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Parliament and the Public

My Lords, this has been a fascinating debate so far, from the originator of the debate, the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, right down the speakers’list. I would like to continue to discuss much of what has been said, but I hope that noble Lords will forgive me if instead I get on with my remarks. The report’s subheading is Report of the Hansard Society Commission on the Communication of Parliamentary Democracy, and that is what most of the debate has been about. It has also been suggested that we consider making it easier to communicate what we do. The Motion refers to participation in the political process. To a degree, those are two different things. Participation in the political process clearly includes communication of parliamentary democracy and involvement of people with what we do in each House; but participation, which I want to discuss in more detail, goes further than that. In doing so, I wish to make clear that I do not disagree fundamentally with the comments on political leadership made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe of Aberavon, who said that it was time that politicians engaged in persuasion not spin, and that people deserved to be led not fed; nor do I disagree with most of what the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, said on the role of this House and its communication. Page 14 of the report touches on other activities and suggests that direct political activities, including signing a petition, taking part in a demonstration, responding to a consultation or presenting views to an MP, have increased in recent years. It reports that the most recent audit of engagement by the Electoral Commission and the Hansard Society found that one adult in six is a political activist, and lists those activities as including signing a petition and writing to your MP. In my view, that does not constitute being much of an activist, if that is all you do. I am aware that tradition always weighs heavily in this House—never more so than when my noble friend Lady Bonham-Carter can quote her great-grandfather in such a debate. I am reminded that the Earl of Oxford and Asquith, as he was then, compared trying to make a speech in your Lordships’ House to trying to speak in a poorly illuminated charnel house—I am not sure whether those were his exact words. We have advanced with the times a little: we now have electric lighting, electric clocks, microphones and even an annunciator for those sitting in the Gallery, so perhaps we can make some advances with such things as the electric Internet and electric television. Democracy depends not just on the institutions of liberal democratic politics and representative democracy but also on people getting off their backsides and taking part actively in the political process. That might entail becoming involved in the formal institutions or in more direct action. Recently, we have talked about the ancient rights of personal belief. In your Lordships’ House, we have discussed the right of free speech in relation to the Bill on racial and religious hatred. We talk a bit less nowadays about rights of association, which I believe are just as important and fundamental. Mr Brian Haw has a tatty display in Parliament Square that upsets a lot of people in this building. I believe the fact that he has been able to do that, and continues to do it, despite so much of authority wanting him not to, is an outstanding statement of democracy in this country. But, in most cases, being effective is not something that people can do as individual acts; they have to associate with other people to organise it. Democratic politics is an untidy, messy and difficult matter. If it is working properly, it should be awkward for authority. Nowadays, we tend to think far too much in terms of people taking part in carefully structured surveys, focus groups, citizens’ panels and so forth. We talk about partnerships and organisations, which are ridiculously called stakeholders—a word that I believe should be banned in your Lordships’ House, as well as everywhere else. We have the new burgeoning quangocracy of people who are appointed by authority to take part in the democratic system through those organisations. That is not real democracy. Real democracy is when people disagree and have big rows and conflicts which have to be resolved. In many ways, democracy is about having structures and institutions which allow conflicts to be resolved, even though people are angry and committed. Ultimately, a process has taken place in which they have been involved. It is not the structures or structural participation that matters, but whether people are able to get organised, associate themselves and put forward their views. As a parliament, what should we do? We cannot force people to take part; to vote, to go on demonstrations, to write to the local newspaper or whatever else it is that they want to do. We can make sure that the institution of Parliament provides clear and full information for people who want it. There is a lot of very useful information in the report. I agree entirely with what people have said about the website, which I cannot find my way round. We must be open in our proceedings rather than secretive, and less sensitive to outside criticism and people mobilising for their beliefs. We must be more receptive to listening and to engaging with people who want to engage with us. I have to say, in parenthesis, that if we are talking about the means of making Parliament more understandable to people outside, or even to those of us who are here, we need to concentrate in your Lordships’ House on this House. If there is a lack of understanding of how Parliament as a whole works among the public and the journalists who are supposed to be in here, the lack of understanding of how this House works is almost complete. Time and again we have to explain to well known, competent journalists, in words of one syllable, how this House works, the procedures and how it relates to the House of Commons. We should be worried about that. In my final few moments, I want to make a few comments about the Parliament Channel, which is brilliant as far as it goes. Far more people have watched it than have ever read Hansard. There are technical problems in many parts of the country. The picture is postcard size on about a quarter of the screen. I have no idea why that is. When you complain, you are just told that there is not enough power to do it properly. That needs sorting out. The fact that the Parliament Channel provides continuous coverage is very good, but the annotation and explanation of what is going on is absolutely abysmal. For anyone who does not understand the procedures of this House it is almost impossible to follow them sensibly. There is no reason why that should be the case. Although some annotation is provided, nowadays we are used to 24-hour news services with strap lines running across the bottom of the screen and panels popping up to tell the viewer what is going on. That kind of information ought to be incorporated into the Parliament Channel. Perhaps it is only a silly point, but we ought to think about the words that are used to describe things. What does ““Starred Questions”” mean? It appears on the Parliament Channel. Simply renaming that business ““Daily Question Time”” would make it far more understandable. I turn to some other aspects. For good reasons this Chamber moves seamlessly from one item of business to the next. That is fine within the House, but those watching from the outside find it meaningless. At one moment we are discussing one thing, and the next we have moved on to another. For example, this debate was announced with the words ““The Lord Puttnam””. Admirable though the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, is and admirable though this debate may be, apart from the fact that the noble Lord has sponsored it, those words do not describe what the debate is all about. Those responsible for broadcasting the Parliament Channel ought to look hard at ways of making it more comprehensible to the people who tune in. Again, we are perhaps all astonished to find out that people do actually watch it from time to time.