WIDOWS', ORPHANS' AND OLD AGE CONTRIBUTORY PENSIONS BILL. (Hansard, 6 December 1929)

§ THE PAYMASTER-GENERAL (LORD ARNOLD)
My Lords, I beg to move that the Commons Reason for disagreement to certain of the Lords Amendments be now considered. In moving this Motion it would be convenient for me to state that the Amendments to which the Commons have disagreed are those moved by the noble Earl, Lord Onslow, imposing a means test. The Reason which the Commons assign for disagreement to these Amendments is the ordinary reason of Privilege. The Speaker having ruled that a question of Privilege arises on these Amendments, I do not think I need say anything more, except that I propose to move, when the time comes, that the Lords do not insist on their Amendments.

§ THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY
My Lords, I hope your Lordships will realise once more the immense inconvenience of the method under which your Lordships' actions are treated by the 998 Government who have control of business in another place. It is not as though your Lordships took an undue time in the discussion of this Bill. On the contrary, so far as I can speak for my noble friends on this side of the House, we placed no obstacle whatever in the way of the Government proceeding with despatch with this Bill. Your Lordships allowed the Government to suspend Standing Order No. XXXIX., in order to take two of the important stages of the Bill on one day, and we sent the Bill back, as I say, with all diligence to the House of Commons.
I am given to understand that in another place the Amendments of your Lordships were considered at a late hour, and we are now called upon to take what action your Lordships may think fit in respect of the Commons' disagreement with your Lordships' Amendments. We have no Papers before us. I have secured, by the courtesy no doubt of the Government and by the action of the authorities of the House, a typewritten copy of the Reason why the Commons disagreed with the Lords Amendments, but that is all the information practically that we have got, because the debate in the House of Commons took place so late that even the OFFICIAL REPORT gives only a very small part of those proceedings. Therefore, your Lordships are called upon to take action without any proper information as to what the House of Commons have done. I agree that on the present occasion I think it unlikely that your Lordships would wish to differ from the House of Commons, but I think it most important to place upon record that in accepting treatment of this kind we do not intend to allow this to be a universal precedent. It is quite impossible to carry on the business of Parliament unless the proper forms are obeyed. To send us back this Bill in this condition is not treating your Lordships' House according to the ordinary rules. No doubt, in the present instance your Lordships will, I think, be well advised not to take any definite action thereupon, for the reason which I will state in a moment, but I earnestly hope the Government will realise that that is not the method with which those of us who have the honour to have had a seat in your Lordships' House for many years, ought to be treated.
999 The noble Lord has been good enough to tell us that the Reason why the Commons have disagreed with the Lords Amendments upon the question of necessitous widows and the exclusion from the operation of the Bill of widows who are not necessitous, is the old ordinary formula of Privilege. I think it right to make one observation about that. So long as the Privilege of the House of Commons was generally enforced—that is to say that, whenever there was what that great Assembly considered to be a breach of Privilege, they disagreed to the Lords Amendments—so long as that was generally the case, there was a good deal to be said from the point of view of the House of Commons for their action. But according to recent practice, of which this Bill itself is a signal example, the House of Commons do not enforce their privilege in every case. On the contrary, so far as this Bill is concerned, I am given to understand from what the noble Lord has just said that the Privilege has been waived in the great majority of cases. I suppose there is hardly one of the Amendments which your Lordships put into the Bill which, upon the rigid interpretation of Privilege as it has prevailed in the House of Commons—although I do not know that it was ever admitted by your Lordships—was not a breach of Privilege. In respect of all these it has been waived. Therefore, this formula with which we are familiar that it is unnecessary to offer a further Reason, hoping that the breach of Privilege is a sufficient Reason, has ceased to be of any real meaning.
It comes to this, that Privilege is only used in the House of Commons in order to avoid giving a Reason for their actions in respect of Amendments by the House of Lords. Whenever they think fit—and of course I do not challenge their right to do such a thing at all—they have waived the Privilege and then this formula disappears. But whenever it seems good to them, and whenever the House of Commons would prefer not to give any Reasons for the disagreement with your Lordships' House, then they fall back upon this hoary formula which we have before us this morning. In this part of the observations which I desire to address to your Lordships I am not making any complaint, but I want to place on record that it is now the practice of 1000 the House of Commons not to insist upon their Privileges but to use Privilege, or at any rate in part to use Privilege, as an opportunity for not giving to the Lords the Reason for which they differ from their Amendments.
I do not want to trouble your Lordships with any more observations when we come to the specific question of agreement or disagreement. Therefore your Lordships will perhaps allow me to say that, so far as the present case is concerned, I shall not suggest to your Lordships that the Lords should insist upon the Amendments with which the Commons have disagreed. If I may be so self-regarding as to refer to any observations of my own, I would venture to remind you that when the Bill was in Committee of your Lordships' House I said that I did not expect the Lords would insist upon the Amendment if the Commons disagreed with it. I did that, of course, anticipating what would happen. I took that view then, and I take that view now. We sent that Amendment to the Commons with the object of giving them an opportunity of reconsidering the decision at which they had arrived during the stages when the Bill was in the House of Commons.
As regards the Amendment itself, it is more a matter of principle—as I think the noble Lord himself pointed out in debate when we were in Committee—than a question of the actual saving which such an Amendment would have secured for the taxpayers, if it had been agreed to. The amount of money involved was not a large sum, because the figure at which we had put the necessitous or non-necessitous widow—the point where they were divided one from the other—was so high. That is perfectly true. Therefore the saving would not be very great. It was more a matter of principle. It was an effort of your Lordships' House to assert once more its grave apprehension at the want of principle under which the Government were acting in throwing extra burdens on the taxpayer. We were so deeply impressed with the risk which this country is running by the many burdens of taxation in all its forms, whether it be rates or taxes, which have now to be borne by the people of this country; we were so gravely alarmed by the reaction which this must have upon industry in this country, that we desired to place once 1001 more upon record our profound apprehension in the matter and our hope that the House of Commons would co-operate with us in restricting these heavy burdens. For that reason we sent the Amendment which was under discussion back to the House of Commons for their reconsideration in the hope that they would be wise enough to accept it. That has not been the case and, so far as I am concerned personally, I shall not ask your Lordships to insist upon the Amendment.

§ THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (LORD PARMOOR)
My Lords, there are two points as to which I should like to raise rather strong objection to what has been said by the noble Marquess opposite. He is never tired of trying to lecture us on this side of the House as to the treatment of business in this House. I want to say in the most direct and positive manner that I have been in this House now for a large number of years, as he knows—for fifteen years—and I say without any hesitation that no Government in that time has treated this House with greater respect than the present Government. We have made it an object of our policy, if I may use that expression, that this House should be utilised, and it is now being utilised, as everyone knows who has regard to the Order Paper, to a greater extent than it has ever been utilised, at any rate during the fifteen years in which I have been here. And yet on every occasion when we try to expedite business so as to make co-operation between this House and the other place as easy as possible, we always have this same lecture. I think that with my eyes shut I could say over again what the noble Marquess has always said about the dignity of the House. I think the dignity of this House is best respected and best assured by bringing real business before it and by its being given work of an important kind to do by the Government that is in power for the time being.
As regards this particular matter, how unjust, if I may say so, the accusation of the noble Marquess has been! I did press, in the first instance, for the Committee stage of this Bill to be taken on the Friday in the same week as the Second Reading, but on his suggestion that the time was short, we postponed it so as to give a full week's interval before entering upon the Commitee 1002 stage. It is quite true that before the Committee stage, thinking it best for our business—and I think it would have been best for our business—I put down a Motion to suspend the Standing Order. The noble Marquess asked that this should not be done, and I withdrew the Motion. I am not sure that I was not too weak in that, but as a desire, which the noble Marquess seems entirely to disregard—

§ THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY
Perhaps the noble and learned Lord will forgive me if I interrupt him.

§ LORD PARMOOR
Well, I will; but I am in possession.

§ THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY
Oh, certainly. I should be very sorry if the noble Lord thought that I blamed, or indeed ventured humbly to criticise, the action of noble Lords opposite in respect of the conduct of business in your Lordships' House. That was not at all my intention. The criticism I delivered was on the conduct of business by the Government in another place, which has placed your Lordships in this position.

§ LORD PARMOOR
I am really grateful that those of my colleagues who are here have heard what the noble Marquess says. That was not the impression that I carried away. I thought that it was a lecture against noble Lords on, this Bench, but I gratefully accept the noble Marquess's statement, and I hope that we shall not hear the suggestion, which is certainly made from time to time, that at present noble Lords on this side desire anything else than to give this House its legitimate position by taking advantage—

§ THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY
I quite agree.

§ LORD PARMOOR
I met the House on every occasion, so far as I could. In fact, I think we altogether met any objection as to pressing forward business in an exceptional way.

§ THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY
The noble and learned Lord has been very courteous, and I am very much obliged to him.

§ LORD PARMOOR
There is no one with whom I desire less to have any 1003 controversy than the noble Marquess opposite. I think he has been always very courteous, particularly to me personally, and I am very grateful to hear what he says now. If I was wrong I put it out of my mind, and we will all put out of our minds the idea that there was any intention whatever to suggest that we on this side of the House have any other desire than not only to treat this House with great courtesy but to give it its legitimate position in legislative and political work which any Second Chamber ought to have, so long as it exists, in a country like this.
If we put that point aside, what is the complaint of the noble Marquess? When this matter was before us in Committee and the question of the word "necessitous" was raised in a most able and moderate speech by the noble Earl opposite, Lord Onslow, the noble Marquess advised this House to accept the Amendment, saying at the same time that there was no intention of insisting upon it ultimately if the other House took a different view and maintained the Bill in the form in which it was sent up here. We acknowledge that. I think it was perfectly right, and no one knows better than the noble Marquess that it is often advisable to raise points of this kind for further discussion in the other House when it is not intended to press the view of this House in such a way as to raise a definite point of dispute between the two Houses. He knows that perfectly well. Then what is he complaining of at the present time? All the Amendments that were inserted in this House were accepted, except two. I do not know how many there were, but there were a considerable number of very valuable Amendments, particularly in the matter of drafting. We took very great care indeed. All the Amendments were accepted, except two, and the only one that is really involved in our discussion at the present moment is that which introduced the word "necessitous".
We discussed that point fully. I will not say that we discussed it too much, for it was an important point, but we discussed it so thoroughly that I did not think that the matter would require further discussion, since there was no probability that this House would insist upon its Amendment. Are we to have what I might call futile discussions over 1004 and over again? Under these conditions, after the time that we have taken over this matter and knowing that after all this House was going to agree with the other place, what would have been the benefit of it? We might have aroused friction, to which I very much object between one House and the other. We might have said hard things of one another, which could never do the slightest good. So far as discussion in the true sense of the term, that of arriving at a true conclusion, is concerned, that had already been concluded.
Let me say one other word as regards the conduct of business. I will not go back to the other matters. What is there, in an arrangement of this kind, which prevents our dealing with all the matters which the noble Marquess desires to discuss? Is there a single thing left over, since only two of our Amendments were disagreed to in the House of Commons? What is there left to discuss? If we were here for days we could not discuss these points more fully than they have already been discussed. I entirely join issue on that. To come down here for futile discussions on points which have already been settled does not conduce to the dignity of the House or of the Legislature of a great country like ours. I am bound to differ from the noble Marquess. I will not say more, because I am grateful to the noble Marquess for what he has said. I presume that we must have misunderstood the first and major part of his speech.