Monthly Archives: May 2013

“ENGLISH VOICE FOR ENGLISH LAWS”

Posted on by

20th May 2013

When the Scottish Parliament, National Assembly for Wales and Northern Ireland Assembly were established by law between 1998 and 1999, no English institution was created in parallel. England therefore continues to be governed and legislated for by the UK Parliament only, while Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are ruled by their devolved competencies on all matters that are not reserved for Westminster. But a problem arises in such an asymmetrical framework of devolution: the question of why MPs from Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales can vote on laws that apply only to England, while MPs from England do not have reciprocal influence on devolved issues. This problem, well-known as the West Lothian Question, is still unresolved. To address the question the Coalition Government set up the McKay Commission, which released its report on 25 March 2013.

Evidence from the Future of England Survey (FoES, 2011 and 2012; see McKay Commission’s Report, 2013: 16-17) clearly shows that the vast majority of people in England see the current state of English decision-making as wrong or unfair. Some solutions for the West Lothian Question have already been suggested. The most radical involve either entirely abolishing devolution, or maintaining the status quo and essentially ignoring the problem. Other proposals include 1) strengthening local government in England, 2) establishing English-based parliaments, either one for the whole of England or several regionally, or 3) electoral reforms aimed at either the introduction of proportional representation or a reduction in the number of non-English MPs at Westminster. None of these alternatives is free of substantial objections.  Perhaps the most significant barrier to implementing one of the above changes is the high cost of implementation.

According to the polls, the preferred solution of those English people surveyed (FoES, 2012; in McKay Commission’s Report, 2013: 18) is a rather different and perhaps less costly one: “English votes for English laws”. This would require that laws applying to England be passed only if a majority of MPs from England is in favour, or that a double-majority, or “double-lock”, be introduced by which legislation could only be passed if there is both a majority of MPs from England and a majority of the House of Commons as a whole in favour. The problem with such solutions is threefold: 1) they essentially create two classes of MPs, violating the notion of equal representation, 2) identifying English laws is difficult given that there are few laws which solely pertain to England, and 3) even laws that solely pertain to England often affect the rest of the United Kingdom, considering how large England is relative to the other regions.

The Commission, however, has tried to address these problems by ensuring that all of Parliament has the capacity to protect UK-wide interests. They propose application of the principle already applied in Parliamentary discussions of devolved issues: listen first to the opinion of the concerned part. In other words, “decisions at the UK level with a separate and distinct effect for England should normally be taken only with the consent of a majority of English MPs”(McKay Commission’s Report, 2013: 36-38). The idea behind the proposal is to improve the accountability of the decision-making process by clearly separating English and UK-wide interests. Hence, where a government tried to ignore the English outcome in the chamber, it would be running the risk of paying the price for doing so at the next election.

As noted by Professor Charlie Jeffery and Sir Stephen Laws in their seminar at the Constitution Unit last week, the Commission has provided a political solution for a political problem.  By advocating the adoption of a convention whereby English MPs would be given privilege in debates over English issues but not in votes, the McKay Commission hopes to address the West Lothian Question while still giving MPs from Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales a say on those issues.

At first, the solution seems fairly pragmatic.  It seems to resolve the mains issues with a kind of “English voice for English laws” solution, while avoiding the costs that would be entailed by creating regional parliaments in England or changing the electoral rules. That said, the McKay Commission’s solution is, at best, partial.  It is not clear on which bills English MPs would be given priority, or what the mechanism would be for making this decision, though some proposals have been already submitted (McKay Commission’s Report, 2013: 52-62). Furthermore, since MPs from the devolved regions will still be voting on English laws, one could argue that the McKay Commission’s solution is more of a band aid, meant to appease the English constituent, than a real solution.  Only time will tell if the McKay Commission’s band aid will be adopted, or if English constituents will demand more substantial action.

MAKING TIME TO REFORM PARLIAMENTARY TIME

Posted on by

14th May 2013

All this talk of draft bills and Loyal Address amendments about an EU referendum raises several vital democratic issues of parliamentary process, not least that of the ways in which MPs, individually or collectively, can initiate debate or legislation on important topics of the moment.  At its heart, as always, lurks the core problem of Government control of House of Commons business and time.

Supporters of the ‘conventional wisdom’ parliamentary reform agenda over the last half century have justified the pace and route of reform as being incremental, evolutionary and practical, being the only way to achieve change in the face of the Government’s dominant position in the House of Commons.  Those more sceptical may choose to describe it more negatively, as being ad hoc, piecemeal, reactive, incoherent and devoid of any consistent guiding principle.

Some changes come not directly from demands from MPs or even the public, but from the initiative of the Government itself, and these, though dressed up as parliamentary reform to strengthen Parliament, often result in making life easier for Ministers.  Richard Crossman in the 1960s said there was a difference between parliamentary reform and modernisation, when he was distinguishing practical updating in infrastructure and facilities from procedural changes.  In the modern context, too often ‘modernisation’ has been the catchword for changes which assist the Government, or which can be absorbed by Ministers without serious inconvenience, whereas genuine ‘reform’, to make Parliament itself more powerful and effective, especially in relation to the Executive, has to take a back seat, awaiting Government permission and, worse, facilitation.

So it is with ‘parliamentary time’ and the control and order of business.  There have been some changes, especially to the scope for debate not initiated by Ministers, such as Westminster Hall.  There has been the innovation of the Backbench Business Committee, but that has been hobbled by the albatross of the Government’s e-petition wheeze around its shoulders.  Some ever-optimistic souls are still waiting in hope for the emergence of Government proposals for a ‘House Business Committee’ of some sort, originally promised for this year.

But we also wait in vain for fundamental change to issues like the current antiquated arrangements for backbench legislative initiative.  How different would the current ‘discussions’ of EU referendum legislation opportunities be if we didn’t have to rely on the various existing ‘private members bill’ processes, with its random ballot and limited scope for genuine progress of controversial bills, but if there were clear and efficient arrangements for the allocation of time for all types of parliamentary business, including scope for debates and legislative initiative by non-Governmental sources, such as backbenchers – getting rid of the unhelpful term ‘private member’ would be a small but symbolic reform – and committees.

The current confused mess – which may, in many ways, be helpful to Ministers – further undermines the Commons’ reputation with the public as an effective, responsive and accountable representative assembly, able to address coherently important issues of public interest.  Time for real, principled and all-embracing reform!

Ed Balls Ed Balls Ed Balls: Spad, Official or Both? The Joys of Research and Government Transparency

Posted on by

10th May 2013

It is occasionally suggested by Whitehall veterans that Ed Balls began as a spad and ended as a civil servant. We have no such evidence that this happened. The confusion seems to lie in the fact that the previous person with the title ‘Chief Economic Adviser’ was a civil servant—Sir Alan Budd), as is the current one (David Ramsden).

But in the period that Balls was ‘Chief Economic Adviser’ he was also a special adviser. He was clearly stated as such in parliamentary questions between 1997 and 2001.[1] The records are not clear for 2001-3 (Balls is not named in the records we have seen),[2] but the Chief Economic Adviser in this period is specified as a special adviser in Hansard. We’re presuming that person is still Ed Balls. So the story seems to be that Gordon Brown as Chancellor decided to appoint Balls to a role which was conventionally held by a civil servant or formal employment terms. But Balls remained a spad.[3] That is our understanding. But we would welcome—indeed, encourage—corrections.[4]

This is nerdy stuff, but it’s important. This is what research is all about: grappling with imperfect information. It’s assumed that everything in government is always perfectly recorded, but it is not. For instance, there is an expectation of regular, annual data releases on numbers and names of special advisers. And for the first two years of the Coalition numbers and names were released at regular intervals—roughly, every four months. There has not been a new release since October 2012—seven months.[5]

Does this matter? It matters to researchers like us. Imperfect or faulty information means we may make faulty inferences. So for instance the lack of up to date data on special advisers means it is difficult to determine tenure of spads with consistency. Data releases on spad numbers never talk about spads leaving, only entering government—so we have to infer from their absence that they have left.[6] Tenure is important because it would help us understand the nature of the work that spads do: for example, if tenure is short, it may suggest short-termism; if tenure is changing, it may suggest the nature of the job is changing.

But there is a deeper point here: government transparency.[7] Some people have already taken office in the period since October 2012 as special advisers, but they are not listed anywhere. Would it not be advisable to list their names and details so that people with relevant interests and concerns might be in contact with these advisers? More generally, if spad numbers have dropped or risen, that might also be useful so that the public to know, so that they can appraise the current government’s use of special advisers, and their numbers.

[1] See, eg., HC Deb 28 July 2000 vol 354 cc972-4W.

[2] See, eg., HC Deb 16 July 2003, cc328-9W. In fact there is generally very little Hansard coverage of special advisers in that period.

[3] Brown had a way of doing such things: he had a ‘Council of Economic Advisers’ which was for all intents and purposes simply another group of special advisers—if one looks at the annual data releases on special advisers, those ‘sitting’ on the Council of Economic advisers were included, oddly, as a footnote, as if to suggest they were not special advisers. Needless to say the Cabinet Office continues to follow this obfuscatory practice.

[4] Tweet us!

[5] To be exact: there was a (poorly edited) release on 19 October 2012—see Matt Honeyman’s spellbinding post on this. But there has since been a revised version of those special advisers employed as of October 19 2012 published 17 February 2013. But all that did was revise the earlier release: it does not tell us who was a spad as of 17 February 2013.

[6] Of course we can work this out in other ways, but they are less authoritative than government statements.

[7] Liz Fisher from Oxford University is similarly critical of the transparency agenda: see

http://ukconstitutionallaw.org/2013/05/09/liz-fisher-gov-uk/.