argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
House of Lords: Lord Speaker’s Committee Report — House of Lords, 2017-12-19
Topic: Government Operations
Paul Tyler (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I should like to return to one of the points made by the noble Lord, Lord True, later in my speech. In the meantime, I confess that I was filled with amazement and admiration when the noble Lord, Lord Burns, took on this job. He is obviously a glutton for punishment because he has chaired so many difficult groups which have come to some important conclusions. I do not envy him having to respond to 93 contributions during this morning and this afternoon’s debate. I am not going to attempt to do so but I want to try to pick out one or two themes that I think deserve a little more emphasis. I will certainly not just reiterate the points I agree with—if I did that, we would be here all night Many Members of your Lordships’ House have indicated today—and previously—that they are full of admiration for the ingenuity of the proposals put before our House by the noble Lord and his team. This is indeed a cunning plan but, like many other cunning plans, it has some problems. While we on these Benches broadly welcome the proposals, I want to touch on these problems because I want to ensure that the House is in accord in facing up to them Understandably, the committee decided to avoid any recommendations that would involve primary legislation. This self-denying constraint, while intensely practical in this particular Session, has two important consequences. First, there is a near-unanimous view in the House that, without a cast-iron guarantee—I think that was the phrase used by my noble friend Lord Newby—that No.10 will accept the full scheme recommended, all the work of his team and our discussions here in this House today and in preparation for this debate, will just have been a waste of time and effort. That, in the words of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris, is the grim reality. This has been a consistent and persistent theme of the whole debate throughout the discussions today and, indeed, in the discussions that took place before this debate. I have lost count of the number of contributions today that have made that point—I think that over half the speakers have Unless the Prime Minister is willing to abide by this constraint, we might as well give up now, and without a statutory scheme her successors cannot be held to her agreement in law either. We would have to insist that in the event that she or any future Prime Minister broke out of this constraint, the whole scheme would be null and void.
House of Lords: Lord Speaker’s Committee Report — House of Lords, 2017-12-19
Topic: Government Operations
Paul Tyler (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Butler, speaks with huge authority, of course. I am only trying to point out that the team led by the noble Lord, Lord Burns, in refusing to take the opportunity to put forward any sort of legislative proposal, has made the case that much weaker—not so much with the present Prime Minister but with future Prime Ministers. The noble Lord may not agree with me but, Members of the House having reiterated this point all day, I think that we should take it very seriously Secondly, the absence of any legislation prevents the normal constitutional process taking place. This has been referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Burns, himself and by the noble Lord, Lord Elder, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, and the noble Lords, Lord MacGregor, Lord Birt, Lord Jopling and Lord Judd. We were forewarned in the debate last year by the noble Lord, Lord Lisvane—and he should know—that, "for some heavy duty things—perhaps a cap on appointments—legislation would be necessary".—[Official Report, 5/12/16; col. 549.] Not only will MPs have no formal say in a major constitutional change but their constituents will have no opportunity to lobby them to express their views. It is extraordinary that in a debate that has lasted for most of the day so few Members have referred to the views of the public. At one point, one noble Lord referred to "the people who send us here". No people send us here, but the people have a considerable interest in the composition of the legislature. I think that only the noble Lords, Lord Forsyth and Lord Hunt, referred to this as an issue that we should address I find it ironic that those who have previously argued so vociferously for the primacy of the Commons should now acquiesce in a scheme which deliberately excludes its Members from any effective say in the composition of this House of Parliament. Here, I am with the noble Lords, Lord Sherbourne and Lord True. It is very interesting that we got to this stage of the debate before this point was raised from the Conservative Back Benches This would be an entirely internal—some would say incestuous—process, decided upon by the institution itself and implemented by it without all the usual checks and balances of the United Kingdom’s constitutional conventions. I do not agree with the noble Lord, Lord Kerr. I think that the noble Lords, Lord True and Lord Sherbourne, are right to draw attention to this. To our fellow citizens this will look like—
House of Lords: Lord Speaker’s Committee Report — House of Lords, 2017-12-19
Topic: Government Operations
Paul Tyler (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): Do Front-Bench speakers have only five minutes? The annunciator said very firmly that Back-Bench contributions are limited to a voluntary five minutes. I propose to deal speedily with the other points. To our fellow citizens this will look like a process appropriate for the membership of a gentlemen’s club, not for the membership of half of the national legislature. To pursue a school analogy, not content with marking our own homework, we would be thought to have written our own exam paper and decided on our own expulsion system and its victims I was struck by the core argument advanced by the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, in last December’s debate, and I very much regret that he is not here today. Addressing the issue of the reputational risks that an excessively large House faces he said: "Some noble Lords appear to say that this is not too important: it is only perception. We do not exist in a vacuum".—[Official Report, 5/12/16; col. 580.] The former Lord Speaker, the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, made a similar point today For these two formidable reasons, I believe that this is a temporary expedient. It cannot be permanent. It is important that we make that clear. We can do a very important job with the report of the noble Lord, Lord Burns, and his team. What we cannot do is make it the final outcome of how this House should be composed We should remember that the present proposals may be sufficient for a short time, but if we are not very careful, the public will become much more disposed to abolishing the House than to supporting its continued appointed basis. The public will want to know where they have a hand in these proposals. The committee’s recommendations may give us a temporary reprieve. However, for the sake of the reputation of the House they cannot be permanent. This is unfinished business. I conclude as I did in last December’s debate by saying that, eventually, "the only acceptable method for reducing the size of a House of Parliament in a parliamentary democracy is democracy".—[Official Report, 5/12/16; col. 509.]
Space Industry Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2017-10-23
Topic: Government Operations
Tom McNally (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I will in due course also speak to Amendments 41 and 42 in this group We have heard a lot recently about Parliament taking back control, yet no Government have done more in recent times to weaken parliamentary scrutiny and strengthen the power of the Executive than this one. They load up Bills with powers to be enacted by secondary legislation, and then complain if either House of Parliament objects to the powers thus taken. The truth is that we ain’t seen nothing yet. The Bill is just a taster of what is to come. We are of course dealing with our old friends the Henry VIII powers. As the Select Committee said on the matter: "The number of delegated powers granted by the Bill is notable —the Bill has 71 clauses and confers approximately 100 delegated powers. Some of those powers are very broad" These should be called the Conrad Russell amendments. During my early years in this House, the late Lord Russell would root out and oppose Henry VIII clauses in Bills from both Conservative and Labour Administrations. As a Minister, I may even have tried to push through the odd Henry VIII power myself. Parliament should be wary of them Amendment 40 leaves out the catch-all term "enactment" and inserts the more precise and narrow reference to "secondary legislation", so that SIs cannot amend primary legislation and only secondary legislation made under Clause 66 can be amended, repealed or revoked by secondary legislation. Amendment 42 would ensure that if we cannot stop SIs amending primary legislation, any regulation under this clause which seeks to repeal primary legislation is subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of Parliament Whatever the outcome of Brexit, it is clear that the Government wish to find ways more easily to future-proof complex legislation. If we are to put the best gloss on these attempts at Henry VIII powers, this is about government trying to be more flexible as the impacts of legislation become clear. However, it involves weakening parliamentary scrutiny. Although this is a debate on the Space Industry Bill, it raises many important issues, which we should look at ways of dealing with in the long term. Certainly, the Select Committee has a good claim for taking this on as a broader issue, or perhaps the Lord Speaker and the Speaker could set up a Joint Committee. However, current parliamentary procedures are not adequate to deal with legislation such as immensely complex, technical Bills—we will soon have another one: the Data Protection Bill—which try to legislate for rapidly changing technologies. Henry VIII powers are not the solution, and although we put down these amendments in an attempt to proceed with this Bill, this is a longer-term problem that is a long way from being solved. I beg to move.
Space Industry Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2017-10-23
Topic: Government Operations
David Steel (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I will speak very briefly in support of what my noble friend has just said. As a former Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament, I must admit that I know nothing about this particular Bill—but the principle she had enunciated is very important. Indeed, it seems to me that this clause, unamended, almost falls foul of the Scotland Act as we passed it in this House. So I hope that the Minister will take this issue away. I see no reason for having this in the Bill at all. It surely should be possible, as a matter of courtesy, simply to talk to the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly and the Northern Ireland Assembly—if it was recreated. I do not see the need for this issue to arise at all. It is a very dangerous principle and I am grateful to my noble friend for raising it.
Space Industry Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2017-10-23
Topic: Government Operations
Jennifer Elizabeth Randerson (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I thank the Minister for her comments. I am grateful for the support across the House for this amendment. We have two forces at work in this clause. One is the Government’s tendency to seize as much power for themselves as possible—that is not unusual in Governments—but it is fatally linked with the desire of the Government to pad out their legislative programme with a series of apparently uncontroversial good ideas. The Bill has support across the House, but we are filling in time before the Brexit blunderbuss arrives. It worries me that we have not been able to see the regulations so we cannot see what the Minister is talking about and it is difficult to imagine exactly how that situation could apply in practice Nevertheless, I draw the Government’s attention to the Constitution Committee’s comments. I might be misreading the Bill but I very much doubt that the Constitution Committee could possibly be misreading the Bill, and if it is worried about it, there are serious grounds to be worried about it. The fact that the devolved Governments have not yet drawn attention to it does not necessarily mean that it will not cause a problem in the end. I have tried to explain that planning issues will be at the crux of the matter. It is simply not good enough to rely on the Sewel convention in this. In fact, this undermines the Sewel convention, which states that the Government will not normally legislate on behalf of the devolved Administrations When we have discussed in the past what "normally" means, people have imagined that there might be a state of national emergency, where there might be a need for haste that would involve instant legislation. However, this is not the kind of thing that you would think would be an exception to "normally". I will take this away and read the record in Hansard, but I very much hope that the Government will take this away and look at it carefully. What would the harm be in including the usual provision about consulting the devolved Governments and legislatures? I see no harm in it. We are not going to be setting up spaceports as a matter of urgent emergency—it is something that will take months and years. There would be no delay involved in consulting them, and there is a great deal of good will to be had in committing to consult them. Having said that, I am happy to withdraw the amendment.
Space Industry Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2017-10-23
Topic: Government Operations
Christopher Fox (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, there appears to be a theme developing in this afternoon’s debate. In moving Amendment 44, I will also speak to Amendments 46, 47, 48, 49, 50 and 51. Again, we are on the subject of catch-all powers. Despite our having about 45 minutes left, I will keep this relatively brief Clause 67(1) states: "Regulations may make provision generally for carrying this Act into effect and for achieving the purpose set out in section 1(1)" We regard this as a catch-all power that should be removed, which would be done by Amendment 44 Amendments 46 to 50 relate to Clause 67(6), which stipulates that general regulations must be made using the affirmative procedure but that for those that will be made under certain sections, only the first regulations are subject to it. In other words, the first go through the affirmative procedure but the rest follow behind without it. These amendments would remove the word "first" in each paragraph, subjecting all regulations that will be made under the relevant sections to affirmative procedure. I believe that Amendments 46 to 50 enjoy Cross-Bench support. During Second Reading, my noble friend Lord McNally highlighted the need for the sector to be continuously consulted to ensure that legislation is fit for purpose Amendment 51 proposes that before any secondary legislation is made under the Act, the Secretary of State must consult the various relevant bodies to ensure that this is done. The Minister may have a view as to which the relevant bodies are, but the principles of consultation and affirmative change are enshrined in these amendments. I beg to move.
Space Industry Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2017-10-23
Topic: Government Operations
Christopher Fox (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I thank the Minister for her answers. Some of them may have been helpful—I will review them, probably with a lawyer sitting on my shoulder to help me—but not completely so, I suggest. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, has described the web of seemingly self-reinforcing executive powers, supported by another Henry VIII Act, weaving their way throughout the Bill. We will need to see what emerges: what the Government think that they have to leave in and what—we hope, having had this debate—they believe it would be more sensible to take out. We need to see that in full On the substance of Amendment 51, the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, was that an awful lot of parties have to be in line for this to work. In a sense, this has to be more co-operative than many other ventures that this House debates, and to be obviously co-operative and mandate the process in the Bill would be a positive sign to all the parties that have to say yes before it can be a success. I again ask the Minister to reconsider but, with that in mind, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
European Council — House of Lords, 2017-10-23
Topic: International Affairs
Sarah Ludford (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, the Government claim that they are committed to European security arrangements and the free flow of data. How will they ensure that those continue if they pull out of reciprocity instruments, the European Charter of Fundamental Rights and the EU court’s jurisdiction? Those moves will all prejudice the vital, mutual recognition and adequacy assessments on which continued co-operation is in fact conditional.
European Council — House of Lords, 2017-10-23
Topic: International Affairs
William John Lawrence Wallace (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I welcome the Government’s change of position on continuing post-Brexit co-operation on internal security and foreign policy. The problem I have is that what I hear from the Government is that we want to continue but are waiting for the EU to propose how. Will we have any of our own proposals on how we will manage when we leave the extensive institutional co-operation in foreign policy which has grown up, often under British initiative, in the last 40 years, or when we leave Europol, if we are going to leave? I remember the nonsense from the leave campaign about how Interpol was perfectly adequate and we did not need Europol. Clearly we do. What proposals are the Government going to make on this, or are they simply going to say that the other side have to tell us how it can be done?
Zimbabwe — House of Lords, 2017-11-15
Topic: International Affairs
David Chidgey (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I, too, confirm our support for the Government’s efforts in this regard. This morning, the Movement for Democratic Change Senator David Coltart said that the military has complete control over the media, and that "this has all the marks of a coup" The MDC is committed to respecting the constitution and is against its breach. Do the Minister and his colleagues support its call for the military to restore order as soon as possible and, if the need arises, for the impeachment of Robert Mugabe What assessment has been made of the potential impact of the military takeover on our ongoing commitments in Zimbabwe, which are varied and deep? Has the Minister spoken to his counterpart in DfID about this yet?
Data Protection Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2017-11-15
Topic: Law and Crime
Sally Rachel Hamwee (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I shall speak to Amendment 124Q and to a number of amendments in this group. I start with a general point. The number of amendments that we have tabled to Part 3 in particular, but also to Part 4, might suggest considerable opposition to the Bill, but I reassure the Committee that that is not the case. We are on a probing mission generally. We have some serious objections but, in general, we support where the Bill is going The probing in many cases is because of the language used. It is about the different uses of language in EU and UK legislation, and how language is used when something is transposed, to use the term non-technically, into UK law. There are different traditions; laws develop in different ways. I might sum it up by saying that it is a matter of style, but the style may have an impact on the meaning. That is why we are using the fact that the Bill has started in this House, where we have a tradition of reading every word and questioning every other word, to get on the record some of the things that we have identified as being helped by explanation This group is about definitions. Amendment 124Q would limit "competent authorities", as they are defined and listed, to the extent of their law enforcement functions. I mentioned just now staff who work at the Ministry of Defence but do not have jobs that come remotely close, in themselves, to defending the country, although they support those who do. It occurred to me that police forces similarly, even if it is above that kind of administrative level, deal with more than law enforcement, if there are still enough coppers around. Prevention work in schools is one example. Then there is dealing with internal human rights—I beg noble Lords’ pardon, I mean human resources—records. I use the acronym HR too often The parties to a collaboration agreement are not necessarily policing bodies or even public sector bodies, which fall within these provisions. Criticising my own amendment, I wondered if it would be confusing to have different regimes applying to different activities—the law enforcement ones on one hand and the others on the other—but there are similar distinctions elsewhere in the Bill.
Data Protection Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2017-11-15
Topic: Law and Crime
Sally Rachel Hamwee (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, to take that last point about certain areas of profiling first, obviously I did not make myself clear, as I want the opposite of what the Minister read me as wanting. I want to be clear that I do not want to leave areas for doubt, so I sought to restrict rather than to extend On police and crime commissioners, I am a little baffled as to why, if so many other organisations which have some functions that are about law enforcement are included, police and crime commissioners should be left to rely on Clause 28(1)(b) rather than being included specifically Finally, yes, we are enthusiasts for incorporating the directive. We want to be clear that the incorporation works. Should I talk for another moment or two in case a message is coming? There was a thumbs up to that suggestion. We are great enthusiasts for certain things that the EU is proposing—I am being a little flippant and this will read terribly badly in Hansard. As I said at the start, all this is so that we may be assured—and this is the stage at which to do it—that what is being incorporated works in the way that reading the words as a sort of narrative suggests.
Data Protection Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2017-11-15
Topic: Law and Crime
Sally Rachel Hamwee (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, without wanting to appear ungrateful, I am very troubled by some of what we have heard about the incorporation of language used in the law enforcement directive and in the modernised 108. Simply to reflect that language, incorporate it into our primary legislation and cause confusion thereby does not seem to be a very good way to proceed. My questions about the difference between "strictly necessary" and "necessary" illustrate this well. To be told that "necessary" is a lower threshold than "strictly necessary"—which is certainly how I would read it—calls into question how necessary something which is necessary really is We will have to come back to this—it may be something that we can discuss outside the Chamber before Report. I wonder whether I should threaten to unleash my noble friend Lord Lester of Herne Hill—that might be enough to lead us to a resolution, but I have not consulted him yet. However, I am troubled, because we are in danger of doing a disservice to the application of these important provisions. For the moment, of course, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.