Parliament (Participation of Members of the House of Commons) Bill [HL]

My Lords, I find myself following the distinguished Liberal Democrat, who seemed to me, in a very interesting variation on various trends, to have come dangerously close to coming out as a nationalist this morning. I found much about the debate perplexing, not least that the Bill before us had been moved by a Member of the party which claims to be in favour of the union. I think that this debate really revolves around the question of how to deal with an unwritten constitution that has been around for hundreds of years which has a number of anomalies, and how one deals with these anomalies. It is perfectly appropriate to cope with anomalies; the question is whether this Bill, instead of dealing with anomalies, in fact creates a constitutional crisis. I take the view that it creates a constitutional crisis and should therefore be avoided. It is surprising that the Bill challenges the right of this Parliament to sit as a UK legislature with powers over all matters, and, if enacted, would undoubtedly signal at last the start of the end of that union. It expresses a view which is wholly destructive and determinedly opportunistic and which should certainly not be given support in this House. There have always been anomalies in our unwritten constitution. I find it ironic that the noble Lord, when in government, never showed any inclination to accommodate these anomalies, and, as a Secretary of State, was satisfied to govern Wales and Scotland without any sort of electoral consent from the Scottish and Welsh people. Has he forgotten that he was a member of the government that used their English majority to force the poll tax on the people of Scotland before the rest of the United Kingdom? One of the more interesting phenomena of that time is that is it is always said that the government tried it out in Scotland first and—this is really fascinating—having found that it was unsuccessful and politically disastrous, went on to use it for the rest of the United Kingdom, with, as my noble friend Lord Sewel said, disastrous consequences for both their then leader and subsequently their government. It appears that this Bill wishes to create two classes of MPs. Under the noble Lord’s proposals, we would cease to have a UK Parliament. Instead we would have a London Parliament where Scottish and Welsh MPs were visitors with limited rights, powers and influence. I can think of nothing more likely to lead to a break-up of the union than an adoption of such measures.