Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)

My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friends Lady Laing of Elderslie and Lord Brady of Altrincham for their amendments. My noble friend Lord Brady seems to have pulled off the ingenious feat of engineering a debate on an amendment he did not want to move or speak about himself. So I will not say very much about his Amendment 90C, other than to note that the answers that noble Lords get to their questions would be far less satisfactory if the people responding had less authority to seek or determine the answers, and that our scrutiny of legislation would be diminished if the Ministers responding did not have the authority to make changes and compromises based on the arguments they have heard. We live in hope that we might be able to persuade Ministers of the need for some changes to and compromises on the Bill before the Committee. I will focus on my noble friend Lady Laing’s Amendment 67, which has far more going for it. It is certainly valuable to be able to bring people into government who might not have had the inclination or the opportunity to stand for election. The present Government have made good use of that. Mention has already been made, rightly, of the noble Lord, Lord Timpson, who had a distinguished career in business but also helped those who had been in the penal system. More pertinent examples are people such as the noble Lords, Lord Vallance of Balham and Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill, who were distinguished public servants in their fields before they dipped their toes into more political waters. Similarly, the noble and learned Lord the Attorney-General stepped away from a successful career at the Bar to provide counsel and public service in government. Governments of all colours have been able to persuade distinguished people from all sorts of walks of life to pause or sometimes abandon their careers in order to serve the country. What my noble friend says is right: they could perhaps persuade more if it were not accompanied by a life sentence in the legislature. Although some noble Lords who have given service in government remain active members of your Lordships’ House, drawing on the expertise they have added in office, others do not. I was struck by the figures that the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, quoted on the rate of continuing participation of former Ministers. Indeed, when I look down the list of those who served in the Conservative-led Governments of the previous 14 years, I am struck by the number who have chosen no longer to sit on these Benches. I remember one difficult conversation with a noble Lord, who will remain nameless, who was anxious to step down as a Minister, having already served for longer than the late Lord Heywood of Whitehall had promised them they would have to in return for their life peerage. So, although I am firmly of the view that Ministers of the Crown should be represented in both Houses of our bicameral system, my noble friend Lady Laing’s suggestion that temporary service in government should be separated from perpetual service here in the legislature is worthy of consideration. I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say.