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Constitutional Reform

My Lords, I am most grateful to noble Lords who are to speak in this short debate. It is a trial run at the Constitutional Reform Bill of my noble friend Lord Willoughby de Broke, which is to be found in the Printed Paper Office. That Bill is not having its Second Reading now because there is no time for it to complete all its stages in this Session of Parliament. However, I am sure that my noble friend will listen carefully to the views of noble Lords and bring the Bill back in the next Session, perhaps incorporating suggestions put forward today. However, I should say at the outset that we do not think the Bill should be much less radical. I am aware that in the wake of the parliamentary expenses saga there have been several debates and suggestions about constitutional change, but these have only been tinkering at the edges of our system of representative parliamentary democracy, which is now, rightly and irretrievably, discredited with the people it was supposed to serve. I hope your Lordships will not be too irritated if I quote what I said on 5 December 2007 when, not for the first time, I was trying to warn of the growing gulf between us, the political class, and the British people. I said: ""Over the past 50 years, we have brought this country pretty low: 40 per cent of our children leave primary school, and 15 per cent leave school, unable to read and write properly; our whole health service is in crisis; our police are overwhelmed; our prisons are bursting with the mentally ill and the illiterate; our transport system is inadequate; our Armed Forces are underfunded, overstretched and undervalued, and even their morale is beginning to crack; our border controls have been deliberately abandoned, so that our inner cities are increasingly uncomfortable and explosive places; and, most worrying of all, Islamist terrorists are on the march, many of whom are home grown".—[Official Report, 5/12/07; col. 1761.]" That was before the credit crunch and parliamentary expenses hit the headlines, which have done nothing to endear the people to their political class. Several times, before that and since, I have also tried to point out that another important reason for the British people’s disaffection from their political class and system is not just that it is hard for them to think of anything that their politicians have got right in the past 20 years or so, but that they do not feel that they or their vote can make any difference or help to bring about the change which is so obviously needed. Of course they are right. That may be why only 60 per cent of electors now bother to vote in general elections. Under our first past the post system, the Government of the day are elected by about 40 per cent of those who do vote, or 24 per cent of the electorate. That 24 per cent has to vote for the Government’s manifesto, containing about 150 commitments, many of which the voter may not agree with, en bloc. It is, of course, worse than all of that because a large majority of our national law—perhaps 84 per cent if we accept the German Government’s figure—is now made in Brussels, where our Government has only some 8 per cent of the votes for large areas of what used to be our national life. So the people are right when they feel disenfranchised and when they feel that they cannot make any difference to the progress of our national decline. Anyone who doubts the extent of our national decline should perhaps read the brief document entitled Better Government, published in January 2007 by the TaxPayers’ Alliance. Apart from the statistics I have already quoted on education, the study shows the UK as providing the worst healthcare among the top 18 developed nations and as having the third highest crime rate. It also contains a penetrating analysis of how Sir Humphrey has now completely taken over from Jim Hacker and how our Ministers have become incapable of delivering the services the people need at anything like a reasonable cost. I shall put a copy in the Library and recommend it as essential reading. That is some of the background to my noble friend’s Bill. As to its detail, its most radical proposal is that binding national and local referenda should be introduced in this country, based largely on the model which has been working successfully in Switzerland for many years. To me, this is the only way in which the people can be reconnected with their democracy because it would get round behind the Westminster hen coop and force their will on those who are supposed to represent them. I am of course aware that there will be a certain amount of harrumphing about Members of Parliament taking decisions on behalf of the ignorant people, but I suggest that the harrumphers are centuries out of date. Of course that theory was valid in the 18th and 19th centuries when most people could not read, but now they can, and modern technology brings them instantly up to date with events unfolding all over the planet. I submit, for instance, that if the system of referenda envisaged by the Bill had been in force at the time, we would not have gone to war with Iraq, nor would the present Government be allowed to drag on in office, and so on. There is also evidence that the proposed system is very much wanted by the people. There is an excellent new organisation called the Campaign for Democracy, to be found at campaignfordemocracy.org.uk, which is finding 50 per cent support on the doorstep in the marginal constituencies for the introduction of binding national referenda. I understand that that is a very high figure. Perhaps the Bill’s next most radical proposal is that the House of Commons should be reduced in size to some 250 Members and left in charge only of national matters. Those matters are defined in the Bill as the national treasury; defence; foreign affairs; border control; criminal law; agriculture, fisheries and food; national energy and transport policy; the national education curriculum and teaching qualifications; and our medical and nursing qualifications. MPs would be limited to a salary of £30,000 per annum, with £170,000 for their offices and a transparent system for all their expenses. So most MPs would have to do a proper job as well and live in the real world, as do Swiss MPs. The Commons would not need to sit for more than 100 days in a year unless in emergency. All other areas of our national life would pass under the control of local government with local tax-raising powers. Both the Commons and local government would sit for staggered, fixed periods of five years. The Bill leaves the method of election open. No doubt that can be decided when we come to Committee, but personally I have always been in favour of some form of proportional representation, perhaps different ones for national local elections. The Bill would require a Royal Commission containing a majority of MPs within two years on the usefulness of our 1,000-odd quangos and other public bodies, including the regional and national Assemblies and Parliaments. I am aware that the Conservative leadership has today promised a "bonfire of the quangos", but I recall Mr Major setting Tarzan—in the shape of Mr Michael Heseltine, as he then was—the task of cutting through the jungle of red tape. That jungle has grown apace, of course, until it now ensnares nearly every aspect of our lives. I fear that today’s Tory plans will prove just as ineffective. The Bill would also require the consolidation of all existing legislation dealing with the same area of law, a long-overdue reform. If we could have thought of a way of preventing any new law being introduced without the repeal of, say, half a dozen others, we would have included it in the Bill, but we could not. Our political class does not seem to realise that the people are entirely fed up with the endless interfering, restrictive stream of legislation from Brussels and Westminster. The Bill would do much to end it and even reverse it. It would introduce five-year sunset clauses for all new legislation and a 10-year sunset clause for the Bill itself. Finally, the Bill considers the reform, even the abolition, of your Lordships’ House. The above system will take some time to bed down, so the Bill envisages a national referendum on the future of your Lordships’ House within seven years of the Bill’s passing. The Commons would have to consult with local authorities and this House and put four options to the people, including abolition and no change to the existing arrangements. We submit that it is logical to leave reform of your Lordships’ House to the end, even if it is the softest target for our present political leadership. First, we must retrieve our democracy from Brussels, then we must sort out the House of Commons, local government and our myriad quangos. Only when we have done that can we decide whether we need a second Chamber, what its function should be, who should therefore sit in it and how they should be appointed or elected. I am aware that my remarks may not meet with universal approval in your Lordships’ House, but nevertheless I trust that they provide food for debate here and in the country at large.