European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Peter Bone and Oliver Letwin

Tuesday 31st January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sir Oliver Letwin (West Dorset) (Con)]

After more than three hours of debate, a great deal of what needed to be said on either side has been said, and I do not intend to bore the House by repeating it. Like my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke), I voted to remain; unlike him, I voted to promote the referendum and indeed played some part in bringing the Conservative party to the point of committing to a referendum. I shall therefore obviously vote tonight in favour of triggering article 50 in line with the outcome of that referendum. I shall also vote in the succeeding week against each and every attempt through amendments of whatever kind to bind the Government in any way—administratively or legally—because the Government must have the ability to negotiate flexibly and in the national interest.

In the brief minutes allowed, I would like to add one point that I do not think has so far come out of the debate: what we are doing if, as I suspect, we vote tomorrow night to trigger article 50. There has been some suggestion in some speeches that, somehow or other, this vote is not irrevocable or final, and that there will come a time when Parliament can decide whether it likes the deal that the Government have negotiated or whether it prefers instead to go back to the position of remaining in the EU. That is clearly contrary to what the Prime Minister set out in her speech, when she made it perfectly clear that, in her view, what Parliament will then be deciding is whether to accept the deal or not to accept it, in which case we will have to fall back on the WTO and other such arrangements because we will in any case leave.

I want to make it clear why I think the Prime Minister was right about that from three points of view. The first is the question of legal fact. None of us in this House is qualified to make a judgment about the law in that respect, but we have a piece of luck, which is that the Supreme Court has made a judgment on that. In the judgment of the High Court—a rather unusual High Court as it was composed—it was not totally clear, but in the Supreme Court judgment it was totally clear that the presumption of the minority as well as the majority was that this was an irrevocable act. The whole foundation of the legal case was that.

[Mr Bone]

My right hon. Friend is making a very powerful speech, but was it not agreed in the High Court that both sides accepted that it was irrevocable, so that the Supreme Court did not look at that question?

[Sir Oliver Letwin]

My hon. Friend makes an interesting point, but it seems to me that the difference between the two judgments is that the Supreme Court made it clear that in an irrevocable act, what was happening in its view was a fundamental change in our constitution, which is a different character of argument from what was made in the High Court judgment—and it seems to me conclusive. It means that the Supreme Court has ruled that, in its view, this is an irrevocable act.

In a sense, that is irrelevant to us, because we are a Parliament and not a group of lawyers. So we come next to the question of the democratic mandate. Is there a democratic mandate requiring that, when article 50 is triggered, the result—whatever it may be; an acceptable deal or a non-acceptable deal—should be that this country leaves?

In that regard, I thought that my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) and one of two others who spoke in similar terms were right. In fact, I know they were right, because I am one of the guilty men. During the referendum campaign, I made it perfectly clear to the many audiences whom I addressed that, in my view—and this is part of the reason why I voted to remain—an inevitable consequence of leaving the EU would be leaving the single market, we would have to reassert our control of the borders which would be incompatible with the single market, we would seek to negotiate with the rest of the world, and therefore we would have to leave the customs union. I made it perfectly clear that we might find ourselves unable to negotiate a free trade agreement—because that takes two sides, and it is impossible for one side to guarantee what the other side will do—and that therefore we might have to fall back on the WTO, which I think would be greatly to the disadvantage of this country.

I made all that clear, so it seems to me, when it comes to the question of the democratic mandate, that the people who voted to leave were voting with their eyes wide open, knowing that the consequence might be our falling back on the WTO. I should add, to be fair, that the leave campaign—or, at least, the more responsible and sensible people in the leave campaign—made that perfectly clear as well. It seems to me that, both as a matter of legal fact and in the context of a democratic mandate, there is an extraordinarily strong argument for believing that when we vote tomorrow night we shall be taking an irrevocable step, which should not lead Parliament to be under any illusion that at a later date it can go back to remaining if it chooses, and if it does not like the deal.

The third and, I think, overwhelming point is this: in the end, what matters most is the fate of our country. All these arguments are just arguments, but the fate of our country is a real thing that affects the men and women living in it. The truth is that the negotiating hand that our Government have will largely determine whether, in the event, we secure a comprehensive free trade deal of the kind that the Prime Minister rightly seeks. I know of no fact more certain than that if the House were to suggest to our counterparties in the EU 27 that we might decide at a later date that, if the deal offered to us was bad enough, we would prefer to remain, they would offer us the worst deal they could think of. It would be an inevitable consequence of their wanting to keep us in—and, although I do not know exactly why, many of our EU 27 counterparties do want to keep us in—that they would best achieve that by offering the worst deal possible if they knew that Parliament might then vote to remain.

I therefore think that we in the House have a very solemn duty to make it abundantly clear—not just to the people in this country, but to the EU 27—that tomorrow night’s vote will be an irrevocable act. We must make it clear that we are taking a step from which we cannot go back; that if those countries want a proper deal that is in the mutual interest, they should offer it; and that if we do not get that deal we will leave, because we have triggered article 50 and we will be out, and we will have to cope with the consequences thereafter. That makes tomorrow night’s vote one of the most important that we shall ever take in the House, and I take it with some doubt and hesitation, but I take it because I believe that, ultimately, the will of the people has been expressed.

Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill

Debate between Peter Bone and Oliver Letwin

2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 18th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Sir Oliver Letwin (West Dorset) (Con)]

I should begin by saying that, like the hon. Member for North West Durham (Pat Glass), who introduced the Bill, I have no personal interest in this, because I, too, will be standing down at the next election.

I should say to my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) that doubtless I am much contaminated by six years in government and 18 years on the Front Bench, but I nevertheless believe it makes sense for us to consider these issues as though we had a population that needs to be served by a system of government that works in the interests of that population. We should not be thinking about this simply in terms of the House of Commons, which is a matter of more concern to many people in this place than it is to many of our citizens, who want to be well governed but who do not know much about and do not much like the workings of the House of Commons. The House of Commons certainly should not think of itself as a model to the world, because, as the hon. Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) rightly said, there is currently much scepticism about the organs of our democracy.

[Mr Bone]

My right hon. Friend will doubtless make a powerful and interesting speech, but does he come to this debate with the belief that there should be a separation of powers, with an Executive outside this House? That may colour his views in this debate.

[Sir Oliver Letwin]

As my hon. Friend knows from previous conversations, I do take that view and have done so, uniquely in the Conservative party, I believe, for about the past 40 years. I shall briefly touch on that at a much later stage in my remarks, but for now I simply wish to observe that it is important that we think about this issue as grown-ups who are trying to look after the interests of our fellow citizens, not as people who happen to be sitting on these green Benches trying to look after the interests of the House of Commons, which is an artefact of no value whatsoever unless it is part of the good governance of our country in the interests of its citizens.

This is the first time I have attended a debate on a Friday for very many years, and I was surprised to discover that I was quite interested in the nature of the debate. It seems that, from time to time, there have actually been some arguments made—that is a rare thing to hear in the House of Commons. In principle, three kinds of arguments have been going on. The first is whether equalisation is the aim of the current Act governing the Boundary Commission activity or whether it is about gerrymandering. The second is about whether 600 is a better number of MPs than 650. The third is the question raised by the hon. Member for Newport West: is it right to make incremental change in pursuit of incremental improvements when large questions about the constitution as a whole also need to be addressed? I want to discuss each of those points in turn.

First, I turn to the question of whether the motive for and effect of the current Act of Parliament governing the Boundary Commission’s activities is equalisation or gerrymandering. As I would have expected, my right hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper) dealt very effectively with the fact that the current Boundary Commission review does not include reference to the people who registered at the last moment. I was the Minister who brought to the House arrangements to ensure that people who registered at the very last moment were able to vote in the referendum, and it is certainly right that they should have been registered. My right hon. Friend dealt very well with whether the fact that they registered after the Boundary Commission figures were produced affects the outcome of the review to any significant extent.

However, we do not need to rely on my right hon. Friend’s view on that because the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Wayne David), who interjected from the Labour Benches, blew the whole argument out of the water when he quoted, quite sensibly, the Library figures. They showed that the total effect, even on an analysis less favourable to the argument I am making than that which was provided by the independent source for my right hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean—the House of Commons Library analysis—the total net difference is two extra in London and one fewer in the south-west and in Northern Ireland. There is no significant distributional impact.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Oliver Letwin]

Actually, no. With his typical brilliance, the right hon. Gentleman is alluringly enticing us to avoid noticing that there would be a reduced number of Scottish Members altogether in this House. As his party currently controls almost all the Scottish seats, it is to his advantage to maintain the number of Scottish Members and, indeed, a system in which Scottish electors are typically over-represented by the number of their Members of Parliament, almost all of whom are from the SNP.

As I say, I do not actually believe that that is the material question. The material question is whether having the current set of proposals being operated by the Boundary Commission would equalise better than not having them, the answer to which is clearly yes. Is it right to equalise more rather than less? The Opposition and the Government appear to agree that that is right, and even my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough agrees that it is right. Are we going to equalise more or less if we proceed with this Bill rather than the current arrangements? The answer is clearly that we are more likely to equalise better if we proceed with the current arrangements rather than the Bill.

I want to turn now to the second question, about the number of Members of Parliament. There was a very interesting contribution from my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough, and the Opposition spokesman made some echoing remarks about it. Both of them were really trying to argue that 650 is a better number—incidentally, I do not suggest that either of them suggested that there was a perfection about 650—than 600 for the purposes of doing what they each described as holding the Government to account. That is obviously a serious argument, in the sense that in a House of Commons in which 99.9% of its Members were on the payroll, the 0.1% of its Members who were not on the payroll would have some difficulty holding the 99.9% to account.

I do not personally believe that the difference between 650 and 600—or, while we are at it, 600 and 550, or 600 and 500—makes terribly much difference to the effectiveness with which this House is able to hold the Government to account. My experience is that one good MP, one effective Select Committee or one Opposition spokesman who knows what they are doing can hold a Government to account very powerfully, and a very large number of incompetent and inadequate people sitting on these Benches can wholly fail to hold Governments to account. I do not believe there is any clear relationship, still less any systemic relationship, between the number of people entitled to sit on these green Benches—most of whom, mostly, are not here—and the amount of actual, effective scrutiny of Government. It is quality, not quantity, that affects the scrutiny of Government.

It seems to me that we should address a different question in looking at whether 650 is a better number than 600 or vice versa—of course I accept that neither is a perfect number, and there is no absolute standard in terms of the right numbers. I think there is a certain myopia on this. We have to open our eyes and ask ourselves just how we look to the world. People have mentioned the other place, which, incidentally, I think is ludicrously structured altogether and is definitely in need of reform. Indeed, I tried very hard to get it reformed into a proper elected Chamber, and I shall go on arguing that case, because it is the only thing that will save that part of our democracy and actually create some checks and balances in our system. People have observed that the other place is now the largest legislature other than that in China, which obviously has more than 1 billion people in it. That may be true, but there is another legislature in this country that is almost as large—it is here. We have 650 Members of Parliament seeking to be the primary source of legislation, if I can put it that way, for 60 million people. In the United States, there are 100 Senators, who are counterpoised against, roughly speaking, the same number of representatives as we have in this House. If we add the two numbers in the United States together, the total is not that much greater than our 650, but those people are looking after the interests of 300 million people, instead of 60 million people.

[Mr Bone]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Sir Oliver Letwin]

I will, but let me just anticipate what I think my hon. Friend might be about to say. It used to be said that the reason that is appropriate is that the states in the United States have so much power. It is no longer the case—this is very much the point raised by various of my hon. Friends—that we live in a wholly centralised system; we live in something that is getting very much closer to being a federal system, in which vast amounts of the power that used to reside in this place have been devolved in one way or another to Administrations elsewhere, and more of that is going on all the time.

We are vastly overweight; there are many more of us MPs per head of population than in most other serious democracies. I am not aware of any Member of Parliament who could not handle some more constituents. Now, I accept that it is more difficult for those who live in and represent seats that are much larger. My own seat is middling, in the sense that it is 400 square miles. I do not have the advantage that urban MPs have of representing a very small patch, but I am not, of course, challenged in the way that some of our Scottish colleagues, for example, are with their vast seats, and I do accept, therefore, the reason for some exceptions. However, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean said, that issue was debated when we moved from 650 to 600, and a balanced judgment was struck about creating enough exceptions to try to deal with those who face particular geographical problems.

[Mr Bone]

My right hon. Friend is making a very powerful speech, which appears to be plausible, until we listen to the substance. He is talking about the United States of America, where there is a wholly different system. There is the split of powers, and, of course, the states have their rights. The comparison is completely unfair, and my right hon. Friend might want to look at look at the point again.

[Sir Oliver Letwin]

I think that is the nearest thing to a compliment I have ever received from my hon. Friend, and it is probably the nearest I am ever going to get, so I shall celebrate it quietly. I do not accept the second part of his argument—the first part I have already dealt with. He asserts that, in the absence of a separation of powers, which, as I have said, I would actually prefer to see, the danger from the numbers of MPs on the payroll, or the crypto-payroll of the Opposition, is that nobody is really holding anybody to account. Actually, the dynamic of this House of Commons—one can see it sitting here or standing here right now—is a dynamic of dialectic. The principal form of the holding to account of the Government of the day resides on the Opposition Front Bench, not, I regret to say this, with my Back-Bench colleagues, among whom I now number myself. It is the quality of the Front-Bench arguments from the Opposition that principally challenges the Government of the day. This House is designed to reflect that, and that is the reason we do not sit in a circle, but opposite one another. That is behind the whole structure of debate in this House. Indeed, the timetable of this House is organised on that principle. If my hon. Friend’s charmingly nostalgic, although never-existing picture of a House of Commons that was holding Governments to account from the Back Benches were accurate, we would not recently have introduced a bit of Backbench Business; we would have substituted Opposition days, of which there are many, with Back-Bench days.

[Mr Bone]

Absolutely. Good idea.

[Sir Oliver Letwin]

My hon. Friend would be very much in favour of that, but that is not how this place works or has ever worked. This place works in terms of the dialectic between Opposition and Government. It is a very powerful dialectic. It reaches certain crucial moments each week at question times. It reaches its most crucial moment at Prime Minister’s questions, and that is the jousting match—often, alas, not terribly illuminating, but nevertheless—that causes the Government to be on their toes most, and that forces Prime Ministers to find out what is going on in their own Governments and to defend them across the Dispatch Box. That is much more powerful as a form of holding people to account than anything that can be done from the Back Benches, and it is nothing to do with the numbers. So I reject the argument that the numbers have any significant impact on the ability of this House to hold the Government to account.

[Sir Oliver Letwin]

I agree that at a time when, regrettably, there is a rather weak Opposition, and when there are, as it happens, many very enterprising Government Back Benchers, not all of whom are willing to go along with everything, we will get cases in which the Government Back Benchers do perform a very important role in holding the Government to account. However, that is due to the quality and not the quantity of the contributions that are made by my hon. Friends on the Back Benches. We could have hundreds of lemons sitting here and not having the slightest effect on the Government of the day, or we could have five, or three, very effective Back Benchers who could cause very considerable trouble for the Government of the day. It is about quality, not quantity.

I want finally to address the interesting point made by the hon. Member for Newport West, whose argument was different in kind from that of the hon. Member for North West Durham and the other speakers. I hope he would agree that I am not doing his argument any injustice if I say that he was arguing, first, that there are many large constitutional deficiencies in Britain today—a proposition with which I abundantly agree—and secondly, that it makes no sense to try to change one particular element of the whole picture, though he admitted that it was an element that probably did require change, in the absence of an overall and thoroughgoing change of the whole system.

That is a very serious argument, but it is also very seriously wrong. I think it is wrong for two reasons: first, practically, and secondly, theoretically. Of course, in the end, the practical argument matters more than the theoretical one. The practical truth is that we are not going to get the kind of constitutional change that I think he, and certainly I, want any time in the near future. I personally was partly responsible for the total failure to secure the reform of the House of Lords. The House of Lords, in its current structure, is a wholly indefensible object. No rational human being could possibly argue that it is a good idea to have a legislature constituted in the way that the House of Lords is constituted. Indeed, I never heard anybody, in the whole of that debate, make an argument in favour of the House of Lords as currently constituted, except that they thought it was the lesser evil. What they meant by that varied. Some of the people I failed to convince said that what is better about the House of Lords is that it is totally useless, so it cannot do anything, and so the House of Commons reigns supreme. Some said that what is better about it is that it is not another House of Commons. Some said that what is better about it is that it cannot intervene in such a way as to prevent the Government of the day having their will, or create the kinds of checks and balances that I suspect that the hon. Gentleman wants, and certainly I want, to see in our constitution.

There were many reasons why people defended the House of Lords, all of which were of the character that things as they are indefensible, but less bad than they would be if we had a properly elected Chamber at the other end of the building. They were a rainbow coalition of people with different points of view on just that one point about the reform of the House of Lords, which made it quite impossible. There was a fascinating interchange between my right hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean and Opposition Members, and indeed my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough, about whether we had to withdraw the proposal. By golly, we had to withdraw it, because we had done the sums and we knew perfectly well that we were going to get nowhere near being able to carry it through. This was something that had been in the manifestos of both the two largest parties, and was the primary goal, once AV—the alternative vote—had bitten the dust, of the minor party in the coalition. All three parties had it in their manifestos, and one of them really cared about it, yet we could not even get that through.

Therefore, the chances of getting through major constitutional reform to create a system of checks and balances based on the separation of powers in a written constitution, which are things this country certainly needs, are very dim indeed. In fact, my guess is that some decades—possibly some centuries—from now, people will still be standing in this place talking about those issues. If we were to wait for that before making incremental change, we would have registers that are 50, 100 or 200 years out of date. That would not, practically speaking, be a sensible way to proceed.

[Mr Bone]

The point that I hope my right hon. Friend and I can agree on is that the Government decided not to proceed with the Bill on the Floor of the House without a programme motion. It is not that they would not have got it through, but that they refused to give up the time to allow it to be debated without a programme motion.

[Sir Oliver Letwin]

We ought to have a historical seminar about this. My hon. Friend is only partly right. It is perfectly true, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean said, that if we had tried to proceed without a programme motion, the main sacrifice is that we would have been unable to do almost anything else that was in our programme for government and that the Government needed to do.

[Mr Bone]

It was a choice.

[Sir Oliver Letwin]

It was indeed a choice. What my hon. Friend does not recognise, though, is that it was perfectly clear, having done the sums, that we were not, at the end of it all, going to get anything through, so we would have achieved the miracle of sacrificing almost the entire rest of our programme for the sake of achieving nothing whatsoever. That was not an attractive prospect, and that is why we withdrew the proposal, even though the corollary of doing so—this is the supreme irony of discussing the matter today—was that the Liberal Democrats in the coalition refused to support the implementation of the very changes that we are now discussing.