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Parliament and the Public

My Lords, I start by adding my thanks to the noble Baroness for honouring the commitment she made to this House in an earlier debate on this important topic. We are all most grateful. As the Hansard Society has the unusual distinction of seeing its name on the Order Paper, as chairman of the society, I shall talk for a moment about what we do and why we commissioned this important report. The Hansard Society is, in a real sense, Parliament’s own NGO and Parliament’s own charity. Our mission is to bring Parliament closer to people and people closer to Parliament—the very two-way process that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe, has just spoken about. We work inside Parliament with those who seek to modernise this venerable institution and make it more relevant and accessible to the citizen. Outside Parliament, we have a wide range of projects, which many noble Lords will have come across, from working with schools—not least in making MPs’ visits less of an ego trip and more useful—to conducting mock elections on a massive scale, to working with disadvantaged and excluded young people—the parts of the electorate that the normal system does not seem to reach—to experimenting with e-democracy and new technology. Some three years ago we first identified the real gap in understanding of what Parliament does and decided to set up a commission to consider how communication of our role in Parliament could be better achieved. Over the years the Hansard Society has used those special commissions, which in their authoritative membership and way of working are not unlike the old Royal Commissions—which are sadly no more—to deliberate and report on matters of political and parliamentary moment. I think of the commission on electoral reform, chaired by the late Lord Blake 30 years ago. Most of the chairs of these commissions either already are or end up in the House of Lords. There was the Rippon commission, chaired by Lord Rippon, which produced the report Making the Law; there was Women at the Top, the commission chaired by the noble Baroness, Lady Howe, although at that point she was not a noble Baroness; the Newton commission, chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Newton, on parliamentary scrutiny, two or three years ago; and several others. At worst, the reports have educated people and changed the terms of debate. At best they have secured reform. I devoutly hope that the Puttnam commission proves to be one of those that secures reform. The report about which we are deliberating today is I believe one of the most powerful and valuable that has ever been produced under the society’s aegis. I have to say—and I shall not spare the blushes of the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam—that each commission has depended crucially for its success on its chairman. After I approached the noble Lord with the important issue of the communication of Parliament’s work, he not only agreed to chair the commission but also threw himself with his usual astonishing energy, enthusiasm and leadership into developing the project. In terms of the cinema—and I hope that he will forgive my dragging the cinema into this debate—the Hansard Society may have been the producer of the report, but the noble Lord was most emphatically the director whose vision imbued the whole thing. He in turn was very well served by his fellow members of the commission—by his vice-chair, Jackie Ashley of the Guardian, and a fine panel of leading academics, media people and parliamentarians from both Houses. I am glad to see that my noble friend Lord Tyler, who was then an MP and who was a member of the commission, will be speaking this afternoon. We are also very grateful for the support of Ofcom in getting the commission going—and I am glad to see that the noble Lord, Lord Currie, is present—and for the help of the BBC and Channel 4. I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, would agree that the commission is not and does not purport to be a comprehensive blueprint. It does not have all the answers about a disengaged public and a superficial media, but it does suggest the first vital steps out of this impasse that we are in of disenchantment, falling turnout and a pervasive contempt for political and parliamentary life. We need what the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, called a step change. There have been repeated polls and surveys, and the evidence from them is clear: as the noble Lord said, people are interested in issues, but ignorant and suspicious of the political process. Although a majority of people respect their individual Member of Parliament—and that is something to build on—they distrust politicians in general. They also believe, for instance, that the media have more power than the Prime Minister or the Civil Service or Parliament; and indeed, judging from research, there is a hopeless muddle in public perceptions between Parliament and government. They are confabulated in the popular mind. So wherever separation of powers exists in the British constitution—and sometimes it is quite difficult to find—it is certainly not in the minds of our fellow citizens. You could argue that their instinct, if not their information, is very good, because Parliament in its role of producing good legislation and in holding power accountable is excessively responsive to the Executive and insufficiently responsive to the citizen. I wonder how realistic it is to expect people to respect Parliament if Parliament so often does not seem to respect itself and its own crucial role. A report was published earlier this week, which many of your Lordships may have seen or read about, by the House of Lords Select Committee on the BBC Charter Review, of which I and my noble friend Lady Bonham-Carter were members. It noted that there were three challenges for the BBC, another great British institution: the accuracy of its reporting and its journalistic editorial independence; the development of new technologies and the digital revolution; and the increasing emphasis on, and need for, more rigorous systems of corporate governance. There are some striking resemblances between the needs of the BBC and those of Parliament: independence from government, so that the public can distinguish between the different arms of our constitution; our ability as a legislature to embrace these new technologies and the digital revolution as a way of getting greater public engagement; and our own systems of governance and regulation in terms of communicating with society. In the Communications Act we succeeded in getting an amendment to ensure that public service broadcasters have an obligation to promote civic understanding. That standard ought to be applied to Parliament as well. How good are we at promoting civic understanding? It is not enough for us to inform the public about what we do; we must enhance the understanding of what we do, and of democracy itself. Finally, in doing that, we desperately need the constructive help of everyone in the media. The Puttnam commission was perhaps a little gentle with the media, but I do not propose to be quite so gentle. We need the help of Ofcom as regulator, which has clear duties laid upon it on our behalf. We need the help of the BBC and the other public service broadcasters, and greater help and responsibility from the press and the rest of the media. I would say to the media who report our work here, or too often do not do so on a serious basis, that if Parliament can remove the beam from its eye—and, as the Puttnam report indicates, there is indeed a substantial beam to be removed—what about the media removing the mote from its own? They should remember that we in this country are all citizens who live in communities, part of a society in whose future we all have a stake, and not just to be treated as consumers and viewers. Here is an example of good coverage. ““Today in Parliament”” shares a birthday with the Hansard Society. We are both 60 years old. I cannot help thinking that if the BBC in particular and the media in general could recognise, as both these institutions do, that you do not have to be dull to be worth while, and that you can be sprightly even if you are mature in years, we could make the next 60 years a time of democratic renewal and of parliamentary renaissance.