Extract 77

EXPOSITION OF THE PARLIAMENT BILL

(Earl of Crewe, Lord Privy Seal and Secretary of State for India, Lords, November 21, 1910)

THE EARL OF CREWE1: . . . In regard to the Parliament Bill, the origin of this particular controversy goes back four years. It goes back to the winter of 1906 when the first Education Bill of Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman's Government failed to pass into law. The Bill failed to pass into law after strenuous attempts to arrive at a compromise, but compromise was found impossible and the Bill was lost. It was lost owing to the unwillingness of your Lordships' House to include in its provisions principles upon which, as we believed, the mind of the country had been most clearly expressed at the General Election of the preceding winter, and, as your Lordships will all remember, its loss was received not merely with regret but with no little indignation on the part of those who had its success at heart. On December 20, 1906, Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, speaking in another place, said, "A way must be found and a way will be found by which the will of the people, as expressed through their elected representatives in this House, will be made to prevail." Then in the King's Speech, when Parliament met on February 12 in the following year, that thesis was developed by the then Prime Minister in words which will be found in the pages of "Hansard." The almost immediate sequel to that challenge, for I think I may so call it, was the Resolution which the House of Commons passed on June 26 of the same year. That Resolution read:

That in order to give effect to the will of the people as expressed by their elected representatives, it is necessary that the power of the other

1 Parliamentary Debates, Fifth Series, Lords, vol. 6, col. 777 sqq.

House to alter or reject Bills passed by this House should be so restricted by law as to secure that within the limits of a single Parliament the final decisions of the Commons shall prevail.

That Resolution was carried on a Division by 434 against 149.

Perhaps I may be permitted very briefly to remind your Lordships of what the terms of the plan at that time were. Speaking generally they were these. When a disagreement occurred between the two Houses a private Conference was to take place; and if agreement was not arrived at through that Conference, the Bill was lost for the time. It could be reintroduced either with or without amendment after a period of six months, and if the two Houses again failed to agree, a second Conference was to be called. If agreement was then not reached, the Bill was to be reintroduced and passed by some rapid process, and a third Conference might be held, but if agreement was then not reached, the Bill was to become law over the heads of your Lordships' House. The remainder of the plan consisted in a provision for quinquennial Parliaments that is to say, Parliaments of which the ordinary duration would be four years, for reasons with which your Lordships are all familiar.

Well, my Lords, as the controversy proceeded, the relations as between the two Houses I fear did not improve. The Plural Voting Bill had already been rejected by your Lordships' House very summarily, and not less summarily the Licensing Bill of 1908 received its short shrift at your Lordships' hands. In 1908, also, fresh attempts were made at a settlement of the education question, but those attempts proved to be again a failure. Then came the unprecedented rejection in 1909 of the whole financial arrangements for the year. The General Election followed, but the Government, although returned to power, found itself in no degree nearer the capacity of carrying controversial Bills than it had been all through the Parliament preceding. That, my Lords, is in brief the reason and the justification for the introduction of this measure,

Now, it is desirable to explain in what essentials this Bill differs from the earlier proposals which I have described. I will do so by going rapidly through its operative provisions. The first clause deals with finance. It gives to the other House complete control over Money Bills, but it contains the important provision and makes the important admission on which your Lordships laid stress in your famous Standing Order of 1702 — namely, that it was not proper to annex to a Money Bill matter foreign to or different from matters of aid or supply. The force of that Standing Order is admitted in Clause 1, and the decision as to whether a Bill is a Money Bill or not is left by Clause 1 to the Speaker of the House of Commons an impartial authority, at any rate an impartial authority so far as the memory of any man now alive goes back, and to whom in the opinion of His Majesty's Government that immensely important duty may be fitly entrusted. But I may perhaps venture to say that if some other tribunal within Parliament could be found which could be expected to carry out these duties with equal authority and equal impartiality, that is not a matter which we should regard as vital to the Bill.

The second part of the Bill deals with general legislation, and the effect of its provisions is that if a measure passes in another place during three successive sessions spreading over two years it will become law. In the earlier proposals much was said about conferring between the two Houses, and it is a matter upon which the late Prime Minister dwelt at length when he introduced his proposals. The Bill which is before us does not explicitly provide for the holding of Conferences, but in the opinion of the framers of the Bill the holding of Conferences is a cardinal matter in relation to the whole question. Nothing, I think, is more curious to any one who takes the trouble to look at the history of the relations between the two Houses than the gradual decline and final disuse of the practice of Conferences between the Lords and the Commons. The causes may be numerous, but one cause undoubtedly was that the later Conferences which were held — I am speaking for the moment of

formal Conferences

a

seem to have become so rigid and so unnatural in their character that it was felt that the practice carried with it little of value. But I do not hesitate to say that in my opinion one of the reasons why the relations between the two Houses have hardened and crystallised into their present condition condition, that is to say, of something like perpetual conflict when one Party is in power and of perpetual acquiescence when the other Party is in power may be traced to the complete abandonment of this habit of conferring. Conferences between the two Houses are of old date. They go back, I believe, to the reign of Edward III; and from the time when the Commons' Journals were regularly kept, I am told that within the one hundred fifty years from 1547 to 1702 anyone who searches the Index to these Journals will find that upwards of twenty pages of the Index are given up to reports of the Conferences that were held between the two Houses on every variety of subject and covering the widest possible field. I therefore do not hesitate to say that the revival of the custom of frequent Conferences between the two Houses is of the very essence of the proposals which we are placing before your Lordships to-day.

Then, my Lords, I would call your attention to an important change from the former proposals, and it is that relating to the identity of the Bill to be sent up on a later occasion - identity except so far as may be agreed as compared with the proposal originally made that the Bill might be amended in another place and sent up as the same Bill. It seems to me that the real issue as between the two Parties—and this I gather from what has been said in this House and on many platforms—the real issue as between the two Parties with regard to these proposals is, "What is the real value of delay and of opportunities for consideration for the purpose of amending Bills?" That is to say, Are you more likely to get a Bill into final shape that sensible men, its principle having been approved, will agree is the best shape are you more likely to get it into such a shape by delay, consultation, and consideration than by a process of summary

rejection, followed, perhaps, by a General Election, and if not by a General Election by a referendum, as I understand is proposed in a Motion on the Paper by my noble friend Lord Balfour of Burleigh?

It is useful in discussing the question of delay and consideration on the one side, and a more immediate appeal to the country on the other, for the purpose of improving a Bill or of deciding its fate, to consider one or two concrete instances. I believe it is to the benefit of both Parties, and, what is more important, to the benefit of the whole country, to get out of the region of abstract Constitutionmaking, because what the country is most interested in is, "What is likely to be the effect of these proposals or of any other alternative proposals in their practical import and in relation to the fate of Bills before Parliament?" Now Parliament is not an end in itself; it is a means, a machine for doing certain things for the nation. It is a machine for doing three things. It exists for the purpose of keeping a check on the Executive; it exists for the purpose of raising money for the public service; and it exists also, although it is not its primary object of existence, for the purpose of passing legislation. I ask your Lordships to consider what would have been the probable fate of one or two well-known measures either under our proposals, or under the proposals which I understand to be generally those of the other side.

I will take the first Home Rule Bill of 1893, a favourite battlehorse, I need not say, of noble Lords opposite, because it is a measure which above all others is supposed to have vindicated the judgment of your Lordships' House. I say without hesitation that the Home Rule Bill of 1893, looking back at it from this distance of time, would not have passed either test it would not have passed the test of a General Election or of a referendum, which I understand would be the proposal, according to Mr. Balfour's speech at Nottingham, for dealing with the question. Neither would it have stood the test of the proposals under the Parliament Bill. The Home Rule Bill of 1893, supported by the majority with which