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UK: Tolerance, Democracy and Openness

My Lords, in this bleak midwinter, I offer some reasons to be cheerful. Indeed, I celebrate and suggest that in the past long decade, we have become a more tolerant, more mobile, more open and, indeed, more democratic society. In the forthcoming general election, the parties will divide on the economy, the NHS, education, housing and the reform of Parliament, but the parallel—indeed, complementary—agenda, so much of which helps people in some modest or targeted way, will scarcely be heard beneath the raging political arguments about those big issues. I regret that. There is much that an incumbent Government can do to improve people's lives, even at the margins. Whoever wins the general election must be alive and alert to mobilise that parallel agenda. Paradoxically, during these tough economic times, that agenda can flourish and help to mitigate some of the hardships. In drawing attention to that parallel agenda, I do not claim that Labour has got everything right—it has not—but I assert that much has been done for the good and should be acknowledged. Let me offer some examples of our fostering a more open, democratic and tolerant Britain. The right to roam Acts applicable to the countryside and our coast have been a tonic for all of us who cherish the opportunity to walk and enjoy tracts of our beautiful countryside previously just talked about but, sadly, not walked about. Painstaking consultation with landowners has resulted in pleasure and leisure for the many, not just the few. Those of your Lordships who watched "Countryfile" on Sunday will have learnt of the farmer who changed his mind about access to the countryside. He found opportunities to offer tea to walkers coming through his land, make a bob or two and, as he said, meet people literally from the other side of the fence, perhaps promoting tolerance. The Act liberating the half of our coastline previously closed to the public was equally welcome, restoring to our people a national treasure. Indeed, we are all bonny beachcombers now. The groundbreaking Hunting Act 2004 has also helped the countryside as well as establishing a decisive step in favour of animal welfare. The fear that the economy of the countryside would implode has been exploded. It has been quite the reverse. Drag hunting has attracted new enthusiasts who love the joy of horseriding. Rural industries and jobs there have been strengthened. Infractions of the hunting law have been limited, as the vast majority of riders have been keen to observe the law—yes, the law of the land. But what of the countryside's future and the parallel agenda for rural Britain? The Government’s recent pledge to bring broadband to rural Britain is essential for a living and active countryside as it confers on the remotest SME or individual the right to roam all modern communications. I hope that we can enable our rural towns and villages to strengthen local communities by collocating essential services in the local shop, pub or, indeed, parish church. We need inspired responses to the changing countryside. Farming is a life-saving industry for our nation, but it is no longer as job-rich as the extractive industries, tourism or the countless small businesses that have been helped by the establishment of first-class broadband facilities. Benign legislation has also allowed Britons the right to roam our national museums and art galleries free of charge. Free access brought in many more visitors, often for the first time, for whom entering a museum was as forbidding as unlocking Fort Knox. The profile of visitors to the excellent Museum of Liverpool shows that there are higher numbers drawn from social classes C2, D and E, which more than satisfies our hopes that our national treasures are thrown open to the people. As democracy comes to the arts, coupled with government-sponsored free access to our national museums has been huge capital investment in this sector, which has revived older museums, such as my own first museum, the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, and built new, such as Merseyside’s outstanding International Slavery Museum where we democratise the art and history of our country. Perhaps the parallel agenda can next liberate the 90 per cent of holdings in our museums hidden away from the public eye for want of exhibition space. The Government have, post-millennium, stimulated new investment in exciting new public architecture, often generating enormous civic pride. Antony Gormley’s "Angel of the North" reflects the pride of the north-east’s industrial steel heritage. The millennium celebrations in London saw innovative public architecture, embracing not only the quickly popular wobbly bridge and the London Eye, but the Millennium Dome, now the world’s most successful entertainment venue. In future, I believe that local and private museums should be helped and linked with local industry and the national curriculum. They are palaces of wisdom and knowledge as yet untapped to the full extent, like too many of our private and public libraries. We should open up the former and repair the latter. Why not give free access to our unparalled theatres? London theatres prosper, but we could subsidise free entry, say, on a one-week-of-the-year basis, to our regional repertory theatres or provide free entry to groups such as the young and the jobless. The recession offers new opportunities for fresh thinking when judiciously encouraged by the Government. How can one get to the local theatre or museum or the coast, countryside or England’s beautiful cathedrals, now spruced up by plentiful public grants? Free bus passes for pensioners have been a winner and are another right to roam. I remember pensioners enthusiastically planning routes to roam Britain by linking up local bus services. Some plotted journeys as far as from John o’Groats to Land’s End. London’s Freedom Pass incorporates the Underground. The right to roam TV channels through free TV licences for 4.5 million people over the age of 75 has proved a bonus, as has the extension of the winter fuel and cold weather payments schemes, which have saved lives as well as cheering everyone up in snow-bound Britain. These added extras supplement the substantial rise in pensions that secures real dignity for those in retirement. The Disability Discrimination Act has strengthened the dignity of those who are less physically able, many of whom are pensioners. The Act not only outlawed obvious discriminatory practices but changed the whole atmosphere of how society values and cherishes all our citizens, whatever their level of mobility. I am a passionate bus fan, and I notice the kindness and tolerance that people have to less mobile fellow travellers on buses. Many people call for the return of the old Routemasters, but they were intolerant of women with children and older people. A propos a more open society, I point to the liberalising of Britain’s antiquated licensing laws. It was controversial to some, but it is here to stay, meeting, as it has, the general public mood of exercising freedom of choice on where and when to drink. Related to this is the brave introduction of the ban on smoking in public places. Its successful implementation has astonished all but the most optimistic. Indeed, "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes" is now imprisoned in the gastropub’s jukebox and is no longer blown across the dining table to the discomfort of us all. Many habitual smokers welcomed the fresh opportunity to give up. In time, the evidence will show the enormous health benefits to our nation of this bold move. Perhaps excess alcohol consumption will be the next target of bold thinking. A more tolerant society is a more open society and, in turn, a more democratic society. The change in mood in modern Britain towards women, members of the gay and lesbian communities and our ethnic communities strengthens our democratic roots. Increasingly, we are becoming a nation at ease with itself. The Civil Partnership Act epitomises this change of mood, as our gay and lesbian colleagues can now, with pride, express, at long last, their open love for and attachment to a companion human being of the same sex before a wider and more tolerant community. I remember learning to my delight from a senior marriage registrar of her staff’s visible pleasure in presiding over such happy civil partnership ceremonies. The Evening Standard’s recent uplifting report on the conference of gay armed services personnel held in the Victory Services Club in central London was unusual in itself, but the event was blessed by a personal message of welcome from Her Majesty the Queen. How welcome, and how heart-warming. Similarly, on women in Britain today, I remind noble Lords of the song "I Love the Sound of Breaking Glass". There are examples here in this House of breaking the glass ceiling. Your Lordships’ House has had five Leaders since I arrived. Four have been noble Baronesses, each here on merit. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, is our first Lord Speaker, and nowadays all the Front Benches boast gifted women in substantial numbers. Tokenism is unwelcome in your Lordships’ House, as it is when it comes to our valued ethnic communities. John Denham and the noble Lord, Lord Ouseley, on this morning’s "Today" programme, recognised a decade of achievement in this respect. We still have much more to do to sweep out prejudice in all its debilitating forms, but progress is real and we should celebrate it while remaining vigilant. The Government’s parliamentary reform agenda has been substantial, and many parliamentarians are ambiguous about the introduction of the Freedom of Information Act, but despite the media’s often selective approach to this new freedom, the Act will be seen to endure. So, too, will be the profound reform of the British constitution, including the sensible divesting from our once multitasking Lord Chancellor his many incompatible roles. The Supreme Court will prove to be a worthy development and a wise surrender of excessive powers. No future Administration will undo it. Similarly, on devolution, who now argues the status quo ante for the Welsh Assembly, the Scottish Parliament, or indeed the coming together of the Northern Ireland Assembly, which are improved equally with a flourish of architectural development that rightly follows those changes? There is an example in your Lordships’ House of how we have moved forward, becoming a more tolerant and more open society. We were the first House in these Houses of Parliament to welcome a youth parliament into our Chamber, which I celebrate. It is right and proper that we who are the responsible politicians of the day pass on the good news to our younger people. In conclusion, there will be a clash of the mighty in the forthcoming general election, but there is a parallel agenda and there are ways in which enlightened and thinking Governments can help the lives of many of our other citizens. We should not miss those opportunities.