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Mr. Greg Knight: May I draw the hon. Gentleman's attention, if he will listen for a moment, to paragraph (1) of the motion? The House would be interested to hear his views about that paragraph, as the Leader of the House did not give any justification for its inclusion. Why should we be denied the right to ask questions on Monday and Tuesday next week?
Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. The right hon. Gentleman is speaking to an amendment that has yet to be moved.
Mr. Knight: With the greatest of respect, Madam Deputy Speaker, I was referring not to the manuscript amendment, but to paragraph (1) of the motion, which says that we shall not have questions.
Mr. Bell: I simply refer to the manuscript amendment that will be before the House, which proposes that oral questions to the Home Department shall be taken on Monday and that questions to the Department of Health shall be taken after that.
Kali Mountford: I think that the whole House will be surprised by the imaginative move that has been made by Opposition Back Benchers. Given that it has been possible to make such a move during this debate, is my
hon. Friend as surprised as I am that those on the Opposition Front Bench were not able to make a similar decision late last night, just as the rest of this House had to make its decision about considering the motion at all?
Mr. Bell: I shall leave it to the Opposition to wonder what they were doing at 1 o'clock or 2 o'clock in the morning. They certainly filled the Tea Room and the Library, although I did not get as far as the bars.
Mr. Mark Francois (Rayleigh): I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way. He has been most courteous in giving way numerous times to allow hon. Members to make contributions during his speech. May I bring him back to the important point made by the hon. and learned Member for Redcar (Vera Baird), who explained to the House that a compromise had been in the offing this morning? As I understand it, the process of ping-pong is designed to promote compromise; in fact, a compromise was very nearly reached, but the Government reneged on it. Much of his argument has been based on saying that the other place has been intransigent, but is it not unfair to blame the other place for intransigence when the Government had just about agreed a compromise, but then reneged on it?
Mr. Bell: As I said earlier, I shall not get into that issue or usurp the authority of the Leader of the House.
I am dealing with the question whether the supremacy of this House can be challenged by the Lords, and I am grateful to the House and to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for giving me the time to speak about that and to make constitutional points. If we do have oral questions to the Home Department on Monday, I will be asking why the Prime Minister has not seen the Queen to recommend new peerages, why we are not debating a new Parliament Bill and why we are not going to restrict the powers of the Lords to seek to usurp the will of this Chamber, and I will be explaining why I will always seek to protect this House of Commons in terms of constitutional law so that its supremacy can remain intact in the interests of my constituents, Members of Parliament and the country.
2.49 pm
Mr. Paul Tyler (North Cornwall): I beg to move a manuscript amendment, in line 2, leave out paragraph (1) and insert
- '(1) notwithstanding paragraph (5) of Standing Order No. 22 (Notices of questions, motions and amendments), Oral Questions shall be taken on Monday 24th November to the Secretary of State for the Home Department and on Tuesday 25th November to the Secretary of State for Health; and the shuffles for these Oral Questions shall be held at 6.00 p.m. at this day's sitting or one hour after the conclusion of proceedings on this Motion, whichever is later.'.
Mr. Blunt: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Would it be possible to move the manuscript amendment that has been accepted by Mr. Speaker on a point of order?
Hon. Members: The hon. Gentleman has moved it.
Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. I did not think that the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr. Blunt) had sought to move the amendment, so I called Mr. Tyler.
Mr. Tyler: I have moved the amendment in the name of the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst and his colleagues.
I want to address the sittings motion and dispel some of the bogus constitutional nonsense that we heard from the Leader of the House and the hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Mr. Bell). I am surprised that the hon. Gentleman got any prizes for constitutional history. I was a historian and I can tell him, as a matter of fact, that the circumstances in 1911—I was not there but there was a Liberal Government—were totally different from what is happening now. In 1910 and 1911, issues were put before the people in a general election, so that was the context in which the House of Lords eventually had to back down. The circumstances are totally different today, as has been made perfectly clear by hon. Members of all parties, including Labour Back Benchers. None of the issues that the House of Lords has examined during recent hours were the subject of manifesto commitments or a mandate from the electorate. There is no way the Prime Minister could now go to the palace to ask for, or in which the monarch could give, the sort of assurances the hon. Gentleman talked about on the basis of the convention in 1910 and 1911 unless there was a general election.
The hon. Gentleman has obviously not taken account of recent constitutional developments. The Prime Minister and leaders of all parties have said that there is no way that the House of Lords will contain a built-in majority for any one party in the future. Unless the new leader of the Conservative party goes back on that assurance—I am sure that he will not—no future Government will ever have a built-in majority in the second Chamber, and rightly so.
The constitutional myths peddled by the Leader of the House revolve around precisely this issue: he said that the matters under consideration had been the subject of a democratic mandate to Members of this House, so the other House could not intervene. That is simply not true. It is possible that if there were a firm commitment to the creation of foundation trusts in the next Labour manifesto, that could be the case in future. It is equally true that if the next manifesto were to include a commitment to abolish jury trials in certain circumstances, Labour Members could then argue that their mandate would override the role of the House of Lords.
However, as the hon. and learned Member for Redcar (Vera Baird) said, the circumstances are nothing like as clear as that. The amendments that the other place has considered were originally tabled by the Government, and the Leader of the House refused to respond to that point at the Dispatch Box. It is simply not true to suggest that the discussions that are taking place in the other place are a challenge to this House and the Government's mandate because the amendments that they are considering were introduced by the Government. Perhaps the Government have changed their mind yet again.
Mr. Burns: Would it help the hon. Gentleman's argument if I reminded him that not only do Labour Members not have a mandate from the electorate, they do not have one from their own party because the Labour party conference rejected the whole concept of foundation hospitals in October?
Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. I have already ruled on that.
Mr. Tyler: As we all know, constitutionally speaking, we are not here at the behest of our party but at the behest of our electorate. The Leader of the House ignored the fact that there is no mandate for the issues that the other House is considering.
Mr. Heald: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the House of Lords adjourned last night after representatives of my party and the Liberal Democrats had made the explicit point that adjournment would allow a cooling-off period so that we could discuss matters and reach agreement? That happened, but the Government then tabled their amendments.
Mr. Tyler: That is an extremely important point. Parliament operates as one whole body—that is the significant constitutional point. It is seen as the High Court of Parliament. The procedure to which the hon. Gentleman refers is part of the parliamentary process.
Mr. David Heath (Somerton and Frome): I was party to the discussions late last night and early this morning. Agreement was reached between Ministers and Conservative and Liberal Democrat Members. We struck an agreement but the Government reneged on it at 10 am today for no apparent reason and with no explanation.
Mr. Tyler: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that absolutely clear. I hope that Labour Members are listening. We are supposed to deal with matters in just such a way, which is why we listen to Ministers when they suggest a way to get out of such difficulties.
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