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Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill

My Lords, I was 100 per cent against the Bill until the speech of my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth, when he informed us that the Hunting Act could be repealed under it. So, perhaps my opposition to the Bill is not as vicious as it might have been; but I hope that that viciousness will return. Everyone agrees that regulation is a problem. Surely, bad regulation arises out of regulation, not legislation. It is the regulations that are at fault. Such regulations have been drafted and given legal power by primary legislation; so, surely, it is possible under existing primary legislation to get the regulations right. I asked the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, during his opening speech—which was so full of glorious clichés that I might apply to be cliché writer for the Minister by appointment—which Acts he thought needed to be repealed as a result of this Bill. He stated that I had got the question wrong. I have not got the question wrong. At Clause 1(1), the Bill states:"““A Minister of the Crown may by order under this section make any provision””—" and it continues in subsection (2)—"““resulting directly or indirectly for any person from any legislation””." That says that if the Bill is enacted the Government can, using this procedure, repeal primary legislation. So I ask the Minister again whether he know of any Acts that he and his Government would like to repeal. Please may we have an answer? If he does not know the answer, it is disgraceful to say, ““Hey ho, let’s introduce a Bill that will give us the power to repeal Acts of Parliament. We don’t know that we need to use it yet and we promise that we won’t anyway””. I would not trust my noble friend Lord Kingsland with that power under any circumstances whatever or any Government if that could be avoided. The Government’s power to repeal legislation is already in the Civil Contingencies Act, which the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin of Roding, did not get to because his historical analysis stopped with Richard Crossman. It is not as if the Government are not so fond of legislation. They have pandered to the hippophagist tendencies of the French and forced horse passports on us for the first time since the horse was domesticated in central Asia is about 2000BC. I heard on the wireless today that if you are an old person watching television in a private room in an old people’s home, you have to get a separate television licence, but that if you watch television in the public rooms, one licence covers everyone. Each private room in an old people’s home has to have a television licence. I cannot see that that regulation needs primary legislation to be repealed. The Minister shakes his head but I heard that in an interview with the television licence people on the way up here in the car. The idea that the Government can be trusted with even the concept of reducing regulation is slightly scary. Furthermore, they cannot be trusted with the constitution either. The noble Lord, Lord Lipsey, has no concept of a Whig and balanced constitution. He thinks that it does not matter that Ministers of the Crown can repeal legislation. What are we in Parliament for except to stop Ministers of the Crown, who are supposed to be responsible to us?