Lord Howard of Rising (Con)

My Lords, this country is being slowly but inexorably paralysed by committees of all shapes and sizes—departmental public bodies, quangos, you name it. New ones are being created on a regular basis, and every single one of them—new and old—is doing its best to expand its remit, thereby increasing its power and, frequently, its budget. The result, more often than not, is that Ministers are unable to take decisions. They are obliged to seek advice from this committee or that. If something goes wrong, however, it is the Minister who is held responsible and has to take the blame, while these unelected bodies, populated by the people who know best, remain unaccountable. Even the Chancellor of the Exchequer has to consult the Office for Budget Responsibility, an organisation that gets things wrong more often than right. What is wrong with our own vast department, the Treasury—or even the Bank of England, which has been known to get things wrong? When it comes to misjudgments, it is but a rank amateur compared with the OBR. I draw your Lordships’ attention to one organisation that could be got rid of with no loss: the House of Lords Appointments Commission—HOLAC. It is a non-departmental public body. If His Majesty the King wishes, on the advice of the Prime Minister, to appoint someone to the House of Lords, what is the commission needed for, when exactly the same advice that the commission calls on to take its decision is available to the Prime Minister? Why does this advice need to be filtered through a separate body? What is the point of having an organisation to collate information from government departments to present it to the Prime Minister?