| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
As I have suggested, it is inconceivable that a second Chamber with elected Members would not want to reconsider the conventions. It might wish to wait to do that until after it had had some time of operating under the current conventions, but as I have said to the Leader of the House on several occasions, an elected House of Lords, or a House of Lords with an elected element, would be a very different House of Lords from that which currently exists. We cannot introduce elections to the House of Lords and expect that it will be the same as it currently is except with a few elected
Members. Just as the House post-1999, with what the Government described as its increased legitimacy, has flexed its muscles more than the previous House did, so a House of Lords with elected Members will, I believe, want to reconsider the conventions. The Joint Committee rightly said that it was outside its remit to look at a changed House of Lords, but the Government cannot sweep aside issues to do with that and assume that a changed House of Lords would have no desire to look again at such issues.
Let me turn briefly to the specific conventions addressed by the Committee. First—this might initially seem to be a minor point—I do not agree that the Salisbury-Addison convention should be renamed the Government Bill convention. That is precisely because of the issue raised by the Leader of the House in his opening speech—that it does not apply to all Government Bills because it does not apply to non-manifesto Bills. The Leader of the House has reiterated the Government’s suggestion that it might be named the Cunningham convention. I have no objection to noting the role played in this matter by the noble Lord of that name, but I see no reason to change the convention’s name, because the Committee has not changed the convention and believes that it operates well as it is. Therefore, I see no reason to change the name from the Salisbury-Addison convention. Nor do I see any need to set it out in a formal resolution, and I suggest that to do so would verge on the very process of codification that the Committee rightly rejected.
I wish to talk about secondary legislation, which has also been the subject of exchanges across the Floor of the House. It raises issues that go wider than the operation of the conventions of the House of Lords. It has been my view for some time that we need to look more widely at the way in which both Houses deal with secondary legislation, as there are problems with the current system. Those problems arise primarily because there is so much secondary legislation, and because Government have increasingly used primary legislation in the form of skeleton Bills, relying on secondary legislation to fill in the detail. While no one would suggest that it is always right for all the detail to be included in every Bill, the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction. Secondary legislation does not get proper scrutiny—and of course, it cannot be amended.
The Government must stop taking the easy option of having primary Bills giving powers to the Secretary of State to make large numbers of regulations through statutory instruments; we need the Government to exercise restraint. It makes for better legislation if more is included in a Bill, as that allows greater scrutiny of the measures proposed. As the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) mentioned, in its deliberations on secondary legislation the Committee said that one of the reasons that could be given for the Lords threatening to defeat secondary legislation arose if the parent Act was a skeleton Bill and the provisions of the statutory instrument were of a sort more normally found in primary legislation. Fewer Bills, with more time for them to be properly considered and with more detail included in them, so that they could be properly discussed in both Houses, and with less resort to secondary legislation, would lead to better legislation.
In response to an intervention, the Leader of the House said that perhaps we should have an inquiry; I think that we should. The House should take time to look at how it handles secondary legislation. Another issue that such an inquiry could cover is whether there should be a power to amend. I have said in this House that I have some sympathy with that idea, and the Joint Committee referred to it, saying on page 63, in paragraph 233:
“The problem with the present situation is that the Lords’ power in relation to SIs is too drastic. The picture would be very different if Parliament had power to amend SIs.”
Mr. Andrew Tyrie (Chichester) (Con): Is my right hon. Friend aware that the Government’s first White Paper on the House of Lords in the first Parliament after 1997 included exactly that proposal, and that they then decided to change their mind at the last moment, perhaps because they realised that that might enhance to some degree the authority of the second Chamber?
Mrs. May: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for reminding us of that; it is relevant. We need to look seriously again at the secondary legislation issue, and the Government might change their mind on that original proposal that they brought forward.
Mr. Cash: My right hon. Friend will have noticed that there are references to orders made under the Regulatory Reform Act 2001 and remedial orders under the Human Rights Act 1998 in page 13 of the Government response. Does she agree that there might be occasions when it is necessary to override the application of the European Communities Act 1972 in respect of regulatory reform orders—as my right hon. Friend knows, I proposed an amendment on that subject, which was supported by our party both in this House and the other place—and that that would require amendments and statutory instruments, so that is another, and more powerful, reason for making sure that we get this right?
Mrs. May: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. It appears that I am not as lucky as the Leader of the House with interventions. Perhaps I should have offered my hon. Friend a trip to Maidenhead. [Interruption.] He tempts me down a certain route, but all I will say is that there is a very real need for this House to re-examine issues to do with secondary legislation. That would enable us to take on board another issue that the Committee dealt with in considering how the Lords handle secondary legislation. It made the point that the Government should be seen to take non-fatal motions in the Lords rather more seriously than they do at present. The Committee proposed that there should be a written statement in response to such motions. I share the view expressed in the debate in another place by my right hon. and noble Friend Lord Strathclyde that there should be an oral statement or a debate on such matters.
The Committee found nothing intrinsically wrong with the ping-pong system, but it referred to the need for proper notice of amendments and proper time for consideration of amendments. That would not only enable Opposition parties to give proper consideration to the proposals, but benefit the Officers of both
Houses and, crucially, give more time for cross-party discussions and for potential compromise where that was desirable. That is an issue to which both Houses should return.
The Committee’s conclusion on the question of reasonable time—which, as I said earlier, was specifically raised in the Labour party manifesto at the last election—should be generally welcomed, although I find it a little surprising that the Government have rolled over quite so easily, given that manifesto commitment. We all want to ensure that legislation is dealt with in a timely fashion, but it would be wrong to set a deadline for the House of Lords’ consideration of legislation. Moreover, the length of time taken for consideration of any Bill in their lordships’ House—or, indeed, in this House—is of course not just a matter of the time taken to scrutinise that legislation; it is also dependent on the Government business managers. Given that, as the Leader of the House has suggested on a number of occasions, we should think ahead to when we are in government, I would not wish to restrict the flexibility available to Government business managers on this matter.
Sir Nicholas Winterton: Does my right hon. Friend not accept that one reason why the Lords have in recent times spent a great deal of time on certain Bills is that they departed the House of Commons with very large tranches of them completely undebated and ignored in this House? The Lords have done no more than their constitutional duty in undertaking the scrutiny that should have been undertaken in this House.
Mrs. May: I entirely agree with my hon. Friend, who was a distinguished member of the Joint Committee. If he casts his mind back, he may recall that I made that point in my evidence to the Committee. There is a real need for the House of Commons to consider how it looks at legislation, in order to ensure that we give proper consideration to all aspects of Bills. That is one reason why I referred earlier to the need for less legislation, which could then be given rather better consideration by both Houses. That would ensure that we end up with better legislation on the whole, instead of the current situation whereby significant aspects of Bills are all too often not considered by this House and have to be considered by the Lords, which does not lead to the best legislation that we could pass.
As I was saying, on the issue of the length of time, I welcome the fact that the Committee has not established a deadline as such. The Committee was also asked to consider codification, and I very much welcome the fact that it resisted that proposal. It said in its summary:
“We do not recommend legislation, or any other form of codification which would turn conventions into rules, remove flexibility, exclude exceptions and inhibit evolution in response to political circumstances.”
That is important. The merit of our system is that, precisely because it is not codified, it can be exercised flexibly and can evolve over time to meet changing needs. I have always thought that trying to find a way of setting out in a code or legislation what is or is not a manifesto commitment would be an impossible task, the only beneficiaries of which would be the lawyers. I
am therefore happy to give my overall approval to the Joint Committee’s report and to the particular aspects that I have mentioned.
Of course, the Committee’s investigation took place against the background of work on proposals to reform the House of Lords and, potentially, to introduce an elected element to that House.
Mrs. May: My hon. Friend the Member for South Staffordshire will not be pleased to know—in fact, he already knows—that I have supported having a substantial element of elected Members in the House of Lords, and voted for an 80 per cent. elected House last time. Indeed, I sit on the cross-party working group on reform, which is chaired by the Leader of the House. He expects to publish a White Paper very soon that will lead to debates in both Houses; helpfully, he set out the timetable this afternoon.
My right hon. and hon. Friends and I have entered into these discussions in good faith, aiming to find a way through the many difficult and complex issues that need to be addressed if elections are to be introduced or any element of reform is to be brought to the House of Lords, and we will continue to do so. I am concerned, however, when I hear that press briefings are taking place suggesting a degree of unanimity on all the issues. There are many issues on which much remains to be discussed and considered.
Mrs. May: I welcome the fact that the Leader of the House said earlier—this may negate his need to intervene—that he recognises that there will not be agreement on all the issues relating to the White Paper in all parts of the House.
Mr. Straw: There have been no covert press briefings; however, I did make a speech to the Blackburn Labour party, which got slightly less coverage than I was anticipating, although it got some. [Interruption.] In that speech, I gave my analysis of where we have arrived at. It is on the record and it was not intended to generate an argument with members of the working group, which has proceeded in good faith; indeed, I am grateful for the contributions that the right hon. Lady and her hon. Friends have made to it. I will ensure that she has a copy of that speech.
Mrs. May: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for that promise of a copy of his speech. My hon. Friend the Member for North-West Cambridgeshire (Mr. Vara) suggested to me a moment ago from a sedentary position that the right hon. Gentleman should perhaps have published his speech as an article in the Lancashire Evening Telegraph; that way, he might have got rather more coverage.
As I said, I am grateful for the Leader of the House’s confirmation that he does not expect there to be full agreement on all the issues, and if I may I shall give just one example in that regard. Reference was made in the
press yesterday to the use of a preferential voting system in this House to determine its view of the make-up of a reformed House of Lords. As he knows, I have real difficulty with that idea—in fact, I oppose the use of preferential voting in this House. We have accepted the future use of exhaustive ballots for the election of the Speaker, but Standing Orders make it clear that even in such ballots there should be a single vote for each Member on each ballot. The idea of Members setting down preferences in a single ballot is contrary to the basic principle of voting—that a proposition is put and Members vote for or against it. I suspect that once it was introduced, it would be difficult to prevent such a system from being used on other issues, such as—dare I say it?—taxation.
However, our aim in these discussions is to find a way forward that will strengthen Parliament, and we will continue to participate in good faith on that basis. The Government set up the Joint Committee—with, I believe, the intention of restricting the power of the House of Lords. The independence and common sense of the members of the Joint Committee delivered quite a different result. I welcome their report and pay tribute to their work, and I look forward to further discussions on the House of Lords, during which I hope we will all have only one aim: to strengthen Parliament.
2.57 pm
Sir Gerald Kaufman (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab): I join my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House and the shadow Leader of the House in paying tribute to the members of the Committee, and in saying how much I welcome their report. When I intervened earlier, I said that there was one small caveat—the suggested renaming of the Salisbury-Addison convention. I agree with the shadow Leader of the House that that should not be done. One thing that I find saddening as we proceed with our activities in this place is the unnecessary junking of things that are part of the history of Parliament and of this country. Although I was a huge admirer of Robin Cook when he was Foreign Secretary, when he became Leader of the House he had a tendency toward change for change’s sake, which did no assistance to the House. An example was the renaming of private notice questions as urgent questions, for which I saw no real justification. I very much hope that we will continue to refer to the Salisbury-Addison convention, because keeping those two names as part of the convention shows the way in which the history of both Houses of Parliament has evolved.
Mr. Cash: I understand what the right hon. Gentleman means, but the Salisbury-Addison convention started out as the Salisbury convention and became the former only because further developments took place. If we follow the right hon. Gentleman’s reasoning to its logical conclusion, we should either stay with the existing phrase or consider referring to the “Salisbury-Addison-Cunningham convention”, although that might be taking things too far. However, it is important that the right hon. Gentleman is accurate in describing the point that he makes.
Sir Gerald Kaufman:
My right hon. Friend the Leader of the House did indeed suggest that the
convention should be renamed the Cunningham convention. With the greatest respect to Jack Cunningham, who is a very old friend of mine, I do not believe that he has played quite the role in the evolution of the relationship between the two Houses that Lords Salisbury and Addison did.
There has been much discussion on both sides of the House of paragraph 61, even though only two speeches have so far been made. I agree with the shadow Leader of the House that it is inevitable that the nature of the primacy of this House would change if the House of Lords were to have an elected element. As I said when I intervened in her speech, there may be different ways of achieving an elected element, but it is certain that those people who were elected to the second Chamber, in whatever way, would claim that the fact that votes had been cast meant that their House had rights in relation to this House that do not exist at present. That would erode and undermine the primacy of this House of Commons, which was certainly part of the terms of reference of the Joint Committee and was part of the terms of reference of the royal commission on which I served.
There is no point, therefore, in claiming that things will not change if things do change, because if things do change, the whole balance between the two Chambers—which goes right back to the passage of the Parliament Acts nearly a century ago—would change. I do not believe that that would change for the better.
I started my political career as a fiery socialist. At this mid-stage in my parliamentary career, I remain a fiery socialist, but part of my fiery socialism now incorporates the important doctrine that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. I love this Government, as my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House knows, but occasionally they depart from that doctrine and, when they do, their intervention always ends in tears.
David Howarth (Cambridge) (LD): The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the Parliament Act 1911. Will he concede that the preamble to the Act states that the reform would be temporary, pending popular reform of the House of Lords? That goes back to the point that all of the conventions, even the Parliament Acts, come down in the end to the question of democracy and nothing else.
Sir Gerald Kaufman: There are many different interpretations of democracy. In this country I regard democracy as being an elected House of Commons, the primacy of that elected House of Commons and everything that flows from that.
My right hon. Friend paid tribute to the fact that the Joint Committee’s report was unanimous. That always helps. However, I have to tell him that the report of the royal commission on which I served was also unanimous. We published it more than seven years ago and all that remains of its activities is this photograph of the members, in which I—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Visual aids are not encouraged in the Chamber, as the right hon. Gentleman well knows. I trust that his words will be sufficient for Hansard to report proceedings.
Sir Gerald Kaufman: I am always guided by you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I was about to say that in addition to the photograph, which certainly shows me in my prime, the only thing that remains of the royal commission report is a handsome presentation edition that its members were given, which might now fetch a small amount on eBay, but is otherwise obsolete.
The fact that the report is obsolete is demonstrated by the fact that my right hon. Friend, who is an assiduous student of all manner of texts and documents, failed—as indeed Robin Cook failed—to realise that it did not recommend an elected element to the House of Lords. If my right hon. Friend looks at page 122, he will see that we did not make a recommendation on composition, although we presented three possible models for the selection of regional members. Indeed, I might as well tell the House that if there had been an attempt to recommend an elected element to the House of Lords, I would not have signed the report. It was because I refused to go along with such a recommendation that we presented only models. I still stand strongly by model A, which does not contain an elected element, but would involve members chosen from party lists in proportion to regional votes—at the same time as a general election—for part of what I would prefer to call the Senate.
Mr. Straw: I appreciate the gloss that my right hon. Friend puts on the report, but as he supports model A, I assume that he also supports the proposed description of model A as “complementary voting”. Either it is a system of election or it is not, and I read those words as meaning that it is a system of election.
Sir Gerald Kaufman: My right hon. Friend is so wise, but his wisdom does not extend quite as far as it might on this occasion. He has scanned part of the relevant page, but not all of it. The paragraph also says:
| Next Section | Index | Home Page |