Examination of Witness (Questions 25 -
39)
WEDNESDAY 17 OCTOBER 2001
PROFESSOR LORD
NORTON OF
LOUTH
Chairman
25. Lord Norton, would you care to join us?
First of all, is it acceptable to you if I address you as Philip,
I am talking to everybody else in first-name terms, it would be
invidious not to do the same here, if I may?
(Lord Norton) Yes.
26. My apologies to you for keeping you waiting,
but you heard the previous discussion, and I think that that will
be broadly helpful, obviously, in your evidence, in that, to a
large extent, your report tracked the recommendations of the Liaison
Committee. I was quite struck, looking at the summary of your
recommendations, at the end, that in the summary of your recommendations
on the committee structure you say that the appointment of committee
members should be taken out of the hands of the Whips, but you
did not actually, in your summary, offer a solution to the alternative.
In the body of the report, you indicated some sympathy for the
Liaison Committee's report. As you will have gathered, I think
that there is a broad recognition of the problems of the present
system, we do not need to rehearse, though I am open to any advice
you wish to give us, the reason why the present system is defective,
but I am intrigued as to why in your summary you did not specifically
endorse the proposal by the Liaison Committee as an alternative;
do you see problems there, or are you personally attracted to
it?
(Lord Norton) No, the summary was meant
to include essentially our own recommendations in the body of
the report; it went far further than indicating sympathy with
the Liaison Committee, we actually strongly endorsed the report
of the Committee, we felt it had got it right, and said so. So
I think we saw our task as just saying we think the Liaison Committee
is right; what we were looking at was then, if you like, supplementing
its recommendations, because the Liaison Committee had a very
precise remit. Our work, of course, went much broader, and what
we were trying to do was to bring in other reforms that needed
to be linked with the appointments process to strengthen the House
as a whole, so that was the context. But, no, we were very much
strongly in support of the Liaison Committee report, and, indeed,
as far as I am concerned, remain so. The more arguments I actually
hear against the report the more convinced I am, I think, they
are actually moving in the right direction, because I do not really
find most of the arguments against really that, the kindest thing
I can say, I do not find them persuasive.
27. I fully recognise the force of the argument
that a case for preserving the status quo might not necessarily
be persuasive, but do you have any sympathy with the points that
have been made by a number of colleagues in these exchanges that
there is a risk that the Liaison Committee, consisting as it does
of chairs of the select committees, may not be the appropriate
body to choose the members of select committees?
(Lord Norton) I can see a problem, and I think this
picks up on Mr Stunell's point, if it operates in such a way that
Members do not feel they have got ownership of the process; and
I think one of the fundamental things one has to look at is, if
you like, in terms of creating a particular culture, I think that
is where the system has gone wrong. The original intention, in
1979, was that the Committee of Selection would have some autonomy
in the selection of the members; that went very quickly wrong,
and the culture developed that the Whips had the same sort of
input they have in standing committees, so a certain culture has
built up. And I think that is why one needs to start afresh, in
order to separate out from the old culture that you were referring
to earlier in terms of the impact of the Whips. I think you have
got to move away from that, you have got to set up a system where
it develops a culture where members feel they are involved, they
are being taken into account, so that one would have a process
whereby those doing the appointing were listening to others, where
there is input, not just from the Whips but from others as well,
where Members can make, and I think this is rather important,
their own case individually, rather than have necessarily to channel
it through the Whips. And I think that would give them a feeling
they were far more involved in the process if they were able to
put their case before the relevant appointees, because, otherwise,
they may feel, "Well, the Whips have got a clear view and
we are being not involved." I think that is part of it. So,
the involvement, and then, of course, the selection itself would
be transparent, in the sense that the lists are published, they
are put before the House, the House can see who is being chosen.
I am not sure if you can be much more transparent than that in
an appointing process, and I do think appointment is preferable
to elections, for reasons I will be happy to come on to. So I
think one can create a culture that meets those points. And I
think it does need to be, and I see no reason why it should not
be, of the sort that was put forward by the Liaison Committee.
I am not persuaded by the alternative arguments that somehow you
have three "wise persons" who do not have the sort of
knowledge that is necessary, and I do not quite follow the logic
of that. Mr Speaker, when he is elected, and the Deputies, are
expected to be wise persons immediately, in terms of their knowledge
of the Members; they have patronage, one of the arguments used
against this particular proposal. So I cannot see why there are
not senior Members who have the sort of knowledge that is sufficient
for the purpose of appointment, particularly if they are guided
by the material that comes in, including from new Members. I think
the information would be there. I do not think you need the sort
of intricate knowledge that the Whips are claiming for themselves
for appointment. I have to say, in the House of Lords, that Whips
are involved in the process of appointing committees, but they
have nothing like the knowledge of Members that Whips in the Commons
have. I was a Member of the Lords for a year before I even found
out who my Whip was. So the knowledge is not comparable to that
of the—
28. You are a fortunate man.
(Lord Norton) Indeed. So it is very different there,
the Whips know something, but not comparable, and yet we made
quite a good fist, I think, of forming committees. So I would
not place too much emphasis on that knowledge aspect. I think
the knowledge would be sufficient for senior Members, having input
from Members themselves and from the Whips, and any other body
that wishes to make representation to them. I think the foundation
is reasonably solid. If it is the three people approved initially,
similar to the Speaker and Deputies, initially, there would not
be a conflict of interest, because they themselves would not be
serving as members of select committees, and it would be up to
the members of the select committees to choose their own chairs.
And I see no particular problem about filling casual vacancies,
it is done quite well in the Lords through the Chairman of Committees
and it creates no particular problems. So I think the basis of
what the Liaison Committee was putting forward is actually reasonably
sound, and I think would be the basis for moving forward.
29. You made a very interesting point that it
is not just a question of the structure but also the process,
and that individual Members should, as it were, have a right of
appeal to whatever body is set up in a way that they do not, at
present, have to the Committee of Selection, nor indeed might
it be a worthwhile exercise of that right. So you would see this
body not simply meeting to put forward the list before the House
but also to hear representations from Members who may feel they
have a grievance?
(Lord Norton) I think I would leave that to the Committee.
I see no reason why not; because if Members put in a case I see
no reason why they should not say, "Well, I've not been selected,
could you give me a reason why?" some element of feedback;
you get that in the employment process, why not in a process like
that. I think that would be extremely valuable, if Members knew
at least they could use the Committee, if you like, as a safety
valve to go and express their feeling that they were not able
to be appointed, and perhaps get some feedback as to why. And
if the Committee is operating, or those appointing are operating
in a fairly rational process they will be able to explain, "Well,
look, it was in terms of particular expertise, these particular
Members have greater expertise," or in terms of balance,
or whatever. At least to actually provide some feedback, I think,
would be helpful to the Members and I think it would meet Mr Stunell's
point as well, about some element of ownership of the process,
the feeling that they were actually being listened to in that
particular process.
30. You trailed your coat a moment ago about
preferring appointment to election; can I jump on your coat and
invite you to expand on it?
(Lord Norton) Yes. The reason I think that, there
are clearly circumstances where I think election is important,
but election is, if you like, based on your capacity to influence
your fellow Members, and reflects to some extent your capacity
to lobby your fellow Members, and I do not think that should be
the prime consideration. I think you need some individuals who
can stand back and look at it on the basis of the qualifications,
in terms of knowledge and expertise of those who are going to
form the committees, and can actually look at it in terms of therefore
creating a balanced committee for the specific purpose of fulfilling
the task of scrutinising government. So if you are going to put
together a committee that is an informed committee, a balanced
one, in terms of background and expertise, I think it has to be
appointment, because I do not think you can do it by a process
of election, which would not necessarily produce that form of
balance. My view, therefore, is that appointment is necessary
for this type of body. I am not saying, obviously, in other contexts
that election and the capacity to lobby one's fellow Members is
not important, it is, but I think, in this particular context,
when you look at what is the purpose of select committees then
I think that does tend to favour appointment, in order to construct
the committees to undertake the work that one gives them to do.
Mr Stunell
31. I wanted to pick up the same point about
election and appointment. At the end of whatever process, there
will be situations where there are two candidates, of approximately
equal merit, to fit into a slot, and somebody takes a decision
to do it, or some group of people does, and at that point there
is a vote, or there is a process of consensus building, or whatever.
Therefore, there is going to be election, in one sense, at one
level or another, and I just wondered if you would like to comment
on that, particularly in the light of your suggestion that there
might be some sort of subsequent appeals or explanation system,
which seems to me to impose a tremendous burden on the people
taking that decision; if it were a wise team of three, presumably
there would be a minority report and two in favour. I can see
various complications. I actually want this process to work, and
although I am currently the Chief Whip for the Liberal Democrats
and have responsibility for the minority parties, I am more than
happy to relinquish that in favour of a more successful system,
believe me I am; but I have not quite understood how this would
be more successful?
(Lord Norton) I cannot see why it is such a problem,
if you have got two or three people. The Speaker and the Deputies
have tremendous responsibilities already, they are in a similar
position; I do not keep hearing reports of them being at one another's
throats when they meet each day to decide matters, necessarily,
and even if they are it does not become public, which I think
is perhaps not a bad thing. If you go along the process of head
counting, of actually having elections, it is in the public domain,
there is the danger then of it becoming a little too adversarial,
and elections do not necessarily allow for the sort of consensual
discussion that I would have thought you would prefer, in terms
of looking at the relative merits of individuals and reaching
an informed view, rather than going to the slightly more adversarial
format of some sort of election. I do not think it necessarily
lends itself to that, I am not sure it would actually be helpful
to the process of instilling confidence in the operation of committees
themselves. And, just as an aside, it is picking up on a question
that Joan Ruddock asked Lord Sheldon earlier, in our recommendations,
we do allow for some flexibility in the size of committees, to
take account of not only the points that she was raising but also
the fact you might have expertise, where the House is rich in
expertise and you actually feel there might be a case for slightly
enlarging the size of a committee, to take that on board, so you
are not actually working within a rigid straightjacket.
Ann Coffey
32. It is just actually a point of clarification.
Are you proposing that the House elects three people, who then
form the Committee of Selection and then go on to appoint members
of select committees; is that what you are proposing?
(Lord Norton) I would have no objection to the formality,
if you like. I would envisage a very similar process that operates
with the choice of Deputy Speakers, something of that nature,
in terms of an internal process, to find senior figures who were
generally acceptable, I would have no objection, clearly, to the
names then being put forward.
33. You are not saying there should be an election
for a Committee of Selection?
(Lord Norton) I am saying I would not find objectionable
the proposal that those names would have to be approved by the
House, and I see no reason about that, because then it would be
the ownership of the House.
34. So you would still have some kind of not
very clear process by which these people emerged, whose names
would then go to the House?
(Lord Norton) There may be some internal process,
and I would not be averse to that. I can see the case for seeking
out the opinions of Members, so that those that then came before
the House were generally acceptable. Hopefully, and this comes
back to my point about establishing a certain culture, as one
has got with the Speaker and Deputy Speakers, where the names
were largely acceptable to the House as a whole, rather than each
nominee being acceptable to a particular party. So, in other words,
I would want people who are respected by Members of the House
as a whole; and I do not see why you cannot generate that culture,
one already has it, I think.
Mr Winterton
35. I am very pleased that Philip Norton, I
think, agrees with the general thrust of the Liaison Committee's
recommendations. Would he actually accept that they are not quite
as dramatic as some people appear to believe, because, for instance,
the composition of a select committee is in part decided by the
strength of the individual parties within the House, so the numbers
that are sitting on a select committee, party-wise, are not decided
by the three individuals, good though they be and senior and establishment,
some people think, they may be, because the Whips will agree,
through the usual channels, that x number are Labour, x number
are Conservative, x number are Liberal, or minority parties; so
that the actual role is not quite so dramatic? And would he not
also accept that those nominations that are made, those selections
that take place, have to be confirmed by the House?
(Lord Norton) Absolutely.
36. And, of course, there is the opportunity
for the House to put forward an amendment that so-and-so replace
so-and-so on a particular select committee. So we are not putting
complete control in the hands of three individuals, senior and
acceptable I hope that they would be, the House itself continues
to have the final word. Is not that the way that this would work,
but take away the influence of party Whips in dictating who should
serve for a particular party on a committee and put the decision
back where it should be, in my view, in the hands of Members of
the House of Commons?
(Lord Norton) I agree with that absolutely, though
just as an aside, before anyone points out, in our report we do
allow for some variation, in terms of the proportionality rule
as it affects committees, but the Government will always have
a majority of Members; but otherwise I agree completely with what
you have said. In fact, I jotted down earlier three general points
I would make about the approach to changing select committees,
one of which is that one is not actually setting precedents in
doing this. I think there is the danger of the committee feeling,
"Oh, we're being very innovative, we're moving away from
what's happened before." One is not; and there are precedents
for what is being suggested. And you are absolutely right, I think,
insofar as you can have transparency, it is through the fact that
ultimately it is for the House to decide, these would be motions
put before the House; and I think that was my point about those
who would make the choice as well as those who were chosen, the
House would have the ultimate say. So, if there was dissatisfaction,
there would be the means for expressing that in the chamber; it
would not be some sort of private process that produced results
that nobody could challenge, it would be overt, in that sense.
And I agree completely with all that you have said. We are building
on precedent here, this is not something that is sparklingly novel.
And so my short answer is, yes, absolutely.
Mr Salter
37. Can I just put it to you, for the sake of
argument, that the three wise men approach, to use the shorthand,
is actually dead in the water, because a vast majority of Members
in this place see it as the establishment rubbing the establishment's
back. Given that 656 of us, by definition, simple mathematics
say, are not going to qualify as three wise men anyway, in fact
53 per cent of the population certainly will not; secondly, there
is enough critical mass of new and newish Members to be deeply
suspicious of such an approach; thirdly, and to come back to something
you said earlier, Philip, you mentioned the respect in which the
office of Speaker and the Deputies are held; would it not be better
to try to construct a process actually based on the unique role
that the Speaker, or particularly the Deputies, actually have?
Because I can think of no group of people who know the strengths
of Members better than actually those that serve the Speaker,
rather than one of the Whips, who have clearly got their own agenda;
and, two, establishment figures, with due respect, also have their
own agenda. So can I just put that as an alternative view, possibly
seeking to achieve the same ends but perhaps likely to command
more support amongst the House of Commons as it is currently constituted?
(Lord Norton) Can I put a question back to you, in
terms of your last point about the role of the Speaker; what were
you implying about the Speaker, you almost seemed to be suggesting
the Speaker should have the role? And I was not quite sure whether
your comments about the Speaker did not seem to contradict your
opening observation.
38. I just wondered whether or not the three
wise men, or women, instead of being drawn from the group of people
as suggested, could actually be drawn from the Deputies?
(Lord Norton) I am glad I teased that out. I wanted
to be quite clear what the link was between your opening point
and then your point about the Speaker, because I wanted to be
quite clear that you were suggesting what I thought, by inference,
you probably were, in which case I have a lot of sympathy with
that. It was just that your opening point seemed to suggest you
wanted to move away completely from anything akin to senior figures,
such as the Speaker and Deputy Speakers, but then you said, well,
actually, could they not be the basis on which one proceeds. And
I have a lot of sympathy with the point you are putting forward.
It was something I was reflecting on, because I thought, well,
you have already got the Speaker, you have got the Deputy Speakers,
they are respected, they are wise persons, and yet the House trusts
them. And, indeed, in our report, in a different context, we did
see the role of the Deputy Speaker - the Chairman of Ways and
Means - as one that we might draw on for other purposes, having
a more pivotal role. Another general point I was going to make
actually picks up on something you were raising with Lord Sheldon,
which is that I think this consideration has to be seen in a wider
context of other changes as well, it is very difficult to see
it in isolation, even though necessarily one's report focuses
upon this, it needs to link in with other reforms as well. But
I have tremendous sympathy with the point you are putting across,
it may not necessarily be the Speaker and the Deputies, but what
about the Deputy Speakers, that is the Chairman of Ways and Means
and the other two Deputies, actually meeting and fulfilling this
role, if the House has confidence in them, and it does. Because
I do keep coming back to this point, that there is this precedent,
because you have already got the Speaker and Deputies, who would
be in a not dissimilar position to what we are suggesting for
the wise persons. So I am not altogether averse to exploring why
those wise persons should not actually be. I would probably suggest
the Chairman of Ways and Means and the Deputies, because the Speaker
has tremendous responsibilities already, but, as I say, we explore
that in a slightly different context in our report, but I do not
see why that should not be explored in this particular context,
because all you are talking about is getting the membership right
at the beginning of a Parliament. I do not think there is too
much of a problem with filling casual vacancies, and it would
be constrained. Various of the constraints would be written, as
has already been mentioned, in terms of the rough proportionality
rule; one could constrain them in other ways, I am not averse
to a rotation rule, especially for chairmen, we have got it in
the Lords and it works reasonably well, so you could have certain
constraints built in. So in choosing the members at the beginning
of the Parliament, the Deputy Speakers would have the confidence
of the House, they would have the different process of inputs,
which they get on other matters anyway, in assessing Members for
the House; so that might well be a way to proceed.
Mr Salter: Thank you; that is most helpful.
Chairman: I think that that is certainly
something we will need to explore; first of all, the Deputy Speakers
are people of authority and independence within the House, they
are respected in the House. The very phrase `three wise persons'
tends to rub the hair of the cat the wrong way, especially if
it is three wise men. And there is also the practical advantage
that the very first thing the House does is to create that.
Mr Tyler
39. Just to reinforce that point, the danger
of basing it on the Liaison Committee is that, by its very nature,
it is a hangover from the previous Parliament, and if you have
a major change in that election a lot of the individuals who have
been key personnel in the Liaison Committee may no longer have
that role. But there is another practical point I just wanted
to put to you. Not only, of course, do we have now the three,
the Chairman of Ways and Means and the two Deputy Speakers, but
we also have the senior members of the Chairmen's Panel, who serve
in Westminster Hall as Deputy Speakers; and if the House felt,
rather in the terms that Martin was saying, that actually three
wise people was too few, you cannot get enough wisdom there and
you wanted a broader base, and it might meet my colleague's point
about other representation of other interests, you could extend
that group to make it slightly larger with the addition of the
Deputy Speakers from Westminster Hall?
(Lord Norton) Yes, that would be an exact parallel
to enlarging the Liaison Committee, as the chairmen of select
committees are appointed; no, I take that point. The discussion
earlier was creating, if you like, three wise people who would
be almost parallel to the Deputy Speaker and certainly standing
in role. I am completely open to the argument, in fact, those
should come together, and, you are quite right, the Chairmen's
Panel would, in effect, then fulfil that role of widening the
body that would be responsible for making any future decision;
so I can see that. So, rather than looking at it as two things
operating in parallel, I would not be at all averse to the argument
emerging of the Deputy Speakers fulfilling that role and perhaps
also the Chairmen's Panel; because it would have all the attributes,
the advantages, that one is ascribing to or looking for in the
body I was mentioning. And, I think, would probably have the advantage,
coming back to my earlier point that you have already got the
culture there, in terms of the standing of the figures involved
and the respect in which they are held; and it would achieve a
point I was making earlier, moving away from the present system
and bringing in a new one, so there is not a hangover in terms
of the old culture. So, no, I take that point completely and have
tremendous sympathy with it.
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