Government: Draft Legislative Programme

My Lords, I wondered when we would get to Lords reform. We reached it very quickly. The Government’s intention is to ensure that the end result of our discussions on Lords reform, the eventual legislation and the changes that will bring about, will enhance parliamentary scrutiny of the Executive. That is our purpose. More generally on the programme of reform in relation to governance, the Green Paper forms a carefully constructed whole which examines the challenges faced by an advanced democracy in the 21st century. Those issues are close to your Lordships’ hearts: the balance of the rights of the individual against the right to security; guaranteeing the relationship between the citizen and the state; balancing the relationship between Parliament and the Executive. I make clear that the Government’s proposals are a route map, not a concluded view. That is why many of them will be subject to extensive further consultation. Indeed, one of the key purposes of the whole exercise is to build a national consensus to guarantee the reforms. A key feature of the proposals is for the Government to improve the way in which they fulfil their obligations to Parliament. My right honourable friend the Leader of the other House and my noble friend the Leader of this House are well aware of their responsibility to ensure that the way in which the Government engage with either House is consistent with those obligations. Parliament spends most of its time considering government legislation. But in advance of the gracious Speech, Parliament has not had a sense of the Government’s general direction of travel or the shape of the programme as a whole. Both Houses have seen significant advances in helping them to scrutinise legislation: to see that we get it as right as it can be; and to provide a balance between the need for careful scrutiny and the Government’s reasonable expectation that their business can be delivered, as long as Parliament does not fundamentally object to it. The Government publish Explanatory Notes to all Bills, some are carried over from one Session to another with the agreement of the House and Bills in the Commons are programmed. During the current Session, we have Public Bill Committee hearings in advance of Standing Committee consideration for Bills starting in the Commons and experiments with Explanatory Notes to amendments. In your Lordships’ House we have seen far greater use of Grand Committee consideration of Bills, more regularised sitting times and an expansion in the work and authority of Select Committees. In particular, the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform and Constitution Committees diligently consider aspects of legislation as part of the House’s revising function. The Merits Committee has recently received recognition for the outstanding work that it does in helping the House to scrutinise statutory instruments. I know how many of your Lordships value the publication of Bills in draft. The Government are equally aware of that value, which is why 58 Bills have been published for pre-legislative scrutiny since 1997 and why the Government are grateful for the work of the Joint Committee on the draft Human Tissue Bill. Clearly, there is a desire for more be published. Ministers assess suitable candidates on a case-by-case basis. That is exactly why the Government indicated their intention to publish some draft Bills on the marine environment and on equalities in the paper on the draft programme. Those are important issues, but they raise complex questions which we need to get right and we look forward to working with Parliament in order to do so. However, I am aware that there is more we can do to make scrutiny better and more open. My right honourable friend the Leader of the other place is on record as wanting to find new ways of making legislation more open and comprehensible. In response to the Statement on the draft programme, the noble Lord, Lord Norton, raised the important question of post-legislative scrutiny, to which we are giving active consideration at present. Those aids to scrutiny are focused on the work at which your Lordships’ House excels, but they do not give a sense of the Government’s plan for the programme across the piece. Clearly, it is possible to work out a good deal of what the Government are likely to legislate on in the near future from the publication of White and Green Papers or from other policy initiatives, but questions about exactly when the Government may introduce legislation are always bound by the injunction that they will do so when parliamentary time allows. The intent behind the draft programme is to give Parliament and the public a sense of where the Government are in the development of their programme and what their priorities are, and to give a better sense of what they propose to legislate on and why. That implies giving a sense of what the Government are not proposing to legislate on in the following Session. This does not mean that the programme is cast in stone. Nor does it mean that because a particular proposal is not in the draft programme, it will not appear in the final programme or in future programmes. Inevitably, there are constraints on any programme—how best to use the resource of parliamentary time, whether the introduction of major Bills means that it is not possible to introduce smaller but equally worthy measures, and whether the announcement of the intention to legislate can compromise commercial sensitivities. But discussions on all these points can inform the debates on the draft programme and, I hope, help Members of both Houses in their wider work in holding the Government to account. It therefore seems to us that the publication of the draft programme improves the way in which the Government interact with Parliament and the people whom we are all in public life to serve. It helps Parliament in its scrutiny work by giving it a sense of the Government’s direction of travel. It ensures that the Government are aware of what are and are not likely to be sensitive issues in the forthcoming Session. But this is an innovation and we are open to views on how we might improve it in future years. I certainly look forward to hearing the views of noble Lords on the process that we have initiated and on the substance of the draft programme itself. As my right honourable friend the Prime Minister made clear in his Statement, the programme is designed to meet the rising aspirations of the British people, especially in education, employment and the provision of housing and healthcare. It is also about providing security for all in a fast-changing world. Measures on these issues form the cornerstone of the Government’s thinking for the next Session. These throw up issues on which the Government have had to make hard choices: ensuring a sensitive yet effective planning regime; preserving the integrity and quality of life in town and country, while providing adequate, decent and affordable housing; and balancing the rights of the individual and the imperative to maintain our security. We welcome the debates that these issues give rise to. Noble Lords will also note the range and importance of other elements of the draft programme: providing a long-term strategy to reduce the UK’s carbon dioxide emissions; ensuring energy supply; reforming and updating the regulation of assisted reproduction and embryo research; introducing a new scheme of low-cost personal accounts to give more people access to a high-quality pension scheme; and making unclaimed assets available to the community. Doubtless your Lordships will also provide the Government with trenchant views on any legislation to give effect to the EU treaty, following the intergovernmental conference. The Government’s draft programme sets out and addresses the core issues of importance to the people of the United Kingdom: better healthcare and housing, and opportunity and security for all. It addresses the challenges that we all face in a fast-changing world. In publishing a draft programme, we have opened up a more collaborative approach to how we might address them. I commend the publication and the contents of the draft programme to the House. I am sure that we will have an invigorating debate over the next three and a half hours. I beg to move. Moved, That this House takes note of The Government’s Draft Legislative Programme.—(Lord Hunt of Kings Heath.)