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Mr. Forth: What is the figure?
Mr. Kirkwood: The administration vote is £85.3 million. The work services vote is £99.6 million. Taking the office costs member vote into account, the total running costs for last year were £273.9 million. That includes quite a lot of capital expenditure for Portcullis House. We cannot build that fast enough either, but the Braithwaite report does not deal with Portcullis House.
I do not know where the right hon. Gentleman has been for--
Mr. Kirkwood:
It seems longer to some of us. We elect the membership of these Committees. There are motions late at night, when sometimes even the right hon. Gentleman is in his place. These motions are amendable and debatable.
Mr. Kirkwood:
I have given the game away, and we are now in for many more hard and long nights. These names are all approved by the House. We could delete one name and add another, and eventually end up with a debate. I think that that answers the right hon. Gentleman's question.
I was grateful for the support that the PDVN received from various hon. Members. I was grateful, too, for the comments of the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young). I look forward to working with him to take this process forward.
My hon. Friends the Members for Hazel Grove (Mr. Stunell) and for Hallam both made important points but, again, broadly supported the thrust of the report. I look forward to talking to them informally.
Finally, the hon. Member for Christchurch (Mr. Chope) is a very brave man if he tells his local and regional press sees that there are moves afoot in the House of Commons to start charging their editors to get copy from the Press Gallery.
Mr. Chope:
I am certainly not going to have my remarks misrepresented in that way. I suggested that there should be a charge per square foot for the office accommodation used by members of the press.
Mr. Kirkwood:
I was teasing the hon. Gentleman. It is an important point. I was astonished when I discovered the extent of the facilities up there. We had a look in the previous Parliament and were so horrified by the facilities that we spent a lot of money trying to improve fire safety and other health and safety measures. [Hon. Members: "Why?"] That is a good question.
I assure the hon. Gentleman that we will be looking in every corner of the estate to try to make the place more efficient in a way that is properly costed and transparent for all our constituents.
This has been a valuable debate and, as a Commissioner, I feel that it has given us something to work on. I have assured hon. Members that we will ensure that progress will be reported religiously and transparently in full consultation. All the points made today will be carefully considered, and we hope to make progress quickly and in a way that people fully understand and can respond to as they think appropriate. Without more ado, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.
Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
Ordered,
Mr. Kerry Pollard (St. Albans):
I am pleased to present and support a petition raised by my local National Farmers Union, which has been signed by more than 2,000 of my constituents.
It declares:
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.--[Mr. Dowd.]
Mr. Brian White (Milton Keynes, North-East):
The right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) earlier referred to impossible battles, and I shall try to take one on. I am indebted to the hon. Member for Rutland and Melton (Mr. Duncan) for his comments on Second Reading of the Electronic Communications Bill. I worry about being so heartily in agreement with a member of the Tory party, but it happens sometimes. I should also put on the record our debt to the House of Lords for debating the matter of plain English several times. I acknowledge the help of the Plain English Campaign, which, since this debate appeared on the Order Paper, has given me some interesting material.
We should start by asking whose interests we serve. In every sphere of life, in government and business, we are moving from being a producer-oriented society to being one in which users and consumers come first. It is unfortunate that Parliament lags behind. The interests of our constituents should be the primary focus when we draft legislation. A myth exists that some language is "right" and some "wrong". In truth, language evolves. For example, there is currently an interesting debate about Spanish as Hispanics in the United States of America are changing the language. Language changes.
My main concern is legalese language that is difficult to understand. By that, I mean such things as unnecessary technical terms, the impersonal style of Bills, twisted word orders, needless repetition or elaboration, unhelpful layout, long sentences, use of double negatives, use of passive verbs rather than active ones and so on. I want to deal with several different areas in this debate.
First, I propose that we have a purpose clause in every Bill. Secondly, we should review legislation as much as pass new legislation. Thirdly, we should tackle the issue of non-sexist language in Bills. Fourthly, we need to use plain English in legislation, particularly statutory instruments.
I am a member of the Select Committee on Public Administration, which considered the Freedom of Information Bill. It was suggested that the Bill should have a purpose clause, as has been proposed on several other occasion. Nearly every time, such clauses were rejected as setting a precedent. It is not conventional to include them. Occasionally, as in the case of the Children Acts, purpose clauses have been accepted but, in discussions on whether a Bill needs one, we are usually told, "We don't want to do it in this Bill because that's not the way it is generally done."
Every Bill should have a purpose clause. Some people will point out that, since Pepper v. Hart, Ministers' comments can be taken into account. However, as Lord Lester, who gave evidence to the Select Committee, pointed out, that would be true only when the wording in the Bill is unclear. Only then would the court resort to Pepper v. Hart.
A purpose clause in every Bill would not only explain the intentions of the Bill, but guard against unforeseen implications and prevent the semantic errors that dog so
much of our legislation. It would make the intentions of Ministers clear to the courts in any subsequent arguments over interpretation and enhance our legislation.
One of the things that we do well in this place is pass legislation; its quantity is testimony to that. However, we rarely review it. When we do so, it is either after a change of Government or because there is a crisis or uproar. The Child Support Agency is a classic example; we reviewed it because it was not working. There were problems, pressure built up and we had to reform it. In other cases, the review is in response to rulings from the European Court--as has happened in the case of the armed forces legislation--or to European directives.
In America, sunset clauses in Bills have become popular. I support them in certain circumstances; they can play a valuable role. The inclusion of such a clause in the Electronic Communications Bill is a useful innovation. We need to build a quality review process into every piece of legislation and to ensure that, as times change, the purpose of the Bill changes with them. Too often, circumstances change, but legislation fails to catch up.
The Select Committee on Deregulation has a role to play in that matter. The Committee could consider legislation and initiate changes through its procedures. I urge the Minister, in his review of the Committee, to consider that matter. I realise that the Law Commission examines legislation. I do not suggest the replacement of its role; I want a political review rather than the technical one that it necessarily undertakes.
I find the use of sexist language in our legislation hard to stomach. When I entered local government in the 1980s and when I was growing up in the trade union movement, there were battles about the use of sexist language. Those battles are over. In business, in local government--even in the local pub--people manage to talk in non-sexist language; it has become the norm. The one matter where we have not caught up is in the drafting of Bills.
I fully expect the forces of conservatism to continue to use offensive and degrading language. Some hon. Members would be quite prepared to use it deliberately. However, we should not have to acquiesce in that practice. It is important that Bills are written so as to avoid the use of "he" in references to a man or woman. For example, clause 10 of the Electronic Communications Bill contains the words
I am not worried if the odd bit of sexist language slips through. My point relates to the use of language and the cultural change that is needed, not to the requirements of narrow political correctness. However, we desperately need to address the issue.
If we expect people to follow the law, it is important that they understand it. I hope that I am a reasonably intelligent person, but, if I have to read every Bill three or four times before I understand it, there really is something wrong. Acts of Parliament should not just be for lawyers and MPs. That difficulty in understanding legislation is a problem for our democracy.
An example occurred this week when the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments was considering a regulation on the working families tax credit, which is one of the best measures that the Government have introduced, and which has helped many people. The tax credit is paid through employers. S.I. No. 3219 details how it should be paid and in what circumstances. The Committee Clerk could not understand a particular part of the regulation. If someone as eminent as a Clerk can misunderstand such a crucial piece of legislation, which is the cornerstone of the Government's policy to help people out of poverty, what hope has a small business man or woman of understanding it?
We use pre-legislative scrutiny a great deal now; it is becoming the norm. I welcome that innovation. Part of the consultation process ought to be to submit every draft Bill to the Plain English Campaign. The aim should be to ensure that as many Bills as possible get a crystal mark, although certain technical Bills might not be able to achieve it. I understand that the Scottish Parliament would have achieved that mark recently, but for a few minor points.
In Canada, the Uniform Law Conference's drafting conventions say:
I accept that change is not the easy option. It would be easier to continue with jargon, legalese and convention. I recognise that it is hard to achieve precision, clarity and ease of understanding and that Parliamentary drafters would have to do a lot more thinking. However, it does not help legislation if we produce Bills with 127-word sentences and excessive detail. That leads to complexity, obscurity and uncertainty.
The Freedom of Information Bill states:
The Irish Freedom of Information Act says:
The British Bill has 86 clauses and seven schedules; the Irish Act has 48 clauses and three schedules. By making our legislation unnecessarily complex, we do a disservice to our democracy by placing citizens at the mercy of the bureaucratic state and by making it easier for people to make the legitimate excuse that they did not understand what we were asking of them.
There is a myth that plain English is not legally accurate, but that has been steadily and repeatedly shattered. In the United States, 44 states have some form of requirement for plain English, and there has never been a case in which a contract has been declared less legally valid because of the use of the plain English.
We need to replace the long sentences, the verbiage and the countless double negatives. I do not understand why we have to frame legislation in negative terms. We should replace the old formalities with concise, simple, familiar and precise language.
Nowhere is that more important than in statutory instruments. Last year, we produced more than 3,000 statutory instruments. Why do we need to dot all the i's and cross all the t's? We need a third way of regulation. The laissez-faire of let it rip should not apply and neither should we nail down everything to say how a particular regulation should be implemented. We should set the objective of the regulation, but not necessarily worry about how people achieve it. We should set the way forward. That is a true third way for regulations.
At present, 60 statutory instruments go through each meeting of the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments and consideration of them lasts for about 30 minutes. That shows how much attention is given to them. Unless they are made much clearer and the scrutiny is made much better, our system of checks and balances will be lost.
That, in respect of the Disqualifications Bill, notices of Amendments, new Clauses and new Schedules to be moved in Committee may be accepted by the Clerks at the Table before the Bill has been read a second time.--[Mr. Dowd.]
Ordered,
That Mr. Peter Bradley be discharged from the Select Committee on Public Administration and Mr. David Lepper be added to the Committee.--[Mr. Dowd]
Ordered,
That Mr. David Drew be discharged from the Select Committee on Modernisation of the House of Commons and David Taylor be added to the Committee.--[Mr. Dowd.]
7.36 pm
The labelling of food is currently confusing and misleading.
To lie upon the Table.
The petitioner therefore requests the House of Commons to urge the Minister to introduce legislation at the earliest opportunity so that only produce which originates in Britain can be labelled as British, thereby allowing consumers who want to buy British the freedom to do so.
7.36 pm
"the Director shall not make any modification unless . . . he has considered every representation made to him about the modification".
Why cannot we say that
"the Director shall not make any modification unless representations about the modification have been considered"?
We do not need to use the word "he" in that context.
"An Act should be written simply, clearly and concisely, with the required degree of precision, and as much as possible in ordinary language".
If there were any Tory Members here, I would upset them with my next quote because even the European Union guidelines say that
"the wording of an Act should be clear, simple, concise and unambiguous".
The use of technological terminology should be appropriate, and Acts should not include redundant or archaic words and phrases.
"Where, on making his request for information, the applicant expresses a preference for communication by any one or more of the following means, namely
when the applicant is simply asking for a copy of a record.
(a) the provision to the applicant of a copy of the information in permanent form or in another form acceptable to the applicant",
"A head may give access under this Act to a record providing the requestor with
The Australian Act says:
(a) A copy of the record".
"Access to a document may be given to a person in one or more of the following forms . . .
That is simple and everybody understands it. Why do we need to make it unnecessarily complex and ensure, through the tautology of language, that people do not understand what we are asking them to do?
(c) Provision by an agency of Government of a copy of the document".
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