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John Thurso (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD): It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Pike.
We will shortly discuss a number of amendments, in a debate introduced by the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside. I have an amendment in that group, so I shall reserve the majority of my arguments for that debate and will now concentrate solely on the concern of the hon. Member for Christchurch about whether precise bands should be included in the legislation. Normally, I argue that as much as possible should be included in Bills—I believe that that is right, and I dislike secondary legislation in general. In this case, I shall argue the opposite, because I can foresee a situation in which we introduce, say, two penalty points in the circumstances that the hon. Member for Christchurch has outlined, and rapidly realise that it was a horrendous mistake. I do not think that we would be able to return to primary legislation to correct that mistake, and it is important that we have the ability to make changes if we discover that what we have done is not correct.
I have grave doubts about going down to two points in relation to speed limits lower than 40 mph, as I shall explain later. I would wish to have the safeguard that, if that did happen, there would be a reasonably straightforward way in which Parliament could make a change without having to resort to primary legislation.
Mr. Chope: Does the hon. Gentleman support the idea that we should, during these proceedings, put something into the Bill, coupled with a power for the Secretary of State to amend any of the detail in the schedule, should he so wish?
John Thurso: I have not considered that. Our next debate will be about laying down minimum criteria, and I do not want to go through that debate now, and trespass on the good nature of the Chair. I should merely like to say that I do not support the schedule because I believe that we should have the ability to change. It is not a situation in which primary legislation is appropriate.
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Mr. Wilshire: I welcome you as well, Mr. Pike. I clarified with your co-Chairman that I could take off my jacket, but I have not done so, because I was told off once by a Chairman for doing it without asking.
The Chairman: Order. I do not expect to be asked. As far as I am concerned, in Committee's that I chair, if Members wish to remove their jackets they may automatically do so.
Mr. Wilshire: It might be helpful if the Clerks' Department were to publish a list of the views of each member of the Chairmen's Panel—and we could move on.
As I understand the Government's position, there is nothing between us and them on the principle of grading. I have no difficulty in agreeing with the Government and supporting my hon. Friends. Rather like my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch, I would not wish to go to the stake over any of the figures, but let us make sure that there is a consensus.
Having got that out of the way, my first point is underlined by the hon. Member for Loughborough (Mr. Reed), who was ever so helpful to my case when he said that we as a Committee ought not to be in a position to take these decisions on behalf of the House of Commons. I agree with him, and, welcoming him to my long-standing cause to ensure that Governments of the day, irrespective of party, have the least necessary power to do the job that they should be doing, I would extend his point. Continually to give Secretaries of State the power to introduce more and more legislation by order is something that I am concerned about.
The hon. Gentleman makes the case better than I. When he says that the Committee is not capable of taking these decisions, and that it should be the House of Commons that does so, I say, ''Exactly so.'' The Secretary of State should not be the person who takes the decision by order; it should be the whole House, following a proper debate. If there must be a statutory instrument, I do not know whether in this instance it will be by an affirmative or negative resolution, and it cannot be amended either way, so I believe that we should have control over the decision. There are some things in this world that can usefully be seen as administrative chores. I do not mind Secretaries of State doing chores; I object to Secretaries of State controlling my life.
Many of constituents feel passionately about their rights to drive their cars. It works up more agitation than many other issues, and our constituents have every right to look to us as their elected representatives, rather than leave it to whoever happens to be Secretary of State, to settle such matters as whether they lose their licence and how quickly they lose it. It is possible that a fairly prominent politician who took pride in not driving would want to persecute car drivers. If we were to have such a Secretary of State, who knows what might happen on the basis of a personal view? I am against this approach in principle.
I am sure that the Government will say that we do not want such provisions in the Bill, but as my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch says, when the
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Minister responds he needs to tell us what the Government think about the figures. Whether or not they should be in the Bill, we are being asked to agree to give the Secretary of State power. If the Minister wants us to accept that our approach is wrong, it would be ever so helpful if he could tell us what the current Secretary of State might use such powers for.
Mr. Reed: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way, and for trying to portray what I was trying to say earlier. Similar to his hon. Friend, I would be interested to know whether he supports the figures in the chart, because I am worried not only about the principle. The point that I was trying to make about the Committee not being able to make the decision is that we have an amendment before us that includes some figures, and if we agree to it and include it in the Bill, serious consequences will follow. I am not quite sure that in a half-hour or even a 20-minute debate, we can go into the provision's finer implications.
Aside from the general implications of amending the Bill, I would be interested to know whether the hon. Gentleman would speak to any of the mileage figures, whether they are from the table or the graduated penalties.
Mr. Wilshire: I may or I may not; it just depends on how the debate unfolds. If the Minister were to accept that approach and give some indication of the sort of figures that he thinks should apply, I might be prepared to agree with the Government.
3.30 pm
If the Minister were to say that he accepted the principle but wanted to come back on Report with a well-researched schedule, I would feel much more confident about joining the debate. We ought to establish first whether the Government accept the approach. If they do, more than half an hour would be needed to deal with the matter. For the moment, that is where I will leave it, except that I shall come back on one other related point in a moment.
I am pleased with the suggestion that there ought to be or could be some flexibility. There is an admission of the need for flexibility, whether it is achieved by order or this amendment, as well as graded points. We have had this debate before, so I shall not go over the ground again. If the Government cannot go as far as I would like, I would welcome an approach that indicated that they at least see the difference between something that attracts six penalty points and something that attracts two penalty points. Perhaps if I had been more alert before the Committee started, it would have been possible to table a new schedule that provided for no penalty points up to two penalty points at the lowest level. I readily accept that even in the worst circumstances certain things need punishing by penalty points. There is some flexibility here, which I welcome.
The hon. Member for Wellingborough said that, because most people are killed at speeds of less than 45 mph, we should not limit the number of penalty points to two. It is as though he assumes that arguing for
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fewer points is the same thing as saying, ''Let us scrap penalties completely and invite people to drive fast.'' I do not buy into the concept that people would race past schools if the current arrangements were changed. I do not know where the evidence is for that.
Mr. Stinchcombe: My point is simply that the penalty should reflect the danger posed by that culpable driver. If 50 per cent. of pedestrians hit at 30 mph will live but 90 per cent. of pedestrians hit at 40 mph will die, I see no justification at all for the penalty point reduction that he advocates in the 30 to 40 mph span.
Mr. Wilshire: I hear what the hon. Gentleman says. Such questions are part and parcel of determining what detail one would support. I understand his argument, but he seems to advance it on the basis that anything less than we have at present is an open invitation to flout the law. We should not automatically rule out consideration of variations up and down in all circumstances. That is all that I am saying, and I would not wish to go to the stake for something else.
Mr. Reed: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that he is probably sending out a mixed message? I almost could have lived with sticking at three points and then graduated penalties upwards, but reducing the penalty to two points, particularly with the figures in the new schedule, sends out a message that driving between 30 and 39 mph is more acceptable than it was before. Is not that the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough was making, and is not that the message that the Committee would send if we were to agree to the provision?
Mr. Wilshire: I doubt that abolishing hanging for stealing sheep was seen as an open invitation to steal sheep. I do not accept what the hon. Gentleman says.
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