Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill

The Liaison Committee, like the hon. Member for North-East Hertfordshire (Mr. Heald), accepts that there is much that is of value in the Bill, and we support that. However, it is not the intent of the Bill that worries us, but its potential impact. I agree entirely with the Regulatory Reform Committee that it is of high constitutional significance. We live in new parliamentary times and every day brings another timetabled Bill. A Bill is not properly formed if it does not have a timetable motion attached, and every Bill is subject to the guillotine procedure. In other words, we have inadequately scrutinised legislation that may result in injustice for people who are at the receiving end. We have inadequately monitored legislation and, under the Bill, Ministers will have the ability to amend primary legislation with a truncated order-making procedure. Inadequate primary legislation will therefore be subject to an inadequate procedure. That fact alone means that the Bill deserves special consideration. I was rather concerned by the Under-Secretary’s response to pre-legislative scrutiny in the minutes of the Regulatory Reform Committee. I well remember our days in the Public Accounts Committee, when we happily harried accounting officers and individuals guilty of financial misdemeanour, and I know that he is in favour of the parliamentary scrutiny performed by that Committee. I was therefore surprised by his response in the minutes to the concept of parliamentary scrutiny. He said that it had been offered last time but had not produced what the Government wanted, so there would be no pre-legislative scrutiny this time. That is a mild paraphrase, but it conveys the impact of what was said. I worry about how Ministers might interpret the powers, once they have them. The Regulatory Reform Committee asked that its remit should be widened. I hope that we can get a firm commitment from the Minister that that will be done. As was said by the Opposition spokesman, the new legislation does not even have to show that it will reduce burdens. The only burdens that are guaranteed to be reduced are the parliamentary burdens on Ministers, because they will choose the type of scrutiny that a measure gets. They can choose the negative procedure, and there is nothing that anyone can do about it. So the Bill is burden-relieving, but not quite in the way that most of us anticipated. As has been pointed out, the safeguards in the Bill are less than are in the existing Act and, worryingly, less than those outlined in the consultative process. The Bill is remarkably devoid of safeguards and guarantees. I welcome assurances, but in parliamentary terms, there is no assurance as good as an assurance written into a Bill.