Examination of Witnesses (Questions 360
- 379)
WEDNESDAY 29 APRIL 2009
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon and Chris Bryant MP
Q360 Lord Rowlands:
I am sure it was. I am as bad as you: my memory is pretty poor
too.
Chris Bryant: Well, my history is pretty poor.
Q361 Lord Morris of Aberavon:
As business managers what would you characterise as the difficulties
of fast-tracking legislation? Looking back, are there any bills,
now acts, which it might not have been necessary, with hindsight,
to be fast-tracked?
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: My Lords, I would
say that there two major categories of difficulties, one of course
being the lack of parliamentary scrutiny and the very difficult
balance that there is to arrive at between the time scale which
is necessary, the speed of the legislation, and the need for parliamentary
scrutiny. The other thing is the difficulties in relation to the
outside world. As a Parliament, we have a duty to the outside
world and we need to ensure that what we are doing inside Parliament
is understood and open and transparent, and I think that is much
more difficult with an expedited process. I think the outside
world cannot be as involved as I would wish it to be in legislation
when there is an expedited process.
Q362 Lord Morris of Aberavon:
On the second question which I put, are there any which, with
hindsight, it might not have been necessary to put through the
fast-tracking process? Are there any?
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: Certainly not the
bills that I am aware of or that I have been involved with. But
perhaps post-legislative scrutiny will show that maybe some were
not necessary. In my view, as I say, they have been necessary
but perhaps post-legislative scrutiny will tell a different story.
Q363 Lord Morris of Aberavon:
It is a subjective view as to whether it is necessary.
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: Yes.
Chris Bryant: There is a particular irony sometimes
that when you limit the amount of time available to people, it
ends up taking longer than if you had not limited the time. Nonetheless,
I think sometimes it is necessary to limit the time. I have noticed
that a three-minute speech from Chris Bryant is normally better
than a 58-minute speech from Chris Bryant.
Q364 Lord Lyell of Markyate:
Her Majesty's Stationery Office having been breaking the law for
30 years, as they discovered, it might be arguable as to whether
it was an emergency matter to put it right. On the other hand,
since nobody is going to object, it seemed rather sensible.
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: Yes.
Chris Bryant: Touché.
Q365 Chairman:
Lord President, you said in your submission that "good scrutiny
is an essential part of making good law" and that "the
Government will seek to make as much time as possible available
for scrutiny subject to the need to achieve Royal Assent by a
given date." First, do you think that that aspiration has
always been achieved in the past? Second, if the Government deems
expedited passage to be necessary, in what ways do you think it
can be ensured that a bill still receives the level of scrutiny
that it deserves?
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: That is a difficult
one. Good scrutiny. In the House of Lords, each of the bills with
which I have been well acquainted have been, in my view, properly
and well scrutinised. In view of the time scale, because our debates
are not limited in time terms, I have never felt that there was
undue pressure. For example, the last bill in which we were all
involved was the Northern Ireland Act 2009, and as I took that
through there were many complaints about the expedited nature
of the bill of which I was well aware, but, having said that,
I was never aware that anybody felt under pressure in debate.
The noble Lords were able to raise whatever concerns they had
and the Government were willing and able to respond, so I did
not feel that scrutiny was jeopardised in any way.
Chris Bryant: My own feeling is the quality
of scrutiny is what matters as much as anything else. One of the
ways that we ensure that there is a high quality of scrutiny is
by having two Houses, where there is a very different style of
scrutiny that happens in both Houses, where there is a different
whipping arrangement. There is independence in both Houses but
it expresses itself in very different ways in the two Houses.
Beyond that, the issue is, as I said earlier, balancing the need
for action with the need for dotting every `i' and crossing every
`t'. I sometimes get a little frustrated when it feels as if,
in either House, it is not just that everything has not yet been
said but that it has not yet been said by everybody, because I
do not know that that necessarily increases the quality of the
scrutiny, though it may increase the level of press releases.
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: My Lords, I am
very proud of the scrutiny that we have in the House of Lords
because of the expertise which we have available. Therefore, I
have great confidence in the scrutiny which we undertake, even
when it is expedited scrutiny.
Chris Bryant: And, My Lords, I am very proud
of the level of expertise that we have in the House of Commons.
I am sorry, that sounds a snide point, but there is an important
point, which is that it is a different style of expertise.
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: Yes, that is true.
Chris Bryant: Sometimes it brings a rapier where
a blunderbuss is necessary and sometimes it is a blunderbuss when
a rapier is necessary.
Chairman: I share both your prides.
Q366 Lord Pannick:
Would you accept that effective scrutiny does not just depend
on all of us doing our jobs; it depends on people outside having
the time to inform us of points of view, of information, so that
we can do our jobs properly. Surely there is a danger with emergency
legislation that that time is not available.
Chris Bryant: Absolutely. I think that is one
of the reasons why, for instance, with the most recent Northern
Ireland Act we were very keen to have first reading as early as
we could so that the bill was out there and people could refer
to it and there could be proper public discussion, because that
often happens long before second reading. For myself, I have always
been rather critical of those who have condemned lobbyists in
the generality. For instance when I sat on the Mental Health Bill
as a backbench MP, it was all the organisations from the mental
health charities and all the rest who came to me and informed
me and made sure that I was making a proper and useful contribution
in committee, so I think that point is a very well made one.
Q367 Lord Woolf:
Because of the point you have just been dealing with, I understand
it is not possible to say that you identify criteria which have
to be fulfilled for a bill to be dealt with under emergency legislation.
What worries me is the broadness of the certification as emergency.
Should there not be conventions which say, for example, that if
it is going to get emergency treatment the issues that are going
to be dealt with by the bill should be confined to those which
are urgent? Have I made myself clear?
Chris Bryant: Very. Indeed, in the Commons that
is very much the debate that happens on the allocation of time
motion. People will say, "Most of this bill I can see why
it is necessary, but I don't see why this other bit is" or
whatever, and that is part of the discussions which will happen
before anything is presented. That is very much part of that process.
There is another thing that can happen, which is that when an
ordinary bill is going through its processes, at a late moment
a department will have an emergency that it needs to meet with
a legislative solution. As a government we are very keen not to
proceed in that direction and the business managers try to prevent
as much as possible that from happening, but there are some very
exceptional moments when that does happen.
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: My Lords, as business
managers within government, when our colleagues speak to us about
the necessity of a piece of expedited legislation, we very strongly
make the argument that every part of the bill should be, of necessity,
expedited. As business managers, whilst recognising the need for
expedited legislation from time to time, it makes our life difficult,
quite frankly, as those of you around this table who have been
involved with government will know. It is a great headache to
have a piece of legislation which we were not expecting which
suddenly we have to slot into a very crowded programme, so, My
Lords, you can be sure that we are arguing vociferously with our
colleagues to ensure that the piece of legislation itself is absolutely
necessary and that every part of that legislation is necessary.
Q368 Lord Rowlands:
Perhaps we could turn specifically to Northern Ireland. Since
1985 there have been 11 Northern Ireland bills and two Home Office
bills, all of which were expedited. Lord President, you have said
that this exercise we are undertaking should be a kind of stock-taking
exercise. Let us take stock and say to ourselves: with hindsight,
can we really now justify the fast-tracking of all these bills?
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: Most of those bills
have come about as a consequence of the Peace Process or as a
result of violence and terrorism in Northern Ireland. Following
the Omagh bombing, I think there was a piece of Home Office legislation
and one would understand absolutely why that was necessary. There
are other pieces of legislation which were a result of the political
process, and some people might question whether or not those pieces
of legislation needed to be expedited but I would say, My Lords,
that they did in order to maintain the momentum of the Peace Process.
I think that where we are politically now in respect of Northern
Ireland demonstrates that those pieces of legislation were necessary
and it was necessary to expedite them.
Q369 Lord Rowlands:
This is what I think. We reviewed them, and I accept that reply.
That is why I thought the last Act, the Northern Ireland Act 2009,
stood out as a rather curious exception to it on two grounds.
First, there was no consensus at all on the expedited nature of
it, as I understand. The Conservatives voted against the allocation
and most of the Northern Ireland parties spoke out against it.
How can you justify that? I listened to you Lord President and
I was not wholly convinced when I heard you on the second reading.
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: I am terribly sorry
about that, My Lord. Certainly at the beginning of that bill,
notwithstanding the vote in the House of Commons, there was consensus
amongst all the parties here and the cross-benchers that this
should be an expedited piece of legislation. At the beginning
of the bill people did express deep concerns and reservations
about the expedited nature, but I think at the end of the bill,
perhaps because of the political moment through which we were
living, with the deaths of soldiers and with the death of a policeman,
it was recognised in fact that this was a piece of legislation
that was necessarily expedited.
Q370 Lord Rowlands:
I understand how the events coloured the debatethey clearly
didbut it did not have any relevance to the actual events.
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: No, they did not
have relevance to the events per se, but it demonstrated the need
to maintain the momentum and to enable the people of Northern
Ireland and the Northern Ireland Assembly to devolve policing
and justice and to keep the whole thing going.
Chris Bryant: One of the other elements in this
is that the act was a permissive oneand I do not mean in
the 1960s sense, I mean in the sense of allowing something to
happen. Without that piece of legislation it would have been impossible
for the Northern Ireland Assembly to move forward. There were
three other stages that had to happen before full implementation
could come about, so I think that in part explains why we felt
it was important nonetheless to proceed.
Q371 Lord Rowlands:
I wonder whether we might not sense from the backbenchers' point
of view a growing impatience on the argument. One backbencher
in your House said that surely a part of returning Northern Ireland
to normalcy would be saying, "Let's treat Northern Ireland
legislation normally."
Chris Bryant: That is very much our ambitionvery
much our ambition. That is where we would like to end up. I do
not think it is quite where we have got to yet. It is Andrew Mackinlay,
I think you are referring to.
Q372 Lord Rowlands:
I do not have the name.
Chris Bryant: I am pretty certain it is Andrew
Mackinlay.
Q373 Lord Morris of Aberavon:
Is Northern Ireland a special case? If the label "Northern
Ireland" is put on a bill, then does it almost automatically
get the status of emergency legislation?
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: In the past, My
Lords, certainly over the past 15 years or so, it probably has
been a special case, but I think that is no longer the case. The
last piece of legislation was, I would hope, the last piece in
the emergency jigsaw in relation to Northern Ireland. I cannot
be absolutely confident but I would hope that that is the case.
Chris Bryant: It is worth saying that the vast
majority of legislation that affects Northern Ireland goes through
in whole UK bills, not in specific Northern Ireland bills.
Q374 Lord Morris of Aberavon:
On the need to have the statutory assent and in order to preserve
or certainly not shackle the political momentum, one is aware
that there are certain limitations about certain government announcements
that can be made in the immediate vicinity of a general election.
Is there such a thing as a purdah where European elections are
involved which limits, constrains the bringing or pursuing of
legislation?
Chris Bryant: It does not restrict the bringing
forward of legislation but it does restrict what the Civil Service
can do. It might be that a government might choose not to bring
forward a piece of legislation during purdah for the simple reason
that the civil servants would not be able to publicise it.
Q375 Lord Morris of Aberavon:
Is it a recognised thing, so far as government is concerned, of
not being able to pursue various stages of legislation during
European elections or is that something novel?
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: My Lords, the legislative
process is continuing as normal throughout the election process.
Q376 Lord Morris of Aberavon:
One of the arguments put by the Secretary of State for Northern
Ireland includes a purdah period during the European elections.
I have never heard of that.
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: My Lords, I have
to confess I have never heard of that either.
Q377 Lord Morris of Aberavon:
I thought it was novel too.
Chris Bryant: Purdah expressly excludes parliamentary
proceedings. It would be rather bizarre to take politics out of
Parliament.
Lord Morris of Aberavon: It was new to
me and I am glad to hear it is new to you as well.
Q378 Lord Peston:
May I turn our attention to the order making powers in part 2
of the Civil Contingencies Act 2004. Would I be right in saying
that those powers have never been used?
Chris Bryant: Yes, you wouldunless somebody
is going to contradict me suddenly.
Q379 Lord Peston:
No, I think that is right. That was just to get it started.
Chris Bryant: I am glad we agree.
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