Strathclyde Review — House of Lords, 2016-11-17
Topic: Government Operations
Angela Smith (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for the Statement. It came very promptly after the leak last night, and I do not think she expected to be here this morning. The decision not to proceed with legislation is warmly welcomed by your Lordships’ House, as she will have heard. I pay tribute to the noble Baroness the Leader of the House and to the noble Lord the Government Chief Whip for the way in which they have approached this issue—it is appreciated. I also put on record our thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, for the diligence and care he took on his report. I welcomed and enjoyed the discussions we had, although I have to say that, knowing the commitment he has shown to this House over many years, I sometimes felt his heart was not quite in it. Although we welcome the main conclusion that there should not be legislation, we still feel that option 3 in the report is wrong, and that it misunderstands the role of this House and the constitutional position of statutory instruments, which are sent to your Lordships’ House from the Government, not from the House of Commons. This was never about the primacy of the House of Commons but about the primacy of government. We certainly welcome the fact that this has been done in the spirit of looking forward rather than of what has happened in the past, and none of us wants to rerun the old arguments. However, I want to briefly reflect on the constitutional background that led to the Strathclyde review following the votes on the tax credits statutory instrument That review and its recommendations were an absurd overreaction from the then Prime Minister and completely unnecessary. But perhaps it did us a great service: for one brief moment in time, statutory instruments became exciting to people who had never heard of them before. This House has an enviable and well-deserved reputation for the way in which it fulfils its duty of scrutiny of government legislation, including secondary legislation. As a House, we recognise those responsibilities but also our limitations as an unelected second Chamber. We also recognise that when it comes to secondary legislation, with our scrutiny committees and our debates, we discharge that duty with both expertise and experience We considered that, as a significant policy change, the tax credits proposals should have been dealt with more appropriately and properly as primary legislation. But even then, this House was reluctant to just block them and we rejected a fatal Motion. However, again in the spirit of how this House works best, we sought to find a sustainable way forward to provide the Government with greater detail on the impact of the proposals, and the time and the space to think again, reflect and reconsider. That gained support from all corners of this House and was passed. The Government reconsidered and changed the policy. That was the right and appropriate action to take Your Lordships’ House unanimously agreed the report of the Joint Committee on Conventions, chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Cunningham of Felling, in 2006, which said that in clearly exceptional circumstances this House retains the power to vote against and reject secondary legislation. But the significance of that power is reflected in how rarely it is used: just five times in nearly 70 years. There have been other attempts, but all have failed. That is because it must be exceptional—for example, where the primary legislation is in effect a skeleton Bill or where an SI is being used for a significant policy change, but not where secondary legislation is merely implementing the details of policy from primary legislation. That does not mean we do not challenge the Government or hold them to account but, as the report clearly says, unless there are exceptional circumstances, "opposition parties should not use their numbers in the House of Lords to defeat an SI simply because they disagree with it" The tax credits votes that led to this review were exceptional. They fulfilled the criteria. It was not just a matter of disagreeing, but was completely in line with the history and conventions of this House and the Cunningham report. The noble Baroness referred to Brexit. Over the past few weeks, there has been considerable speculation about the role of your Lordships’ House in examining Brexit. We have been clear: we will not block; we will not delay. But a Government without a plan do not have a blank cheque. Clearly this House will have an important role, especially if there is considerable secondary legislation that will need us to work together to provide effective scrutiny from all sides of the House in the public interest. I say to the noble Baroness that I hope she and her colleagues in government will see this House as an asset rather than just a challenge On these Benches we always considered that the Strathclyde review was evidence that the then Prime Minister, David Cameron, loathed challenge and feared scrutiny. That made life a bit difficult for us because challenge and scrutiny are what we do. However, in warmly welcoming today’s announcement, I thank the noble Baroness and the Chief Whip. I hope this heralds a new, more adult and reasonable approach to government and opposition where challenge and scrutiny are recognised as being in the public interest.