Constitutional Reform (Prerogative Powers and Civil Service etc.) Bill [HL]

My Lords, I was once rebuked by a grumpy Member of this House, uncharacteristically, for making a serious point after the dinner hour. He explained that no serious point should ever be made then. I am well aware that this is now the lunch hour, and I will be extremely unpopular if I do not send the House to lunch as speedily as possible. However, I shall first make a few points. I thank everyone who has taken part in this debate, including the Minister, with his very full and almost entirely negative reply. I shall not attempt to sum up what has been an extraordinarily rich, deep and wise debate, which has raised issues I want to reflect on further. I also thank those who have congratulated my elected leader, Sir Ming Campbell. In my view, it is marvellous to have such a very young energetic Queen’s Counsel as the leader of my party—five years younger than me—so I am delighted by that. I need to say something about complacency, especially government complacency. I hope the Minister will not mind my saying this: the only glasnost or perestroika that came out of his long speech was a reference to a possibility of some change with regard to codifying the Ponsonby rule. Otherwise he did not indicate in any way acceptance of any part of the Bill, and gave no indication of whether the Government will introduce a Civil Service Bill. Shortly before the previous election, during what we call the ““wash-up”” period, I was sitting gossiping with two civil servants from a great department—which I shall disguise—about to negotiate with the Minister, when they said, ““We can’t put any proposal to the Minister unless the special advisers have communicated with the party headquarters and told us that it is acceptable to do so””. I said, ““I beg your pardon?””, and they repeated it. Now, when the noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, my noble friend and leader Lord McNally and I were special advisers, and when the noble Lord, Lord Armstrong, was working in the Home Office and I was working in his department, that would have been totally unthinkable. I would not have dared to go to Roy Jenkins without the Principal Private Secretary being there. I never did—I never intrigued—but if I had gone to Transport House to ask them for the party line before going to the Home Secretary, he would have sent me packing immediately.