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21 Jan 2003 : Column 268—continued
Mr. Robert Marshall-Andrews (Medway): Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that one reform would receive overwhelming support in the House and in the country? It is that the House of Lords should consist of 0.16 per cent. of elected Members—the Lord Chancellor.
Mr. Forth: The hon. and learned Gentleman is a braver man than me in reducing the Lord Chancellor to 0.16 per cent.
We are entitled to know the Government's view of our current position, our starting point and, more important, our destination. The Leader of the House tried to be helpful by saying that there would be votes in two weeks and reference back to the Joint Committee. However, the Government's terms of reference to the Joint Committee will be crucial. In his opening remarks, the Committee's Chairman told us that it was constrained by the terms of reference that it was given initially. It is therefore important to know the terms of the Government's marching orders to the Committee, if they intend to issue such orders, for events after the votes in the House of Commons and in another place.
It is crucial to know what happens if the House of Commons produces a centre of gravity—to use the Leader of the House's favourite term—which is radically different from that of another place. I suspect that that will happen. If two different views are expressed at each end of the building, what will the Government conclude? Where will that lead us, via the Joint Committee, in future? What is the timetable? Much work remains to be done. After reading the Joint Committee report, one wonders whether we are near any sort of conclusion.
Will there be Ministers in a reformed upper House? The answer is crucial, not only to the constitutional dispensation, the relationship between the Houses and the Government of the day, but to whether we could have directly elected but relatively independent Members in an upper House. Without Ministers, that could happen because there would be no promotion ladder, arm-twisting or Whips, whose position would be rendered meaningless. I should like to add that issue to the list that the Joint Committee will consider. I hope that it will examine it seriously.
I hope that the debate will help the process. Its tone gives ground for optimism, but that could be tempered by the Government's attitude. If the report from The Times, which no one has refuted, about the Prime Minister's attitude is accurate, I am profoundly pessimistic about the process. It is up to Labour Members to do their best to ascertain what is happening. If they are unhappy, they should use their influence. We have done our bit in the debate. We must wait and see what Members of another place have to say, but in the end, as always, it will be for the Government to decide where they want to take us, how they will get us there and how they will work with and through the Joint Committee. I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary is about to give us as many answers as he can and that he will not leave us believing that the Government are divided, have no clue about their destination and do not want to get us there.
6.49 pm
The Parliamentary Secretary, Privy Council Office (Mr. Ben Bradshaw): Our debate has been excellent, good humoured and, at times, humorous. That is not unusual when we discuss a matter that will be subject to a free vote. I am in a slightly unusual position because we are considering a subject about which the Opposition have a policy, whereas the Government have no view, at least on composition. I emphasise that because some hon. Members have drawn attention to a couple of recent newspaper articles, referred to dark forces or to people who want to kick reform into the long grass. I
assure them that that is not the case. The Government do not have a view on the vote that we shall have in two weeks' time on composition, but they are certainly of the view that they want to get Lords reform concluded in this Parliament. That was a manifesto commitment, and we shall try to stick to it.I would like to thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Copeland (Dr. Cunningham) and the other members of his Committee for their excellent work. I also want to thank those members of the Committee who have contributed to the debate this afternoon, as well as non-members who have done so. I am sure that they have all heard the interesting and constructive contributions made by a number of right hon. and hon. Members, including the shadow Leader of the House, which will help them in their further work when we have got over this interim stage of voting on the composition of the upper House.
It is worth noting that, in this debate, a large majority of Members have spoken in favour of a largely or wholly elected upper House. In doing so, they have reflected opinion in the country and the findings of the surveys that have been conducted previously by Members of this House. They have done so from a variety of perspectives—some, such as the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) and the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke), from what sounded like a Damascene conversion to the need for a stronger check on the Executive and for more pluralism, as the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe put it. That is very nice, coming from two former Members of a Government who commanded a massive majority not only in this House but in the other place—something that the Labour party has never done. But we should welcome converts where we find them.
The same point about the importance of checking the Executive was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase (Tony Wright), who has at least been consistent in his concern about the power of the Executive. Drawing on the excellent report produced by his Public Administration Committee, he also extended the democratic argument. The desire to extend democracy has been shared by most right hon. and hon. Members who have spoken in favour of a largely or wholly elected House. They include the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young), my right hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead, East and Washington, West (Joyce Quin), the hon. Members for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler), for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb), for Salisbury (Mr. Key), and for Ceredigion (Mr. Thomas) and my hon. Friends the Members for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Savidge), for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart), for Bridgend (Mr. Griffiths), and for Edinburgh, North and Leith (Mr. Lazarowicz).
I have to say that, when I go round schools in my constituency—as I do increasingly, following the introduction of citizenship studies—and when I travelled abroad in my previous capacity as a Minister in the Foreign Office, I have had a problem, in a personal capacity, explaining to emerging democracies in other parts of the world, for example, that I was trying to sell the value of democracy while defending a system in which the membership of one of the two Houses of our Parliament was based solely on appointment.
The right hon. Member for North-East Hampshire (Mr. Arbuthnot) called a mixed or hybrid system with a majority of elected Members a fudge, although he said that he would vote for it. My hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, Acton and Shepherd's Bush (Mr. Soley) used a different term, calling it a sensible compromise. He, and a number of other hon. Members, saw an opportunity to improve the regional and, in some cases, the Scottish and Welsh representation in the upper House. Coming from a part of England that is seriously under-represented in the other place, I share that desire.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley (Mr. Foulkes) and my hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley, North and Sefton, East (Mr. Howarth) tied their banners firmly to the abolitionists' mast, with, in the case of the former, a wholly appointed Lords as his second preference. He was supported by my right hon. Friend the Member for Newport, East (Alan Howarth), and my hon. Friends the Members for Western Isles (Mr. MacDonald) and for Tyne Bridge (Mr. Clelland), and by the anti-election contingent on the Opposition Benches in the form of the hon. Members for South Staffordshire (Sir Patrick Cormack), for Stratford-on-Avon (Mr. Maples), for Rochford and Southend, East (Sir Teddy Taylor), and, I think, for Leominster (Mr. Wiggin), although I was not quite clear whether that was his position. I think that he is nodding in assent.
Much of the opposition to elections, particularly on this side of the House, seems to stem from a fear that a more democratic second Chamber would challenge the supremacy of this place. I have to tell my hon. Friends that that fear was not shared by other hon. Members who spoke this afternoon, or by others who share the desire to maintain the supremacy of this place. Nor was such a fear expressed in the report of the Public Administration Committee, which looked into this matter.
Mr. Leigh: Will the Minister consider the possibility that elected Members of the other place will not become Ministers in order to ensure that independence?
Mr. Bradshaw: That, along with a number of other interesting suggestions made this afternoon, will be first and foremost a matter for the next stage of the Joint Committee's work. Anything recommended in its final report will of course be taken on board by the Government.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Newport, East and my hon. Friend the Member for Tyne Bridge introduced the idea of syndicalism. The Joint Committee might like to take that up as well, but it does involve enormous challenges and complications. That is another reason why it too was not favoured in the Public Administration Committee's report. Interestingly—as far as I am aware; I was not present for a couple of speeches, although I watched them on my screen—no speaker supported the idea of electing a minority element.
The right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire, the hon. Member for North Norfolk and one or two others were troubled by reports that the Government
might seek to delay change. Some raised a couple of recent media reports that the Government, or members of the Government, were retreating into favouring an all-appointed second Chamber. I can reassure them that that is not the case. As I said earlier, the Government have no policy on composition, and there will be a genuinely free vote. I must, however, tell those who have that fear, wherever they may be in this House, that the best way of preventing—or avoiding—such an eventuality is for this House to send the clearest possible message in a fortnight, when the options will be voted on.
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