Lords Sitting of 16 June 1997

Preamble
The House met at half-past two of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Southwell.
The Marquess of Tweeddale—Took the Oath.
The Bishop of Liverpool—Took the Oath.

Message from the Queen
The Lord Chamberlain (The Earl of Airlie): My Lords, I have the honour to present to your Lordships a message from Her Majesty the Queen signed by her own hand. The message is as follows:
"I have received with great satisfaction the loyal and dutiful expression of your thanks for the Speech with which I opened the present Session of Parliament".

Parliamentary Procedure
Lord Wallace of Saltaire Lord Wallace of Saltaire asked the Leader of the House:
Following the appointment of a Commons Select Committee to look at ways of making parliamentary procedure more effective and efficient, whether a similar proposal will be made for a comparable committee in the House of Lords.
The Lord Privy Seal (Lord Richard): My Lords, the noble Lord makes an interesting proposition on which I have an open mind, though leaning towards the sympathetic. It is, of course, very much a matter for the House itself and therefore I shall be consulting with the usual channels and the Chairman of Committees.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that Answer to my Question. Perhaps I may be tempted a little further by his sympathy into asking him to accept that changes which are made in the Commons procedure in terms of pre-legislative scrutiny, organisation of committees and management of legislation necessarily affect what the revising Chamber does, even if we stop before considering joint committees and the like. Therefore, does he consider that, as the other place considers revising its procedures, we may need to do the same?
Lord Richard: My Lords, with great respect to the noble Lord, there are better arguments for his proposition. What he has just said is an argument for not doing it until after the House of Commons has reported. That is certainly one side of the argument. The other side is that this House should give consideration to its own procedures at this stage. As I said, I have an open mind on that.
Viscount Cranborne: My Lords, will the noble Lord accept from me that this side of the House has great faith
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in his judgment in these matters and will look with confidence to the guidance that he gives to the House in considering what will be a difficult matter of judgment? Nevertheless, will he recognise, when he comes to give guidance to the House in these matters, which are particularly fashionable at the moment and understandably so, that this House is not a clone of the other place? As he said in his Answer to the noble Lord, there is a great deal to be said for this House not falling into the seductive trap, very often indulged in—dare I say?—by Members of your Lordships' House who have had experience of another place, of believing that the practices of another place are necessarily better than those of your Lordships' House. If the noble Lord. Lord Wallace, has thoughts on this matter, will the noble Lord the Lord Privy Seal consider asking him to submit a paper for the consideration of the Procedure Committee?
Lord Richard: My Lords, I personally am touched by the noble Viscount's faith in my judgment. Any guidance that I give to the House will be well considered. Frankly, I do not want to go any further this afternoon than what I said to the noble Lord, Lord Wallace. It seems to me that this is a matter which the House might wish to consider. But it is a matter for the House to decide whether it wants to consider it. As regards the noble Viscount's observations about the difference between this House and the other place, as he and I know, having served in both Houses, the answer to what he asked is yes.
Lord Dean of Beswick: My Lords, does the noble Lord agree that a matter of this kind should be referred to the Procedure Committee of your Lordships' House? Bearing that in mind, does the noble Lord the Leader of the House agree that any changes that do come through shall not be at the expense of the freedom of individual Members of your Lordships' House to challenge the Executive and the Government, whenever they feel it appropriate, on the Floor of this Chamber?
Lord Richard: My Lords, of course, it is a matter for the committees of your Lordships' House to decide which way this House wishes to go. The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, might indeed think hard about the suggestion made by the noble Viscount the Leader of the Opposition as to whether he should put a paper before the Procedure Committee. So far as concerns the rest of my noble friend's question, yes, I entirely agree with what he said.
Lord Beloff: My Lords, does the noble Lord the Leader of the House agree that most of our important procedures are carried out in this Chamber? Does he further agree that an important part of those procedures is that we should feel comfortable? Would he suggest that comfort to the Opposition Benches could be assured if the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, and his friends would cross to the other Benches in conformity with their oft expressed admiration of the new Government?
Lord Richard: My Lords, I feel extremely comfortable with the existing arrangements in the House, infinitely more comfortable than I felt three

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months ago. The place where the Liberal Party sits is very much a matter for the Liberal Democrats and the Conservative Party to work out for themselves
Baroness David: My Lords, can my noble friend say, if a committee is set up, whether it will look at the procedure for the introduction of Peers? Cannot there be a reduction in the ceremony that goes on?
Lord Richard: My Lords, I have considerable sympathy with what my noble friend says. Again, it is a matter for the House. Whether or not at some stage I will feel moved to offer the House the firm and well thought out guidance to which the Leader of the Opposition referred a moment ago in relation to the introduction ceremony remains to be seen.
Lord Campbell of Alloway: My Lords, is the noble Lord the Leader of the House aware that there is anything radically wrong with the existing arrangements? They have gone on and changed from time to time to meet circumstances.
Lord Richard: My Lords, the noble Lord tempts me. At this stage all I will say is that it is a matter for the House. Though I have a sympathetic view in relation to this request, it will have to go through the normal committees in the normal way.

BSE and Other EU Countries
2.44 p.m.
Lord Bruce of Donington Lord Bruce of Donington, on behalf of Lord Wyatt of Weeford, asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they have studied the report in the Sunday Times of 1st June which indicated that beef imported into the United Kingdom from European Union states carried a high risk of being infected by BSE: and whether they will seek a ban on the export of beef by those states.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Lord Donoughue): My Lords, I trust that my noble friend is not too ill in Ascot week. The Sunday Times report refers to findings by a Commission study of BSE controls in the European Union indicating lapses in the identification and reporting of BSE in member states. The Spongiform Encephalopathy Advisory Committee considered this matter at its most recent meeting and recommended that action should be taken to extend our specified bovine material controls to imported material. In the light of that advice, the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food announced on 5th June that we were opening consultation on proposals which would mean that the requirement to remove and dispose of specified tissues would apply not only to carcasses of cattle slaughtered in the UK, but also to imported bovine material. We are not proposing an import ban.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that satisfactory reply. However, is he
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aware that when this matter first arose in May of last year, when the European Commission put out a regulation banning the United Kingdom from exporting beef to countries other than those in the EC, the then government and the then opposition were united in support of my contention that the EC acted entirely illegally? One would hope that that action is still being pursued. If any doubts arise again in the future, I hope that Her Majesty's Government will not hesitate to take the appropriate legal action through the European Court of Justice.
Lord Donoughue: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for his question. The Government are proceeding, as did their predecessor, through the European Court of Justice in protest against what they see as an excessive use of the powers of the European Union. We await the result of that judgment which we consider should be due before the end of the year. In relation to any ban which members may incline towards, it would not be appropriate for us to pursue a ban on imports while at the same time protesting that such a ban was beyond the EU powers. I should point out also that it is contrary to GATT, to which we are a signatory, as well as contrary to the single market treaty.
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that all our undertakings on BSE followed strict scientific advice? Is he happy and confident that other European countries are proceeding in the same way as we have always proceeded?
Lord Donoughue: My Lords, to the best of my knowledge that is the case. We act only on strict scientific advice. When my right honourable friend announced on 5th June that we were applying the same controls to imports that we applied to our own meat, it was based on the SEAC report. The European Commission takes independent veterinary advice and acts upon it. I have no reason to believe that that is not independent and highly qualified advice.
Lord Jenkins of Putney: My Lords, can my noble friend say whether or not I misunderstood him? I believe he said that the Government were adopting a ban which they would not enforce. What is the use of an unenforced ban?
Lord Donoughue: My Lords, I do not believe that that is what I said. or anything like it. I said that we were not introducing a ban. However, we are applying controls to imported meat of the same kind that we apply to ourselves. That will be strictly enforced.
Viscount Waverley: My Lords, who will pay the cost of the measures outlined in the noble Lord's initial response?
Lord Donoughue: My Lords, consultation is currently taking place. That will be completed at the end of this month. The Government will then announce their proposals.
Lord Hooson: My Lords, if we are imposing the same kind of controls over imported meat from the

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European Community as we do on our own meat, does this also extend to other countries such as the United States? That, after all, in 1950, was the first country to ban imports of British beef.
Lord Donoughue: My Lords, the controls apply to all countries where it is suspected that there is BSE. They do not apply to countries such as the United States; to some what I would call old Commonwealth countries; to one or two countries in Africa; and to one or two countries in South America, where there is no reason to believe that there is BSE. If there is reason to believe that there is BSE, the controls will be applied.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords, in the light of the report in the Sunday Times and the risk of BSE infected meat now entering this country, will my noble friend have conversation with firms such as McDonald's and Burger King and with food manufacturers which rushed to ban British beef, which is now recognised to be the safest in the world? Will he have words with them now and ask them to reverse their ban and include British beef in their products?
Lord Donoughue: Yes, my Lords. We believe that the ban was precipitous. My right honourable friend is in the process of being in touch with the firms that my noble friend mentioned.
The Countess of Mar: My Lords, is it not the case that all these measures were taken because of the fear that BSE was transmissible to humans? Can he say whether there has been any confirmatory scientific evidence of the work of Professor Collinge, which precipitated the announcement by Mr. Stephen Dorrell last March bringing in all these extra measures?
Lord Donoughue: My Lords, I wish I knew what was ultimately confirmatory scientific advice. We can only take the best advice we get and be as cautious in applying it as we can. That is what we are doing
Lord Lucas: My Lords, does the noble Lord accept that we are delighted by what the Government are doing? Can he tell us whether the European Commission is similarly delighted? Can he also clear up a little confusion in my mind from the Statement last Thursday? Was the noble Lord saying then that the Government are contemplating continuing the 30 months' scheme for a considerable period into the future but reducing—perhaps even substantially reducing—the compensation paid to farmers under it?
Lord Donoughue: My Lords, on the latter point, our proposals for compensation will emerge in due course. On the other point, it would only be honest to say that not everyone on the Continent welcomed with complete glee what we said. The Commission itself is troubled by the situation on the Continent in terms of surveillance and control of BSE and has, first last December and again on 14th May of this year. put forward proposals
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to introduce Europe-wide standard controls. So in the Commission there is considerable understanding of our approach.
Lord Dixon-Smith: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that it is only the existence of an adequate compensation scheme for farmers in this country that ensures that infected animals are brought forward for slaughter? It is the absence of such a scheme across most of mainland Europe which means there is doubt as to whether infected animals are brought forward. Will he bear that in mind in any review of the compensation scheme the Government might undertake?
Lord Donoughue: My Lords, I wholly agree with the noble Lord. The need to avoid fraudulent evasion and the need to ensure that all cases are brought forward and disposed of will be the main factors behind our decisions on compensation.

Standards Task Force
2.55 p.m.
Lord Quirk Lord Quirk asked Her Majesty's Government:
What will be the role of the Standards Task Force announced by the Secretary of State for Education and Employment on 30th May.
Lord Whitty: My Lords, the Standards Task Force announced by the Secretary of State will bring together interests throughout our education service and beyond and it is part of our drive to raise standards in schools. The task force will advise the Secretary of State on the developments and implementation of policies, it will keep him informed of best practice and be an advocate of the spread of good practice. The task force will work with national agencies and with others to achieve the national targets for literacy and numeracy that have already been announced.
Lord Quirk: My Lords, I naturally welcome, as who would not, any further initiative to raise educational standards and I am grateful to the Minister for the further detail he has given on this one. But may I ask him for a little more detail? Will the new task force publish periodic reports on what it is doing? Will it make recommendations; for example, to individual schools, to institutions, or more broadly? Is it the case that the task force will address itself to one particular educational level—say, primary level—or will it spread right throughout the education system? Furthermore, will it address perhaps particular curricula areas, such as literacy and numeracy? In all those connections, if I may sum them up, what will be the new task force's relation to existing task forces, such as those on numeracy and literacy, to the newly established task force, the Standards and Effectiveness Unit, in the Department for Education and Employment, and of course to Her Majesty's Inspectorate in Ofsted?
Lord Whitty: My Lords, the noble Lord has asked a number of questions. The task force will hope to work

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closely with all of those bodies, including the new numeracy task force under David Reynolds, and with the inspectorate and will take advice and information from all of them. It will report to Ministers. Ministers are not laying down the form of those reports, but the Standards Task Force will itself be free to decide whether it publishes a regular report or an occasional report. It will cover all aspects of school standards. However, there will of course from time to time be priorities for the focus of its activities, including the one I have already mentioned, in regard to the achievement of numeracy and literacy targets at age 11.
Lord Henley: My Lords, bearing in mind that two vice-chairmen with what one could call widely differing views have been appointed to this task force—the noble Lord will be able to confirm that—can he give an assurance that those different views can be accommodated? Bearing in mind what seems to be a road-to-Damascus conversion towards traditional classroom teaching standards, can the noble Lord again give an assurance, having agreed that their different views can be accommodated, that that road-to-Damascus conversion is not merely illusory? Can he also tell us how often the committee will meet?
Lord Whitty: My Lords, it will lay down its own frequency of meeting but it will meet at least once a month. Because it is bringing in a wide range of opinion, both in its own membership and in the bodies it consults, the intention is that we will reach a consensus, albeit that some people come to that task force with widely differing views. As to a conversion on the road to Damascus, it has always been the view on this side of the House that standards in schools are central to our education policy. We intend that the task force will point the way to achieving some very basic standards of literacy, in regard to which, unfortunately, the inheritance from the former government has left something to be desired.
Lord Walton of Detchant: My Lords, is the Minister aware of moves now being made towards the establishment of a college of teachers? In the light of the Government's pledge in their manifesto to establish a general teaching council, can the Minister give any indication as to when such a council is likely to be established? Surely those two major initiatives could play an important role in improving standards in the teaching profession?
Lord Whitty: My Lords, at the end of the day the delivery of these higher standards will be very much due to the quality of teaching, which of itself is due very much to the training of teachers.

Business of the House: Debates, 19th June
3 p.m
Lord Richard: My Lords,I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper
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Moved, That the provisions of Standing Order 38(4) be dispensed with on Thursday 19th June to allow the Motion in the name of the Earl Russell to be taken before that in the name of the Baroness Hogg.—(Lord Richard.)
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: My Lords, having declared an interest as the father of the noble Baroness, Lady Hogg, why is it thought necessary to alter the order of batting?
Lord Richard: My Lords, Standing Orders give precedence on days other than Wednesdays to Select Committee reports over Motions for Prayers, such as that tabled by the noble Earl, Lord Russell. It has been agreed through the usual channels that, for the convenience of the House, the Prayer of the noble Earl, Lord Russell, should be taken before the debate on the Select Committee report in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hogg. This Motion does nothing more than to give effect to that agreement. It has no general application and I assure the noble Lord that no discourtesy is intended to his daughter.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Law Officers Bill [H.L.]
3.1 p.m.
The Solicitor-General (Lord Falconer of Thoroton): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
For me, this is a momentous and nerve-racking day. It is my maiden speech in the House of Lords. It is my first speech as Solicitor-General and it is my first speech in full-time politics. I am proud to sit in the House of Lords. I am proud to hold the honourable and historic office of Solicitor-General for England and Wales; and I am especially proud to be a member of this reforming Labour Government
When I left private practice at the Bar suddenly on Monday 5th May to take up my present role, I was relieved at least in one respect: that I would no longer face on a regular basis the risk of judicial destruction of what I had said. So often, that which looked watertight in chambers proved easily prone to well aimed judicial torpedo.
As I took my seat in the House on 15th May 1997 there, to my horror, dotted around the Chamber—sitting in some cases on the steps and aisles—were all the usual judicial suspects willing me on with what appeared to be a genuine warmth. Whether the warmth was the anticipation of the burning flesh as they hold my feet and my logic to the fire, only time will tell. I thought, on that day, you can run, but you just cannot hide.
I have, since my abrupt arrival in this House, been welcomed with immense kindness by my follow Peers. Perhaps I may mention three only. First, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, who, on the day I was introduced into the House, personally congratulated me and told me that the job of Solicitor-General was one of the best in government.

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For those who are aware of his contribution to the law, first as President of the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division and then as a Law Lord, those were encouraging words indeed.
Secondly, the noble Lord, Lord Rodgers of Quarry Bank, said in the Chamber that he was not sure what the Solicitor-General did, but he was sure that it was better that he did it from this place rather than another place. I was not present when he made that speech, but subsequently he repeated it to me with a great deal of warmth (not the whole speech; simply the part dealing with the role of the Solicitor-General).
Thirdly, there is my noble friend Lord Callaghan of Cardiff, whose judgment I have in recent days particularly come to respect. He congratulated me when he met me for the first time in the House. He particularly complimented me on the photograph of my family in the newspaper. He referred to a lady, who was in fact my wife, and said how very nice the lady standing with her legs crossed holding the child looked. He said that he assumed this was the nanny. I felt this was a compliment both to my wife and myself.
The Bill to which I ask your Lordships to give a Second Reading is not the stuff of political controversy. It seeks simply to remove a difficulty which exists in the running of the Law Officers' department, primarily in respect of the work of a non-political role which the Law Officers perform. In a nutshell, every time the Attorney-General wishes to delegate a particular piece of such work to the Solicitor-General he has formally to authorise the Solicitor to perform it. This means that the papers have to be presented to the Attorney for the delegation to be made.
The Bill, if passed, would permit the Attorney and the Solicitor to agree a general division of labour between them and then the work can be distributed without the need for further formality.
The two Law Officers for England and Wales—the Attorney-General and the Solicitor-General—are politicians, and members of the Government. They are the chief legal advisers for the Executive, and their prime advocates. They also perform a wide range of duties in the public interest in which they are independent of government and to which the doctrine of collective responsibility does not apply.
My right honourable friend in another place is an experienced and heavyweight politician who has held Front Bench office, including Cabinet Office, in all the years that Labour have been in power since 1964. He is a man whom I know from my own experience to be of immense political and legal judgment. Moreover, he is a man who has, from the time I was thrust beneath him, shown to my family and me a degree of tolerance, support and kindness, which was way beyond the call of duty and for which we are immensely grateful. I believe the Labour Government and the nation is lucky that there is such a man as Attorney-General.
In centuries gone by the Law Officers have not performed their role of government advocate with the degree of objectivity and balance which would now be expected of them. In 1730, a leading commentator,
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Mallit, said that some of the people who had held the office of Solicitor and Attorney-General acted at the Bar as if they thought themselves,
"absolved from all the obligations of truth. honour and decency".
Even in the eighteenth century anti-lawyer jokes appeared to be fashionable. Whilst Mallit names no names, he might well have had in mind Sir Edward Coke who, at the trial of Sir Walter Raleigh, described Raleigh as "a monster", and went on:
"Thou are the most vile and execrable traitor that ever lived … I will now make it appear that there never lived a viler viper upon the face of the earth than thou".
That was no doubt part of Sir Edward's non-controversial opening statement.
Or he may have had in mind Richard Rich who, as Solicitor-General, assisted in the prosecution of Sir Thomas More. When there appeared to be a gap in the evidence necessary to convict, the ever-amenable Rich simply went into the witness box and gave the necessary (perjured) evidence himself. At the end of his trial, as described by Robert Bolt in "A Man for all Seasons", More sees around Rich's neck the chain of office of the Attorney-General of Wales, and says:
"For Wales? Why, Richard, it profits a man nothing to give his soul for the whole world … But for Wales!".
The more recent roll of Law Officers, some of whom are in this Chamber this afternoon, has I think completely removed the blot on the reputation of the Law Officers. The Law Officers' public interest functions are wide-ranging and important. Some have arisen by operation of law, such as the Attorney-General's role in representing the interest of charity in the courts; or his role in bringing proceedings to vindicate the rights of the public in court; or his right to enter a nolle prosequi in criminal proceedings thereby halting the proceedings.
Others of his public interest functions come from statute; for example, the Attorney's right to apply to make people vexatious litigants; or his right to refer unduly lenient sentences to the Court of Appeal. With a very few exceptions the performance of these functions is personal to the Attorney-General.
The problem of the personal nature of many of the functions of the Attorney-General is one that Parliament has, on a number of occasions in the past 350 years, sought to address. In 1644 the Long Parliament could not find an Attorney-General. This was hardly surprising since they had impeached the last one and left him languishing in the Fleet prison—no doubt something of a disincentive to his successor. So they passed an ordinance saying the warrants of the Solicitor-General should be treated as if they were those of the Attorney. That was only a temporary measure, which was repealed when a new Attorney was eventually found. The problem was then left in abeyance for 300 years.
In 1943 during the war the then Attorney, Sir Donald Somervell, went to the USA for a prolonged period (some months) to participate in the drafting documents of the United Nations. he left the Law Officers' department in the hands of the then Solicitor-General,

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Sir David Maxwell Fyfe, who went on subsequently to be one of the leading lights in the drafting of the European Convention on Human Rights.
When he returned from the USA Sir Donald sought to remedy some of the problems his absence had caused by introducing and procuring the passage of the Law Officers Act 1944. This permitted the Solicitor-General to perform the statutory functions of the Attorney-General when the office of the Attorney-General was vacant, when the Attorney-General was away or ill and where the Attorney-General had authorised the Solicitor-General to act in a particular case.
That is where the law presently stands. It has significant practical and legal shortcomings. First, it requires the specific delegation in every case as I have described above. Secondly, it does not resolve whether, where the Attorney is available, he can nevertheless delegate his non-statutory functions to the Solicitor.
The position in the Law Officers' department is, therefore, unlike any other Ministry where work of the appropriate level can be assigned to the junior minister without the need for the intervention of the Secretary of State or leading minister, and without the fear, save in the exceptional case, that it could be said the junior minister did not have the authority to undertake the function.
The Bill, for which I am seeking a Second Reading, addresses the problems I have described in a short and straightforward way. Clause 1 permits the Solicitor to perform all the functions of the Attorney for England and Wales. This obviates the need for the specific delegation. It covers the position of vacancy or illness or unavailability on the part of the Attorney, and it removes the doubt about the extent which the Attorney can delegate his non-statutory functions.
Clause 2 does the same in respect of Northern Ireland. Since 1973 the Attorney-General for England and Wales has been ex officio the Attorney for Northern Ireland, by virtue of the Northern Ireland Constitution Act.
Clause 3 is the short Title and repeals section, which repeals the 1944 Act in so far as it relates to the English Law Officers.
The Bill will permit my right honourable and learned friend in another place who is in charge of the department and his successors to run the department in a sensible and efficient manner, using the Solicitor-General to the full, without the need for specific delegation. I beg to move that the Bill be read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(Lord Falconer of Thoroton.)
3.11 p.m.
Lord Rawlinson of Ewell: My Lords, it is a pleasure as well as a duty to congratulate the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer of Thoroton, on his delightful maiden speech. Not only did he describe the Bill with great clarity, he also regaled the House with some historical anecdotes. The only time that I thought I saw
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the noble Lord, Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos, flinch was when the noble and learned Lord gave his anecdote about Wales.
Lord Birkenhead (F. E. Smith), the predecessor of the noble and learned Lord, said:
"All that is left in the House of Commons for the Solicitor-General in normal circumstances is the elucidation of unintelligible legal difficulties in minor and uninteresting bills".
That will not be the fate of the present Solicitor-General in this House, whose important addition to the debating prowess of the Government will be immediately welcomed by them, just as his agreeable speeches will be welcomed by this side of the House.
I have two things in common with the noble and learned Lord. First, I too made my maiden speech in this House from the Dispatch Box, but that was 19 years ago and was from this side of the House when we were in opposition, as we are once again. Secondly, I held the same office, but that was 35 years ago—a time when it was unthinkable for an English Law Officer to be a Member of this House.
It was 1962 and I was summoned to Admiralty House because Downing Street was then, in the immortal words of the American Ambassador to the Court of St. James, undergoing "refurbishment". The Prime Minister was Mr. Harold Macmillan. He waved me to a seat and made a lengthy and elegant survey of the salaried officials who had been Members of Parliament. He dwelt a great deal on Samuel Pepys in the 17th century and said that the Law Officers were the last of the breed. Most importantly, he said to me, "Your obligations as a Law Officer are first to the Crown, secondly to Parliament and only thirdly to my Administration". Then came a courteous inquiry, which was quite unnecessary, as to whether I would do him the honour of joining his Administration. I am afraid that I rather spoilt it in my eagerness to say yes by asking him to delay it while I mitigated in the Central Criminal Court on behalf of a former colleague who had pleaded guilty to gross indecency with young males, at which the Prime Minister inquired why the gentleman had not fled abroad as had old Willy Beauchamp so many years earlier. I am afraid that I could make no adequate reply.
Those were sound instructions about the duties of a Law Officer, especially in those days when a principal duty of a Law Officer was to appear in cases in which the Crown had a major interest which, for the Solicitor-General, was the Revenue List, into the horrors of which we were introduced by the doyen of Treasury counsel, Reggie Hills, who had coached generations of Solicitors-General before. I do not anticipate that the noble and learned Lord will have such horrors inflicted upon him.
Later, when I was invited to become a Law Officer a second time, the style was very different from the elegant style of 32 years previously. It took the form of a gruff and laconic telephone call, appropriate for the person issuing the invitation. By then, eight years later, I had discovered that Harold Macmillan's ideas about the duties of a Law Officer were not at all acceptable to Whitehall which believed that the Attorney-General's first duty was to be on hand, to attend and to advise

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Cabinet, and not to wander about appearing in court, here or abroad. It has always been the desire of Whitehall that Law Officers should be tame, in-house lawyers at the beck and call of government. Whitehall has always wanted to remove them—and accomplished it in the end—from the law courts where their chambers used to be situated and to bring them nearer to Whitehall and Westminster. Perhaps I should add that I managed to resist that since I feared that removal from the law courts would loosen the Law Officers' links with the courts and their semi-judicial duties and would translate them into mere political Ministers with legal qualifications. In those days—25 years ago—despite Whitehall, I was able to insist on appearing regularly in court—in the appellate courts, in Strasbourg and at the Hague, and to prosecute on each circuit, save the Welsh circuit. As I had succeeded my dear friend Sir Elwyn Jones I would not have dared to prosecute on that distinguished circuit, among its distinguished practitioners.
In the past 25 years, the role of the Law Officers has greatly changed. Their appearances in court have significantly declined. That may be partly due to the European business which is now inflicted upon them, but principally their traditional role has changed because another place has increasingly ceased to be an assembly where Members with different experiences and different expertise in finance, industry, agriculture, the law or medicine can contribute their experience to debates. Such Members have been replaced by professional politicians who are without real experience of trade or the professions. Sir Gordon Downey appears to be doubting whether Members of another place should even be permitted to have any outside interests whatsoever. In the future, therefore, there is little chance of a successful barrister seeking election to another place. In my day, "real barristers"—that is, practising barristers; not those simply with qualifications who have been called to the Bar—were encouraged and accommodated as Members of another place by being excused morning committees by the Whips, provided that they were in the House by 4.30 p.m.—that is, after the courts had risen. How can a government in future expect to find banister Members who are capable of serving as Law Officers? They will not be able to do so.
Therefore, while I welcome the noble and learned Lord to this House—he has substantial practical experience in the courts—there remains a problem for the other place which used to receive expert legal advice from Law Officers, knowing that they enjoyed a substantial practice in the courts. If the Attorney-General does not appear regularly in the courts, I do not see how he can remain head of the Bar. I hope that I shall not be the last ex-Attorney-General to be elected chairman of the Bar, but I regret that I do not believe that the traditional role, whereby Law Officers were frequently in the courts and appearing in cases in which the Crown was seriously interested, either prosecuting or being involved in fiscal or other matters, can be preserved. Indeed, as I expressed on the Courts and Legal Services Bill, the judicial role of the Lord Chancellor has been threatened by his becoming the head of a vast spending and administrative
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department. He thus becomes less the judge and more the political Minister. Inevitably, I fear that the time is coming for the establishment of a ministry of justice.
As far as concerns the role of the Lord Chancellor, perhaps I may give the noble and learned Lord a rather sly warning. The Law Officers are the constitutional advisers on law to the Cabinet, of which the Lord Chancellor is a member. When the Law Officers give advice the question has been researched not only by themselves but by lawyers in their departments, lawyers in the department concerned and also Treasury counsel—the leading practitioners in the field of law under review. Such is their calibre that in my time I can cite, for instance, the following Treasury counsel: the noble and learned Lords, Lord Bridge, Lord Slynn and Lord Woolf, and Lord Justice Peter Gibson in Chancery matters. Such is the calibre of lawyers who contribute to a Law Officer's opinion. I warn the Solicitor-General, half in jest but half seriously, to beware of "top-of-the-head" advice. It is not unknown for such advice to be given in Cabinet to government by otherwise friendly Lord Chancellors. Beware!
In conclusion, I welcome the Bill. However, I foresee the demise of the traditional system. I am saddened that the changes in another place over the past quarter of a century have effectively driven from its ranks those who were known as the gentlemen of the long robe and who over the centuries have long adorned the lower House of Parliament.
3.21 p.m.
Lord Lester of Herne Hill: My Lords, this debate gives me the opportunity to express my personal pleasure at the appointment of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer of Thoroton, as Solicitor-General, to congratulate him and to wish him happiness and fulfilment in his new career in public office. He has had a very successful career at the Bar where he is popular and universally admired for his warmth, wit, high intelligence and forensic ability. He will, I am sure, be a source of strength to the Government and to Parliament. I pay tribute to the Prime Minister and to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor for this imaginative and well merited appointment.
There is nothing unprecedented about a Law Officer being a Member of this House rather than of another place. There have been times when Law Officers have been outside Parliament altogether: Sir William Jowitt. as Attorney-General, was without a seat in 1931; Sir Henry Slesser, as Solicitor-General, was without a seat in 1924; the Solicitor-General for Scotland is not invariably a member of another place; and the Lord Advocate is now a Member of this House, which perhaps reflects the decline in the number of able advocates in the other place.
The present Bill makes a small but important change by empowering the Solicitor-General to discharge the functions of the Attorney-General free of the existing unnecessary constraints. Traditionally, the Solicitor-General has been the general deputy of the Attorney-General and subordinate to him. In effect the

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present Bill establishes the Solicitor-General as a Law Officer with potentially co-ordinate powers and duties to those of the Attorney-General.
I hope that this will be only a first step in a programme of much needed reform of the government legal services. I am very glad that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor has already expressed an intention to create a judicial services commission for the appointment of judges, a proposal long advocated by my party. The importance of that proposal is twofold: first, properly constructed—by which I mean with a mainly judicial membership—a judicial services commission will protect the independence and high quality of the judiciary. Secondly, the creation of such a bulwark and safeguard will make it possible to move towards the creation of a more powerful department of justice, unifying responsibility for the criminal and the civil law together with public law in a single department and giving a very high priority to constitutional and law reform. It is surely anomalous that responsibility for criminal law reform is still a matter for the Home Secretary while responsibility for civil law reform is a matter for the Lord Chancellor.
I respectfully agree with the view expressed by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Steyn, in his recent lecture to the Administrative Law Bar Association, that it would also be desirable for the Lord Chancellor to cease to be the head of the judiciary in England and Wales while retaining all his other functions about appointments, law reform, statute law revision, legal administration and as constitutional adviser to the Government. As the noble and learned Lord observed,
"Under governments of all complexions the Lord Chancellor is always a spokesman for the government in furtherance of its party political agenda. Even in respect of matters affecting the administration of justice he is … always subject to collective cabinet responsibility. The Lord Chancellor as a cabinet member represents the voice of reform guided by the Treasury perspective. The view of the judges is rather different. They do not wholeheartedly share the modern adoration of the deity of the economy. On the whole they put justice first. That view can in our system he best put forward by the Lord Chief Justice. He should he the head of the judiciary in England and Wales."
Like the noble and learned Lord, Lord Steyn, I believe that the proposition that a Cabinet Minister must be the head of our judiciary in England is no longer sustainable on constitutional or pragmatic grounds.
What then of the constitutional role of the Law Officers? The office of Attorney-General is highly political. Although he is not normally in the Cabinet he is a member of the Government. Together with the Solicitor-General, the Lord Advocate and Solicitor-General for Scotland, he is a member of the Administration and one of the Crown's principal advisers on points of law. He represents the Crown in all matters in which rights of a public character come into question. He is entitled to take civil proceedings to enforce the law, including contempt proceedings against the media. He may be instructed to prosecute in important criminal cases and his consent is required before some criminal proceedings can be undertaken. He has the power to enter a nolle prosequi on any
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indictment. The Director of Public Prosecutions is responsible to him and he is in turn accountable to Parliament.
The Attorney-General's power to take civil proceedings to enforce the law and his control over criminal prosecutions is quasi-judicial, but he is also a political figure responsive to political pressures. By convention, in his quasi-judicial function the Attorney-General is not subject to collective responsibility and he does not take orders from the Government. But he may seek the views of other Ministers and they may volunteer their views. He must weigh issues of public interest and public policy, but he is not meant to be influenced by party political considerations.
As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Steyn, has pointed out, these conventions are weak and their
"efficacy depends on Chinese walls in the mind of the Attorney General".
He gives the examples of the decision taken by a distinguished Attorney-General, Sir Michael Havers, to bring proceedings to prevent the publication of Spycatcher, observing that there was nothing very quasi-judicial about that decision.
In his Hamlyn lectures in 1990 the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, examined the Attorney-General's function in bringing civil proceedings to protect the public interest. The Master of the Rolls said that in controversial cases involving the Government it seemed virtually impossible for the public or the media to identify when the Attorney-General was wearing his guardian of the public interest hat rather than his governmental hat. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, concluded that it was not apt any longer for the Attorney-General to perform this important function. He called for the appointment of an independent director of civil proceedings, and I tend to agree with him.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Steyn, has argued cogently that the same reasoning based on considerations of public confidence applies to the Attorney-General's power over criminal prosecutions. He asks,
"How can there be public confidence in a decision by the Attorney-General to prosecute or not to prosecute in a politically sensitive case? How can the public have confidence that the Attorney General is able to keep his political and public interest responsibilities in separate mental compartments? The present position is entirely inconsistent with constitutional principle. Nothing will be lost if the office of Attorney General is removed from the political arena, as an independent office outside government."
That is a model adopted under the Irish constitution and the constitutions of many Commonwealth countries. The Attorney-General in those countries is not a government servant, but an independent officer with quasi-judicial and executive functions. There is much to commend it. There is an alternative to the independent status advocated by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Steyn, and others, which would be to relieve the Attorney-General of his functions in respect of criminal prosecutions and to take civil proceedings to enforce the law by entrusting those powers to independent public

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officers—the Director of Public Prosecutions and a director of civil proceedings, who could be made accountable to Parliament through the appropriate Select Committee.
In his review of Government Legal Services, in 1989, the distinguished public servant Sir Robert Andrew wrote that he had been struck by two features of the present organisation.
"On the one hand, the Law Officers do not really have a Department—only a Legal Secretariat … If the Attorney-General, assisted by the Solicitor-General, is to perform the important and onerous task of acting as Legal Adviser to the Government on a wide range of increasingly complex issues … he needs more substantial support. On the other hand, the Treasury Solicitor's Department is a department without a ministerial head in the usual sense. It would be helpful to the Treasury Solicitor to have a Minister in day-to-day charge of the Department. This would give him a ministerial voice and ensure that he saw copies of ministerial correspondence … thus facilitating an early legal input on policy issues. It would give him additional 'clout', for example in disputes over resources."
I believe that Sir Robert Andrew was right in recommending that the two departments should be merged to form a single Law Officers' department presided over by the Attorney-General. The Treasury Solicitor would retain his historic title and duties but would become the Permanent Secretary of the new department, and would be the Law Officers' principal adviser as well as supervising the department.
I agree also with Sir Robert Andrew that there would be advantage in bringing Parliamentary Counsel's Office within the new Law Officers' department. Giving the Attorney-General a more direct responsibility for Parliamentary Counsel's Office would not alter the position of the Lord President, nor the relationship between individual drafters and the Ministers for whom they prepare Bills. It would not mean that the Attorney-General became an extra link in the drafting process, but it would help to meet the criticism that there is no one to whom Ministers can turn if they are dissatisfied with the way in which the drafting of a Bill is being handled. I well remember that problem, when I had the privilege of acting as special adviser to my noble friend Lord Jenkins of Hillhead at the Home Office in the mid-1970s. Both the Home Secretary and the Attorney-General were greatly dissatisfied with the way in which a Bill's drafting was being handled, but they were helpless to do anything effective to resolve the problem.
I hope that each of those suggestions will be carefully considered at an early stage in the lifetime of this Government, and that the noble and learned Lord the Solicitor-General, whose powers and influence will be greatly enhanced by this little Bill, working with the Lord Chancellor and the Attorney-General, will be a midwife for further reforms.
3.34 p.m.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: My Lords, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Rawlinson, paid a felicitous and well deserved tribute to the admirable maiden and ministerial speech of the noble and learned Lord the Solicitor-General. I exceptionally wish to associate myself with that, partly on personal grounds and partly
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because it is a valuable parliamentary development that an English Law Officer should be a Member of your Lordships' House.
I do not know whether there is still, in the library of the Law Officers' department, an old hook, now superseded, by Norton-Kyshe, on the Law Officers of the Crown. If the noble and learned Lord the Solicitor-General has not come across it, I recommend the first three pages to him. In that he describes, first, how horrible is the existence of the Attorney-General: everything he does will be execrated; on the other hand, he says that the job of Solicitor-General is the happiest in the Government. I hope that that will encourage the noble and learned Lord.
Your Lordships will remember that when Disraeli became a Member of your Lordships' House one of his colleagues asked him how he was getting on, and he said,
"Dead, dead, but in the Elysian Fields".
The noble and learned Lord will not merely be occupying the most felicitous post in the Government, but he will be grazing, in that respect, in the Elysian Fields, and we are glad that it should be so.
I mentioned the value of an English Law Officer being a Member of your Lordships' House. In a sense, that is partly a reversion to history. Until about 1600 both Law Officers, but particularly the Solicitor-General, had the duty of advising your Lordships' House. The Attorney-General's duties, oddly enough, consisted, among other things, of carrying messages between the two Houses, but the Solicitor-General was particularly the adviser of your Lordships' House. When he was elevated to Attorney-General, difficulties sometimes arose. They were mainly personal.
The main difficulty arose when Francis Bacon, a Member of the other place, was made Attorney-General. He was already by that time intensely distrusted, partly because of his obvious ambition, by his parliamentary colleagues. They resolved at first that no Attorney-General should be a Member of the other place. They relented slightly after that and resolved that Mr. Attorney Bacon should remain a Member, but that in future no Attorney-General should be a Member of the other place. Remarkably, that was observed for about three-quarters of a century, but since the Restoration the Attorney-General has been welcomed as a Member of the other place, the difference again, I think, being largely a matter of character.
Sir Henry Finch, afterwards the great Earl of Nottingham, was a man of outstanding integrity and was implicitly trusted by the other place to carry out his duties impartially and not merely as a servant of the Crown. That brings me to why it is valuable to have an English Law Officer among your Lordships. The law officers, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Rawlinson, explained, have their primary function as legal advisers and representatives of the Government. But they also have a duty to Parliament. Parliament looks to them to explain with impartiality difficult points of law. I remember Mr. Attorney Manningham-Buller explaining to a mystified House of Commons the

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Byzantine differences between malice aforethought, constructive malice and implied malice. The House readily accepted his advice, even if it did not fully understand it. Indeed, we look to the Law Officers not only to represent the Government but also to advise your Lordships with integrity and impartiality.
For those reasons, I greatly welcome the noble and learned Lord the Attorney-General. For some time, we have had the Lord Advocate as a Member to our advantage. Indeed, he has gone far beyond the bounds of Scottish business in assisting your Lordships. I do not know what will happen to him if we have a Scottish Parliament. One of the many ideas that has been successively floated is that there should be a Cabinet in the Scottish Parliament and that the Scottish law officers should be heard and advise there but not be Members. How that places the Lord Advocate in regard to your Lordships' House I do not know. Perhaps he will be a noble embodiment of the West Lothian question. If we are to miss him we will all the more value the presence of the noble and learned Lord the Solicitor-General, who by his speech today has so much commended himself to your Lordships.
3.42 p.m.
Viscount Bledisloe: My Lords, your Lordships may be relieved to hear that I do not intend to follow the noble Lord, Lord Lester of Herne Hill, in his perpetual and restless desire to change almost everything seemingly for change's sake or merely because it is done differently in some remote country. I rise to express my delight at the appointment of my noble and learned friend Lord Falconer of Thoroton as Solicitor-General and as a Member of your Lordships' House. I have two reasons for doing so. The first is purely personal; the second is more general and relates to the functions of the Law Officers of England and Wales, if Wales will still have him after his earlier remarks.
Sitting on these Benches, I can have no general view as to the desirability or not of the recent change of government. However, that they have brought the noble and learned Lord. Lord Falconer, to the office of Solicitor-General and to this House is a great point in their favour. Not only is the noble and learned Lord a very able lawyer and advocate, but he is also an enormously interesting and interested person who will bring to this role a highly intelligent and original mind; a great felicity of expression; a high degree of charm and wit, as the House will already have witnessed; and a deep concern for what is fair and right. He will also bring to it a very delightful and charming wife who, as he assures us, is not his nanny. Your Lordships might have thought from that that he is an ideal adornment for the Front Bench, but one must perhaps accept his lack of sartorial elegance.
I have only two qualifications to my unadulterated delight at his appointment. The first is that our chambers are a much duller place without him; and the second is that I feel a deep sympathy for those in his office who, no doubt, have already encountered his unique ability to create instant and total chaos out of his room and out of
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every set of papers put before him. If they find that position wholly intolerable and would like to get in touch with me I shall be able to give them the name of probably the only person in the world who can deal with it.
On a more general point, I strongly echo what was said by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Rawlinson of Ewell. In the distant past. many of those elected to another place had already pursued successful careers in spheres outside politics. They came to Parliament bringing that wisdom and experience and they did not abandon that other activity. Now, such are the demands of the parties that almost everyone in another place is and always has been a full-time professional politician who has done and achieved little else. Of course, this is not the time and perhaps not even the place to debate the general desirability of that.
However, in few fields has that been more marked than in the law. There were times when much of the leading talent at the Bar was available for appointment as Law Officers. Names such as Carson. F.E. Smith, Sir John Simon, and so forth, come to mind. In more recent years. more notable exceptions have fulfilled the talents and abilities of the names I have mentioned. One has to think only of the noble and learned Lords, Lord Simon of Glaisdale and Lord Rawlinson of Ewell, to see what I mean.
But it will be accepted that it is no longer the case that there is available for choice as Law Officers in another place those who have and are pursuing successful careers at the Bar and who therefore are in touch with the full knowledge and nuances of an ever more complicated legal system. If our Law Officers are always to come from those elected to another place, it is therefore inevitable that they will lack the knowledge, experience and wisdom of someone in full-time practice.
That fact has led many, including myself, to doubt the continuing utility of the system and to wonder whether it would he better if each government appointed a panel of leading lawyers to advise them rather than relying on the Law Officers.
As regards Scotland, in recent years Law Officers have been appointed from lawyers rather than from Members of Parliament and have therefore had that wisdom. In the presence of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Ackner, one can hardly expect to gain the unanimous approval of this House for that step or for its consequences, but I believe that on the whole it will receive general approval. This is the first time that the step has been taken for England and Wales and I very much commend it. However many people may dislike lawyers as a breed, it is the function of government to propose and of Parliament to enact law. In doing so, it is surely necessary that they should have access to the best possible legal advice and cogent exposition of that advice.
I hardly expect the noble and learned Lord the Solicitor-General, with his natural modesty. to say in his closing speech how much he agrees with me; that his was an excellent appointment and innovation. However, I hope that my remarks and those of the noble and

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learned Lord, Lord Rawlinson, may be conveyed to others and that we will see this excellent precedent followed on future occasions.
3.50 p.m.
Lord Meston: My Lords, I too congratulate the noble and learned Lord the Solicitor-General on his maiden speech. It is the latest of several from the Government Front Benches, from which position a maiden speaker probably does not have the same freedom of choice as a Back-Bencher in relation to either the occasion or the content of his first speech. That has not affected the noble and learned Lord who comes to the House, as we have heard, with a well-deserved reputation for his formidable intellect and advocacy.
The noble and learned Lord has introduced a Bill which will give him more work for no extra pay because, according to the Explanatory Memorandum, the Bill will have no effect on public expenditure. As your Lordships may be aware, there has been much cheerful speculation about just how big a financial sacrifice the noble and learned Lord made to take up his office. There have also been serious suggestions for a reconsideration of the level of remuneration to the Law Officers. Perhaps the argument for higher pay will be defeated so long as governments can recruit and retain eminent practitioners such as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer.
Some people say also that the Law Officers should appear in court more often, as in the days when they often appeared in important criminal trials and tax cases. That is a point on which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Rawlinson, touched. It may be that the present Solicitor-General can make up for the dramatic impact on the Inland Revenue resulting from his own abandonment of practice by restoring his appearances for that organisation. However, I do not know whether there is any way in which the effect on the turnover of the chambers of the noble Viscount, Lord Bledisloe, can be remedied in quite the same way.
I should like to think also that this appointment sets a precedent for there to be one Law Officer for England and Wales in this House. Not only would that relieve the sometimes enormous parliamentary burden on the Lord Chancellor but it would also enable a Law Officer to participate directly in the work of this House as a revising Chamber, to the long term enhancement of the quality of our legislation. I hope also that the point made by my noble friend Lord Lester about an assumption of responsibility for the work of parliamentary counsel will be considered seriously.
The necessity for this Bill would surprise most lawyers who would have assumed—and would probably have been taught—that the Solicitor-General can exercise all the powers of the Attorney-General when the Attorney-General is not available. The late Lord Elwyn-Jones, in his memoirs, quoted the author of Forensic Fables who described the difference between the Attorney-General and the Solicitor-General as,
"Broadly speaking, the difference between a crocodile and an alligator".
In present company, I am sure that that refers only to speed of movement when roused and to firmness of grip.
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In fact. the 1944 Act provides only for the exercise of statutory powers by the Solicitor-General in place of the Attorney. The reason for that limitation is not very clear from reading the debates on the 1944 Act. Then there was no debate about the constitutional position of the Law Officers. Nowadays, every first-year law student learns that the Law Officers' position exerts much theoretical and actual strain on the separation of powers. The Law Officers' ability to withstand that strain depends on the independence and integrity of the office holders and on their ability to separate the interests of the government of which they are a member and the interests of the wider community.
Unfortunately, the public probably no longer believes that a Law Officer can fully immunise himself from political pressures. Yet there must be public confidence in the total independence of those who make the sort of discretionary decisions which Law Officers must make; for example, decisions whether or not to prosecute the media for contempt of court or, in cases of incitement to racial hatred, where it has been suggested that there has been too much caution in prosecution and that that has had the effect of weakening the legislation.
As we have heard this afternoon, there have been many different proposals to detach the Law Officers from the political arena while retaining some measure of parliamentary accountability for which, as my noble friend said, there are models in other jurisdictions. These proposals have come not just from political parties but from distinguished academics and most recently from noble and learned Law Lords, in particular the noble and learned Lords, Lord Woolf and Lord Steyn.
We are embarking on a period of constitutional reform. I hope that it will include a real consideration of the functions and powers of Law Officers at the turn of the century. But perhaps I may end by reassuring the new Solicitor-General that this Bill will not be used by me at any rate as a vehicle by which to change his job description so early in his career.
3.55 p.m.
Lord Kingsland: My Lords, in view of the politically anodyne content of this Bill, and the many excellent speeches that we have heard this afternoon in your Lordships' House both from noble and noble and learned Lords, almost the only thing that is left for me to do is to congratulate the noble and learned Lord the Solicitor-General most warmly on an entertaining and accomplished maiden speech. Listening to him, it is easy to understand how he has attained such great eminence in his career and at such a tender age.
I should like to think that, while in office, he will manage to maintain himself in court room condition. As I understand it, in the old days the Law Officers honed their forensic skills on prosecuting poisoners in the criminal court. Nowadays, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Rawlinson, told us, the role of Law Officers is mainly that of what the Americans now call, I believe, "upstairs lawyers". They advise government departments on how best to behave and no doubt advise them on how to make their decisions immune from judicial review—usually with absolutely disastrous consequences.

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I believe that this move, which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Rawlinson, particularly addressed, is reflected in what I regard as the rather sad shift of the Law Officers from the law courts in the Strand to Buckingham Gate. That symbolises what has happened. However, it is true to say also that poisoning is not as fashionable as it used to be.
Your Lordships' House will agree, from the grasp that the noble and learned Lord showed of the historic background of his appointment, that he will be a great servant in that role. I wish him the very best of luck in it.
The noble and learned Lord quoted the noble Lord, Lord Rodgers of Quarry Bank, as saying what a jolly good thing it was that the Solicitor-General had come to your Lordships' House. I share that view. I was particularly struck by what the noble Viscount, Lord Bledisloe, said about the difficulty these days in combining a full and successful law practice in the courts with a full and successful political career in another place. That is something that has perhaps passed us by for ever. In those circumstances, and particularly with the kind of international travel that a modern Law Officer will have to undertake, appearing in international courts, including the European Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights, it may be a very good thing that he is not burdened with the heavy constituency duties which are now a daily part of the diet of Members of another place.
Also, it reflects a very interesting change in the direction of authority as between your Lordships' House and another place. The story of the 20th century has been a story of a gradual ebbing away of power from your Lordships' House to another place. Here is a happy example of a reversal of that flow. The power has now come back to your Lordships' House in the shape of the office of Solicitor-General. I rather take the view that, just because you have been elected, does not necessarily mean that you are a good thing. So, perhaps one day, we will see the position of Attorney-General also added to that of Solicitor-General in your Lordships' House.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, said that he thought that the appointment of Solicitor-General was an excellent appointment to have in government. That was not the view of the first Labour Law Officer, Sir Patrick Hastings, who is said to be, by those who saw both men, the greatest advocate of the 20th century, next to Lord Carson. He hated the job of Law Officer. Indeed, he only held it for a few months. He called it, "the job out of Hell". He recommended that a certain prosecution take place but the Labour Cabinet reversed that recommendation. As a direct result, as I understand it, the first Labour Government fell.
I am not suggesting to the noble and learned Lord the Solicitor-General that that will be the consequence of the Bill that he has introduced today. On the contrary, I believe it to be an excellent Bill. I only wish that my own party had introduced it when it was in government, because it is clearly long overdue. By doing so, the noble and learned Lord has fulfilled that other requirement when making a maiden speech which is to introduce
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something uncontroversial. The noble and learned Lord has opened his innings in the finest style and I wish him the best of luck in the future.
4.1 p.m.
Lord Falconer of Thoroton: My Lords, I am extremely grateful for the many kind words that have been addressed to me in the debate. For me, it has been a short but interesting debate. I am pleased and relieved that the Bill has been broadly welcomed.
I shall begin by dealing with the very helpful contributions which have been made this afternoon. I should like, first, to refer to the contribution made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Rawlinson. I should tell him that, in my capacity as deputy to the Attorney-General, I was in Northern Ireland last week. While I was there, without making any comment on his predecessor and on the politics involved, a member of the Northern Ireland Bar said that one of the few benefits of the suspension of Stormont and what followed in the Northern Ireland Constitution Act was that Sir Peter Rawlinson (as he then was) became the Attorney-General for Northern Ireland. Plainly he is a man held in the greatest respect both here and in Northern Ireland.
In effect, the noble and learned Lord made three points. First, he said that he very much hoped that the Law Officers would continue with the tradition of appearing in court. We very much agree with that; but, of course, it is very much more difficult to appear in court on the regular basis that the Law Officers have done in the past. Moreover, there are certain kinds of litigation, such as revenue litigation, in which it might not be appropriate for them to get involved. However, both myself and my right honourable and learned friend in another place hope to appear in court, not just in poisoning cases—indeed, perhaps not even in poisoning cases—but certainly in criminal and civil cases of importance.
Secondly, the noble and learned Lord said that it was most unfortunate that there was no time now to be both a successful barrister and a Member of the Lower House. That does not apply to my right honourable and learned friend in another place who, after the Labour Government lost power in 1979, pursued an extremely successful career at the criminal Bar and now holds the office of Attorney-General. Thirdly, the noble and learned Lord warned me about, as he described it, the top-of-the-head advice from the Lord Chancellor. All of us would agree that the top-of-the-head advice from the present Lord Chancellor would be better than the bottom-of-the-head advice from most of us. However, I take on board the warning given to me.
I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Lester of Herne Hill, for his kind remarks and welcome. I am not sure that this is the appropriate debate in which to discuss the constitutional position either of the Lord Chancellor or of the Law Officers. However, I shall simply make three points in relation to what the noble Lord, Lord Lester, said. First, there are substantial benefits in having as a Law Officer a political big hitter—I do not mean myself, but my right honourable and learned friend in another

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place—because it is useful to have a substantial politician who is able to express legal advice. Secondly, as the noble Lord, Lord Kingsland, said, perhaps among the most distinguished barristers who has held the office of Law Officer this century was Sir Patrick Hastings. Whether through his own fault or otherwise, he ended up making a very substantial mess so far as concerns politics.
Thirdly, the noble Lord referred to statutory drafting. The position now is that if a Minister is dissatisfied with the drafting of a Bill, he is entitled to go to the Law Officers for their advice to ascertain whether or not the Bill as drafted reflects the policy of the ministry. If it does not, then it is for the Law Officers to raise the matter with the drafters of the Bill and to make sure that it gives effect to the policy. Therefore, one hopes that the problems that the noble Lord identified, especially in relation to the legislation to which he referred, would not now be encountered.
I am most grateful for the remarks made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale. I very much hope that I will be grazing in the Elysian Fields, as he suggests. I would regard it as immodest to suggest for one moment that the Solicitor-General could take over the role that has been performed with such distinction by the Lord Advocate in this House over many years. As for my noble friend Lord Bledisloe, I must say that I am deeply grateful for his kind personal remarks; indeed, I regard every one of them as being in breach of confidence. As regards his echoing the remarks made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Rawlinson, I believe that I dealt with those points when responding earlier.
I am also grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Meston, for his kind remarks. I particularly noted his reference to the financial position of the Law Officers. Up until 1892, Law Officers could conduct their own private practices. However, Mr. Gladstone, the Prime Minister at the time, sought the advice of the Attorney-General on a particular occasion but he was too busy performing his private practice. He then reached for his very much second best, the Solicitor-General, but he, too, was performing private work. Therefore, they were banned ever afterwards from conducting private work. Their last hope was the fact that they used to be paid when they appeared in court on behalf of the Government but, thanks to the negotiating skills of Mr. Hartley Shawcross (as he then was), that right was negotiated away in return for a bigger salary. I imagine that there is no connection between that negotiation taking place and the fact that the appearances of the Law Officers in court have substantially declined since then.
I am extremely grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Kingsland, for the kind remarks that he made. Again, I believe I dealt with all the points that he raised in my earlier responses. I commend the Bill to the House.
On Question, Bill read a second time, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1996 (Amendment)Order 1997
4.7 p.m.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Northern Ireland Office (Lord Dubs)The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Northern Ireland Office (Lord Dubs) rose to move, That the order laid before the House on 3rd June be approved [2nd Report from the Joint Committee]
The noble Lord said: My Lords, your Lordships may already be aware of the news from Northern Ireland today of the murder of two police officers. I condemn unreservedly the cold-blooded and brutal murder of two police officers in Lurgan and express my sympathy to their families. Full details of the incident are not yet available, but the RUC is investigating the matter. However, the Provisional IRA has claimed responsibility for these murders. No effort will be spared to bring those responsible to justice. At this stage, I would appeal for calm on all sides and for anyone with any information on the murders to contact the police as soon as possible.
I return now to the specific details of the order. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State made this order proscribing the Loyalist Volunteer Force (the LVF) and the Continuity Army Council (the CAC) on 3rd June. It came into effect on 4th June and is subject to approval within 40 sitting days.
The Loyalist Volunteer Force is a breakaway group of the Ulster Volunteer Force. The Continuity Army Council is a name generally used to describe the military wing of Republican Sinn Fein.
We do not take decisions concerning the proscription of any organisation lightly. It might be helpful if I put the proscription of these two organisations in the context of a number of appalling acts of terrorism for which they have claimed responsibility. First, in March this year the LVF set fire to the tourist information centres in Banbridge and Newcastle. It is also responsible for arson attacks on the Irish Heritage Centre in Donaghmore, a school in Newry and Sinn Fein offices in Dungannon. It also in the same month claimed responsibility for planting a bomb in Dundalk town centre. In April the LVF claimed responsibility for an arson attack on a public house in Aghalee and in May it claimed responsibility for the murder of 62 year-old Sean Brown, from Bellaghy, a respected member of the community who was active in the local Gaelic Athletic Association club.
With regard to the CAC, in July 1996 it claimed responsibility for a car bomb left outside the Killyhevlin Hotel in Enniskillen which destroyed much of the building. In September it claimed responsibility for a bomb abandoned in a stolen car in Belfast city centre. In May the CAC was believed to be responsible for a car bomb in Belfast which detonated prematurely injuring an occupant of the car.
Taking into account such heinous crimes as these, and judging carefully all the available information against our criterion for proscription, my right honourable friend concluded that in both cases the criterion of being

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concerned in terrorism or in promoting or encouraging it, had been fully met. Once this judgment had been made, my right honourable friend decided to take immediate action since any organisations which are constituted for the primary purpose of carrying out criminal terrorist acts can have no legitimate place in our society. As a result of this order, it is an offence to be a member of the LVF or CAC from the time they became proscribed organisations. It is also an offence to solicit or invite any person to become a member of these organisations or to assist in the holding of a meeting to support or further their activities.
Our message is clear and unambiguous. We will not tolerate violence from whatever quarter it comes in Northern Ireland. Violence will not win. Its use is futile and unacceptable. The LVF and CAC have joined the IRA, INLA, UVF and UDA and others on the list of proscribed organisations in Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland's hope lies with those who are committed to creating a just, peaceful and prosperous society; something which all of us in your Lordships' House support. The Government regard this order as a fully warranted response to the activities of the LVF and CAC. I therefore have no hesitation in commending it unreservedly to the House.
Moved, That the order laid before the House on 3rd June be approved [2nd Report from the Joint Committee].—(Lord Dubs.)
4.12 p.m.
Baroness Park of Monmouth: My Lords, I fully support the measure now before us. I wish only to sound a note of warning to the Minister and to the Government he represents. As a result of the recent elections in the Republic of Ireland it has been reported that the new Taoiseach intends to nominate Albert Reynolds as his special representative to and link with the nationalists in the North, and has committed himself to defending the interest of the Nationalists. Given the part that Mr. Reynolds himself has publicly claimed that he played in using Sinn Fein/IRA drafts as the basis of the Dublin version of the Framework Document, and in effect allowing them to dictate the then Dublin Government's policy in what was supposed to be the work of the two Governments, this move is bound to cause both anxiety and anger among Unionists in the North. This is a critical time for them.
The former Taoiseach, John Bruton, had gone far to reassure Unionist opinion by making it clear that he and his Government joined us in holding Sinn Fein/IRA at arm's length while they refused to abandon violence, and had said specifically that his Government did not share the IRA all-Nationalist agenda. Now there is a new Government in Dublin with a long tradition of sympathy with Sinn Fein/IRA. It will be extremely important, therefore, to reassure the Unionists, who have good reason to feel anxious. The marching season is upon us, when tempers run high and Sinn Fein/IRA are as adept at provoking clashes as some of the Orange Order are, I fear, at acting intemperately. The callous murder of two RUC officers today is an example. I was immensely reassured but not at all surprised to hear the
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firm words uttered by the Minister. Sinn Fein is very good at provoking crises. I hope I may therefore urge the Government most strongly to step warily with Mr. Reynolds, and to require Mr. Adams and Mr. Reynolds to say clearly what they think of the unnecessary murders.
In a "Dispatches" programme last year Mr. Reynolds was happy both to state unequivocally that Dublin's drafts of the Framework Document were written by Sinn Fein/IRA, and to show on television actual exchanges of correspondence between himself and the then British Prime Minister, John Major. I urge, therefore, that Ministers should recognise that confidentiality will fly out of the window as Mr. Reynolds comes in. I do not suggest that the new Taoiseach, who is perfectly open in his political stance, seeing himself as the champion of nationalists in Northern Ireland, will not be ready to respect confidentiality himself—of course he will—but there has been plenty of proof that Mr. Reynolds does not operate by those rules, and that he is likely to be little more than a willing and voluble voice of Sinn Fein/IRA.
The Unionists, whether Dublin and Sinn Fein like it or not, are the majority in Northern Ireland, and they and a large number of nationalists who did not and would not vote for Sinn Fein are indispensable to the peace process. They need every reassurance the Government can give them that the Government, who have so far most honourably followed a bipartisan policy in Northern Ireland, will take account of the strengthened position of Sinn Fein/IRA in the South and their capacity not only to influence but to form Dublin policy. At this critical time that is important.
This might be no bad moment to ask Dublin where it now stands on the one tentative possible concession it offered in the Framework Document: the commitment to consider the abolition of Articles 2 and 3 of the constitution. I still believe that practical, pragmatic, step-by-step agreement to work out various cross-border conventions in the areas of trade, transport, public utilities and so on, and the devolution of much more responsibility within Northern Ireland to district councils where people can work together, coupled with talks, however slow the progress, could produce real results.
Meanwhile, however, we must not be blown off course by the Unionist reaction to Mr. Reynolds's re-entry on the stage, which we must expect to be wary, if not hostile. He will be bent on high visibility; what is needed are patience and a low key approach, some small practical gestures, and above all the trust of the majority. The loyalist paramilitaries as a whole have behaved with admirable restraint. I think they will recognise that their efforts must not be destroyed by the small group who are being discussed today.
Perhaps I may add one last word. I hope that, whatever the Government's intentions on the issue of marches, special efforts will be made to show the RUC that the extreme pressures to which it is subjected in its efforts to keep the Queen's peace are valued and respected; that it will be supported; and that we all share its grief and anger over the hateful and inexcusable

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murders that have been reported today, and claimed so blithely by the IRA. Nothing could more clearly justify the need for the measure before us today. I fully recognise that extremists—whichever side of the barrier they are—need to he restrained. However, I hope very much that we shall nevertheless remember that the vast majority of Protestants in Northern Ireland, and a large number of Catholics, believe in the peace process and are exercising great restraint.
4.17 p.m.
Lord Fitt: My Lords, I rise for a few moments to associate myself with the sympathy that has been expressed in relation to the terrible murders of two policemen that took place today in Lurgan. This order before the House today should make it unnecessary to have any prolonged debate as, in view of the terrible murders that have occurred, no one in his right mind could object to an order such as this.
In 1973 I was a Member of another place when this emergency provisions order first came on to the statute book. Since then I have seen a succession of Secretaries of State introducing orders to ban certain organisations. All I can say is that they do not appear to have been particularly successful. I had intended to ask my noble friend Lord Dubs today, in the event that there was a credible ceasefire—up to this morning I believed that there was the possibility of a ceasefire, as many reports in the national newspapers in particular suggested that—by word and deed, to use the words of the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, how long it would be before we could take legislation such as this off the statute hook. It now appears that that moment will be a long time in the future.
In a recent debate in this House, the noble Lord, Lord Alderdice, drew the attention of the House to the fact that, while the loyalist paramilitaries claimed that they supported a ceasefire, many things were happening behind the scenes which associated them with some awful acts of terrorism. We cannot come down on one side and say that one section of the paramilitaries is admirable and the other side comprises murderers. They are all engaged in murderous intent.
I say this to my right honourable friend the Secretary of State. I believe that the murders today have taken place with malice aforethought. They took place in Armagh; and everyone in Northern Ireland knows that Armagh is a tinder keg at present. We shall run into Drumcree in July. The so-called tenants associations have indicated that in July they will bring American television crews, American congressmen, American senators, civil rights organisations and Amnesty International to the Drumcree geographical area. They will not bring them to stand and watch; their intent is to bring about a confrontation between the police, the Army and the Catholic population in Garvaghy Road. The Catholic population will be put in a position where there is likely to be serious rioting and American television will be watching it. Pictures will be beamed to America to show the American people how brutal the security forces are in Northern Ireland.
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The terrible act of depravity this morning, the murder of two innocent community policemen in Northern Ireland, is part of an IRA-Sinn Fein ploy to create the maximum amount of trouble in Drumcree this year. I hope that my noble friend Lord Dubs has taken that into consideration. What is to happen in July of this year is, I believe, ominous.
4.21 p.m.
Lord Alderdice: My Lords, on a day like today when two policemen have been murdered in Lurgan in County Armagh, it would be easy to be taken up with a deep sense of anger and frustration at what has happened. It is an anger that I share not only as someone who comes from Northern Ireland but as someone born in Lurgan.
Many of the other events that have taken place are not far removed from any of us. I refer to Harryville where the LVF and its associates have been distinguishing themselves by blocking ordinary Catholics from going to worship. That has been happening for some 39 weeks, with increasing violence over recent weeks. The violence is not lessening. On such an amendment as we debate today which permits us to add two more organisations, one on the Loyalist side and one on the Republican side, to the list of proscribed organisations, it would be easy simply to say yes and to pass on to the next business. However, the very event of proscription of the two organisations demands a little more thought.
My noble friend Lord Fitt referred to the fact that the emergency provisions legislation first came on the statute book in 1973. In the not too distant future when we review its continuation, we shall do so in respect of emergency legislation which will be going into its 25th year. The very word "emergency" scarcely conjures up the notion of a quarter of a century. The provisional IRA which has claimed responsibility for the murder of the two policemen today was one of the organisations put on that list of proscribed organisations from the very beginning.
One can simply say that it is a political problem which will be solved in that kind of way. Indeed, we know that there is no purely security solution. However, I find the requirement to add these two organisations to the list of proscribed organisations disturbing for a political reason. Why did the two organisations come into being? The Loyalist Volunteer Force came into being because it was perceived in that paramilitary community that the paramilitary organisations and their political representatives were moving towards democracy, or perhaps a mixture of politics and violence. There were those within the community who said "No, we simply want to stick with the violence". They were referred to by one of the representatives of the Progressive Unionist Party, which politically represents the Ulster Volunteer Force, as renegades in the paramilitary organisations. What a curious term, my Lords. Yet it represents a disturbing way of thinking.
Some of the political representatives of the Loyalist paramilitary organisations are guilty of the most foul and despicable crimes. On the Republican side one sees Sinn Fein prepared quite unapologetically to represent

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the views of a long proscribed organisation, the Provisional IRA. One of the disturbing features of recent times is that with the seductive suggestion that those organisations, both political and paramilitary, were prepared to move into democracy, and democracy alone, a cloak of respectability has been cast upon them, without either side committing itself to democracy. On the Loyalist side, we are told that the CLMC ceasefire is still intact. The CLMC is not still intact. There is barely any kind of ceasefire between the component organisations, never mind from that set up to the community as a whole. It is a charade and the people in Northern Ireland know it to be so.
Yet those who stand as the apologists for those organisations are welcomed with open arms and given not only publicity but a place that I think is out of kilter with their proper standing in any democratic society. That is so on the Republican side too where there are representatives, and, indeed, representatives who have been elected to the other place. I fear that we may be crossing, if we had not done so already, a line between politics and violence over which we may find it difficult to cross back. I greatly fear that the use of violence has now become such an entrenched component of politics in Northern Ireland—not only by those who have been involved and their elected mandate but also in the way they find themselves being treated by representatives of proper sovereign governments—that even where there is a supposed ceasefire, we shall not find those atrocities disappearing.
In a recent edition of the Economist, in an interview with a respected journalist, it was made clear by a leading Republican that, yes, even if there were another IRA ceasefire such atrocities as we have seen today in Lurgan would continue because the so-called Loyalist ceasefire has seen atrocities continue and their representatives have not been banned from the talks.
So while we may with all propriety, and perhaps with a degree of self satisfaction, add those two organisations to the list of proscribed organisations, I fear that at the same time we are allowing a degree of respectability to gather round those longer-standing paramilitary organisations and their political apologists which may not serve anyone well either in my home place or on this side of the water.
4.28 p.m.
Baroness Denton of Wakefield: My Lords, everyone on these Benches joins in the condemnation by the Minister of the acts of violence today in the killing of two, I understand, community policemen who were going about their job. They were mown down in a most terrible way. We extend our sympathies to their families and share their heartbreak. Perhaps we could also praise the members of the RUC who at this precise moment, despite these incidents, continue to do their duty maintaining law and order in Northern Ireland.
We also support the Government in all their efforts to defeat terrorism in every form and at all levels, and therefore are supportive of the order brought forward today.
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Although I do not agree with all the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Alderdice, I do agree that proscription will not provide a cure to violence. That must come from within the community, whatever the dedication of those at all levels in all organisations who work towards peace. I take this opportunity to put on record that in my view that includes the Northern Ireland Civil Service. The fact that they do many jobs which local politicians should do does not raise a question as to the way they do them or their desire to find peaceful solutions.
Real help will come when there is no support out in the community for terrorists and when there are no hiding places. Those who connive at terrorism or turn a blind eye to terrorist activities are participants in violence. The Minister rightly appeals for information about today's killings and the many other incidents that the people of Northern Ireland suffer. Everyone must play his or her part against violence. This order deserves the support of the many people in Northern Ireland who desire and deserve peace. We wish the Government every success in their fight against these terrible crimes.
4.31 p.m.
Lord Dubs: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness on the Opposition Front Bench for her words of support. She was a Minister in Northern Ireland for a long period of time and is well aware of the situation on the ground there. Her words therefore carry additional weight.
Perhaps I may deal briefly with the points made by other Members of the House in the course of the debate. To turn to the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Park, the Government value enormously the work of the RUC, their bravery and their willingness to put up with enormous dangers in the course of their day-to-day work. It is very much upon them and other members of the security forces that so many people in Northern Ireland depend for the safety of their day-to-day existence. That in itself adds further risks to being a member of the RUC, as we saw so tragically earlier today.
As regards the new government in Dublin, the Government, as did the previous British Government, will co-operate with any government in Dublin. We are confident that whoever becomes Taoiseach on 26th June will stand fully behind the Anglo-Irish communiqué of 28th February last year, in which both governments agreed that their Ministers would not meet Sinn Fein until there was an unequivocal restoration of the IRA cease-tire. Mr. Ahern has affirmed in recent days his support for this position. I do not want to go into the details of particular appointments made by the government in Dublin; it would not be appropriate for me to do so, except to reiterate that we expect to co-operate fully with the new government in Dublin. We are confident that they will be as opposed to terrorism as the previous government in Dublin were.
My noble friend Lord Fitt speaks with the authority of having lived for many years in Northern Ireland and has a great deal of knowledge of the situation on

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the ground there. He will understand that I am not able to give an undertaking about the future of the emergency legislation today, except to say that it will stay in place for as long as it is needed. We will not lessen the power of the security forces, the police and others by taking away from any legislation that protects them. We will keep that legislation firmly in place.
The noble Lord, Lord Alderdice, at times struck a pessimistic note. Last week, the Secretary of State made a speech from which perhaps I may quote a small section. She said:
"The Government will do all it can to deal with terrorism from whatever source. I fully share the concern expressed by many about recent terrorist attacks that have been attributed to loyalist extremists. The ceasefire announcement by the so-called Combined Loyalist Military Command is still formally in place and, as the Prime Minister has said. that sign of restraint—so far
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as it goes—is welcome. But the words of any ceasefire declaration are meaningless unless reflected in deeds on the ground".
I thank all Members of the House for the support that they have given the Government in relation to this order. I commend it to the House.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
4.34 p.m.
Baroness Gould of Potternewton: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now adjourn during pleasure for five minutes.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
[The Sitting was suspended from 4.34 to 4.39 p.m.]
House adjourned at twenty minutes before five o'clock.