstances. I made sure that I was here on the Treasury Bench last night, as was my duty, to see that money resolution safely through the House in order to give a fair wind to the Bill and to ensure at least that it would not be an obstruction and prevent consideration of the Bill proceeding.

We have agreed the recommittal, but have not yet decided whether it should take place now. Given the comments by my hon. Friends, that point is worth considering, if only because of what would happen to the Bill were we not to consider it in Committee now. I think that we are clear in our minds about that and no doubt you will guide us if we are not, Madam Deputy Speaker.

As I understand it, if we decided not to proceed now, the Bill would go back into the private Members' Bills queue and, if time were available, would be considered in Committee. I am not sure whether that gives the Bill peculiar difficulties, but I think that some of my hon. Friends have that approach in mind. If we followed it, it would give everyone time perhaps to consider the implications of the money resolution and look again at clause 12 and perhaps even, as my hon. Friend the Member for Spelthorne (Mr. Wilshire) suggested, give the Bill's promoter time to look at his Bill again, consider its state and all the difficulties connected with the limited time available to private Members' Bills.

I hope that the hon. Member for Clwyd, South-West (Mr. Jones) will speak after me to advise the House what should happen. We presume that he wants to go ahead now with the Bill, but he has not told us the strength of his feeling on the matter or why it should go ahead. Given the importance of clause 12 to the Bill, it is appropriate to consider it seriously.

I remind the House that clause 12 states :

"The following provisions of the Consumer Protection Act 1987, and section 25 of the Trade Descriptions Act 1968, shall apply in relation to the enforcement of this Act, and in relation to offences under this Act or under any regulations under this Act, as they apply in relation to the enforcement of, and in relation to offences under that Act".

The clause raises important points, as I think the hon. Member for Clwyd, South-West would agree. It means

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that trading departments and officers would be responsible for enforcing the Bill's provisions, unless the House subsequently passed the hon. Gentleman's amendment to delete this part of the Bill--a mystery that we have not yet resolved. At this late hour, we are still waiting for it to be resolved. I have invited the hon. Gentleman to explain, but he has not yet done so.

I hope that the hon. Member for Clwyd, South-West will seek to catch your eye, Madam Deputy Speaker, to make it clear to us why he thinks that it is important to deal with this matter now rather than subsequently, whether he thinks that hon. Members have sufficient evidence with which to deal with this complicated matter and whether it might be advisable for me to seek further advice from my Treasury colleagues on the detailed provisions of the money resolution. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will give us all that guidance.

This is an important matter and my hon. Friends have made clear their concerns. Although it may well be appropriate for us to deal with this point now, unless the Bill's promoter answers our questions, we shall find it difficult to make a determination. I sense that some hon. Members feel that it would probably be inappropriate to give the Bill further detailed consideration now. On the other hand, some hon. Members feel that that would be appropriate. I shall await the remarks of the promoter of the Bill before deciding whether to support the motion.

1.15 pm

Mr. Martyn Jones : I think that we should resolve ourselves into a Committee immediately. In any case, the House cannot do much more business today, and I understand that the Minister responsible for the next Bill is not here.

The Minister's second question was about my amendments numbers 133 and 134, and I should be out of order if I sought to discuss them now. He will find out the answers if he joins us in voting for the motion.

Question put :--

The House divided : Ayes 77, Noes 0.

Division No. 151] [1.16 pm

AYES

Banks, Robert (Harrogate)

Barnes, Harry (Derbyshire NE)

Barron, Kevin

Bennett, A. F. (D'nt'n & R'dish)

Boateng, Paul

Bowden, Gerald (Dulwich)

Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

Carrington, Matthew

Chapman, Sydney

Clay, Bob

Cohen, Harry

Conway, Derek

Corbyn, Jeremy

Crowther, Stan

Cryer, Bob

Cummings, John

Davies, Ron (Caerphilly)

Dixon, Don

Durant, Tony

Dykes, Hugh

Finsberg, Sir Geoffrey

Fisher, Mark

Fookes, Dame Janet

Fraser, John

Garel-Jones, Tristan

Gordon, Mildred

Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)

Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

Hardy, Peter

Haynes, Frank

Heal, Mrs Sylvia

Heffer, Eric S.

Hind, Kenneth

Hoey, Ms Kate (Vauxhall)

Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)

Illsley, Eric

Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S W)

Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald

Loyden, Eddie

Macdonald, Calum A.

McKay, Allen (Barnsley West)

Madden, Max

Morris, Rt Hon A. (W'shawe)

Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)

Norris, Steve

Owen, Rt Hon Dr David

Patchett, Terry

Pendry, Tom

Pike, Peter L.

Quin, Ms Joyce

Rathbone, Tim

Richardson, Jo

Rowlands, Ted

Ruddock, Joan

Sedgemore, Brian

Shersby, Michael

Shore, Rt Hon Peter

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