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10.27 pm
Mr. Desmond Swayne (New Forest, West): I have attended the Committee's sittings assiduously. I would say that I have been here for every minute of every sitting and have spoken on every occasion. If one were to check Hansard, I reckon that one would find that I spoke for between five and seven minutes each time. I did not filibuster but made the points required of me carefully and cogently. I believe that to be the case, because, had it not been, I am sure that the Chairman at any given time would have called me to order. Indeed, had it not been the case, Labour Members would not have sought to intervene to make their own cogent remarks. There has been no filibustering on this Bill.
The fact is that it was the hon. Member for Ilford, South (Mr. Gapes) who spoke for half an hour, and the Minister of State for nearly a full hour.
Mr. Blunt:
My hon. Friend makes an important point, but the Minister of State was giving the Committee proper
Mr. Swayne:
That is indeed the case. I do not begrudge the Minister of State his hour. He was well worth listening to. In that hour, he strenuously attempted to deal with every point made by my colleagues.
I disagree with much of the Minister's analysis, but it was entirely appropriate that he should have taken an hour to express it, just as it was entirely appropriate that I should have spoken to three groups of amendments, because, during the general election campaign, anxieties on the subject matter dealt with by the Bill were expressed, entirely unsolicited, on virtually every doorstep in my constituency.
The people who expressed their concerns speak in this Chamber through me. That is the very basis of a representative democracy. This timetable motion, however, will deny them that opportunity. After Front Benchers have had their say, there will be very little time for Back Benchers to speak to the Bill.
We have a constitutional convention in the United Kingdom, although, I grant, we do not have a written constitution. We generally do not offer our people referendums, or include mandatory thresholds in those referendums. We also do not, unlike France or Germany, have a constitutional court. We do, however, have a constitutional convention, which states that, on constitutional matters, any hon. Member can have his say, without having written to the Speaker and hoping like hell that he will get a chance to speak. The convention is that any hon. Member can have his say by attending the Bill's Committee stage, which will be taken on the Floor of the House. Today's motion will ride roughshod over that convention.
It is all very well for Ministers to say, "This guillotine is your fault. If you had treated the Bill's Committee stage with some respect and not abused it, we would not have been driven to protect our parliamentary timetable for other Bills with this motion", but it was entirely disingenuous of the Secretary of State to say that the Bill has been debated on five days, because the debate on the Bill's Second Reading was entirely irrelevant to today's motion. Moreover, as he himself said, today he made another Second Reading speech. He said that the treaty will protect our borders, guarantee subsidiarity and implement Labour's election manifesto pledge to implement the social chapter. However, only by going through the Bill's detail in Committee will we discover that the treaty will do nothing of the sort. That is precisely why the Government want to kill the Bill's Committee stage; they want debate on the Bill to be silenced.
It is a matter not only of silencing hon. Members, who have every right to speak, but of using smoke and mirrors and of covering up the Second Reading speeches that have been made. A Committee of the whole House has debated the Bill for a total of 12 hours, which represents about three hours per group of amendments. That strikes me as entirely reasonable. If the Government are concerned about their legislative programme, why are they not prepared for the Committee to sit after 10 o'clock? Is the matter not of sufficient constitutional importance to do so? Do Ministers really need their beauty sleep so badly? I wonder. Why has every sitting of the Committee, with one exception, been preceded by a ministerial statement?
Many hon. Members have mentioned the Single European Act 1985 in this debate. That Act was debated for three full days. As I said, the Secretary of State was disingenuous when he said that the Bill had been debated on five days. That does not mean that it was debated for five days. In fact, it was debated for 12 hours.
Dr. Rudi Vis (Finchley and Golders Green):
The hon. Gentleman has now been speaking for seven minutes.
Mr. Swayne:
I thank the hon. Gentleman for drawing my attention to that. I have made the points that I wished to make, so I shall take his cue to resume my seat.
Mr. Graham Brady (Altrincham and Sale, West):
However helpful or unhelpful Labour Members may be, I cannot promise that I shall be as compliant as my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest, West (Mr. Swayne) in taking cues on how long I should speak.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr. Cash) said that the best way to keep a secret is to make a speech in the House of Commons. The reason for that is behaviour such as that of the Government this evening. It is a privilege to follow so many thoughtful and passionate speeches from my hon. Friends, but my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd) made an outstanding contribution to the debate. I echo his point that the standing of the House of Commons is at stake when the Government treat Parliament in such a way as to demonstrate their disregard for democracy.
The speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills was particularly important. I only wish that all new Members elected on 1 May could have heard it. I fear that many new Members do not have sufficient regard for the history, tradition and importance of this place as the guarantor of the freedom of the British people. My hon. Friend's speech brings that home.
It is desperately important that we should all remember why we are here. I am tempted to say that it is particularly important for new Labour Members, some of whom were not expecting to be elected on 1 May, but found themselves here--some with small majorities--and who may not be here for very long. Of course, we are all here for as long as our electors choose, but I fear that some who were elected on 1 May do not have sufficient regard for the institution of which we have the privilege to be Members, and that is most regrettable.
The low standing of the House of Commons has been compounded in recent months and years. I make no bones about it. Many questions and problems have been raised. Many people take the view that, at times during the past few years, the Conservative Government did not maintain the highest standards. However, what I find particularly worrying in the arguments for the guillotine motion that have been advanced rather sparingly in just one speech from the Government is the suggestion that, if the previous Government did it, it must be all right.
That is reflected in the behaviour of the new Government over the past few months. The formula one crisis involving Mr. Ecclestone gave the impression--
however unjustified--that the Government may have changed their policy because they received a donation of a considerable sum of money.
Mr. Gerald Bermingham (St. Helens, South):
I know that the hon. Gentleman has newly arrived, but I recall that, in the last Parliament, the then Conservative Government, who had a majority of 29, introduced 82 guillotine motions. I cannot remember how many there were in the 1987 Parliament, but they were awfully frequent, given the Government's majority of 100. In the 1983 Parliament, the Government had a majority of 144, and they tried to shut us up on every possible occasion.
This is the first one in the current Parliament. I admit that I have been away for part of the time, so will the hon. Gentleman explain why a Government are not allowed to get their business through? What was sauce for the goose from 1983 to 1997 is surely sauce for the gander from 1997 onwards--probably to 2010.
Mr. Brady:
I am most grateful to the hon. Gentleman for taking the trouble to make my point for me. That is precisely the argument that I find so distressing and unsettling.
Dr. Vis:
Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that Mr. Ecclestone gave £14 million to the Conservative party? If so, will he confirm that that might be related to the absence of any legislation about tobacco?
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael J. Martin):
Order. The hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West (Mr. Brady) is not going to confirm anything of that nature. He is going to confine his remarks to the motion.
Mr. Brady:
I am struggling to do so--although Labour Members appear to be engaging in a determined filibuster by raising matters that have no relevance whatever to the guillotine motion.
I was referring, in my valid point, to how the standing of Parliament is threatened by the behaviour in which the Government are engaging. This guillotine motion is an important instance of that. It adds to the distressing and unfortunate public view that Parliament is worthless, that it no longer represents the people of this country or has a genuine democratic function.
I am pleased to see the Foreign Secretary in his place again--almost by magic--because I am about to refer to a point that he made in his opening speech. [Hon. Members: "Go on, then."] I thank Labour Members for their helpfulness in trying to move me on to my point.
My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard) said that the Foreign Secretary gave two novel justifications for the guillotine motion in his introductory speech--first, that unanimity is required on the Opposition Benches for such business, and secondly that a very large majority on Second Reading obviates the need for a proper Committee.
I think that a third very worrying and novel justification was advanced. It was suggested that, because the Government won a large majority on 1 May, there was no need for a proper Committee stage. Democracy does not end in this country when we have a general election. It is important that we recognise that democracy continues through the Parliament. We are sent here as
representatives of our constituents, not merely to implement what may be in a rather sparse election manifesto, of whichever party.
I am tempted to say that, on 1 May, just as all Labour voters may have thought and known that they were voting for incorporation of the social chapter, they all thought and believed that they were voting against a cut in benefits for single mothers. The Foreign Secretary's argument does not stand up when he is prepared to be so selective about which parts of Labour's manifesto and which pledges are considered sacrosanct, and which ones can be thrown away without regard. That is of great concern to hon. Members.
Suggestions, especially by the hon. and learned Member for North-East Fife (Mr. Campbell), that the Bill has been filibustered need to be refuted. There has been no filibuster. Indeed, most hon. Members would agree that good progress has been made. In 12 hours, we have spent, on average, three hours on each group of amendments.
I make no criticism of the Minister of State, but he made the longest speech of the proceedings when he spoke for almost an hour in winding up. The second longest speech was from another Labour Member. The hon. Member for Ilford, South (Mr. Gapes) spoke for 30 minutes--far longer than any Conservative Member's speech. If the Government are contending that their own Members are filibustering business, it is rather a bizarre accusation to lay at our door.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stone spoke about the origins of the guillotine motion in 1887 in proceedings on the Criminal Law Amendment (Ireland) Bill. It is particularly telling that Gladstone called the proposal
10.34 pm
"a further abridgement of Parliamentary liberty".
That was in the days when we had a Liberal party which was worthy of the name, which we no longer do.
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