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Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill

Indeed, my Lords, but that would be a bit too late. But the noble Earl makes my point for me. I think it fair to say that the Parliament Act is quite a significant measure of our constitution. It could arguably reduce quite a significant burden. So if we are to proceed with the Bill, then further changes are clearly necessary. But why are we proceeding with this Bill? Why has it been brought before us? There has to be a compelling case for the introduction of a measure that confers significant powers on a Minister and limits the scope of parliamentary scrutiny. What is the compelling case? The review of the 2001 Act, published last year, is cited as the basis for the measure. Who was consulted in the course of this review? To quote from the Explanatory Notes at paragraph 4, dealing with Part 1 of the Bill:"““The review was informed by detailed feedback from Government departments which have been involved in the making of RROs under the 2001 Act, and by the findings of the Better Regulation Task Force . . . The Task Force’s report made some recommendations . . . as to what the Government’s review of the 2001 Act should cover””." The task force’s report basically recommended that the Government undertake their review of the 2001 Act as a matter of urgency and look at whether the scope of the regulatory reform orders could be widened, especially to deliver non-controversial orders for simplification. It also recommended looking at whether the whole process for developing an RRO and subsequent scrutiny could be more proportionate. That set some broad terms for the review, but the review itself then rested on, as the Explanatory Notes make clear,"““detailed feedback from Government departments which have been involved in the making of RROs””—" in short, hardly the most detached body of commentators. Even so, as the Public Administration Committee in the other place has noted, the review recommended a far more limited reform of the 2001 Act than is embodied in this Bill. Indeed, although finding problems, not least that the application of safeguards was overly complex, the review noted that, at a basic level, the current framework is effective. The case thus appears to rest on weak foundations. There is no clear evidence that there is a problem with parliamentary scrutiny. In so far as there is a problem with achieving a reduction in regulatory burdens, the cause lies elsewhere. Andrew Miller, chairman of the Regulatory Reform Committee in the other place, said on Report that what the Minister should glean from the debate and his reading on the matter,"““is the fact that, while the Regulatory Reform Act 2001 has not proved as effective as it might have, the blame lies not with the House but with Government Departments””." There was, he said, an inertia in the system:"““It is extremely difficult to achieve momentum, however determined a Government may be””.—[Official Report, Commons, 15/5/06; col. 733.]" As the Procedure Committee in the other place noted in its report on the Bill, referring to parliamentary scrutiny of RROs, the Government,"““has not produced evidence that the delays and obstacles have been caused by that parliamentary scrutiny. If the tests required of an RRO were too restrictive they could have been amended rather than abolished. Other problems such as Whitehall’s cultural approach to regulatory reform will not be solved by this Bill””." In short, the Bill is premised on the belief that Parliament is the problem, whereas the real problem lies within government, not within Parliament. We have not heard a compelling case for the Bill, nor, I might add—a point already touched upon—a compelling case for introducing it without the benefit of pre-legislative scrutiny. The flawed nature of the Bill tends to reinforce the observation as to rushed Bills being bad Bills. Given that, it is incumbent on the Minister to explain why this Bill, or at least Part 1 of it, is being pursued in the way that it is. If it is to be pursued, then there need to be many changes to it. I will just briefly adumbrate the most important because most of the points have already been made by noble Lords. The scope of the Bill needs to be tightened further. The measures exempted from its provisions need to be extended considerably—a point picked up by the Constitution Committee—either generically or by reference to specific Acts. Clause 3, as we have heard, covering Law Commission proposals, needs to be subject to far more stringent limitations. The power given to Ministers to cherry-pick commission proposals, to use such proposals to change the common law, and the absence of adequate parliamentary scrutiny are unacceptable individually and in combination constitutionally indefensible. Rather like the Delegated Powers Committee, I am not persuaded that the clause should remain in the Bill. There are, after all, mechanisms already in place for dealing with Law Commission proposals. The decision as to the level of parliamentary scrutiny should rest, in the first instance, with Parliament and not with a Minister; in other words, the onus needs to be reversed. The other change that I would have proposed, but which the Minister has indicated that the Government will accept, is to strip out of the Bill the limitations on committees in the criteria they can employ in considering orders. That should never have been in in the first place. It limited the discretion of Parliament in determining what its own committees could do and it raised the potential for a legal quagmire by embodying in statute limitations on parliamentary committees and raising the prospect of being judicially reviewable. The amendments made to the Bill in the other place have made it less bad than it was but there is still a great deal to be done. There is a problem in achieving deregulation, but I am not persuaded that this is the way to deal with it. Even with amendments, the Bill will be a hostage to fortune. I hope we do not live to regret it.