HC Deb 30 November 1967 vol 755 cc666-71
Mr. Mendelson

I beg to ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House under Standing order No. 9 on a specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration, namely, the conditions attached to the International Monetary Fund's standby credit which would impose a further period of severe deflation upon this country and would seriously interfere with the ability of Her Majesty's Government and of Parliament to determine the economic and fiscal policies of the United Kingdom". I intend to spend the few minutes at my disposal entirely and specifically on the constitutional propriety of the Motion I seek to move and not on the subject matter. When the Standing Order was revised, I think that it was understood generally in the House that what was intended was an opportunity for hon. Members to raise matters which, by the very nature of the subject involved, needed immediate consideration or consideration within 24, or 48, or 72 hours—depending on the day of the week on which the Motion was moved—if the House was to have any influence whatever on the immediate situation.

I believe that this is a case in point where the Order ought to operate and that is my submission now. The White Paper that will be published containing the Letter of Intent is only one part of the story. Hon. Members will be able to read it this afternoon and if the Adjournment were to be granted for 7 p.m. tonight, as you have it in your power to do, Sir, or for Monday, in both cases hon. Members will have studied the letter and it will also be possible to introduce into the debate many other substantiated reports from first-class sources which give chapter and verse on the negotiations and on the demands made upon Her Majesty's Government and mentioned in the context of my Motion— … seriously interfere with the ability of Her Majesty's Government and of Parliament to determine the economic and fiscal policies of the United Kingdom". There are involved in the general phrases that we have seen so far and in the more specific reports, first, an agreement every four months for Her Majesty's Government to give an account of their economic and fiscal policies to an outside body, and no one can underestimate the importance of such a commitment. That commitment is not in dispute. Secondly, there has been a demand upon the Government, which they have not accepted, that the Budget should be discussed in detail with an outside body. Thirdly, if we do not have an early opportunity to discuss these negotiations and the commitments the Government have entered into, when legislation comes later, as I submit it inevitably will, it will be seriously influenced by these arrangements.

It will then be too late for the House of Commons to do anything about such legislation, because the Executive will have a powerful argument to use to the House—namely, "We are internationally committed to the pursuance of these policies and cannot go back on them. You said nothing at the time, but allowed the Government to proceed into these commitments. You have no right to complain now of the consequences which flow from it."

Finally, there is nothing to be gained in changing an important Standing Order and taking every possible step to free you from the encasement in which you yourself confessed that you had been kept for so many years when I tried, on a previous occasion—and I have only tried to do this twice in my eight years in four Parliaments—to seek to move the Adjournment of the House.

You said then, in so many words, that you felt very strongly on this point and that the case was one that ought to be granted, but that precedence encased you and did not allow you to grant it. In its later considerations, the House kept very mindful of your advice so that, if a change in the Standing Order is to be meaningful, I submit that this is the occasion when it should be operated. It is on these grounds that I submit my Motion to you now.

Mr. Speaker

The hon. Member for Penistone (Mr. Mendelson) asks leave to move the Adjournment of the House under Standing Order No. 9 on a specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration, namely, the conditions attached to the International Monetary Fund's standby credit which would impose a further period of severe deflation upon this country and would seriously interfere with the ability of Her Majesty's Government and of Parliament to determine the economic and fiscal policies of the United Kingdom. Before I rule on this application, I would like to clarify a point of doubt which arose when last I was asked to rule on an application under the Standing Order. When I ruled on the Standing Order in its new form, an hon. Member suggested that I am not directed by the House to refrain from giving any reason for my decision, but that the question of giving a reason or not lies within my discretion. That is not the case.

The Order passed by the House on 14th November is not all permissive. In certain respects, Mr. Speaker is given a measure of discretion, but in other respects the Order is mandatory, and, in particular. directs Mr. Speaker to give no reason for his decision. Subsection (5) states: Mr. Speaker shall state whether or not he is satisfied that the matter is proper to be discussed without giving the reasons for his decision to the House. It is now my duty to rule on the submission of the hon. Member for Penistone. I thank him for his courtesy in advising me that he would seek to raise this matter, advising me as early as he could this morning, and I also thank him for the succinct and persuasive way in which he put his arguments. He has asked leave to move the Adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a matter which he thinks should have urgent consideration.

I have given careful study to the circumstances to which the hon. Gentleman has drawn attention, but, in the light of the new provisions, I now rule that his submission does not fall within the provisions of the revised Standing Order and, therefore, I cannot submit his application to the House.

Mr. Michael Foot

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Of course, I am not seeking to question your Ruling in any sense. That would be quite improper. But since the House has just started to operate a new Standing Order in dealing with these matters, perhaps I may put it to you that many of us, listening to the submission of my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone (Mr. Mendelson), concluded that this was precisely the kind of matter the change was designed to bring within the purview of the new Standing Order and that the matter was one of great urgency and importance. We fully expected, therefore. a Ruling that we could have a debate, probably on Monday.

I am not questioning your Ruling. What I am asking is quite separate from that. Following the two or three Rulings you have given previously and in particular, on this matter, would you undertake to give to the House at an curly date a statement on your Rulings about this matter and on your understanding of how the Standing Order, as revised, liberates you from the previous situation?

I say this particularly in relation to matters of urgency, which I would have thought this subject of the I.M.F. credit to be, but if you could tell us in general terms how you believe the change in the Order has liberated you from the previous situation, it would be a guidance to hon. Members in future as to how they can use their facilities.

If you could give that guidance, it may he that the House may decide that it has made a mistake in the way in which it has revised Standing Order No. 9. In view of your latest Ruling, some of us believe that to be the case and the only remedy we would have, therefore, would he to put down a Motion to get it changed again. It would be of great assistance to many of us who will seek to get this matter changed, if your Ruling is to stand as it is at present, if you could tell us precisely how you believe the change in the Standing Order alters the situation from what we had before.

Mr. Ridley

Further to that point of order. There are many hon. Members on this side of the House who agree with the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) that this is the sort of matter, whatever we may feel about the merits, which could well form the subject of a debate under Standing Order No. 9.

I endorse what the hon. Gentleman has said and I hope that it will be possible for you to indicate, Mr. Speaker, how the subject of the debate for which the hon. Member for Penistone (Mr. Mendelson) has asked could be brought within the purview of the Standing Order if the House were so minded to alter the Standing Order by Resolution at a future date.

In addition to knowing how it has been changed, it would be a great help if we could know how we should further change it to bring matters of this sort within order.

Mr. English

Further to that point of order. I wish, first, to thank you, Mr. Speaker, for the kindly way in which you pointed out that the other day I was mistaken. The matter upon which I was mistaken is precisely the difficulty.

What I thought was the case and still believe ought to be the case is that we neither required Mr. Speaker to give reasons, nor directed that he should not give reasons. The reason for the former was that by giving reasons in every possible case successive Speakers might again narrow and restrict the scope of the rule, as happened in the past.

It seems to me that the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) has put very clearly the precise difficulty in which you find yourself, Mr. Speaker, since as the rule stands at present you are precluded from giving reasons, even when you feel that you should because they are of importance on an issue of this character; but we can never know what guides your actions in any way. This seems to be a trap into which the House has unintentionally fallen.

May I submit that, although you are precluded by the Standing Order from giving reasons in individual cases, you might on a suitable occasion, as a general statement unconnected with this or any other particular case, be able to give your interpretation of the meaning of the words of the Standing Order?

Sir H. Legge-Bourke

Further to that point of order. If, as I hope, you are prepared to answer the request of the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) favourably and you are able, Mr. Speaker, to give us a considered statement at a time appropriate to yourself, will you consider particularly including in that statement your own interpretation of the extent to which, if at all, you are in any way bound by the precedents which used to apply before Standing Order No. 9 was amended?

Many of us supported the alteration on the assumption that you would be starting de novo all over again and that you would not in any way feel bound by the old precedents which used to apply to the Standing Order before it was amended.

Mr. Speaker

I am grateful to hon. Members for raising what is a serious matter. We are at the beginning of the application of a new Standing Order and I have to be careful lest anything I say becomes a precedent which binds Mr. Speaker on future occasions.

Hon. Members who read the evidence which Mr. Speaker gave to the Select Committee on Procedure will know exactly what Mr. Speaker thinks about the whole issue of Standing Order No. 9 and the difficulty of reconciling the various aspects of the problem.

I can answer the last question of the hon. and gallant Member for the Isle of Ely (Sir H. Legge-Bourke) now. The aim of the Standing Order was to abolish all previous precedents. No such precedents exist in the mind of Mr. Speaker. I am concerned about and I am aware of the disappointment which any hon. Member must feel when his application for a debate under Standing Order No. 9 is not granted. I can only assure the House that I have given tremendous thought to the problem. I sense the feeling of the House and I know how deeply hon. Members are concerned about it and I shall do my best to carry out the Standing Order.

On the other hand, the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) is right. If the application of the new Standing Order does not prove in the long run to secure for the House more acceptances of debates under Standing Order No. 9 than happened during the previous long period, then it would be the duty of the House to have a look at it again. I am conscious of this problem.