It is a great pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Nicholas Soames) and I want to start my speech on a note of agreement, as he is absolutely right that the contributions made by the hon. Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) and my hon. Friend the Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) added to the debate. It has been very worth while and will be followed, although at times it got complicated. I thought I knew everything about the Catholic Church and a bit about the history of this country, but I have learned so much from so many colleagues and I appreciate what they have said.
I pay tribute to the Deputy Prime Minister, the Deputy Leader of the House and the Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, the hon. Member for Norwich North (Miss Smith), for the way in which they conducted the discussions preceding and following the introduction of the Bill in this House. In particular, the hon. Lady went out of her way to ask Members for their views. In all the years I have been in this House, I have not often been invited to meetings with Ministers to discuss my views on impending legislation. That took place in a formal meeting at which many right hon. and hon. Members from both sides of the House were present. We had a fruitful discussion and she certainly seemed to have listened to the points that were made, as demonstrated by her speeches.
The difficult task was that of the Deputy Prime Minister. He has had to go to other members of the Commonwealth and persuade them to agree. He has done that diligently—I do not think that people automatically agree when he rings up and says that he wants to alter the law of the land. Of course, there has been careful thought. I know that, because when I introduced my ten-minute rule Bill on 18 January 2011, two years ago, I wrote to all 16 Commonwealth Heads of Government. Obviously, I do not know the royal family and Heads of State as well as the hon. Member for Northampton North (Michael Ellis) does, but I do my little bit in royal circles. The response I received was quite depressing, and the Prime Minister of Canada, Stephen Harper, went so far as to issue a statement saying he did not think that this issue was a priority—the Canadian people were facing other issues—and that he was not absolutely supportive of the proposal. He has changed his mind, and I am sure that that was because of the Government’s persuasion.
In conclusion, I want to pay tribute to Terry and Janet Herbert, two constituents of mine who live in Northfields and came to my surgery to say that it was quite wrong for us not to have equality in our succession laws. They pointed out that at least six European countries have changed their succession laws to ensure equality, as we have heard in our numerous discussions on this matter. We have heard them all: the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden and others. If it was good enough for them, my constituents asked, why were we not doing the same? They started a petition that was circulated around Leicester and put on websites, which many thousands of people have signed since. I pay tribute to Terry and Janet. I know that they are not solely responsible for this massive change in the law, but I am grateful to them for coming to me and making suggestions. They are great royalists and supporters of
the monarchy and they love the Queen, as we all do—we all like her as a person even though we do not all support the monarchy.
We have now brought the monarchy into the 21st century and we can all be very proud of that.
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