Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2015-11-24
Topic: Government Operations
James Wallace (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I do. If I start answering that partly now, I will probably end up repeating myself. I certainly will address the point that the noble Lord, Lord Reid of Cardowan, asks I see the Bill as having a number of different parts, dealing with constitutional issues, fiscal issues, welfare issues and what might be described as miscellaneous provisions issues. On the constitutional issues, the commission recommended that, "UK legislation will state that the Scottish Parliament and Scottish Government are permanent institutions", and that, "The Sewel Convention will be put on a statutory footing" Clause 1 of the Bill does indeed state that the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Government are permanent institutions, and it is claimed, as the Minister said, that it should not encroach on the sovereignty of Parliament. I certainly believe that federalism would be a better guarantee of the long-term establishment and entrenchment of the Scottish Parliament, but that is not on offer—it was not before the Smith commission During the Scottish Constitutional Convention—there are a number of noble Lords present who were party to that convention—we had many agonising debates as to how we might best entrench the Scottish Parliament that we were intent on establishing. We came to no really good conclusion. When the Labour Party, in Opposition in 1996, recommended and proposed a referendum, my party colleagues and I were opposed to that. In retrospect, I think we were wrong. The fact that we had a referendum in 1997 with such an overwhelming result—both on the Parliament itself and on its tax powers—means that there was a political entrenchment that no amount of legal debate, legal argument or legal wording was ever going to establish. While it is undoubtedly the case that, technically and legally and in constitutional theory, Parliament can repeal what has been said here, nevertheless the fact that it is suggested that there should be a referendum before there is any abolition of the Scottish Parliament lends a political entrenchment which is very welcome indeed. With regard to Clause 2, I note that what is in the Bill is almost literally what the commission proposed—that it should put on a statutory footing the Sewel convention—because it states: "But it is recognised that the Parliament of the United Kingdom will not normally legislate with regard to devolved matters without the consent of the Scottish Parliament" Those are the words that Lord Sewel used on 21 July 1998. Of course, in practice, legislative consent Motions have been extended by Devolution Guidance Note 10 to include Bills in the United Kingdom Parliament which confer new powers or responsibilities on Scottish Ministers and the Scottish Parliament. By definition, if we are conferring new powers, the powers cannot already be devolved. My question for the Minister is: why is the clause limited to the very narrow, literal expression used by Lord Sewel in July 1998? In practice, that wording plus Devolution Guidance Note 10 has worked. Strictly speaking, this Bill does not require a legislative consent Motion because it is conferring new powers on the Scottish Parliament. Are two categories of legislative consent Motions envisaged and, if not, why not just put the whole practice of legislative consent Motions on to the statute, rather than limit it to the words of Lord Sewel during the passage of the Scotland Act 1998 With regard to welfare powers, we believe—and it was reflected in the outcome of the Smith commission report—that it is consistent with the principle of securing a social union that many welfare benefits are rightly reserved to the Westminster Parliament, but we support the proposals for the Scottish Parliament to have power to create benefits in the areas of its devolved responsibility: housing, carers, disabilities and discretionary payments in areas of welfare. As the noble Lord, Lord McAvoy, said, no doubt they need to be looked at in more detail so that they deliver what was said on the packet, and we will certainly do so It is also important to remember that with that power goes responsibility. There is not much point if people go around promising more in terms of top-up benefits unless they are prepared to say where the money will come from to pay for them. It is an inevitable consequence of having a mixed welfare system—partly devolved, partly reserved—that the Scottish Government and the United Kingdom Government will have to work more closely together. That in itself cannot be a bad thing; we hope that it will generate more collaborative working than we have sometimes seen in the past The amendments made in the other place have to some extent taken away the concern that there was a veto, which is welcome. I always thought that the veto case was totally overstated. I think it is a question of practicality. I remember that when I was in the Minister’s position of having to answer to your Lordships’ House, I asked: "What is actually meant by this?", when we were dealing with the draft clauses. The example given to me was: "If the Scottish Parliament decides that it wants to have a top-up benefit for left-handed redheads, frankly, the social security system does not have a database for that, so we could not agree to it until such time as we had one". It was therefore not unreasonable that such a mechanism was included to allow the practicalities to be resolved. There are one two other specific provisions. The commission recommended that there should be, "a formal consultative role for the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament in designing renewables incentives and the strategic priorities set out in the Energy Strategy and Policy Statement" Clause 58 refers to "Renewable electricity incentive schemes", but it does not refer to heating schemes. I am not sure that any explanation has been given as to why heating schemes should not be included, given the wider remit of the Smith commission proposals I echo some of the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord McAvoy, on equality. However, I think it is important that we ensure that the basis of equalities legislation in the United Kingdom is in no way diluted through devolution With regard to the Crown Estate, the commission recommended that there should be devolution of management to the Scottish Parliament—or, more practically, to Scottish Ministers—and onward devolution to the communities of Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles, and indeed, other local authorities. Many of us here are hugely suspicious about whether a Government in Edinburgh who seem to spend all their time centralising, as the noble Lord, Lord Maxton, said during Questions today, will actually adopt the spirit of decentralising power further. The noble Lord, Lord Smith of Kelvin, in his personal comments on the commission, stressed the importance of devolution going beyond Edinburgh. We may wish to examine amendments along the lines of those moved by my right honourable friend Alistair Carmichael in the other place to leapfrog, as it were, and genuinely ensure the empowerment of local communities Turning to the fiscal powers, we now have full income tax, aggregates tax, air passenger duty—the latter, too, having been recommended by the Calman commission on which I served. Can the Minister indicate why aggregates tax is included now? We did not include it before because we were awaiting judgments from the European Court of Justice. An update on where we are on that, and why the Minister thinks it is possible now when it was not in previous legislation, would be welcome We owe it to your Lordships’ Select Committee on Economic Affairs to respond to the report that it has given us, which undoubtedly has aroused some controversy. I certainly understand and recognise the frustration that we do not yet have the fiscal framework. In response to the noble Lord, Lord Reid of Cardowan, I believe that it is important that we should have sight of that at some stage in our proceedings, but I just utter this word of caution. We cannot do this in a political vacuum. Delaying the Bill at this stage would effectively give the SNP Government a veto on the progress made, and that would not be particularly desirable either. The Minister said that John Swinney was on record saying that he wanted this agreement. We must take that at face value, but, equally, those of us who are immersed in Scottish politics well know that, if something went wrong and we did not manage to reach agreement, they are the masters and mistresses of turning that to their account, and the finger of blame would point unequivocally at your Lordships’ House. Those who have made milking grievances a master art would be only too pleased to have a narrative of betrayal.