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Mr. Marlow: With a few exceptions, all the measures that the Government bring before the House are fair, effective and not in conflict with our international obligations, and the hon. Gentleman opposes them. Will he oppose this Bill or support it?
Mr. Straw: I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman has only just woken up, but of course we will oppose the Bill. If he cares to listen, he will find out why. We would much prefer the Bill to be examined on an all-party basis by a Special Standing Committee. If he had thought about it, he would have recommended that for the Maastricht Bill.
The Secretary of State claims, as we have just heard, that the Special Standing Committee procedures are only for non-controversial legislation, but he has been unable to find a single convincing text in support of that restriction. First, on the "Today" programme, he quoted from an obscure and long-discredited White Paper on "Scotland and the Union", forgetting that the scrutiny of Bills is a responsibility of the House, not of the Government.
When that ruse failed, the Secretary of State sought support in the Chairman of the Procedure Committee, the right hon. Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery), who, he said, had written to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition,
I have that Procedure Committee report here. It contains no such finding. In his letter, the right hon. Member for Honiton quoted a single phrase from that report. The phrase was:
Mr. David Winnick (Walsall, North):
Is my hon. Friend aware that I was then, and remain, a member of the Select Committee on Procedure, and that I was therefore party to the report? Although it is true that we said that,
"in particular", the Bills that were not party political could be referred to a Special Standing Committee, we certainly did not work on the assumption that all measures that might be considered controversial in party political terms should not be considered by such a Committee. I am certain that, had such a Bill as this come before the Procedure Committee for consideration, we would have accepted that there was every possible justification for its going to a Special Standing Committee.
Mr. Straw:
I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who is entirely right. The words
Indeed, contrary to what the Home Secretary just claimed about the way in which Parliament can effectively scrutinise legislation, the Procedure Committee recorded at paragraph 312:
Mr. Robert G. Hughes (Harrow, West):
Is that not simply a rather long-winded way of saying that the Special Standing Committee is a fig leaf that will enable the Labour party to appear to be on both sides of the issue? Will the hon. Gentleman answer two specific questions? Does he recognise that there is a problem with the number of asylum seekers? If so, what are his proposals to deal with that problem?
Mr. Straw:
Does not the hon. Gentleman recognise the danger of not subjecting the Bill to proper scrutiny-- a danger which, as the hon. Member for Broxtowe pointed out, has led to the failure of the Asylum and Immigration Appeals Act 1993?
Mr. Nirj Joseph Deva (Brentford and Isleworth)
rose--
Mr. Straw:
I must make progress.
As Madam Speaker pointed out two weeks ago, there is no restriction on which Bills the House may commit to a Special Standing Committee. As she said, the bottom line is that it is for the House to decide.
When, in 1986, these Standing Orders were introduced, an attempt was made to restrict the circumstances in which Bills could be committed to such a Committee. Ministers sought an automatic veto over any Bill that could be remitted to a Special Standing Committee, but the House rejected that notion. There was a rebellion on both sides of the House, and the man who led it was none other than the Chairman of the Procedure Committee. He said that the right to commit Bills to such Committees should not be reserved for Ministers.
Mr. Howard:
The hon. Gentleman is doing what he always does when he is on a thoroughly bad point, which is to address his argument to a different point altogether. No one is disputing the fact that the House, in its wisdom, can decide, if it so wishes, to subject any Bill to any procedure, including a Special Standing Committee. That is not the argument; the argument is whether this is an appropriate Bill to be subjected to that procedure.
The Government made their view clear in the White Paper on Scotland in 1993. My right hon. Friend the Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery), the Chairman of the Procedure Committee, made clear his Committee's view in his letter. In order to avoid the issue, the hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr. Straw) keeps talking about the completely different question of whether the House can decide to send the Bill to a Special Standing Committee. Of course the House can decide that if it so wishes, but that is not the point.
Mr. Straw:
The Home Secretary is as badly briefed today as when he appeared on the "Today" programme. It is no good quoting a White Paper, as White Papers are published by the Government. It is for the House to determine its own procedure.
The Home Secretary mentioned the Procedure Committee. The question of the nature of the Bills to go to Special Standing Committees was debated in 1986. The issue then was whether Bills should be non-controversial and whether they should be referred only by Ministers. The House came to a different view from that which the Secretary of State and the Chairman of the Procedure Committee are recommending to the House.
Mr. Flynn:
Did my hon. Friend observe that the Home Secretary failed to honour the promise he made to me in response to my intervention, and explain why genuine asylum seekers will be deprived of all benefits from 8 January? Does my hon. Friend agree that one reason for a special Committee is that it would remove that injustice, which will leave thousands of families penniless in a few weeks' time?
Mr. Straw:
Yes, of course I agree with my hon. Friend.
Mr. Jacques Arnold (Gravesham):
Will the hon. Gentleman explain why he thinks that this House will not properly scrutinise the Bill, given that the right hon. Members for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) and for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) have volunteered to serve on the Standing Committee? Why on earth will it not be properly scrutinised by Members from his side of the House as well as ours?
Mr. Straw:
The hon. Gentleman shows a profound misunderstanding of the way in which Standing and Select Committees operate.
Mr. Straw:
He asked a serious question, and I shall give him a serious answer. The value of the Special Standing Committee procedure is that it enables evidence to be taken from practitioners and others on how the bill might work in practice. As his hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe (Mr. Lester) pointed out in the House on 20 November, had that procedure been available during the passage of the Asylum and Immigration Appeals Act 1993, the Act might not have turned out to be the failure it has.
Mr. Alton:
May I support the hon. Gentleman in what he is saying? Surely, if the Act has served us so badly and we are having to find new legislation only three years after it was introduced, that in itself is a justification for calling witnesses to find out why it has not worked.
"referring him to a finding of the Procedure Committee in the 1989-90 Session which clearly demonstrates that [the Special Standing Committee] procedure would not be appropriate for the Bill".
"in particular those Bills which are not controversial in party political terms".
I am afraid, however, that he did not put that phrase into its proper context, because the Committee was highly critical of the way in which the House scrutinises legislation, and of the Government's refusal to countenance reform.
"in particular those Bills which are not controversial in party political terms"
was not a finding for the House but a recommendation to the Government following the most serious criticism of the Government's refusal to make use of the Special Standing Committee procedure in almost any circumstances.
"There is widespread dissatisfaction with the way in which the Standing Committee system operates".
It continued:
"We . . . strongly believe that the best way to harness the positive attributes of Select Committees to the scrutiny of legislation in appropriate cases is through Special Standing Committee. The necessary procedural machinery already exists in Standing Orders and we have urged on several occasions that proper use should be made of it . . . All that is lacking is the necessary will on the Government's part".
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