National Insurance Contributions Bill

The Minister follows a line of thought that I often used when I had the fortune to be a Minister in a previous government: that legislation will have to come back to Parliament, in this case an affirmative order. In theory, Parliament can object and throw out the order; in practice, it practically never ever happens, either in another place or in your Lordships’ House. Occasionally, there is such an outcry that a Minister is forced to withdraw an order. I am sure that the noble Baroness, Lady Farrington, will remember my noble friend Lord Cockfield having to withdraw an order to allow the building of the ““green goddess”” south of the river. That is very rare and it takes a very strong, established Minister to be able to do it. We may have these orders 20, 30, 40, 50 or 100 years down the line—the whole thing is open-ended, which are the words the Minister might have used in answer to the noble Lord, Lord Newby. The whole point is that, even if there is enough contrary feeling in the Parliament of the day, it is extremely unlikely that any order will not end up on the statute book. That is always supposing of course that the Salisbury convention remains—it is under a certain amount of discussion in your Lordships’ House. Perhaps the Minister should start to think about being a little more careful about relying on secondary legislation to achieve his ends.