Petitioners' Rights (Hansard, 26 July 1988)

§ Mr. Harry Barnes (Derbyshire, North-East)

I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to protect the signatories of petitions presented to any organisation or body outside the House of Commons from any penalty or discrimination, legal or otherwise. The Bill that I seek to introduce is about petitioners' rights. Three of the greatest petitions ever presented to Parliament were the people's charters of the 19th century. They contained six points of wide constitutional and democratic significance: secret ballots, equal electoral districts, payment of MPs, the end of property qualifications for people entering Parliament, universal male suffrage and parliaments to be elected annually. Only that last demand has not yet seen the light of day. The suffragettes helped to overcome the sexist limitations of the initial Chartists' demands.

The poll tax legislation which has just been adopted, together with the earlier measure for Scotland, likewise contains six points of great constitutional and democratic significance, but they are all regressive, making it a counter-charter. First, the franchise will be cut, as many of those who cannot afford their poll tax seek to evade it by leaving their names off the poll tax and electoral registers. Secondly, normal democracy will be virtually ended as the central state machine takes over the last remnants of local government independence. Thirdly, just to be on the safe side, local government elections will be fixed as pressure is created to keep down poll tax levels and the services that they provide.

Fourthly, the poor will be required to subsidise the rich, in contrast to the norms of democratic taxation systems. Fifthly, for the first time since the universal franchise was finally achieved in the Acts of 1918 and 1928, people will have to pay tax to qualify to vote. Sixthly, civil liberties essential to a democracy will be damaged, as poll tax registrars will be required to invade all sorts of sensitive information to try to discover who is missing from their registers.

In the House on 28 March, at column 839, the hon. Member for Stockton, South (Mr. Devlin) even hit on the notion of using anti-poll-tax petitions as an avenue for placing people's names on poll tax registers. The Minister of State, Scottish Office agreed with that in column 851—as, it seems, did the Leader of the House in answer to my business question on 23 June, in columns 1278–79.

There is, of course, a logic to such illiberal thought. If criminal records, housing benefit and educational grant records and so on can be invaded by the poll tax registrar, why not use petitioners' names and addresses? Fortunately, public petitions to Parliament are out for such purposes because, as you confirmed, Mr. Speaker, in column 1281 of Hansardof 23 June, the names and addresses of such petitioners are Parliament's property and are not available to the Government or to the registrars. However, petitions to the Prime Minister, Government Departments and poll tax registrars are available for this use and abuse unless the House decides to pass a Bill on the lines of the one that I seek to introduce.

It is time to turn the logic of the hon. Member for Stockton, South the right way round. If there is a sound, democratic and constitutional reason for protecting 259 petitioners' names and addresses, might there not be a similar reason for protecting sensitive information on housing, employment and education? The word "petition" means a prayerful request and in its constitutional form it is an application for redress to an authority, and no duress can be levelled at petitioners for the act of petitioning. Nowadays such authorities are often Government Departments and agencies, but it is essentially the monarch, Parliament and the courts that are currently covered by petitioners' rights.

My Bill would protect the signatories to petitions presented to any organisation or body outside Parliament from any discrimination, legal or otherwise, and would include such petitions as the people's petition recently presented to the Prime Minister. Petitions to the Commons must be in writing and must be free from disrespectful language or imputations against any tribunal or constituted authority. The Bill would require similar provisions and checks over petitions qualifying for protection when delivered outside Parliament.

I am seeking to place petitions in this country on the same, or on a similar, level to petitions in the United States of America, while acknowledging the constitutional differences between the United Kingdom and the United States. The right to petition the Government in the USA is secured by the first amendment to the United States constitution, which was ratified between 1789 and 1791. It says: Congress shall make no law … abridging … the right of the people peacefully to assemble and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. A United States Supreme Court ruling in 1875 in the United States v. Cruikshank case took the view that the first amendment assumes the existence of the right of the people to assemble for lawful purposes and protects it against encroachment by Congress. The right was not created by the amendment; neither was its continuance guaranteed except as against congressional interference. For their protection in its enjoyment, therefore, the people must look to the states. The power for that purpose was originally placed there, and has never been surrendered. The right of the people peaceably to assemble for the purpose of petitioning Congress for a redress of grievances, or for anything else connected with the powers or duties of the national government is an attribute of national citizenship, and as such under the protection of and guaranteed by the United States. The very idea of a government republican in form implies a right on the part of its citizens to meet peaceably for consultation in respect to public affairs and to petition for a redress of grievances". That protection should be provided in this country in connection with petitions to Government. My Bill seeks to protect petitioners who add their names and addresses to petitions to the Government and other official bodies.

260 That protection would be similar to the protections provided to those who petition Parliament in the way that is laid down in "Erskine May".

In seeking to extend petitioning rights I should tell hon. Members that they should be aware of the role that petitioning played in the development of Parliament and parliamentary democracy. The right to petition the monarch goes back to Saxon times and was implicitely recognised in Magna Carta. The Bill of Rights 1688, the tercentenary of which we have just celebrated, said: it is the right of the Subjects to petition the King, and all commitments and prosecutions for such petitions are illegal. Parliament probably originated in meetings of the King's Council, which considered petitions. Up to the start of the 15th century the main work of Parliament was the considering of petitions. It was only with the final growth of parliamentary democracy, especially with the slow start of the working-class franchise from 1867, that petitioning started to lose its constitutional significance.

When people acquire the vote, have the freedom to join together in trade unions which can freely negotiate for their interests, start to have their ideas and interests expessed in the press, make the political system respond to their concerns through a progressive taxation system and a growing welfare state, petitioning will be of minor significance. However, when employment Bills, Budgets, cuts in the Health Service, attacks on housing benefit and income support, Murdoch and the poll tax start to dismantle the workers' achievements, petitioning rights become important in an age of declining freedoms.

Furthermore, we can no longer be described as a parliamentary democracy. Elections are presidential. Governments dictate to Parliament through the Whips and through their use of patronage. The new computer technology adds to central control and authority. Against such trends, democratisation at the workplace and decentralisation are essential. Petitioning rights have their part to play in the struggle for re-enfranchisement, similar in many ways to the Chartists' initial struggle for working-class enfranchisement.