Queen’s Speech

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Monday 1st June 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Dubs]

I would rather he took that honour than me. I would have a job explaining that one away but I am grateful to the noble Lord.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)]

My noble friend’s problems are nothing compared with mine. I keep getting invited to meetings of Conservative lawyers for reasons I cannot understand, but they will probably become clear when we come to the reply to this debate.

[Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon (LD)]

I wonder whether the noble Lord finds it as confusing as my case: I keep being asked for very large sums of money on the grounds that I am Lord Ashcroft.

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[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the wise words of my noble friend—I think that I can call him that as I have known him for a long time—Lord Empey. I am not sure that I will be able to live up to his billing, but I shall do my best.

First, however, I want to try to dispel a myth. There is a myth going around that the SNP is a left-wing party. That myth arises because Nicola Sturgeon and Alex Salmond said that they could work only with a Labour Government and not work with the Tories, but nothing could be further from the truth. The SNP from 2007 to 2011, as a minority Government in the Scottish Parliament, relied on the Tory party and Annabel Goldie, now the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, for its support. It would not have been able to get a budget through or to survive without the Tories. So that is not left wing.

The council tax freeze that the SNP has introduced is not left wing, either. I benefit from it—it is wonderful for me, in a nice house in Corstorphine—but people at the lower end of the income scale who rely on council services are losing out. That is not left wing. Then there is the so-called free higher education, which helps people who are relatively well off at the expense of college students. There are 130,000 fewer college students now than when the SNP started, who are unable to do vocational courses. That is not left wing. And then there is ScotRail. When the franchise came up, the opportunity was there to put it into public ownership, but the SNP continued with franchising and now it is in Dutch hands, being run by a Dutch company. That is not left wing. So there is not a shred of truth in the argument put forward, unfortunately successfully, by the SNP in Scotland. It is one of the reasons why the party did well, but nothing could be further from the truth.

I also take this opportunity of castigating the SNP for taking its eye off the ball. It has been so preoccupied with constitutional issues and the referendum in particular that the services that it has responsibility for at the moment—health, education, social work and justice in Scotland—have been neglected. The noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, mentioned the Scottish education system, which was once the pride of the world. In the past few years, we have seen literacy and numeracy rates go down in Scotland because of the SNP. Over the past four or five years, the astonishing thing is that the increase in expenditure on the NHS in Scotland under the SNP has been less than under the Tories in England. It is certainly not left wing and it has certainly occurred because the SNP took its eye off the ball.

Anyway, that is nothing to do with the gracious Speech, but I wanted to get it off my chest and I feel better for it. They are two important things. But I now get back to congratulating the noble Lords, Lord Lisvane and Lord Dunlop, as well as the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leeds, on three excellent maiden speeches. It reminds me of my maiden speech, not in here but in the other place, in 1979. Outside this place I would say that very few people would remember that—but, of course, in here everyone remembers way back, long before 1979. Even then, I raised the question of the constitution, right at the start of my parliamentary career. Rather more recently, in the Queen’s Speech debate on 14 May 2012, I argued in favour of a constitutional convention moving towards a quasi-federal or federal system. I warned then that if we did not come up with a sensible, credible and above all stable alternative, we would be back at the precipice that we saw in the general election sooner rather than later. I can say that underlined, a fortiori, and even more so because of what has happened. That is why we need to find a credible alternative. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Dunlop—I will no doubt have other opportunities to do so when we get to the Bills that are coming through—that unless we find a credible, coherent alternative, nationalism and the separation of Scotland from the rest of the United Kingdom will become increasingly likely, if not inevitable.

That brings me to what we are getting from the Government. What are we getting? Instead of something coherent, we are getting EVEL, which really is evil, as so many people have said. It is not getting much support. Apart from the Minister, I do not think it has even had any support on the other side of the House. What will happen? Discussions and decisions that take place in Committee, when only English Members can participate on English Bills, could be overturned at a later stage. When I spoke informally to the Secretary of State, Mr Mundell, he told me that that was not likely to happen. However, it is a bit naive to say that that is not likely to happen.

The noble Lord, Lord Lawson, rightly said that it is ridiculous to have two levels of Members of Parliament. However, it is even more ridiculous given that it will not work in practice. As regards this place, no one has said anything about Scottish Peers—if they can be identified—not participating in English legislation. Therefore, unelected Members from Scotland are allowed to participate in English legislation but not elected Members from Scotland. Is that not ridiculous? It is absolutely ridiculous. We now have an opportunity to take a coherent look at this.

As well as EVEL there has been mention of the northern powerhouse and today we have heard about developments in the Midlands that are being pushed by the Government. However, that is not a coherent approach to this issue. The noble Lord, Lord Purvis, and I have set up an all-party group, of which a number of Peers and MPs are members, to push for a coherent solution. The noble Lord, Lord Purvis, has introduced a Bill on this subject. It will be interesting to see the Government’s response when that Bill comes forward. It is a coherent way forward.

However, I recognise what the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, said. We have to pay a lot of attention to what he says, not just because he is a Member of this House but because of his academic background and experience. I understand that the constitutional convocation, commission or convention—whatever we call it—needs to be established. Indeed, a convocation might be a more appropriate way forward, but something needs to be done to sort out all the muddle that exists and find a systematic—to use the noble Lord’s word—way forward. The noble Lord said that the Constitution Committee of this House was too busy to do this work. That is a pity because this is the most important matter in the constitution. Even if the committee cannot undertake this work, I urge him and other members appointed to the Constitution Committee to point the way forward or at least to signpost or give a direction as regards what should be done. That could be done by the Constitution Committee in one or two sessions. I hope that others will take it up.

That brings me to my penultimate point.

[A noble Lord]

Thank God!

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

Who said “Thank God”? I never did like some of the Liberal Democrats but now they are on our side I am told that I have to like them. However, even the Liberal Democrat who said “Thank God” might agree with what I am about to say. For some time I have been an advocate of first past the post for election to the House of Commons. The strong argument in favour of it, which I think even those who are sceptical about it are agreed on, is that it maintains a good constituency link and that Members in the other place are interested in their constituencies, run surgeries and are very much involved in their constituencies. That is a good thing which does not always occur in other systems that we have. However, we have got into a muddle on this as well. I take Scotland as the worst example again. In Scotland we have four electoral systems: in local government, we have STV; in the Scottish Parliament, we have the additional member system, which is a combination of first past the post and lists; in Westminster, of course, like the rest of the United Kingdom, we have first past the post; and in Europe we have the closed list—the worst of all, by the way. I do not know how we ended up with that.

I have now come round to the conclusion that that muddle could also be looked at by the convocation or the convention. If a Neanderthal like me—a dinosaur like me, one of the great first past the post advocates—can come round to that point of view because of the mess we are in, surely the Government and those who are sceptical about looking at this in a comprehensive, coherent, systematic way, as the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, and others have suggested, can also think again. I know the pressures from civil servants. I sat in exactly the same office in Dover House that the noble Lord, Lord Dunlop, is now occupying. It is by far one of the best offices in Whitehall, by the way—it has the best view. When Trooping the Colour takes place everyone comes in and looks out; it has a wonderful view. But I remember going again and again to Cabinet committees and Labour Ministers—yes, Labour Ministers—coming up and reading out briefs that had been prepared by their departmental officials. Fortunately, because I was the Minister of State for Scotland, we did not have such a vested interest. I would say, “Wait a minute. We are here as Labour Members to implement Labour Party policy, not the departmental policy”. That is why I think we need Ministers like our new Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Dunlop, and the noble Lord, Lord—

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord Faulks) (Con)]

Faulks.

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[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

No one can pronounce my name properly either. You know who I mean. By the way, we also have the noble Baroness, Lady Fookes, here today—we have the whole trio.

I hope Ministers will take away from this debate the fact that there are people like the noble Lords, Lord Forsyth, Lord Lawson, Lord Norton and Lord Purvis— people of all political parties and none—who are arguing in favour of some kind of coherent look at the constitution. I hope they will exercise their muscle, push this and say, “This is the considered view of the House of Lords. Let us in government consider it also”.

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[Lord McAvoy]

We have taken a defeat. The noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, indicated that we were defeated because of our economic policy. There were many reasons for our defeat, which we will deal with and hopefully fix in the future. The combination of the Barnett formula and the tax-raising powers of the Scottish Parliament will be entirely up to it. If it does not have the money to do these things, it will not do them. It is our policy to make sure that it has the choice to do so, and that is the difference.

Devolution is about all of the United Kingdom. The Labour Party and I endorse Ivan Lewis’s statement that there is a duty on all parties within the Stormont Parliament to come to a responsible arrangement. We urge them all to do so. We also urge the Government to play a part in bringing these folk together as well.

Labour supports measures to put Welsh devolution on a stronger statutory basis, as in Scotland. We agree with taking forward proposals from the Silk commission and extending the power the people of Wales have over their transport, elections and energy. Wales must not be unfairly disadvantaged by the Barnett formula. The previous Government cut the Welsh budget by £1.5 billion, so this Government must ensure a fair funding settlement for Wales by introducing a funding floor, and we are glad to hear that that is what they are proposing. The measures that are expected to be put into the Wales Bill transfer new powers to Wales by implementing the agreed settlement for Wales and handing over more responsibility to the Welsh Assembly.

I am trying to paint the picture that devolution is not just about Scotland. Scotland is naturally taking all the headlines at the moment, but for devolution to work it must work for the United Kingdom.

I shall deal with one or two things that cropped up in the debate. My noble and learned friend Lord Falconer of Thoroton cleared the noble Lord, Lord Dunlop, of any guilt concerning the poll tax. My view is that if somebody is in the Scotland Office, I believe in collective guilt, so with one bound he is not free. I am still waiting to hear a complete denial of that.

The noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, had a very lucid, shrewd perspective, urging the SNP to nominate. I thought it was a very useful contribution: a voice comes from the non-political world, urging the SNP to get involved. The noble Lord, Lord Forsyth of Drumlean, has made some credible criticisms of the Labour Party over the past few years. I am not saying that I accept them, but they are credible and must be answered. He has some questions to answer himself, for instance about the performance of his Prime Minister on the steps of Downing Street on the morning after the referendum, with his quite disgraceful party-political broadcast on English votes on English laws, thereby giving the Scottish National Party the justification for saying that all unionist parties lied to the people of Scotland to get their vote and then withdrew everything else for it. He altered at a stroke the outcome of that referendum. It was a defeat for the SNP, but Mr Cameron’s intervention helped to turn it into a victory for them. In addition, the Prime Minister compounded it by the scare tactics of using the SNP in England to get votes by frightening people in England about how Scotland was going to take over—Mr Miliband in Salmond’s pocket, and all the rest of it. Therefore if there is some reckoning to be had, the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, should be knocking on the door of No. 10 and making his point of view heard. Knowing him as I do, he has probably been there already.

I also picked up on the issue of voting systems. I was quite surprised to hear my two noble friends Lady Adams of Craigielea and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock indicate, in all honesty, that perhaps a look should be taken at the voting systems. However, the votes study, which the noble Lord, Lord Flight, mentioned and my noble friend Lord Gordon of Strathblane analysed, does not give a clear picture that the problem would be solved by the introduction of the Liberals’ holy grail of proportional representation. My noble friend Lord Gordon destroyed that case—it is not a clear picture. We are all interested in tackling the problems; all the Liberals can talk about is proportional representation, which gets quite boring.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

I do not purport to speak for my noble friend Lady Adams, who is more than able to do that. However, all we said was that that matter should be looked at, and I am sure that even my noble friend on the Front Bench would not object to that.

[Lord McAvoy]

That is absolutely right, and that is the point I made: that both my noble friends were genuinely and honestly considering whether this is a problem. There is nothing wrong with that at all, and I go along with that.

I must deal with my friend with a small “f”, the noble Lord, Lord Sanderson of Bowden. Again, he was one of the few people not to say something during his speech that was said previously, and he indicated that as well. He may not know it, but he is a local hero in Rutherglen, Cambuslang and Halfway—he does know it—for his services to those areas in local government reorganisation in the 1990s.

I will quickly mention something the noble Lord, Lord Jopling, said when he seemed to warn the Labour Party about the constitutional danger of voting against the Government. I remind him that between 1997 and 2010 this House defeated the Labour Government over 500 times, so the lecture, if it was meant to be that, was a bit misplaced.

Finally, before I get accused of provoking people, the noble Lord, Lord Truscott, made a point about the £1,600 per head that Scotland gets. That is part of the metropolitan attitude that annoys people not just in Scotland but in Wales, the north, the north-west of England and elsewhere. If you took away the hidden government subsidy to London and the south-east from government bodies, contracts, employment and all the rest of it provided by the United Kingdom Government, there might be a better case for complaining about Scotland and elsewhere. However, there is a case for the decentralisation of England. Before I upset anybody else, I will close with that.