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Royal Marriages and Succession to the Crown (Prevention of Discrimination) Bill

The hon. Member for Thurrock will indeed have a chance, as I am on the last part of my speech, in which I shall look at the Government's position and pose some questions to the Minister. I am pleased that the Secretary of State is present—I recognise that he is a busy man—and that the Deputy Leader of the House has stayed for the debate. I gave the Deputy Leader of the House notice that I intended to quote from his excellent work on constitutional reform. He produced a pamphlet relatively recently called "Powers to the People", in which he identified things that could be improved. I shall quote from it as I know the hon. Gentleman is sincere in his view that these things need to happen. He wrote in that document:""The succession to the crown is presently determined by the Act of Settlement 1701, which stipulates that the throne shall pass to the Electress Sophia of Hanover and her Protestant descendants according to the principle of male preference primogeniture. This means that the crown passes to the eldest son and his descendants before it would pass to a daughter or her line. Even if the eldest child were a daughter, she would not accede to the throne unless the male line had been exhausted."" Indeed, we know that daughters are not heirs apparent. They are heirs presumptive, in case there is male issue later. The pamphlet continues:""Clearly this is unfair—and most other European monarchies—" Sweden, the Netherlands, Belgium and Norway are cited, which I would say have a record second to none, compared to our country—""have already changed their equivalent acts of succession to provide for absolute primogeniture, so that men and women are guaranteed equality.""Whilst the UK could only proceed with reform in this with the agreement of other Commonwealth nations who share the monarch, there is a strong argument for reform now, before Prince William or Prince Harry has children. If William's first child were to be a girl and his second a boy, it would be inconceivable that the daughter should not inherit the crown. For that very reason, in Sweden the succession was changed when there was already a male presumptive heir who was replaced in favour of his elder sister."" The hon. Gentleman goes on to say:""The Act of Settlement also requires that any descendant who is or becomes a Roman Catholic, or who marries a Roman Catholic, is barred from the succession."" He goes on to cite the example of Prince Michael of Kent, and he points out—this was written in 2008—that:""In May of this year, Princess Anne's son Peter Philips … married his Canadian fiancé Autumn Kelly—only after she had converted from Catholicism to Anglicanism in order to secure his place in the pecking order for the succession."" Even the most proselytising evangelical Protestant would not see that as a particularly efficient way of picking up converts. The document continues:""The Act also stipulates that the sovereign must be in communion with the Church of England, must swear to preserve the church, and to uphold the Protestant line of succession."" The hon. Gentleman goes further than my Bill when he states:""The government has tended to oppose such moves on the grounds that if there were no bar to a Catholic taking the throne the monarch's role as Governor of the Church of England would be in question. However, several senior members of the Church of England, including the former Archbishop of York, have argued for the repeal of these provisions, at least so as to allow the monarch or heir to the throne to marry a Catholic."" So we come back to the limited measures in the Bill. I cannot understand, which is why I asked the Minister, why the Government have not made more progress on the issue. The Bill states that it is for this Parliament to do so. There is a provision specifying that there must be consultation with the Commonwealth before the measure can have effect. I accept that the wording of the provision may be too wide because it refers to consulting""the government of every Commonwealth country"," whereas only 15 Commonwealth countries need to be consulted. I am prepared to accept that there is an obligation on the Executive to consult those Governments, but I do not think there would be opposition, and there is no veto. The Government could use the Bill, and the time that has been reserved for it, to introduce it at the same time as consulting. I do not understand why the Government said overnight that they did not support the Bill, even though they supported the principle behind it and the contents of it. I do not see how they can bring in their own Bill in time. Quaint though our constitution is, it specifies a five-year term for a Government, and that term will end, at least for this Parliament, next June. There is a Report stage day ready and waiting for this Bill. I am not selfish about it. The Government can take it, call it their own, and amend it as required, so that it did not come into force until""such day as the Secretary of State may by order appoint"," in order to ensure that everything is done right by the Commonwealth.