Wales Bill

Lord Wigley Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 10th October 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wigley (PC)]

My Lords, the pleasure falls to me to congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist, on her eloquent and delightful maiden speech. The fact that she has chosen the Wales Bill for her first speech to the House intrigued me, until I did some homework and discovered that not only has she recently been on a course in Wales to learn Welsh, to which she referred, but she has also obtained a distinction on her first grade on the harp. I understand that this was part of a fundraising endeavour in support of the London Music Masters, which promotes diversity and excellence in music to inspire positive social change, so well done.

I also noted the noble Baroness’s comments about the diaspora. It has always been an ambition of mine to harness the Welsh diaspora much more effectively, and this is an excellent example of the benefits that can come from such an approach. I have no doubt that her education at Atlantic College enabled her to appreciate the place of Wales in an international context—that college most certainly does that. We wish her well for her fundraising—to the extent that it focuses on worthy cultural causes rather than political ones—we welcome her active interest in politics and we wish her well in her career in this Chamber and look forward to her future contributions to our debates.

This is the fourth piece of primary legislation on Wales which various Governments have introduced since 1998. Such a continuous sequence of amendment reflects two things: yes, a view that devolution is a process and therefore will develop over time; but also a widely held feeling that the original legislation was inadequate and needed amendment to make it work in a transparent, effective and democratically answerable fashion.

Along with several other Members in this Chamber, I have had experience as an elected Member of the Assembly. We are fortunate to have here today a former Presiding Officer, my colleague and noble friend Lord Elis-Thomas, and the newly elected Assembly Member, the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan of Ely, both of whom are up to speed with current thinking across party politics in the Assembly as to how its powers should be augmented or modified to make it a more effective body able to hold the Government of Wales to account, while enabling that Government, whatever their complexion, to work effectively for the benefit of Wales.

We have here two former Ministers in the Welsh Government on the Liberal Democrat Benches: the noble Lord, Lord German, and the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson. We have former Secretaries of State for Wales—the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris of Aberavon, and the noble Lords, Lord Hunt, Lord Hain and Lord Murphy—who over many years have had a deep involvement in several Wales Bills, as have many other noble Lords.

I should also say how glad I am to see the noble Lord, Lord Crickhowell, participating in this debate. We have not always seen eye to eye on matters relating to devolution, but I know that in accepting our National Assembly as an essential part of Welsh governance, he will want to see it made more effective, transparent and answerable. We noted his wish to see the two Governments at each end of the M4 working together more constructively and his trenchant comments on the Barnett formula.

We have here the noble Lord, Lord Morgan, Wales’s most eminent historian on the period from 1868 onwards when questions of greater Welsh autonomy were emerging and, of course, my noble friend Lord Elystan-Morgan, a long-standing advocate of greater Welsh autonomy and of dominion status. We are also fortunate that the Minister taking this Bill forward, the noble Lord, Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth, was a very effective leader of the Conservatives in the two Assembly terms in which he served and was a key member of the Silk commission, which wrote the second report which forms the background to this Bill.

In other words, we have significant experience in this Chamber, whatever its democratic shortcomings, and it would be short-sighted of the Government not to take on board the issues that will be flagged up today, and at Committee and Report stages, which may not have had adequate coverage in another place. Colleagues have already referred to some of these and I shall touch on one or two others.

In doing so, I do not in any way resile from Plaid Cymru’s ambition for Wales to be a member state of the European Union in its own right. We accept that change comes but gradually and sometimes painfully slowly. Questions relating to the interface between Wales and the EU today appear to be in a somewhat different light. The constitutional future of these islands will partly depend on how Northern Ireland and Scotland are allowed to relate to the EU. To that extent, some aspects of this Bill are already dated, and the Bill’s existence reminds us that the United Kingdom Government still pursue separate constitutional proposals for Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, and for England, and give little thought to securing a balanced UK-wide settlement that might stand the test of time.

First, I remind the House that this Bill emanates from the Silk commission, which was set up by a Conservative-led Government in 2011. That commission included members of all four parties which then had seats in the Assembly. My friends in the SNP in Scotland have often been criticised at Westminster for not being willing to participate in similar commissions in Scotland—the Calman commission, for example. Plaid Cymru took a full role in the Silk commission’s work, with Dr Eurfyl ap Gwilym playing an outstanding part, as I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Bourne, would immediately acknowledge. Sir Paul Silk worked hard to secure a unanimous report, supported by all four party representatives. That took a good deal of work and compromise all round.

I must say that I think we had every right to expect the Government, unless there were fundamental reasons to the contrary, to accept the report in its entirety and not to cherry pick those items that fitted in with the Conservative agenda and discard others that were deemed to be inconvenient. I have party colleagues in Plaid Cymru who will be reluctant to participate and compromise in this way, given that the Silk recommendations have been diluted and re-engineered to meet prejudices in Westminster and the convenience of Whitehall departments, rather than the agreed needs of Wales.

So as not to be unnecessarily divisive, let me first identify some matters covered by the Bill that I welcome. These include the permanence of the National Assembly, the acceptance of the principle of a reserved powers model, giving the Assembly power over elections to the Assembly, including the electoral system and franchise, and control of fracking in Wales. I certainly welcome all of those.

However, I must also flag up some unsatisfactory aspects of the Bill, which I shall want to pursue at a later stage. I expect that my noble friend Lord Elis-Thomas will refer to the key issue of how to implement the central plank of Silk, namely the need for the powers of the Assembly to be based on the principle of reserved powers rather than the conferred powers model enshrined in the 1998 and 2006 Acts. The version which the Government have brought forward is regarded in Cardiff Bay as inadequate. In fact, it still contains as many as 200 reserved matters. Indeed, in some ways, it makes the position worse in that it actually takes back powers from the Assembly and the Welsh Government.

Furthermore, while the Secretary for Wales, Alun Cairns MP, has been apparently willing to explain his proposals, he has been reluctant in this respect to negotiate an outcome which might meet the needs of both Wales and Westminster. That smacks of government by diktat.

The Report on the UK Government’s Wales Bill, published last Thursday by the Assembly’s Constitutional and Legislative Affairs Committee, of which I have a copy here, states in paragraph 11 that the Bill,

“is a complex and inaccessible piece of constitutional law that will not deliver the lasting, durable settlement that people in Wales had expected”.

Paragraph 14 adds that,

“in our view, significant improvements needed to be made to the Bill … to reflect authoritative criticism … Regrettably, necessary improvements were largely not accepted by the UK Government”.

It is the unanimous view of the committee that the arguments put forward by the UK Government in opposing a more ambitious Bill, “are not convincing”. Paragraph 22 of the report says:

“The Bill we are left with provides a restrictive settlement that over-complicates rather than simplifies and fails to fully empower the National Assembly as a modern legislature”.

The report describes the Bill as,

“the first piece of devolution legislation that takes backwards steps and that is a matter of considerable concern”.

These views were endorsed by all four parties represented on that committee, including the Conservative former Deputy Presiding Officer of the Assembly, David Melding AM, and if the UK Government now state that they will ride roughshod over their representations, it shows how misleading are the assurances given by the new Prime Minister that the wishes of Wales will be taken into account by her Government. Incidentally, I am somewhat surprised that the report is not available in the Vote Office for noble Lords to access.

If I may give a specific example, it might help noble Lords to appreciate the shortcomings of the Bill. I take the issue of compulsory purchase. Under the 2006 Act, it has not been specifically devolved, but neither is it retained. Therefore, legally, the National Assembly could legislate in this matter, provided that it was “incidental”, and not “central” to that piece of legislation. It is an example of what has been referred to as a “silent subject”. In the Bill, compulsory purchase is deemed as a retained matter, so the Welsh Government would in future be unable to legislate as it could under the 2006 Act. This is a clear example of how this Bill is withdrawing powers from the National Assembly, despite claims by Ministers to the contrary.

I refer to some other matters which are not included in this Bill, although they were part of the Silk recommendations, concerning which I hope to table amendments in Committee. These include: the devolution of policing, supported by all four newly elected police commissioners in Wales; provision for the emergence of a distinct Welsh legal jurisdiction, the absence of which has caused much of the complexity for which this Bill has been rightly criticised; powers relating to the youth justice system; and powers concerning the Wales and Borders rail franchise.

I shall also seek to propose amendments that deal with greater Assembly powers relating to energy, to remove veto powers enjoyed by the Secretary of State and to clarify the Welsh Government’s authority in dealing with trade matters relating to the single market of the European Union, in the unfortunate circumstances that the UK Government fail to negotiate unfettered rights for manufactured goods and agricultural produce, free from tariff and technical barriers. I shall also raise questions relating to the repatriation from Brussels to Westminster of matters that are already devolved, so that they can be transferred immediately to the National Assembly if they impinge on devolved functions.

I also flag up my intention to bring forward an amendment in Committee to give the National Assembly full powers to decide on any new proposals for extracting water from Wales. Specifically, this must include the power of veto over any intention of drowning valleys to create new reservoirs, which must be subject to authorisation by the National Assembly, which should have the powers to impose whatever conditions it deems fit on such projects. Sixty years on from when Liverpool Corporation resolved to drown the Tryweryn Valley, against the united opposition of all Welsh MPs bar one, this issue still causes rancour and bitterness. If there was one single step that the Government could take that would recognise Welsh sentiment on this issue, it would be to empower the Assembly to decide on such matters. I have no doubt that every party in Wales would welcome such a step with delight. Associated policy issues, such as land use, flooding, agriculture, the development of natural resources, environmental policy, industrial development, tourism and recreation are already overwhelmingly devolved to the Assembly. I ask the Minister if he will, even at this late stage, take up with his fellow Ministers the possibility of righting a long-standing wrong, and bring forward at least an enabling clause at a later stage that could facilitate such a move.

At a time of great constitutional uncertainty, when the UK Government put so much emphasis on the validity of identity and “taking back control”, and on enabling communities to do much more to help themselves, this Wales Bill should be a beacon that demonstrates how such thinking now applies to Wales. It should project how the principle of bringing power closer to the people is not just a tug of war between London and Brussels; it is equally valid in enabling Wales to decide for itself those matters which—because of cultural diversity, differences in social aspiration and community values, or of geographic or administrative convenience—can best be decided in Wales.

We are united that we need new legislation that enables Wales to do more to help itself in a transparent and effective manner and that overcomes the shortcomings of the tangled mishmash of existing law. We need legislation which has the confidence of Wales’s elected representatives and which the Government of Wales herald as a positive step to overcome current deficiencies in our constitutional settlement. As a number of noble Lords have already indicated, I fear that this Bill falls short of those ambitions. Depending on how the Government respond to proposals from across this Chamber to improve its provisions at later stages, a question must remain as to whether we are better with, or without, the Wales Bill as currently drafted. I support its Second Reading, so that it can be amended at a later stage to enable it to achieve the purpose for which it was meant.