Constitution Committee

Wednesday 15th July 2026

(began 2 weeks, 1 day ago)

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10:36
None Portrait Speaker 1
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God is distributed across the legislature, executive and judiciary of the Custodiet Ipsos Custodes question because, um, there are there are are rather complex constitution, sometimes inaccurately described as unwritten. It isn't, of course. It just isn't written in a document called the Constitution with capital letters, but it's written in all sorts of places. And then there are constitutional conventions, some of which have been encapsulated in writing, but which are not always clear. And so the job of, a constitutional guard. Guardians, constitutional interpreters is sometimes to.

And certainly was the case when I was cabinet Secretary, is to interpret different conventions. Components of the Constitution. How do they overlap?Are they in tension and what might that mean for a particular decision?And I can give a couple of examples of that. I think it is important to note that the the to the extent that we have Guardians, they are distributed across all three branches of government. So within the legislature, of course, there are committees, but in particular, one would imagine one would think of, Mr.

Speaker, having a particularly important role in the in the governance of the House of Commons, uh, within the judiciary, as we discovered, uh, through various cases, in one of which Lord Burnett was involved when he was Lord Chief Justice. We have the judiciary itself and the Supreme Court ultimately, which will make judgments on matters of both constitutional law and constitutional Convention. Should it should it come to a point of tension?And then within the executive, I think it is important to remember the Prime Minister is the primary.

Um, uh, bears. The primary responsibility for the good conduct of the constitutional conventions advised by the Cabinet Secretary. And then, um, obviously there's the sovereign and the so-called Golden Triangle that enables that relationship between the head of state and the head of government. So with the cabinet secretary essentially at the heart of it, but the, uh, the sovereign, the Prime minister, their principal, private secretaries, uh, that that's essentially another element within the executive. And then finally, just briefly bridging, bridging the two, the attorney general, of course, and the law officers.

Yeah.
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10:41
None Portrait Speaker 3
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Thank you.
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10:42
None Portrait Speaker 1
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It's a. hypothetical one. Well, I think one would one would rest on the Lascelles principles, the famous letter from 1950, which essentially says that only in exceptional circumstances would the sovereign not grant a dissolution to a Prime Minister who has sought one. This was somewhat different. Under the period of the Fixed Term Parliaments Act, and we can talk about that if you wish, but that's now been repealed. So we've now restored to the previous, uh, the previous position.

And in that letter, I mean, essentially two of those principles still apply. The third was essentially if it would damage the national economy, which I think any, any sovereign would regard as fundamentally a political decision rather than one for them. But the other two principles were essentially, um, if essentially, um. That the sovereign concluded that an alternative government could be formed with a working majority, that would fall, would command the confidence of the House of Commons at that time, and therefore, in effect, the Prime Minister was seeking almost a sort of personal dissolution as opposed to a governmental dissolution.

Um and one can imagine, in periods of minority government, of course, that being particularly pertinent. And then the other factor being essentially, if there had only just been a dissolution, they'd only just been an election. And so some. And so some of this, it doesn't come down to hard and fast principles. Yeah. You know, we're currently two years into a parliament. We were two years in in 2017. We were two years in in 2019.

Um, when these issues of transitions of government arose and the question of whether there might be an early election arose. So it's a matter it's very much a matter of judgment. My expectation would be only in exceptional circumstances would the sovereign apply that reserve power of essentially denying the request of a prime minister to dissolve?
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10:44
None Portrait Speaker 1
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Well, other former cabinet secretaries would, of course, have also been part of the group that one might speak to in those in those circumstances, of course. Um, and I think I mean, actually to take the example of my successor as cabinet secretary, he was actually taught by one of the two that I mentioned. So I imagine he would very readily have, um, uh, have, have sought his advice were he to face that kind of, that kind of challenge, the way that conversation goes tended to go though.

Um, and I can give an example if it's helpful, is that one of the reasons it through partly from one's own knowledge, you don't end up as cabinet secretary. Certainly someone with a diplomatic background who spends one's life dealing with this kind of issue without having a reasonably good appreciation oneself of the of constitutional principles in essentially putting to them the dilemma and and then say, look, here is here's what I'm thinking, here's how I'm thinking my way through it. AM I getting it wrong?Are there options I haven't thought of?One isn't just as saying throwing it open and having a seminar.

One is actually making a proposition and then seeking challenge and insight on that. And so if I can give a give an example which actually did relate to the period of the fixed term parliaments Act, although it wasn't, that wasn't particularly pertinent in the case was the 2019 2019. Um, transition from Theresa May to Boris Johnson, minority government. Um, in, in supported in a confidence and supply arrangement by the Democratic Unionist Party. But it wasn't clear that that arrangement or indeed, given the, uh.

Fractures within the conservative government and the Conservative Party at the time that, um, the, the incoming Prime minister would necessarily be able to command the confidence of the House of Commons because it was right on a knife edge. In any event, with a minority government. And there were certainly some who were saying they might not support him in a matter of of confidence. So it wasn't clear. Unlike other transitions, the 2007 one being an obvious example, but actually, the 20, the 2016 one was examples where there was a clear majority.

It was clear the party would rally behind whoever had been elected. And so the Prime Minister would be able to command the confidence, the issue then was, should that transition take place as the. Actually, the current transition is about to take place after the parliamentary recess, and my advice to the outgoing Prime Minister was that they had to conclude. They should conclude the leadership elections, selecting the new leader of the Conservative Party and thus the next Prime Minister before the parliamentary recess, so that were in a minority government Parliament to choose to do so, to test confidence in the new Prime Minister.

They had an opportunity to do so. And the reason I felt that mattered was that otherwise a new prime minister would have been appointed by the late Queen, would have been in place for probably two months, six weeks to two months before Parliament had the chance to do that. If they then lost a vote of confidence immediately, they'd go into the election with all the prestige and, um, sort of panoply of being the sitting prime Minister and would, in effect, have drawn the sovereign into a politically, potentially politically biased decision.

So I felt that the two constitutional principles of commanding the confidence of the House of Commons and the strict neutrality of the sovereign were were sort of colliding there. And one there was only one way of resolving it, which was to create an opportunity for Parliament to have its say while still sitting. There was no direct precedent for that one. I couldn't find one. So then I had exactly that conversation with those constitutional experts and said, look, this is where I'm thinking, this is the advice I'm planning to give to the Prime Minister.

Does that make sense?I gave that advice and she accepted it. Um, and that's, that's how it that's how it played out.
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10:49
None Portrait Speaker 1
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Yeah.
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10:51
None Portrait Speaker 1
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The prime minister.
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10:51
None Portrait Speaker 1
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Yes.
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10:52
None Portrait Speaker 1
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Uh. Yes, but I think actually, I mean, if I'm, if I may suggest this is a topic it's well worth pursuing in more detail with Gus O'Donnell when he's here, because he faced exactly this in the 2010 election. I essentially that has now set the precedent for these circumstances. So it was it was clear if one looks back to previous precedent and, um, when the sovereign tended to play a more active role in circumstances like that, both in the 19th century, but certainly right up till 1931, um they wanted to avoid that happening, given that the 2010 election, it looked as though not it was it wasn't quite as fragmented as, as, as our current political scene, but it did look as though it was quite likely that there would be an outcome, um, in which.

A party didn't, didn't have a majority. And of course that's, that's how it turned out. And so what Gus O'Donnell, Lord O'Donnell. Um, did in his conversations beforehand was essentially try to put in place a mechanism to. Avoid the queen, the late queen, being drawn into what is fundamentally a political matter. And indeed, for the civil service itself to avoid doing that. And so the, the, the, the key principle that he was essentially trying to ensure there was a mechanism to deliver was this is a political matter, and therefore the politicians have to work their way through it and provided the facilities to do so.

Now in that case, um, the, the. The key phase was the negotiations for several days between the conservatives and the Liberal Democrats. But of course, there was a parallel negotiation going on between the sitting Prime Minister and the Liberal Democrats. Um, and in 1974, in the February 1974 election, it was constitutionally quite correct, although politically he took a lot of heat for it, for Edward Heath, knowing that it might be possible to secure a majority that commanded confidence to to also seek to try to do so with the Liberal Party at the time.

And then only when he realised he couldn't do so, then, um, advise the Queen to send for Harold Wilson, who um was also going to have a minority government and therefore at least give him the chance to test the confidence of the House of Commons, even though he might not, he might not be able to secure it, in which case there would have been a further a further election. So in those circumstances, I think one would draw on the 2010. Uh um. Mechanisms that Gus O'Donnell put in place, which would be to facilitate whatever conversations the various party leaders might wish to have, but essentially force the conversation into the political space and keep it away from the, the civil service, the palace, uh, the cabinet, etcetera, and the civil service were not involved in those conversations except kind of logistically, really, they were fundamentally delivered.

Um, um, conducted by the politicians. And I think that has to be right.
10:54
None Portrait Speaker 2
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Lord Jones.
10:54
None Portrait Speaker 3
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Yes, sir.
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None Portrait Speaker 5
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Thank you, Lord chair. We live in a world of extremes, so I'm going to put something to you that is an extreme scenario, but I'd be interested in your view. The the sovereign has obviously been very, very careful over the years to make sure that he or she is seen as neutral, constitutionally neutral. But I wonder how that might be tested in the future. A dominant executive controlling a compliant parliament can do whatever it wants. It could do.

It could move forward with legislation or policies that are either within or without its manifesto. You might have a government that decides the judges are going to be appointed directly by government for their political views, not because of their ability. Undermining the judicial system. A government might decide to suspend civil liberties using Parliament to do it could even abolish habeas corpus if it wanted to. If parliamentary sovereignty is taken to its extreme view, you. Mentioned my question is this.

You've mentioned that, of course, the monarch takes advice from the Cabinet Secretary and others, no doubt. But what happens in that kind of scenario where you have a government that is moving ahead with, um, actions that are perhaps outside of his manifesto that undermine the Constitution. Would the monarch what sort of advice might be given to the monarch to dissolve Parliament in those circumstances without a request from the Prime Minister?There is a precedent, of course. Australia in 1975, the Whitlam government, where that scenario did emerge.

But if you were faced with that, you're not in the role now. So I can speak more freely if you're faced with that scenario, which you've never faced before in this country, but who knows in the future, what would your advice be?
10:56
None Portrait Speaker 1
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Point I should make. Don't worry, I'm not going to duck the question. But just for the record, it is. It is important to record that the Prime Minister is the sovereign's First Minister, and the Prime Minister has a constitutional responsibility to advise the sovereign, and indeed to do so that in in a way that preserves the sovereign's neutrality. And Prime Minister do take that seriously. Obviously there is in these circumstances, one to about that sort of separate, sort of almost dotted line channel of communication where there is a direct channel between the cabinet secretary and the sovereign as head of state and via the the private secretary.

And we've never faced a position where a cabinet secretary is essentially, including in my time, had to advise the head of state versus the head of government. And let's hope it never arises, because fundamentally, in the end, the cabinet secretary is primarily responsible to the Prime Minister, and one would have to one would have to recognise that. Look, I think those I think the truth is, um, the sovereign could not become directly involved in that. And one would be relying upon Parliament itself. So the House of Lords um.

Because there are of course are exceptions to the Parliament Act, uh, to, to where the, the, the House of Commons can override the Lords in the Parliament Act, for example, in the extension of Parliament, beyond it's beyond its normal terms and would be relying on the checks and balances within the government, within the legislative system, the political system, and of course, relying on, in the end, the courts, because almost certainly anything of this kind would be challenged. Um and unless the legislation had already been repealed with the consent of the House of Lords, then the courts would seek to enforce the law and the Constitution as it stood.

But but the truth is, during times of emergency, Second World War being the obvious example, we have suspended constitutional. Protections like. The habeas corpus. We have extended parliaments beyond their natural term. But that's been done. Um, essentially by the political system and with the consent of the political system. And you're right, there is obviously in in the absence of, um, a sort of supermajority requirement in our system of the kind, there is in other jurisdictions to override or to.

Change the written constitution itself. We do have we do have the sovereignty of Parliament. We have what Lord Hailsham referred to as the elective dictatorship. And therefore we're relying upon conventions and the checks and balances within the parliamentary system, um, to, uh, to, to constrain that kind of scenario that you, that you set out. And it would be a failure of our political system were we to try to reach for the sovereign to do so, and would of course, be highly controversial, as it was in the Gough Whitlam case, when the Governor-General did that for the sovereign to become or the representative to become involved.
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11:04
None Portrait Speaker 1
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Indeed.
11:04
None Portrait Speaker 7
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Crown servants.
11:04
None Portrait Speaker 1
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Indeed.
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11:08
None Portrait Speaker 1
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Uh, quite a complex set of issues there, Lord, if I can just unpack them. So just on your first point, the sort of premise of this. Have standards declined?My answer to that is no. And I mean, I take your points about Hillsborough infected blood and so on, but let's not forget these are actually long standing, decades old scandals that have only been revealed and addressed in the modern era. And so I'm not going to say standards have improved.

It just seems to me that one has to be very careful about suggesting, because they are current issues being addressed. Um, scandals being addressed, which have been revealed over many, many years that somehow or other that means modern standards are deficient. Actually, modern standards have forced those issues out into the open, and that's with the consent of Parliament legislation. Um, at. Etc.. And if one thinks back to issues such as the cover ups relating to undercover policing, uh, etc., um, I'm not suggesting again, nothing like that could happen in the modern era, but the modern era has been the period at which these things have come to light.

And there is a greater culture of transparency in modern political culture. And of course, there's legislation seeking to entrench the duty of candour, etc.. But there's a modern culture of transparency, which wasn't, I think, apparent in the same way in, say, the 1970s and 1980s when I was just when I was first becoming essentially politically aware. And we also have, not least in the Supreme Court and the judiciary, a very active, um, doctrine around judicial review that um, and public inquiries that does force transparency into these, into these issues.

So that now. That doesn't mean you're. Second secondary points because I don't accept the premise that standards have declined, doesn't mean your second set of points are not important. They are. Clearly very important that the cabinet secretary, as head of the Civil Service, both, um, are exempt. Guys, but also enforces the values set out in constitutional law, crag, etc. but also the civil service code. And so perhaps the reason some of these things are not explicit is because it is, it is simply taken as read, that the Cabinet Secretary, as head of the Civil Service, has to exemplify and enforce the Civil Service Code.

And all of this is set out. Along with a range of other issues. Um, uh, in, in, in there. Um, and I think modern public servants do hold themselves to a, to a very high standard. And because there's a culture of transparency are probably held more accountable for that than perhaps was the case in the past.
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11:11
None Portrait Speaker 1
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Well, that's a fair point. It was 40 years ago. So so I mean, I was I was I was at university when when the tragedy actually happened. And of course, my successor as cabinet secretary will have been at school. The current cabinet secretary would have been at school. And I went, look, I went through a cycle. I went through this, this question, um, quite acutely when I was actually running the home office and we had the child sex abuse scandal came up and there was a whole question about what had happened back in the 1980s and 90s around destruction of material and so on.

And these issues are deeply uncomfortable for the public service, because you look back and, and realise that actually there were cover ups. Um, sometimes more or less apparent to, to the public. Um, there is a very strong presumption in the modern era that, that we are going to be held accountable, whether immediately, because there's a culture of accountability, we have freedom of information, we have a much more aggressive media, and we have an active doctrine of judicial review. Um, but we also have, of course, parliamentary accountability that's much more intrusive on civil servants than used to be the case.

You know, civil servants could shield behind ministers. You know, there are definitely periods in my career when I wish that were still, I'd wish that was still true. I was certainly felt held very personally accountable by the Home Affairs Select Committee when I was running the Home Office for what was happening. And we're very conscious that every civil servant is very conscious that anything really significant will find its way into the public domain or a public inquiry. So I think we have ethically people who are still as strong ethically in in the public service, in many ways stronger than they were before.

They're also conscious that we're in a period of transparency when they're going to be held accountable, um, either immediately or in retrospect for those decisions, I'd have no argument with you, Lord Burchard, about including this kind of, um, issue. In the key objectives of the cabinet Secretary, uh, all I'm doing is explaining perhaps why, um, it's an understandable omission, but I don't I don't have were this committee to feel it was important to set that out, um, as a key objective of a cabinet secretary of the day. The point about the loyalty to the Crown and to the wider Constitution and ethics and values, I don't think any cabinet secretary would argue, um, argue with that, that addition to the, to the, to the job description.

Thank you.
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None Portrait Speaker 2
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Lady Henry.
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None Portrait Speaker 1
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Well, I think we do live in a more turbulent period politically. As Lord Waldegrave was indicating that this is as much a feature of more fragmented politics um than was the case was the case in the past. Um I describe it more as scenario planning than horizon scanning. So one does as. We were discussing, um, in the run up to the 2010 election then certainly Lord O'Donnell, I'm sure you'll, he'll be able to talk much more informed way about this than I can.

Certainly did horizon scanning or scenario planning around what might happen were there to be an indecisive outcome and how to handle that, and how to ensure that those discussions, as I described, took place in the political arena. Not, um, and didn't draw in those those who are politically neutral, uh, or politically impartial, um, and so one does that kind of thing. I did that sort of, um, horizon scanning, uh, in the context of the 2017 2019 elections, I had to think very hard about potential scenarios relating to the fixed term parliaments act during the Brexit period.

And, um, the various pieces of legislation that had us leaving on certain dates and how those two pieces of legislation, with or without a deal, how those might interact, how, uh, how to address the question, um, of, of what happened in that two week standstill period that was within the fixed term parliaments act after after the loss of a vote of confidence and which Parliament had been silent. So how to deal with that?What did the conventions say about that?And one had all of those conversations, some of them very informal, just with my own team, some of them with some of these constitutional experts, including my predecessors.

Um, in, in, in quite a, I mean, actually genuinely, I genuinely quite enjoyed the horizon scanning, brainstorming kind of conversation, as one does about as one does about other issues. And a lot of it is, is just to sort of try to keep informing oneself, testing one's own thinking, um, testing one's own understanding, recollection of precedent, etc., uh, in order to then digest and, and, and be better prepared. It's like all scenario planning. Um, the plan was it Eisenhower who said the plan is nothing.

Planning is everything. It helps build the musculature to deal with the issue when it arises, even if the scenario itself is different.
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None Portrait Speaker 11
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Thank you.
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None Portrait Speaker 2
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Burnett.
11:16
None Portrait Speaker 1
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Um. Was going to ask you, um, a follow up question about, uh, relationships. with the, with the sovereign, but I think the moment has passed. So can, can I pick up, um, a slightly different point, which I hope fits in the narrative that is, is developing. Um, you've mentioned in the course of your, of your observations, um, constitutional conventions, um, and we know that there are constitutional boundaries which exist between the different arms of the state, but more widely between independent players, government and so on.

And um, certainly when, when, when I was um Lord Chief Justice and we had a certain amount of dealings together in not altogether um un turbulent times. Um, I saw one of my roles as being to patrol those constitutional boundaries and it was, if I may say so from time to time, necessary. Um, and really my, my question is, is this, do you think as certainly there is widespread commentary to the effect of that in the political world?Um. Some at least are not as sensitive to the conventions and the boundaries as they should be.

And that this is introducing some tension. And I seem to remember that you had to deal with a particular issue about a letter, whether a letter would be written that Parliament had mandated in an Act of Parliament. And it was, in the end written, um, but very publicly. Um there was something of a row about whether it would be written. And so that's a, that's an example that's in my mind. Yes. I think, I mean, this goes to the, to, to, to the point about, um, sort of the extreme scenarios.

There's sort of hard cases, bad law point here that what was clear, I think we should just be candid about it. What was clear during the Brexit period was that there were protagonists actually on both sides of the argument, and it is important to make that point. Whom their position on Brexit for or against overrode?Their, um, concern for the Constitution or indeed the Union. And there were they were prepared to put both the Constitution and the Union at risk in order to pursue their particular view on Brexit.

They felt that was so important. It overrode those things. Certainly my view as a public servant, as a crown servant, was that we had to deliver the result of the referendum, but we had to do so in a way that to go to a slightly different version of Lord Beast's point did not put either the Constitution or the Union in jeopardy, because I felt both. That was obviously important. But there were people on protagonists on both sides. And so I think in, in, in the most acute examples, you know, that was essentially an argument about our entire national identity.

And we saw echoes of this actually in the 2014 as well as the 2016 referendum in, in Scotland, within the public service in Scotland. Circumstances, that's the real test of whether the checks and balances work. Whether the judicial um role, the role of the Attorney General, the role of the cabinet secretary, and even the hopefully never exercised role of latent role of the sovereign are, are important. And we just about came through it in the Brexit period. As you say, the letter was written in the end because the Prime Minister of the day, in the end, had to recognise, he had to respect the law and that even though he disliked it.

Um uh and so the Constitution did survive. It didn't, it didn't, it certainly got bruised. Um, but the, the Constitution checks and balances did manage to apply under the most intense pressure. So I think we should take some comfort in that because most, most of the time we won't face that kind of pressure.
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None Portrait Speaker 11
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Um.
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None Portrait Speaker 9
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Can I just one.
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None Portrait Speaker 9
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Well.
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None Portrait Speaker 1
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I agree with that. Um, but I think, um, Lord Burnett would would say that it's also a job for the Lord Chief Justice. Um, it's also a job for other, uh, prominent figures. And my point in answer to your Hillsboro timing point without going round and round, that was that you asked you said you asserted that, um, standards had declined. And my point was, I don't think they had declined. The scandals themselves were decades old. And it's in the modern era.

ERA they've been revealed. Doesn't mean they couldn't happen again, doesn't mean people still don't get these things wrong. Doesn't mean people still don't, you know, cover their backs and, you know, tell lies and so on. But they always did. And as Lord Waldegrave has just pointed out, Suez was perhaps the most acute example of that. Um, which was generations ago. And that hasn't happened in the that hasn't happened in the modern era. So I'm not suggesting they're better.

I'm just suggesting one has to be very careful about saying standards are worse. And I think it is absolutely right that. Cabinet secretaries now have a higher public profile than was the case when I was first entering the civil service, I think Sir Robert Robin Butler, Lord Butler almost never found himself in the news during his period as Cabinet Secretary. He did ten years. Um, whereas I was in the news the whole time, um, from my period. And therefore one has to accept there's a that goes with shouldering more public responsibility for maintaining a commitment to some of these standards and reassuring the public.

I accept that point.
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None Portrait Speaker 2
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Leave it alone.
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None Portrait Speaker 1
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There is clearly a risk of that. I think that is absolutely right, and indeed, it goes beyond the civil service, but it depends on the nature of the accountability. Um, is the truth of it. So I'll give you a different example. I chaired a commission, um, for policy exchange on regulatory regulatory reform. And one of the points I made there was exactly your point about risk aversion that if you're a, if you're an individual regulator and some academic can demonstrate that the cumulative effect of your regulation is to knock 0.01% off growth, that is not going to make the front pages.

But if there is a failure, that means a citizen loses their savings or has. There's some other acute failure, then you will be dragged into Parliament and um. Held personally very accountable for that failure. And that therefore creates a bias in the system to avoiding avoiding that. Avoiding that. But the key point, if one is to find a way of maintaining the transparency and the discipline of accountability is for accountability, not to be the bear pit and the knock that sometimes I think everyone around the table will recognise.

And also for the professionals, whether civil servants or regulators or others, to have the backing of ministers when they go into those into those sessions. So accountability. Absolutely right. But what sometimes one sometimes sees as sort of the grandstanding element of accountability, which is more about the person asking the question than the person answering it. Sometimes not in this house, but perhaps in the other place sometimes. And I've certainly experienced that. That does create a culture of risk aversion.

And so I think one has to have a mature accountability and a mature way of holding people accountable. But I think in the modern era, it's just no longer tenable for officials to completely step. Up behind, step into the shadow of ministers, and expect ministers to to cover absolutely everything, when in truth, so much of the delivery of government policy is down to individual um teams of. Civil servants.
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None Portrait Speaker 11
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Thank you.
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None Portrait Speaker 9
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And Lord Griffiths um, well, thank you first of all for coming and and being alone and subject to all this interrogation. I read the account of your previous thing, and 1 or 2 of the exchanges were quite terrifying or would be to me anyway. So thank you for coming and being brave enough. My questions are always a little bit sort of different. You talked about history. Um, and we have here experience second to none of people involved in various aspects of governing and interpretation of law.

And, um, the evolution of law and so on. My interests have always been a cultural and, um, and um. Historical certainly, but, but also philosophical. Um, sometimes I wonder whether in terms of the way we govern ourselves, takes cognisance quickly enough of the fact that the facts yesterday are not facts today. And I'm very involved in questions related to immigration, for example. And indeed my own doctoral studies were to do with um black societies in general. At the end of the 18th and early 19th centuries.

So black people at one particular moment, many of them were considered to be chattels. And our universe is a teeming with studies of post-colonial studies now. And the question of reparations. And, and you have various people appealing to bodies of truth that are diametrically opposed to each other and that emerge from this different perspective. And then there's the question, because I also represent, or I'm on the team representing this parliament at Strasbourg, and I sit on migration committee there, and we had the European Convention in 51, which spelled out very clearly what people were entitled to if they landed on anybody's shore by way of treatment and all the rest of it.

And we all signed the paper to say that was the case. But the debates recently suggest that that's no longer the case, that it's questionable whether someone arriving on our shores has a right to be heard, and so on and so forth. How do you make laws that continue to hold confidence and practice in the political realm that can be spelled out meaningfully to the public at large, when you're actually dealing with fissiparous and fragmentary material of this kind. Um, which, which is the culture and we're no longer living, we are living in post-modern times.

I mean, ideas of truth change everything. Now, I could just go on a little bit more, but I won't. But but to talk about similar developments in the field of technology, which is going far faster than any of our conventions and ways of behaving and so on. And so is climate change. Um, so we're trying to govern ourselves sensibly and responsibly and accountably in an environment where everything seems to change all the time. And I really think my intervention was to say that if ever your job were on the market, I would not apply for it.
11:36
None Portrait Speaker 5
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Well.
11:36
None Portrait Speaker 1
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Actually, to go to that very final point, I'll address the substance of your point in a second. We're going to go to that very final point. It actually relates to Baroness Lange's point earlier. There are people coming through the system who decide they don't want to become permanent secretaries or rise to the very top, because they just don't want the public exposure, and they can pursue a very successful career to the level below that and stay somewhat in the in the in the shadows.

And I certainly have talked to people who've said, look, I just don't want to do it. So your, your risk aversion point does also have a can also have an effect on the quality, um, of the, of the, of the public service, actually, not just the civil service. The same is true in other, in other areas. I mean, on your point, Lord Griffiths, I. A there's a, there's a fascinating sort of, um, probably over dinner conversation about all of the issues you've, you've described, but fundamentally, um, from the, for the purpose of this evidence session, all of that is in the realm of politics.

That's, that's why we elect politicians. It's to recognise that there are different interests. There are different versions of the truth. Um, that, uh, that there are conventions which we've adhered to that, that some considered to, to, to, to no longer be relevant, etc. fundamentally that's for politicians to decide and something that you will find an absolute commitment to, to go to Lord Bishop's point, but this isn't written down either, which is we will say to ourselves, look, in the end, they're elected. They have the mandate.

We don't. Our job is to. Of course, respect the rule of law, respect the constitutional conventions. But to deliver the mandate that the government has set. And in the end, these matters are matters to be thrashed out in political debate and. Yeah, I think it's one has to be very, very careful. And you didn't suggest this, but I just want to register this point because it sometimes comes up in the question of Democratic security, election security, etc..

Russian bots and all of that kind of intervention. What has to be very, very careful of saying that someone, some impartial body, should step into the arena and decide what's true and what isn't?In the end, I just think politicians have to fight that out. And, uh, because that's. Is by far the safest way of dealing with it in a democratic system.
11:39
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