Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, I congratulate and thank all those who have spoken in this debate, including the Minister and others on the Front Bench. The speeches were unusually thoughtful, knowledgeable, passionate at times and, typically in the case of the Minister, very lively. I am delighted that in the course of the last two hours we have strayed from Cumbria, through the Lake District, to the north...
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, I totally understand what the Minister has just said. I, for one, was certainly not expecting any statement today on the national park. However, I am very glad to hear the rider that he added, that it is absolutely extraordinary that the first preliminary decision to turn the South Downs into a national park was taken in 1999. It is amazing that, eight years later, that has not been...
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: rose to call attention to the environmental importance of areas of outstanding natural beauty; and to move for Papers. My Lords, this seems a sudden step away from the drama and tragedy that is Zimbabwe to the relative tranquillity of the British countryside, but I am pleased to have this opportunity. The National Association for Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty asked me not long ago...
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, surely the matter is a great deal more serious than whether a few people have been sacked. Is it not clear that in finance, and in life, you cannot have three chiefs—one in the Treasury, one in the FSA and one in the Bank of England—all responsible for doing the same job? Once there was real trouble, as in Northern Rock, the system failed. Would it not be much better now to wind...
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: asked Her Majesty's Government: Whether they are proposing any changes in the relationship between the Bank of England, the Financial Services Authority and HM Treasury.
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, I confess that I find that an extraordinarily disappointing reply. I have to say that I think that we deserve better. Is it not true that the Government have, perhaps unwittingly, created the landscape in which a financial crisis could arise and has done? Is it not also true that while in the years 1997 to 2004, it might have been sensible to create a Financial Services Authority...
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, I will refer to the point that I was going to make briefly earlier when the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, was speaking. I apologise if I was breaking the protocol of the House in interrupting him; I thought that I was in order. I would like to strongly take up the point that my noble friend Lord Kingsland made not just on consulting Parliament in the case of going to war, but actually...
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords—
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who spoke in this debate. All the speeches from colleagues on both sides of the House have been extremely constructive and helpful. I shall make one or two specific points in reply. The noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig of Radley, made a point about finding major benefactors who might help to finance the space for the educational office when we move there....
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: rose to move, That the First Report from the Information Committee, Improving Facilities for Educational Visitors to Parliament, (HL Paper 117) be agreed to. The report can be found at http://www.publications. parliament.uk/pa/ld200607/ldselect/ldinformation/117/117.pdf
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, when I came to Westminster this morning at 10 o'clock, I walked from the Members' Lobby towards our Lobby and I passed a guide who was talking to a bunch of young people. He was explaining to them that well known picture, "Speaker Lenthall asserting the privilege of the Commons against Charles I". This, of course, is the picture in which Charles is seen in the Speaker's chair trying...
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, I offer my wholehearted support to the concern that the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, has just put before noble Lords. Following my happy years as a Minister in the Foreign Office, I can stress to the noble Baroness the enormous importance of both Marshall and Commonwealth scholarships. They brought to this country some exceptional students who, when they grew up, often went into high...
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: asked Her Majesty's Government: Whether they intend to support a new treaty modernising European Union institutions and rules at the European Council in June.
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for that reply. I speak as someone who has been a long-time believer in the importance of Britain being a leading member of the EU. The problem of this week's reform treaty is that it must make the EU clearly more efficient and more comprehensible to the public, but at the same time cannot mark such a shift to deeper integration as to justify a call for a...
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, perhaps I may take this opportunity of congratulating the noble Baroness on her birthday.
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords—
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, it was a great pleasure to serve on the EU Select Committee for four years under the chairmanship of the noble Lord, Lord Grenfell, and the report that we are discussing and looking at tonight was an investigation undertaken under his chairmanship. He has spoken tonight in a way that, as all noble Lords will agree, showed great competence, thoroughness and looking at all the...
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, in this debate. He was an early prophet of biofuels, and it was the fact that we were about to look into biofuels that made him eager to rejoin the EU sub-committee of which I had the pleasure of being chairman for a few years. I was also delighted that the noble Lord, Lord Sewel, who opened the debate today, was willing...
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, is it not increasingly clear that for a substantial reduction in carbon emissions from energy production to be obtained we shall have to realise a greater percentage of our power from nuclear energy? When will the Government have the courage to make this decision, tell the country that that is what they are going to do and produce a programme for more nuclear power stations?
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, these are grave matters that we are debating. I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Williams of Crosby, for giving us the opportunity for this debate. I am not a lawyer. I will not try to define the position of the Attorney-General—whether it is right or wrong, or should be extended or not. I approach this from a rather different angle. For 20 years, before I went into...