Constitutional Renewal

I thank the hon. Gentleman for the welcome he gave to the proposals, but let me say in response to his slight chiding—that civil service reform has taken a little time, for example—that we have acted on a vast range of constitutional changes, in contrast to the Conservative Administration, who over 18 years did absolutely nothing in respect of any such changes. Also, on the issue of the Union, his history is wrong. The devolution settlement in 1998 was to bind the Union and provide legitimate transfer of power from this place to the devolved Administrations of Scotland and Wales. It was not the devolution Acts in 1998 that drove nationalism; it was the poll tax in 1987, which fuelled it to an astonishing extent and led to a situation in which Scotland became a Conservative-free zone, although the Conservatives had had 50 per cent. of the votes and seats some decades before. The hon. Gentleman asked me some specific questions; for example, he asked about special advisers. The draft Bill is for consultation by this House; we have a view about whether there should be a limit, but let us hear what the House has to say. As for retrospective approval where there has been an operational need for a decision to go into armed conflict to be made in secrecy, or where other operational matters have been involved, we have thought about that a great deal. Ultimately, it should be a matter for this House, but there are genuine problems—for example, if, when troops have already been committed to a theatre, there is then a big question about whether the action will subsequently be approved. We hope that, aside from operations by special forces, occasions when there is a total emergency and this country needs to undertake major armed conflict in secrecy are likely to be very few and far between. I cannot think of any such example over the past 20 years. That was why we came to the judgment that we did, but let us hear what the House has to say. All I would say about access to this House is that the Sessional Orders used to work very satisfactorily. When I was organising demonstrations myself a few years ago, they were certainly enforced by the public order office in respect of the organisations for which I was responsible. [Interruption.] ... No, I was never arrested. The hon. Member for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert) raises an important point on consent to prosecutions, but we cannot have it both ways. It is proposed that the requirement for the Attorney-General to give consent to a series of prosecutions should, in general, be removed. If we want to make prosecutors more independent, we must bite that bullet. Ultimately, the choice will be one for this House and the other place, but we cannot have things both ways. The Attorney-General will still be accountable for the broad operation and management of the prosecution service, and I think that that is appropriate. I agree with the hon. Gentleman about voting systems. I think he was directly quoting me, because although I claim no monopoly on the view, I have always said that we should never change the voting system for partisan purposes. That has been the practice in one or two European countries, usually with disastrous consequences for the parties doing the proposing. We published a review of voting systems. Personally, I am profoundly committed to single Member constituencies. I have always thought that there is much to be said on both sides, whether we are talking about first past the post or the alternative vote, particularly as we now have multiple candidates, as opposed to the situation in the 1950s when there were normally simply two candidates. Let me make it clear that we are against making it a criminal offence not to vote. We need to address the issue of how we can raise turnout at elections, and there is a case for there to be a general non-enforceable duty for people to vote, as part of their understanding of their responsibilities as citizens; we are consulting on that. On citizens' powers, I merely say to the hon. Gentleman that when I was Leader of the House we put forward radical proposals to the Procedure Committee for improving how the petitions system works so that matters could be triggered in this House. It was a matter for the Procedure Committee that they came to a different view from some of us on the Modernisation Committee.