Extension of Franchise (House of Lords) Bill [HL]

Lord Dubs Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 19th July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Dubs (Lab)]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, on having introduced the Bill. He and I had a chat about it beforehand and I very much welcome the fact that he has introduced a Bill on the same principle as the one that I introduced into this House about six years ago.

I want to comment on one or two of the speeches that we have heard. I was slightly surprised; I say to the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, that I have never argued that, by giving Members of this House the right to vote, we could significantly tip the balance in parliamentary elections. It may be that that would happen, but I think it is a slightly way-out suggestion. I would welcome it if we could tip the balance in close votes, but that is not the way it is.

I am more concerned about my noble friend Lord Desai, who said that we have to pay a price to be here. I find that an extraordinary comment. There are enormous privileges in being here, of course, but the idea that we should somehow be penalised by not having our democratic say seems to be slightly odd in terms of our parliamentary democracy.

I have enormous respect for the noble Lord, Lord Norton, and I often agree with him, but I must say I part company with his thesis today. This may be a distraction for some, but surely a principle is worth talking about even if there are not demonstrations in Whitehall and Parliament Square in support. The noble Lord is putting forward the theory that there has to be a lot of public feeling and there have to be demonstrations out in the streets before we should make a change. I am sure he does not really mean that, but that is what his argument sounded like.

There is a fundamental point of principle here. I like helping in elections, and at the last general election I helped in about five constituencies. Whether or not one does that, though, I actually felt a sense of pain, I was hurt, that on polling day I was not able to vote. I regard that as my right as a citizen and a fundamental democratic point, even if only 800 people would be affected by changing the law. Maybe I am being sentimental, but I have felt hurt, on every general election day since I was privileged to join this House, that I was able to help, to knock on doors and ask people to go and vote but could not do so myself.

One of the fundamental points is this. Yes, of course we are in a privileged position in that we can influence legislation, initiate legislation and change the laws of this country if the Commons agree with us, as they often do, but we do not have the right to influence who would be our Government, and that surely is the difference between influencing legislation on a day-to-day basis and actually having a say in who we want to govern the country, which we would do through voting in parliamentary elections. I would have thought that was absolutely basic. Bishops have a vote, as do Members of other second Chambers in the world, but we do not.

I would like to refer to what happened last time. After quite an extensive debate in this House, we agreed to the Bill, and off it went to the Commons. I should be careful before I criticise the procedure of the Commons but, gosh, I am going to. There is an odd procedure under which, if a Bill works its way there, any Member of Parliament can shout, “Object!”, without there being any ability to identify who that person is. So I took the trouble to write to all the known objectors on the Back Benches who might object explaining what the Bill was about, that it did not affect their rights in the Commons and so on. I thought I had covered everyone, but someone still shouted “Object!”. I do not know who it was, but I am going to tell the House what my suspicion is, and I am looking at the Lib Dem Benches. When I was moving my Bill last time, the Lib Dem Benches did not like it and said it was not appropriate—I will come on to that in the moment—so, when it got to the Commons, it is my strong suspicion that the notorious objectors did not shout “Object!” but someone did so on behalf of the Lib Dem Benches.

Why was that? After all, we have had a conversion on the road to Damascus from the Lib Dems; I believe that they are now totally in favour, and I welcome that. However, their argument then as I understood it—and this was Nick Clegg’s view—was that we do not change anything about the House of Lords unless we change everything. This was a dramatic revolutionary principle that piecemeal change was no good: “Don’t touch the Lords unless you change it in all sorts of ways”. Frankly, that is an absurd approach to politics. The evidence of British parliamentary history is that progressive change bit by bit is the most effective way of achieving change, so I was surprised when the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, who six years ago was speaking for the Lib Dems, suggested that they did not want this. As I say, I have a strong suspicion that there was one objector in the Commons; I was sitting in the gallery but could not identify who they were. This is a great fault in the procedure of the Commons. We should have the right to identify anyone who shouts, “Object!” and blocks a Bill. I say this to the Lib Dems: I welcome a conversion, and if they are all converted then that is wonderful.

The Bill is about something important. There will not be cheering in Parliament Square and people will not be marching down Whitehall, but as a fundamental principle of democracy we should have the right to vote. My only regret is that the Bill says that this is to happen a year from now, but we might have an election before then, so even if the Bill went through, that would be another election where we were denied the right to vote. Still, I very much welcome the Bill, and I hope this House will give it a welcome and warm passage.

Honours System

Lord Dubs Excerpts

Tuesday 26th March 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham]

I understand that the order cannot be renamed. The statute makes it quite clear that it must be known by that name and no other, so we would have to close it and start another. In response to the general issue that has been raised, it is noteworthy that 10 Commonwealth countries, many of them in the Caribbean, continue to nominate people for Orders of the British Empire and other ranks, so I am not sure that the reservations expressed by my noble friend are necessarily widely shared.

[Lord Dubs (Lab)]

My Lords, while accepting the point about not using the term “Empire”, I put a further comment to the Minister. Does he accept that one of the criticisms is that there is a hierarchy of honours and that the top honours go to senior people in this country who get them because of their jobs, whereas at the bottom of the scale are the most worthy people who do voluntary work for fellow members of their community? Is it not those people, who work for nothing for their community, who ought to be given pride of place in our honours system?

[Lord Young of Cookham]

I agree: no one should get an honour simply for carrying out the job they are paid to do. As I said right at the beginning, the operation of the honours system is independent of government; there is a Main Honours Committee and nine or 10 sub-committees below it, with civil servants and Members of your Lordships’ House on them. I am sure they will take on board the comments made by the noble Lord that there should be a fairer distribution of the ranks of Orders of the British Empire between those who at the moment are the main beneficiaries and others who perhaps get some of the lower orders.

Digital Mapping: Restrictions

Lord Dubs Excerpts

Thursday 31st January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham]

Again, I understand the noble Lord’s concern. Access to critical national infrastructure sites is, of course, heavily restricted. Ordnance Survey, as the Government’s national mapping agency, is the only mapping organisation that has right of access to property for the purpose of mapping under the Ordnance Survey Act, passed by your Lordships’ House in 1841. But in view of the concern that the noble Lord has expressed and that of the noble Lord, Lord Fox, I will go back to double-check the information I have been given. Of course, much of this information is already obtainable through satellites and Google street survey. The Soviet Union has mapped the UK since the 1940s. One has to be realistic about the amount of information already available—satellites can identify objects that are 30 centimetres long.

[Lord Dubs (Lab)]

My Lords, would the Minister care to comment on the following? I was returning in a taxi from outside London to London. Going up my road, the driver was able to tell me the colour of my front door—he knew exactly what it was. Is that a healthy situation to be in?

[Lord Young of Cookham]

I hope it enabled the noble Lord to reach his destination. The geophysical data available helps people in their everyday lives. Noble Lords waiting for a 159 bus can use their iPhones to see when that bus will be coming. Noble Lords who might have forgotten where they parked their car can use their mobile phones to identify it. Noble Lords who go jogging in the morning can see whether they are going faster or slower than other noble Lords on the same circuit. One has to recognise that there are real advantages from having this geophysical data. I would not be concerned if everybody knew the colour of my front door.

House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) (Abolition of By-Elections) Bill [HL]

Lord Dubs Excerpts

Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 7th September 2018 Lords Chamber

The noble Lord, Lord Grocott, spoke about the whole-House by-election in March 2017. It was for a seat previously occupied by a Conservative Peer, so under the Carter convention a Conservative should be elected. The noble Lord argued that the fact that 346 out of 803 voted in the election indicated a lack of enthusiasm among your Lordships for the election. He argued that a turnout of only 43% was very low. However, given that few of your Lordships other than these Benches would naturally have an interest in electing a Conservative, one can assume that among Conservative Peers there was a very high turnout. Even if all 250 Conservative Peers had voted, which was obviously not quite the case, 96 Peers from all other parties would have voted. Perhaps one can assume—

[Lord Dubs (Lab)]

My Lords, I am not an expert in procedure, and I have listened quite hard, but are we not in a Second Reading debate? I thought that was not acceptable.