Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts

Wednesday 24th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Straw]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his generosity in giving way. May I illustrate the point that he and I have made in answer to the Minister’s perfectly reasonable point? At first blush, it appears that the provisions of clause 2(1)(c) strengthen the role of the House against the Prime Minister. However, I remember what happened in 1979. I was a candidate at the 1979 election, so I was no longer working for the Government, but I was in very close touch with people for whom I had worked for three and a half years and knew a lot about what was happening. There was a crisis over the outcome of the Scottish Assembly referendum, and the Commons needed an occasion on which it could give vent to that feeling, because the various smaller parties had to have their positions put on the record. Had there been a provision in legislation for an early Dissolution by two-thirds majority, the Government of the day—

[The Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. Interventions must be shorter. I understand that the point has to be made, but I would be grateful if we could get to it quickly.

[Mr Straw]

In that situation, the Government of the day would have worked with the smaller parties and said, “You can have your shout on the two-thirds majority, and in return, we’ll give a bit of extra cash to Northern Ireland,” and so on. That would have happened. Therefore, the motion of no confidence would probably never have been tabled, and even if it had been, it probably would have been lost.

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[Mr Harper]

Frankly, the point of order that the hon. Gentleman raised last week was nonsense. He did not give me notice of it, so I was unable to respond. I listened carefully to last week’s debate and responded to it. I then made an announcement of Government policy in this House at the Dispatch Box, which I thought was the usual way of conducting business.

The following day, I wrote to the leaders of parties in each of the devolved Assemblies, as I said I would. I did not put anything in those letters that I had not announced in the debate. I also wrote to the shadow Justice Secretary, who leads on political and constitutional reform for the Opposition, to keep him properly informed. I placed copies of all those letters in the Library.

[The Chairman]

Order. We should not be rehashing previous points of order. We should be dealing with the amendment. I am sure that Mr Bryant wishes to do so.

[Chris Bryant]

Yes, indeed. This is just about the process and the fact that it has been the convention in every Committee stage in which I have been involved for Ministers to write to all members of the Committee, and, when the Committee is sitting on the Floor of the House, to all those who have taken part in the debate.

My point is that clause 2 has no electoral mandate. Clause 1 has some degree of mandate, in that we had proposed in our manifesto that there should be fixed-term Parliaments, and the Liberal Democrats had made a similar proposal. I do not believe that there is a mandate for a five-year fixed-term Parliament, as both political parties had previously said that they were in favour of four-year fixed-term Parliaments. Clause 2 has absolutely no mandate from the electorate. Indeed, the proposals in it run directly counter to those in the Conservative manifesto, and to what the Prime Minister said as Leader of the Opposition in relation to the reform of the power of Dissolution. He said that he would introduce legislation to ensure that, should there be a change of Prime Minister as a result of the party in power changing its leader, there would be a general election within six months, but that is not the proposal that we have before us today.

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[Chris Bryant]

The Deputy Leader of the House is chuntering away. I think he is trying to talk to you, Mr Hoyle, because he keeps on saying that I am out of order and that I am not speaking to the right part of the clause. Perhaps he could have his conversation with you privately.

The hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil) is absolutely right in one sense. We have to achieve a balancing act. This House needs to exert its power through its majority to hold the Government to account and, if necessary, to sack the Government. In most circumstances, that has happened when a political party has splintered or when a leader of a party has proved unable to control his or her troops—his, in most cases—through the Division Lobbies. We have seen that happen with the Irish Home Rule Bill and with the Budget at different times, leading to a collapse of confidence in the Government on the Government side and the subsequent fall of that Government. I think that we should still stick with that process.

In case hon. Members feel that in recent times motions of no confidence—and particularly successful motions of no confidence—have been pretty rare, it is worth pointing out that we should look at a longer period of history than just the last few years if we are to set out constitutional change that will stand the test of time. We have no way of knowing what will happen to the political parties, as presently constituted, in five, 10, 15 or 20 years’ time.

Looking back over the last 150 or so years, we find that no confidence motions have been used quite regularly and have frequently led to the collapse of Governments. Lord North’s Government, for example, fell in 1782. There was also a sustained period in which no confidence motions were common from 1885 onwards; indeed, there were two such motions in 1886, when first Lord Salisbury’s Government and then Gladstone’s Government fell again on the issue of Irish home rule, which divided the Liberal party—

[The Chairman]

Order. I am sure that the Committee, like me, welcomes the history lesson, but we must stick to the amendments, from which we are drifting away. The hon. Gentleman may feel that he is in order, but he is not. I would like him to come back to order, and it would also be helpful if he faced the Chair.

[Chris Bryant]

I am grateful, Mr Hoyle. I will address myself to you more directly. The point I am trying to make is that clause 2 deals with motions of no confidence and early elections and these have been a sustained part of what we have put up with. I am not sure whether you are going to allow a clause 2 stand part debate later. I note that you are saying no, but I hope it will be possible to allow a degree of latitude so that we can consider all the elements of the clause.

The hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr Shepherd) observed that Governments had fallen by virtue of their Budgets’ being opposed. One of my arguments is that the whole concept of a no confidence motion is excluded from the Bill. It is not clear what counts as a no confidence motion; nor is it clear, in the part of the Bill that we are currently considering, what counts as a motion calling for an early general election.

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[Chris Bryant]

I am not sure that that is true. It depended on the Crown—that is, the Government or Executive—retaining the power to dissolve Parliament. I do not think that a measure that was considered to be a motion of no confidence in 1866—namely,

“to leave out the words ‘clear yearly’ and put ‘rateable’ instead thereof”—

would be considered to be one today, and I therefore think that it would be inappropriate for that power to remain.

[The Chairman]

Order. The next set of amendments deals with no confidence motions. I think that the hon. Gentleman is in danger of jumping ahead, and I am sure that he does not want to do that.

[Grahame M. Morris]

I am concerned less about hon. Members’ definition of a confidence issue than about whether that definition would be acceptable to the court if a certificate were challenged. However, I accept that that is the subject of a later clause.

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[Chris Bryant]

In case there were any doubt about it, I shall join the hon. Gentleman in the Division Lobby unless the Whips manage to get to him, which is very unlikely. They rarely manage to get to him—he is an undiscovered country beyond whose bourn no Whip has ever returned, since we are doing “Hamlet” this afternoon.

[The Chairman]

Order. It may help the hon. Gentleman to know that the Chair will decide on which amendments the Committee may vote.

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[Mr Shepherd]

Mr Hoyle, I have a point of inquiry following your response to the Opposition’s Front-Bench spokesman, which is about the stand part debate. As the amendments are theories in concatenation, it is difficult to address an amendment in isolation without reference to a wider context.

[The Chairman]

It is unlikely, not ruled out. The other point is that I am not sure that we will even get there. At the rate at which we are going, we have quite a while to go yet.

[Mr Shepherd]

Thank you, Mr Hoyle. I shall start with my first observation, which is that the test of each clause in both of the constitutional Bills is to ask in what way it enhances the role of the people in relation to Parliament. The answer, again, is that this does not. The measures are meant to be an internal reorganisation of the rules and regulations of the House of Commons effected through statute. We have had advice from the Clerk of the House that, if challenged, it will be open to judicial interest and the views of the courts. Historically, this matter has always been determined within these precincts and so the question of what we call parliamentary privilege is particularly germane to the Bill. I am very concerned about that. I make the perhaps minor observation that in a struggle between a new Government without a mandate and the House of Commons authorities, who are appointed by the House, I would back the advice of the House rather than that of the politically motivated and interested Government of the day. I do not dismiss the Clerk’s memorandum or accept the response to it, which is effectively like that television sketch “Computer says no.” That is an extraordinary and very undignified response to the Clerk’s advice on something that is of the greatest importance to Members of the House, and through them, citizens’ rights, activities and freedoms.

My next point concerns the accumulation in clause 2 and the proposed amendments to it of purposes, or distinctions between ways of dissolving Parliament. These measures have shifted my position from benign acceptance of the concept of a fixed Parliament to one of questioning whether there was not greater wisdom in the proceedings and processes that we had before. These measures worry me enormously. My hon. Friend the Member for Epping Forest (Mrs Laing) generously moved an amendment in which she has no confidence in order to test a proposition, and she did test it—to destruction. On examination, the amendment is too threadbare and offends the very conscience of why we are here. It suggests that some Members’ views on whether a Parliament should stand or not should be disregarded because they do not have a party leader who represents a certain number of votes. I do not know how such an amendment got through the Select Committee but I think it was to form the basis of some sort of standing order that could be cooked up to meet the point about judicial inquiry into the purposes or nature of the Bill.

Let me make another point about motions for an early election or of no confidence. We have tickled, argued and considered across the Chamber the way in which Mr Callaghan accepted that there had to be a general election, but that was nearly at the end of a five-year Parliament. There was very little scope beyond going the few months left, but he stood up immediately and said, “There will have to be a general election.” I remember the perfervid moments of the Maastricht debates and the subsequent consequences of a Government who had a very small majority wanting to increase the rate of VAT on domestic fuel. The motion was to be vehemently opposed by people such as myself, who had lost the Whip, but not just because of that—it was an opposed measure. It could not have fallen but for the support of Conservative Members who took a broader view on it, and it did fall.

The argument that was put by the bastion of the 1922 Committee and the Whips, of course, for they have an argument for all seasons, was that if it fell, the Government would fall, and that the solemnest duty of any Conservative Member was to support the measure because the confidence of the House stood in the Budget. I shall always have a soft spot for the Justice Secretary—then the Chancellor—because when he lost the vote, he said, with that famous giggle, “Oh, we’ll have to have a corrigendum Budget.” We duly had one on the following Thursday. I am really talking about the pressure that was put on Back Benchers, because we were told that the Government would fall.

If I had stood in front of my constituents at the general election and said, “I’ve got two little measures. The short title of one of them is the Fixed-term Parliaments Bill, but the long title seems to contradict that concept,” they would have been bemused. If I had then started talking to them about the nature of confidence votes and motions for an early election, they would have been struggling. We were entering an election and they knew what it was about; there was a crisis. There was a huge public deficit and anxiety about jobs, yet here was Shepherd of Aldridge-Brownhills troubling them with the notion that

“each member of the House of Commons who at the time of the motion being made is the registered leader of a registered party”

and so on. If I had done that, my constituents would have thought, “Well, he’s been with us a long time,” and they might have made a different judgment in the election.

The measure has no mandate. I have opposed other constitutional measures, but however wrong I thought the balance of the argument was for the detail of the Scotland Bill proposed by Labour, no one could say that there had not been a national convention on it. There was no political party in Scotland that had not long resourced such a measure. I recall John Smith’s role and that of a whole series of people. They were alert and alive to the issue. No one could claim that there was no mandate for the reforms and changes that took place under the sovereignty of this Parliament to create a Scottish legislative structure and to pass powers to Scotland. The constitutional developments in Wales and Northern Ireland were similar.

Those measures could claim a mandate. The 19th century is often cited, but these are long struggles. I was a little riled by the Labour spokesman because he referred to the 18th century. It is proclaimed that the glory of the House is reflected in our coming to the democratic age—it is rather like dividing up what happened in a great empire—but the democratic age is fairly fresh and young and new. It did not really start until the 1860s. That was when political parties were formed and there was a more regimented approach to the management of the House—not easy to do. There was a glorious extract from the London Illustrated News next to the office of my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash)—I now know where Pericles found the stones to get over his lack of confidence. The extract was from the Queen’s Speech—then Her Majesty Queen Victoria. The burden of it was to say, “This parliamentary Session”—well, this particular parliamentary Session will last for ever, but apart from that—“Her Majesty’s Government will concentrate on foreign affairs. It will leave domestic legislation to the House.” Just like that. That is a world away from where we are now—where the Government have to fiddle and twiddle, and do everything at the behest of a very informed—

[The Chairman]

Order. The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) also gave us a history lesson and had to be reminded to come back to the amendment. I am sure that the hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr Shepherd) would prefer to stick to the amendment. I realise that we can broaden things out, but we are going a little bit too far from the measure.

[Mr Shepherd]

Of course, I joyously do that. Implicit in every line of the measure is the management of the House. That is the only reason why I diverted slightly to recall the London Illustrated News.

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[The Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. Such an experienced Member will know that the referendum is not quite part of this group of amendments. I am sure that he would like to get back to the amendment.

[Mr Chope]

Absolutely, Mr Hoyle. I am sorry, but the right hon. Member for Blackburn, who is a former Home Secretary and holder of many other important national offices, drew me down that road of speculation.

To sum up, the Government have a motive to cover either outcome of the AV referendum. It suits both parties in the coalition to prevent an early general election, which is why they want a fixed-term Parliament—they want to assure themselves of a longer period in office. I say only this: good luck to them, but they should not expect me to vote for the Bill tonight.

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[Tristram Hunt]

My hon. Friend is right, and I shall come in a moment to the Hunting Act 2004, which is another piece of legislation that was open to judicial review. In the courts at the moment, there is the extraordinary situation of an election court judging my—I not sure of the correct parliamentary terminology—previous hon. Friend the Member for Oldham—

[The Chairman]

Order. We will not stray down that path, as the matter is before the courts. We must return to the amendment.

[Tristram Hunt]

Thank you, Mr Hoyle. That proves my point—the areas where we cannot go because they are before judges are increasing.

In his written statement, the Minister simply cites article 9 of the Bill of Rights 1689, and leaves it at that. It provides that

“proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court”,

and he said he could see

“no reason why the courts would not continue to defer to them”.

The comity between Parliament and the courts has relied on the fact that the internal proceedings were entirely matters for the House’s jurisdiction. Its procedures arising from Standing Orders or resolutions cannot be legally challenged, but statute law can. That is the extraordinary development in the Bill.

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[Tristram Hunt]

rose—

[The Chairman]

Order. We are in danger of straying into amendment 6, and I would like hon. Members to come back. I am sure that that is what the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Tristram Hunt) was about to do.

[Tristram Hunt]

I was about to come straight back to amendment 33; I will not be led too far astray.

Reference has been made to the new Supreme Court on the other side of Parliament square, which gives the capacity for amendments relating to the self-governing of this place, such as amendment 33, to be overturned by the actions of judges. The Clerk of the House has further warned us of the not infrequent need in recent years for interventions by the Speaker of the House of Commons to protect parliamentary privilege in the courts. As the hon. Member for Stone knows far better than we do, these matters can go from here across Parliament square and even to Europe.

All we want from the Minister is some clarity on this issue, and evidence of some slightly more rigorous thinking than the rushed elements that we have had so far. Rather than being slightly dismissive of the fears expressed by the Clerk of the House, will he provide us with some certainty and a clear answer to the question on statutory instruments and the certificate?

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[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[The Chairman]

Order. After such a long debate, may I inform the Committee that I do not propose to allow a debate on clause stand part?

[Mr Harper]

There are several other groups of amendments, and we can expand on these matters further in due course. I shall go only as far as I need to in discussing this group, rather than trying to accelerate the debate. I want to deal briefly with the timetable. I do not think that the Bill has been rushed in any way. It was published in July, it had its Second Reading in September, and the first day of its Committee stage did not start until November. We have another day in Committee today, and the House passed a programme motion earlier that gives us an extra day in Committee on Thursday. I do not think that we are rushing ahead with this. No knives were included in the programme motion, and we are taking the debate at the proper pace that the Committee requires.

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[Chris Bryant]

I would not want the Minister inadvertently to mislead the Committee. He said that extra time has been provided, but he has not allowed any extra time; he has merely allowed the injury time for the three statements that interfered with the debate. [Interruption.] If the Deputy Leader of the House wants to make a speech, I am sure he will be able to catch your eye, Mr Hoyle. [Interruption.]

[The Chairman]

Order. I would like to stop this bickering between the Front Benchers. Let us move on.

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend moved amendment 33, although many members of the Select Committee pretended that they wanted nothing to do with it; to be fair, so did my hon. Friend. She explained why the amendment was tabled—to enable this Committee to debate and test the concerns raised by the Clerk. I shall touch on them briefly. I will not overdo them, as we may have an opportunity to debate them further in a later group of amendments on the Speaker’s certificate. However, I shall deal with the amendment. I know my hon. Friend said that she does not want to press it to a Division, but it is the lead amendment.

The amendment would remove two central provisions—the two mechanisms that provide for an early general election to take place: the vote through which the House can choose to have an early election and the mechanism for having one following the loss of a vote of confidence. Instead, the amendment provides that the early election could take place only on the House’s address to the monarch, which can be made only

“by the Prime Minister acting with the agreement of…the Leader of the Opposition; and…the…leader of a registered party that received more than 20 per cent. of the total votes cast at the previous…general election.”

I have a number of serious issues with the amendment. First, it would prevent the Prime Minister from calling a general election only if he did so for political advantage. It ignores and does not address the circumstances where there is a loss of confidence. It also focuses greatly on Front Benchers, as our debate has made clear. I exempt my hon. Friend the Member for Epping Forest from this criticism, as she said she did not agree with the amendment, but given their views about the role of Front Benchers, I am surprised that the other signatories to the amendment thought that that was a good idea. The hon. Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) is not in his place, but I do not think he would mind my saying that he is somewhat sceptical about the power of Front Benchers and the usual channels. I am surprised that he supported an amendment that suggests they should have a lot of power. As the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds) pointed out, not every registered leader of a party is necessarily a Member of this House.

The amendment also fails to deal with what would happen to a party such as the Liberal Democrats, our coalition partners, part-way through a Parliament. How would we take account of the vote it had received at the previous general election? Indeed, the 20% threshold would leave Northern Ireland parties out of the picture completely. If this measure had been in place following the 1992, 1997 and 2001 elections, only two people would have been required to table the motion—the leader of the Labour party and the leader of the Conservative party. In view of what has been said about the need to remove the power of the Executive and Front Benchers, that does not seem a sensible step forward.

It would thus be fair to say that amendment 33 is not well drafted. From what I heard, it does not sound as if it had enormous support across the Committee, including even from my hon. Friend. Despite the fact that she did not agree with the amendment, she moved it in a way that was very becoming to her parliamentary experience and the Committee enjoyed the opportunity with which it was presented.

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[Mr Harper]

In a moment; let me first address the question I have just been asked.

Earlier in the debate, we had a conversation about motions that were not specifically in these terms, and several Members on the Government Benches referred to certain votes. My hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) referred to some votes on Europe and my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr Shepherd) talked about a vote on VAT on fuel. How the Government behaved after the debates on those motions was determined by Ministers, not the House.

[The Chairman]

Motions of no confidence are an issue to be debated later. Members ought to be speaking to amendment 33.

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[Mr Harper]

The Prime Minister—

[The Chairman]

Order. I think we are back discussing no confidence—

[Chris Bryant]

No—

[The Chairman]

Order. I am sorry, but I am making a ruling from the Chair. I feel that this is a debate that we are going to have and I am concerned that we are getting drawn into it now. The Minister may answer quickly, if he wishes, but I do not want to let this go any further after that.

[Mr Harper]

Mr Hoyle, you are pointing out that we can discuss this at length when we get on to a later group of amendments. My view on the hon. Gentleman’s example is very clear: if the Prime Minister so wishes, he can cease being Prime Minister whenever he feels like it. The House could then see whether an alternative Government under a different leader could be formed—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda says not under this provision, but this provision is for an early election. The Prime Minister can cease being Prime Minister whenever the Prime Minister chooses and Her Majesty will then be able to send for an alternative person to form a new Government. That is not what the Bill is about. The Bill is about fixed-term Parliaments, not fixed-term Governments.