Debate on the Address — [1st Day]

Part of Outlawries Bill – in the House of Commons at 8:32 pm on 18 November 2009.

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Photo of Andrew MacKinlay Andrew MacKinlay Labour, Thurrock 8:32, 18 November 2009

Obviously, I have a great deal of sympathy for what the hon. Gentleman is saying. Either we have to have an English Parliament, or we need a number of Parliaments within England. I have an open mind as to whether we should create provincial Parliaments in England to represent populations comparable to those of Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland, or whether we should have an English Parliament. We cannot, however, go on with this nonsense whereby people can not only come down from Scotland and vote on exclusively English matters but actually be Ministers dealing with such issues. An example is the Dartford toll bridge. A Minister who is a Scottish Member of Parliament told me that I had to have higher tolls on the Dartford toll bridge, when a comparable decision had just, rightly, been taken to remove the tolls from the bridge across the Clyde. That was a very sensible decision, but it was nothing to do with me. That position is just not sustainable.

This very day, a report was published by the All Wales Convention, which was set up by the National Assembly of Wales-to its credit-under Emyr Jones Parry to look into whether devolution in Wales could be advanced. The fact is that any such greater devolution-which I support-will have ramifications for the constituency of the hon. Gentleman and for mine. That report is not available in the Vote Office, however. I got an executive summary of it through the good offices of a member of an Opposition party. We cannot go on like this. The Calman commission produced a similar report into further devolution for Scotland, initiated largely by the Scottish Government, but with a nod and a wink and some support from the Secretary of State for Scotland and the Prime Minister. That, too, has ramifications for my constituency. I just wish that we could get a grip on this issue and address the modernisation of the United Kingdom constitution, in order to create parity of treatment and constitutional symmetry.

I also want to raise an important constituency issue, which affects not only Thurrock but the wider Thames Gateway area. A little while after my party came into office, in order to increase the supply of housing stock and to create jobs, it developed a strategy for expanding in the Thames Gateway to the east of London. I supported that policy then, and I still do, but I am bitterly disappointed at how slow and sluggish its implementation has been. One problem is that Tony Blair and the present Prime Minister have kept moving their Ministers. This is true of so many Ministries. These Prime Ministers have an obsession with changing their Ministers every few months. There is never any settlement, and never any ownership of the issues. Some Ministers change their minds, and sometimes the civil servants think, "Ah, we've got rid of him and her; now we can reverse some of their initiatives." This is bad governance.

In the past year or two, there has actually been significant progress, but I hear a rumour that the current Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government is contemplating giving the responsibility that is vested in the Thurrock Thames Gateway Development Corporation to an outfit called the Homes and Communities Agency. I am implacably opposed to that, to the extent that in the few weeks I have left in this place, there is going to be one hell of a row if the daft Minister decides to hand this over to a man called Bob Kerslake and this national quango, which has been created on top of the plethora of bodies that already exist in the Thames Gateway.

This is completely bonkers, and I hope that the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend Chris Mole, who is sitting on the Treasury Bench, will tell the Communities and Local Government Secretary tomorrow that the Member for Thurrock who supported and sustained the policy of developing the Thames Gateway is not in favour of the Thurrock Thames Gateway Development Corporation losing its powers and having them handed over to a big national quango, which cannot, in my view, either address the needs of the people of Thurrock and the Thames Gateway, or achieve the Government's objectives of increasing the housing stock in this important region as well as creating jobs. This would be foolhardy in the extreme, so I hope that that message will be conveyed back.

I have spoken informally behind the Chair to Mr. Amess and other Essex MPs. It is interesting to note that when we raise matters relating to our constituencies or the wider region, BBC Essex is dilatory about reporting Parliament and the issues raised by Members, whether they be left, right or centre, about the county of Essex. If the issue is expenses, of course, the BBC people are on the telephone, but we do not get good reporting from BBC Essex, which I am angry about.

BBC Essex has closed studios in Southend. It had a newsgathering facility provided by the borough of Thurrock at the western end, but it did not use it, and gave it up. It is time that we complained about the coverage by BBC local radio. I imagine that hon. Members in other areas will have similar experiences. The service is parlous, and I believe it is time we demanded that BBC Essex and other BBC radio stations up and down the country report real news and real initiatives by councillors and MPs speaking on and about local issues. They are supposed to be providing local news and local interest.

Colleagues have expressed disappointment or, in some cases, surprise that there was no legislation relating to immigration and/or the stewardship of our borders by the Border and Immigration Agency. All I can say is that I simply cannot understand why successive Governments have not been able to get on top of managing the migration system. MPs of all parties have cases in which the Border and Immigration Agency is behaving in a totally absurd manner, with consequences of great hardship, great anxiety and, in some cases, cruelty to individuals.

I have frequently had cases in which people have, rightly or wrongly, lived in the UK for many years, and have developed relationships and had children and are living as loving family units. We are told, however, that we have to wait until 2011 for those cases to be resolved. It is indefensible that we cannot provide a swift common-sense remedy, because we know what common-sense remedy will eventually prevail: these people will be allowed, for a whole variety of sensible human rights reasons, to gain permanent leave to remain in the UK. Why cannot this agency, and Ministers, address the problem? It is just beyond me; I urge them to revisit the issue.

We expected electoral reform to be mentioned in the Gracious Speech, but it does not seem to have emerged in the way that some of us had hoped for. Both before and during my time in the House, I have believed that we need to alter the electoral system both for Westminster and for local government. Failure to address that need will be a source of further aggravation. There are ways in which we could reach a consensus across parties. We could find a way of maintaining the single Member constituency system while making people's votes count much more. We could create a system in which every Member of Parliament would be able to say that he or she had a mandate from more than 50 per cent. of the electorate. I cannot see why the Queen's Speech did not at least issue a promissory note to voters saying that if a Labour Government were returned at the next election, electoral reform would follow. There should have been a paving Bill to that effect.

I hope that over the next few days of our debate on the Queen's Speech we may hear some news from the Government. Our detailed debates on justice and home affairs will give them an opportunity to address the issue. In my view, there is an urgent requirement for electoral reform to be put both before Parliament and before the country as a whole.

Other Members, who have been very patient, wish to speak, so I shall not labour my points for much longer. However, I think that we need to be much more ambitious in asserting the rights of the House over the Executive, and indeed the Opposition Front Bench. The Executive are to blame to a large extent-the Executive of the day, that is; the same would be true if there were a Conservative Government-but there is also a cosy consensus between the Front Benches which excludes the influence of Back Benchers, and I think that it needs to be broken down.

You have been here for many years, Madam Deputy Speaker. If you read past Gracious Speeches, you will find that, certainly in your early years in the House, they gave details of overseas state visits made by the monarch, and of the people whom she expected to welcome on their state visits to this country. The latter practice has largely ended. When I inquired about that I was told that it was to do with security, but I think it is going too far for us not to announce when Heads of State are to visit and when visits are to be made at "state visit" level. The public should be given more notice. I suspect that on occasion many Members have observed some disruption in London, or some extra flags flying, and have inquired about the reasons, only to discover that there had been a state visit earlier in the day. A significant Head of State may have visited, but it is possible that no Member of Parliament will have known about it.

I mention that matter for a variety of reasons. One of them is a parliamentary reason. I feel that whenever there is a state visit there should be a presumption that the Head of State involved will address both Houses of Parliament, but that does not always happen. In fact, I think that on the majority of occasions it does not happen, and that is wrong. A state visit by a Head of State is a visit to the country. It is not just a visit to the Government or to our Head of State. After all, it is the tradition for our Head of State to address legislatures when she goes around the world, both in the Commonwealth and in other states. It is also the tradition for many other Parliaments to welcome people to address them in their chamber. I think that we should develop the practice of insisting that both the House of Lords and the House of Commons welcome people making state visits in a very formal way. Perhaps the Chambers could alternate as host.

This is the last time I will do this in the House, Madam Deputy Speaker, but let me, by way of illustration, remind you of a speech by Winston Churchill. He said, "The French generals told the divided Cabinet that in three weeks England would have her neck wrung like a chicken. Some chicken! Some neck!" That speech was delivered in the Canadian House of Commons-and that is the tradition. Mr. Blair and our current Prime Minister often address other legislatures. Why do we not at least invite visiting Heads of State into our legislative Chamber-and also, for that matter, important Heads of Government? That would be a very good innovation.

Although I hope to catch the Speaker's eye again between now and Dissolution, I shall conclude my remarks tonight by referring to the pride that I have taken in being a Member of this House, and to the fact that colleagues left, right and centre have been bruised recently, and in many cases traduced. We have got ourselves to blame to a large extent, of course, but some of the vitriol and criticism have been wholly disproportionate. I hope that Members will get an opportunity to read the contribution that I am making this evening, because I shall now quote some words of Teddy Roosevelt, a distinguished President of the United States at the beginning of the last century. He said:

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat."

I think we should take heart. There are people outside this House-we know them-who find it easy to traduce but never to contribute to public life. There are many people who say repeatedly that they could do the job of a Member of Parliament more cheaply and better than we do it. It is perfectly reasonable for them to assert that, but if they believe they can do the job more cheaply and-this is the important ingredient-better, not only may they stand at the next general election, but I say they have an obligation to stand. If they are elected, they will have to fulfil their duties in the way they have outlined to the people outside this place. They will also have to remember that resources are limited, and that being a Member of Parliament is not about being away in the recess and enjoying relaxation, but that it is a 52-week-a-year commitment, seven days a week, 24 hours a day. Therefore, I say to our critics, "Yes, you're entitled to criticise us, and we will never want to stop you doing so, but if you feel so strongly about this and think you can do the job better and more cheaply, not only can you stand at the next election, but you have an obligation to stand."