Wales Bill

Baroness Randerson Excerpts

Report: 1st sitting: House of Lords
Wednesday 14th December 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Morgan]

My Lords, I was once vice-chancellor of the University of Wales and I think that this is a distinct improvement. It will strengthen the status of Welsh university institutions and I am grateful for it.

[Baroness Randerson (LD)]

My Lords, I start by declaring an interest as a governor of Cardiff Metropolitan University. I echo other noble Lords by referring to Amendments 5 and 7; I am really pleased to see that the Government have clarified that they had no intention of changing the status of Welsh universities. It is a status that is rightly prized and valued, not least because it gives them charitable status, which is extremely important from the funding perspective.

Government Amendment 8 deals with the Open University, which the Minister referred to in his remarks. Does he believe that this clarification is adequate and fully addresses the concern of the Open University that it should be seen as operating equally in all four constituent countries? Obviously it would not be seen appropriately as a Welsh institution, but it does not want to be seen as an English institution. It wants to be seen as bestriding all the countries of the United Kingdom. It would therefore be helpful if the Minister could clarify that he believes those concerns are fully addressed.

[Lord Crickhowell (Con)]

My Lords, as for expressing thanks and congratulations, may I, as the first president of Cardiff University, add to those thanks and congratulations from these Benches?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Randerson]

My Lords, it really rankles that, yet again, something which is taken for granted in Scotland is viewed as not appropriate for the Welsh Assembly and the Welsh Government. There is no logic to this decision. There might be an excuse, but that is different from logic. There is every reason to take a comprehensive approach to managing the ports in Wales on very good strategic and economic grounds, along with developing a strategy in relation to them as a whole. Moreover, as the noble Lord, Lord Crickhowell, mentioned in Committee, there is the importance of the safety aspects of this issue. So I would say to the Minister, who I realise understands only too well the importance of ports to the Welsh economy and who understands extremely well the economy of that part of Wales, that even at this late stage of our consideration of the Bill he should give this matter further thought and come back at Third Reading.

[Lord Crickhowell]

My Lords, I had not intended to intervene again on this issue. I have long experience of dealing with the port authority and sometimes the relationships were very good. One particular person was running the authority during my early years as the local MP with whom I had an absolutely first-class relationship. However, they were not always as good. What people ought to understand about the port authority is that it will not be the Welsh Government, or indeed the UK Government, actually operating and controlling things; that is very much for the port authority, which has extensive powers. I once had a profound disagreement with the authority over a campaign that I and others fought on the safety issue because we were deeply concerned about some of the actions being taken not by the Government but by the port authority for its own commercial or other reasons.

I wonder whether there is not some solution here. I understand entirely the crucial fact that the gas terminals are at the end of pipelines that carry gas into England and form an important part of our energy package. Surely it would be possible for some agreement to be reached by the Government with the Welsh Assembly that would take the authority for dealing with the strategic link and the gas facility out of the specific responsibility of the Welsh Government and make it a separate strategic effort, while somehow allowing the Welsh Government much more involvement for the reasons that have been outlined in the handling of such matters as safety within the port.

The fact is that the town of Milford, the oil facilities and the people who live around them on the south of the haven, as well as Neyland and Pembroke Dock, are all close to areas where, if an accident occurred, the impact would be enormous on the local population. So there is a real issue here, and I have a good deal of sympathy with the view that these matters should not necessarily be in the hands of a trust port whose powers were established a long time ago in very different circumstances. I wonder whether the powers and authority of this port should not be looked at again, perhaps jointly, by the Welsh Government and the UK Government, because there are practical issues here that go back to the original creation of this facility, when the circumstances were wholly different.

I understand the vital strategic issue, which needs to be covered and dealt with adequately, but I hope that the Government will give at least some further thought at some stage—whether they can do it during the passage of this Bill I am not sure—to the way in which these issues are managed and handled in the port of Milford Haven.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord James of Blackheath (Con)]

I believe that the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, has been led astray by a very faulty piece of wording here on which I have written to the Minister. I think it is not a question of a minimum bet of £10. I believe you can nominate any value you want down to 20p on any machine. It is not a minimum bet; it is a minimum bank that you have to open to have the right to play on the machine. That is £10. Then you can have any value of stake you want within it down to 20p, even perhaps 10p in some instances. The confusion comes from the difference between a minimum stake and a minimum bank that you can buy into on any machine. If we could get that clear once and for all, this problem would largely go away.

[Baroness Randerson]

My Lords, I start by making clear that I do not share the views of the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, on the value for money of the repairs to Buckingham Palace, which I see as a major tourist attraction and therefore well worth the investment.

I agree, however, with his views on the limits to the Assembly’s powers on energy and support his amendments to increase them. For many years, it has been Liberal Democrat policy to give the Assembly power over energy, with the exception of nuclear energy. It is essential that we keep pressing this issue because it is so illogical to have this 350 megawatt limit plucked— I understand why—out of the air.

Will the Minister supply us with further information on fixed-odds betting terminals? We have had some very interesting suggestions. The noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, said that she is unclear about issues associated with gambling. It is certainly not something on which I can speak with any authority, but I am sure we need to make sure that the powers given to the Welsh Assembly are sufficient to be meaningful. The only reason for giving it powers over this would be to allow it to exert those powers in a way to change behaviour and deal with a very serious problem. I would be very grateful for any further information that the Minister can give us about the intention of this amendment and about, for example, the percentage of terminals that would be affected and the percentage of gamblers whose activities would be affected by this amendment.

I am very grateful that the Government have made a concession on this. It is something that has been pressed by many noble Lords, and not just in the context of this Bill. However, it is important that it should be a meaningful concession.