Consumer Rights Bill (Carry-Over Extension)

John Spellar Excerpts

Monday 12th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

I simply rise to agree that this is an important Bill, and we are looking forward to progress being made and the Government finally agreeing with us in the Lords on ticket touting. We look forward to its return to this House for us to approve it.

[Mr John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

rose—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Dawn Primarolo)]

I call—[Hon. Members: “John Spellar”.] Oh, yes. I call John Spellar.

[Mr Spellar]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Those days we spent in Washington together were clearly—

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Order. Mr Spellar, this is not the time to tell secrets. My apologies for temporarily not calling you correctly to speak.

[Mr Spellar]

I understand, Madam Deputy Speaker. It is an age-related thing.

I congratulate the Minister on moving the extension right up to the end of her period in Parliament. We wish her well in her future career. As she and the Opposition spokesperson said, this is an important Bill, in which case one wonders why the Government have taken so long to bring it to fruition on the statute book. What is their problem? It is not as though we are burdened with business. Week after week, the Government are filling time in this Parliament—not just since we came back after the Christmas holiday, but certainly since we came back in September. What have the Government been doing and why are they taking so long to pass the Bill? This Parliament has rightly now been described as a zombie Parliament.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that since the introduction of fixed five-year Parliaments, there is no excuse for not knowing when the general election will be, meaning that the proper programming of Bills should be a piece of cake for the Government?

[Mr Spellar]

My hon. Friend is exactly right; it should be a piece of cake for any properly run Administration. We realise that there are substantial internal tensions in the Government. That is why several private Members’ Bills are held up in the proceedings, and why other important issues, such as one dear to his heart in his role as deputy defence spokesman for the Opposition—the failure to advance the programme on the renewal of the Trident submarine programme—are also held up. On those matters, we understand, although we do not agree, with the delay. The hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) has several times drawn to the attention of the House and the Prime Minister some of the internal contradictions of the coalition. We understand those problems.

What are the problems with the Bill before us? There might be differences between the Government and the Opposition, as we saw with the Government’s disgraceful support for the ticket touts against the interests of supporters and fans of sport, music and the arts, but there are no internal differences to hold up the progress of the Bill. That brings us to the underlying point: the Government’s programme is in a bit of mess. We have to consider this point, because it is important for the constitutional arrangements of the House. Although there are strong differences of opinion within the Chamber, things really fall down when we have a Government who cannot handle their own business, do not know what they are doing and—equally important, although for some this is a more trivial issue—do not understand the dynamic of Parliament, not just in this House but in the relationship between the two Houses. We are seeing many examples of that.

It might be that the Minister can give us some clues as to where the problem lies. Who is in charge of Government business? Who should be steering the Bill through Parliament, and why have they failed so singularly to do so inside a year—a very long time? Normally, when there is good will in the House—as the Minister rightly said, the Bill has broad approval and is important—Bills can progress at a reasonable pace. Have there been unreasonable obstacles from the Opposition or within the coalition? Or is it that the Government are asleep on the job?

Many Members, including Back-Bench Government Members, have raised concerns about that issue. It is clear that the Prime Minister and the crew at No. 10 are not in charge of Government business. We have seen in the newspapers and heard personally many complaints from Members about his “chillaxed” approach, and we remember the comments about the fish rotting from the head down. He makes a virtue of his “chillaxed” approach to policy and, in particular, to administration and organisation—those dull details that actually ensure that government and Parliament run properly.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

The right hon. Gentleman is making an interesting speech. It seems to me that he is arguing for a business of the House committee, which I would of course support him in.

[Mr Spellar]

Most certainly not. I am arguing for an effective Government, but the hon. Gentleman makes an interesting observation, because he is really saying that the driver behind his business of the House committee is the failure of his own Government. He has to consider whether that is a failure arising from the particular circumstances and structure of this unholy coalition, or whether it is down to the deficiencies of the individuals concerned. I think it is probably both, but even within this alliance, which I know he is deeply unhappy with and would like to see ended—it was Government Members who voted for the five-year fixed-term parliaments, which has ossified this Parliament—if there were people there who had some grip on the situation, matters would be improved. Either way, it is clear that the Prime Minister and his fairly undistinguished staff at No. 10 have not got a grip on the situation. Within the House, of course, under all Governments, including much better run Governments, the Leader of the House and the Chief Whip have played key roles, so let us deal with them in turn, starting with the Leader of the House.

I say without any sense of irony that the right hon. Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Mr Hague) was a very good Foreign Secretary. I did not always agree with all his policy, but he was an effective Foreign Secretary who advanced a number of important and noble causes. I pay tribute to him for the redirection and reorientation of the Foreign Office towards using our embassies more to ensure that they sold British goods and services and represented British interests. I am pleased to say, too—I pay tribute again—that he made sure that embassy staff drove British-made cars.

The Leader of the House is also an entertaining speaker. On a day when he is not bored, he is an extremely effective speaker and very fine writer, too. I suspect he will use those talents in the future, and I think it will be a loss both to this House and to the Conservative party when he stands down voluntarily—unlike the Minister, who will be standing down involuntarily—at the next general election.

However, notwithstanding all those qualities, I do not believe that organisation and boring detail are top of the right hon. Gentleman’s agenda, so I do not think that the Leader of the House—in this as in a number of other facets of this zombie Parliament—has got a grip on the pace of the programme of the Government’s legislation.

The Chief Whip is in a slightly different position, along with the deputy Chief Whip, although I see a lack of organisation in what they do. We have seen many examples of them rushing around during votes when they clearly do not have a clue what is going on. They have not been speaking truth unto power, either, when it comes to what can or cannot be done within this House, so they bear some degree of responsibility for what has happened.

We are having to spend some time this evening examining these issues not just because of one Bill. Rather, it is because of a systemic problem in the Government that is, frankly, not helping Parliament, not helping proper debate, not helping the progress of legislation and not helping the bringing forward of measures to deal with the problems facing this country. Thus, I am pleased to say, we now have a useful opportunity to examine all that, and I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham will be able to deal with it in more detail in his contribution.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

It is a privilege to follow my right hon. Friend the Member for Warley (Mr Spellar). I agree with him that this is an important Bill, although, as my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) stated, much should have been in it that is not in it, so it has been a missed opportunity. I give credit to my hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson) and others who have argued for greater transparency over ticket touts. I cannot for the life of me think why the Government think there are votes to be gained from ticket touts rather than from the mass of the public who buy tickets. My hon. Friend helpfully highlighted cases where people had clearly been ripped off or misled under the present situation.

The motion before us relates to paragraph (13) of Standing Order 80A, which states:

“Proceedings on a bill ordered to be carried over to the next Session of Parliament shall lapse on the expiry of the period of twelve months from the date of its first reading in this House and the bill shall be laid aside unless the House shall order, in pursuance of a motion under paragraph (14), that proceedings on the bill be extended for a specified period.”

This Bill had its First Reading on 21 January 2004, as the Minister mentioned—[Interruption.] I meant 2014.

Very little legislation has gone through Parliament over the past year. Another habit of this Government is trying to push things through the House very quickly, with limited days allotted for the scrutiny of legislation, which means that the other place has more time to examine a Bill at leisure. I have a fundamental objection to that, because this House is the supreme body for framing and scrutinising legislation and for tabling amendments. The rush to get everything through this House as quickly as possible has left us with what has been described in many newspapers as a “zombie Session”. The programme for next week and subsequent weeks shows that very few votes on legislation are going to be provided for. We are waiting on their lordships’ House to return legislation that has speedily been channelled through this House.

I do not believe it right that an amendment such as the one debated today to deal with ticket touts should have been agreed in the other place. It should have been agreed here. The Government should have taken more time to consider it in detail and to ensure that hon. Members understood the implications of what they had done. We have seen legislation—badly drafted legislation—rushed through this House time and again during this Parliament; it has then gone to the other place and been filleted like a fish.

[Mr Spellar]

My hon. Friend draws attention to a further aspect that causes difficulty. In the initial enthusiasm of the coalition, a number of ill thought through constitutional changes were brought through—changing the date of the Queen’s Speech and the five-year Parliament, for example. However, no consideration was given to the natural rhythm of legislation in this Parliament, either on a sessional or a whole-Parliament basis. In both cases, the coalition has run into considerable difficulties in respect of running through legislation in this place and of the inter-relationship between this place and the other place.

[Mr Jones]

I agree with my right hon. Friend. After passing the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 for five-year Parliaments, it should have been easier for the Government to programme their business motions through this House. At the time of the last general election, the Prime Minister talked freely about reducing the cost of politics, but since then he has absolutely stuffed the other place with new peers and peeresses. He is obviously trying to ensure that the Conservatives maintain their in-built advantage in the other place.

It is clear that the whipping system in the other place is not working very well, which is laughable. Either Members who have just been ennobled are not turning up or other Members are rebellious, because they are clearly not voting along Government lines on every issue. The amendment on ticket-touting, for example, was tabled by a Conservative peer.

A five-year Parliament ought to ensure that programmes are completed, but motions such as this mean that Bills are stuck in the other place and we must wait for them to come back. That applies to some important Bills, such as the Armed Forces (Service Complaints and Financial Assistance) Bill, which would create an armed forces ombudsman and must be keenly awaited by members of our armed forces. It has been argued that there has not been enough time during the current legislative Session, but we should bear in mind the number of Opposition days and Thursdays devoted to business tabled by the Backbench Business Committee. I mean no disrespect to any of those debates, but space could have been made for debates on important Bills.

Moreover, during the current Parliament an unprecedented number of Committee stages have been dealt with on the Floor of the House rather than in Committee Rooms upstairs. That has used up days that could have been devoted to more lengthy consideration of Bills.

[Mr Jones]

No, I am not. I cannot think of an example at the moment, but a number of Committee stages that would previously have been dealt with upstairs have been dealt with on the Floor of the House. That leads us to ask whether the Government are simply trying to fill up time on the Floor of the House—and I think that that is exactly what they have been doing.

As I said at the beginning of my speech, this is an important Bill, and it will clearly be given a great deal more scrutiny and attention in the other place than it will be given here. Given the current logjam in the other place, we shall have a very thin February and March as we wait for Bills to return to us. There is also the broader issue of the reputation of the House of Commons. I do not think that headlines about, for instance, zombie Parliaments or MPs coming to the House on only two days a week do our reputation any good. We cannot expect the public to understand the minutiae of parliamentary timetabling, especially given the incompetent way in which the Government are handling it.

[Mr Spellar]

My hon. Friend may recall press reports about a memorandum sent by the Government Chief Whip to his Members of Parliament, indicating that they were unlikely to be needed on Thursdays and, possibly, Mondays, and therefore, effectively, they had to be here on only two days a week. In fact, this level of inactivity was being “programmed in” by the Chief Whip, partly because of failure to run the business, but also for party political purposes.

[Mr Jones]

That is an interesting point. I do remember seeing press reports about the letter sent to Conservative Back Benchers. If I thought that the Chief Whip and the Leader of the House were well organised enough, I would say that there was obviously a plot, but I do not think that there was. I think that they have found themselves with time on their hands, and Conservative Back Benchers have been told not to come here on Mondays or Thursdays.

[Mr Bone]

May I state categorically that I have never received such a letter from the Chief Whip?

[Mr Spellar]

He does not include the hon. Gentleman.

[Mr Bone]

He would prefer me to stay away much more often.