My Lords, my noble friend Lord Paddick and I also have Amendments 178, 180, 183 to 187, 187A, 188 and 189 in this group, which deals with the appointment of all commissioners.
I appreciate that the Government have moved very significantly by requiring the appointment to be dependent on the recommendation of the Lord Chancellor, the Lord Chief Justice and the heads of the Scottish and Northern Irish judiciary. It would probably have been tactful to include a reference to the latter two in our amendments. The central point of several of our amendments is to make the appointments entirely a matter for the judiciary after consultation with the Prime Minister—in other words, to take this as far away as possible from being a political appointment. It is a point of principle. After all, the Prime Minister can reject recommendations; although she cannot appoint without that support, she could require other recommendations to be put forward, and in our view there should be no hint of a political veto but clear independence. Again, that point is made by the House’s Select Committee on the Constitution. I do not know whether the Minister will tell us that this will be included in the Government’s response to the committee’s report.
On Amendment 178, I thought I had lost the plot by leaving out Clause 203(2) but happily I have not—at any rate not on this issue—as I put the matter of eligibility into our proposed new clause in Amendment 187. We wanted to make the point that further appointments of the judiciary may be needed. The proposed new clause would enable the Lord Chancellor to make recommendations to fill the appointments without adversely affecting the operation of the Court of Appeal and the High Court. I of course appreciate that putting recommendations forward does not need a provision in the Bill, but I know that in certain circles this is a pretty hot topic and I wanted to highlight what I understand may be the added strain on other parts of the judicial system without going on at any greater length at this time in the evening. However, it is important to make the point.
Amendments 183 to 186 question delegation by the IPC to any other judicial commissioner. That seemed wide and unstructured, but on the other hand we wondered whether it might be sensible for the IPC to have a designated deputy, so we included an amendment to that effect.
Amendments 188 and 189 were prompted by briefings from the Law Society of Scotland. The commissioner may be or may become unfit for reasons beyond those listed in the Bill, and consultation with the heads of the judiciary and so on would provide a check on unjustified removal. This area was also picked up by the Constitution Committee, which again made points about the need for public confidence in independence, which makes it inappropriate for the Prime Minister to play any substantive role in the dismissal of the commissioner. Again, the Government may be planning to respond on that matter. I beg to move.
9.30 pm