It has been agreed that, should any of the Questions for Short Debate not run for their allotted hour this afternoon, the Committee will adjourn during pleasure until the end of the hour. Therefore, each of the Questions for Short Debate will start on the hour.

I thank noble Lords for attending today's debate—we are, I fear, the usual suspects—to discuss how the needs of those with a learning disability will be addressed in the Government's forthcoming paper on future funding for adult social care. You will appreciate that, as president of the Royal Mencap Society, this subject is close to my heart. Mencap is a leading member of the Learning Disability Coalition, which is at the forefront of the campaign to ensure that this Green Paper fully addresses the demographic changes which will necessitate, and already are necessitating, greater social care support for those with a learning disability.

Currently, only 120,000 people out of the 1.5 million people with a learning disability receive support from social services. Many of those who receive support have had it reduced because of pressures on social care budgets. That means fewer hours at a day centre and fewer hours of help with washing, shopping and attending social activities. Others have been totally excluded from care as cash-strapped councils tighten their eligibility criteria. For all the people affected, that means that their quality of life has deteriorated. Many languish at home instead of being able, like their non-learning disabled peers, to reach their potential.

The Commission for Social Care Inspection has referred to these people as becoming “lost in the system” and has confirmed that the tightening of eligibility criteria is set to get worse with 73 per cent of councils stating that next year they will be able to support only learning disabled people with severe or critical needs—means testing by another name. That means that three-quarters of councils' learning disability budgets are under-resourced.

Individual stories of hardship, as a result of this tightening of eligibility criteria, are beginning to emerge. The other day I heard from a 70 year-old mother and an 80 year-old stepfather who support their 41 year-old son, Philip, in the family home. Previously, Philip enjoyed a total of nine weeks' residential respite at a local unit three miles away from home. He also had six tea-time visits a year. The family described this respite as a “life saver”, giving them a chance to relax and carry out their household tasks. They also had access to a 24-hour emergency support service.

I believe you will be as shocked as I was to hear that most of this system of support has been withdrawn. In their own words, the family says:

“Philip's respite was reduced to just four weeks, eleven miles away at a unit which we consider unsuitable and which necessitates a difficult journey for us, his elderly parents. There are no tea time visits, no emergency services in place. In reality we had only fifteen nights respite in the last year”.

The care services Minister has announced a review of eligibility criteria, and for this we are grateful. However, stories such as Philip's show how urgently action is needed and that these alarming reductions in the availability of social care need to be addressed in the forthcoming Green Paper.

Another worrying story concerns a 43 year-old man, Andrew, whose father contacted the Learning Disability Coalition. Andrew suffers a range of physical and mental disabilities. His father says that,

“whilst his condition has been deteriorating over the past eight years, this mainly affected his mobility”.

The underfunding of adult social care in his area has meant that the vital one-to-one support that Andrew's daycare centre provided has ceased. Andrew used to have the capability to communicate vocally with a few words and short sentences, through which he could indicate his needs. However, Andrew's father says,

“Since the one-to-one facility was abandoned by the centre, he has lost all power of speech. Whilst one cannot be absolutely sure his loss of vocal communication is the result of the lack of stimulation, being shuttered up daily with 50 or so others in a ‘warehousing’ situation, leads our own doctor to strongly believe this is the major cause of his problem”.

That widening reduction in services, caused by a lack of adequate resources, will make it near impossible for the Government to deliver the admirable policy promises they have made to people with learning disabilities. Those promises have been set out in Valuing People Now, Improving the Life Chances of Disabled People, Putting People First, the Independent Living Strategy, and others. Those government plans have raised the hopes and expectations of people with a learning disability and their families. However, as the excellent report from the Joint Committee on Human Rights said earlier this month,

“limited resources are undermining attempts to implement the aims of that policy [Valuing People] effectively”.

The Commission for Social Care Inspection has also commented that,

“the quality of life for many could be significantly enhanced with relatively minor social care interventions ... support to take part in leisure activities, support to go to a skills class at the local further education college or support to sustain a job”.

Indeed, removing day-time activities for people with Down’s syndrome and other forms of learning disability can lead to early onset of dementia and mental health problems. Withdrawing support from people to take exercise endangers their health and encourages obesity. Apart from the impact on people's quality of life, that will cost more in the long run than the cost savings made. This shortfall in funding is making a mockery of the Government's prevention agenda.

The Green Paper provides the Government with the perfect opportunity to get to grips with the current failure to resource properly the services they have promised people with learning disabilities. The Government have talked a great deal previously about this Green Paper's agenda to tackle the problems of an ageing population, but they have not talked nearly enough about how they plan to address the social care needs of adults with a learning disability. There are significant differences between the social care needs of people with learning disabilities and older people. Many people with learning disabilities need care packages for life and those packages will need flexibility so that they change as their needs and aspirations change.

Co-payment, which is such a pertinent issue in funding the care of older people, is unlikely to be relevant for people with learning disabilities as many of them remain, regrettably, some of the poorest and most socially excluded in the country. I am delighted to say that more people with a learning disability are surviving infancy and are living much longer than ever before. However, improvements in neo-natal care mean that the number of babies surviving with profound and multiple learning disabilities is increasing. Such babies may need costly care packages. This is adding yet further to the pressure on social care services which, as we have seen, are already struggling to meet demand.

Another issue is that 60 per cent of people with a learning disability live with their parents. As these sons and daughters live for longer, many elderly and frail parents and families will no longer be around to care for them in the family home. Unfortunately, there is not enough up-to-date information about the trends in demand for services for people with learning disabilities to make accurate projections of how those numbers are increasing and what the likely future costs will be. We need a great deal more evidence if we are to ensure that we allocate sufficient resources to provide the accommodation and support that people with a learning disability need to live independently of their parents. I would be grateful if the Minister could tell me whether the department has, or is considering, carrying out that vital research.

My conclusion is very simple. I invite the Government to use the months before the publication of the Green Paper to commission the necessary research so that when they publish they can ensure that services for people with learning disabilities will be adequately resourced in future. The Government have set themselves the aim of achieving equality for disabled people by 2025; if they are truly committed to tackling the complex and sensitive issues that I have outlined today in the forthcoming Green Paper, it has the potential to be a vital tool in the achievement of the 2025 aim. I look forward to hearing the thoughts and comments on these issues from other noble Lords and, in addition to these speeches, eagerly anticipate the Minister’s reply to this discussion.

First, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Rix, on initiating this timely debate, focusing attention on the needs of one of the most significant groups in adult social care. I fear that I shall repeat many of the points that he has made but, such is the importance of this debate, I have no doubt that many of us will do so. To date, as he said, the debate surrounding the forthcoming Green Paper has been focused almost solely on the funding of long-term care for elderly people. The value of this debate is in pointing out how some of the potential solutions voiced in that area will not meet the needs of adults with learning disabilities.

As the noble Lord pointed out, social care packages for people with learning difficulties are for life, not just old age. While elderly people may be able to contribute to the cost of their social care, it is unlikely that people with learning difficulties will be able to gain the resources to do so. Moreover, the social care packages for people with learning difficulties accommodate much more than just personal care. They need to involve multi-disciplinary teams covering most aspects of that person's life, including housing, domiciliary support, employment, further education, health and leisure activities.

First, I congratulate the Government on their decision to publish a Green Paper on adult social care, which has been warmly welcomed. It is extremely heartening that adult social care is at last gaining prominence on the political agenda. The Government strategy unit's report Improving the Life Chances of Disabled People was widely applauded, with its target date to achieve equality for disabled people by 2025. However, if that is to be realised, this Green Paper must address the sensitive and complex needs of people with learning disabilities. It needs to grapple with two stark facts: first, the extent of need which is not currently met and, secondly, the future growth in demand that will result from social trends and demographic changes.

Mencap's report, Breaking Point, put in sharp relief the significant amount of unmet need that currently exists, especially relating to respite care. It found that seven of out of 10 families have never been offered a choice of short-break services and six out of 10 do not get a short break that fully meets their needs. One in three families had experienced a cut in their short-break services last year and six out of 10 family carers who are in poor physical health say that it is because of the amount of care they provide.

As this shows, local authorities are struggling to meet even current need. The Local Government Association has found that in 2005-06 three-quarters of councils experienced significant cost pressures for their learning disability services. As a result, local authorities have tightened their eligibility criteria for care services to a shocking degree. According to the state of the nation report from the Commission for Social Care Inspection, by the end of the current financial year 73 per cent of local councils will support people with learning disabilities only when they have substantial or critical needs.

What does this mean for all those people with learning disabilities who have very real needs that are not so severe? It means that they will live poverty-stricken lives of isolation and restriction, in which they are given no chance to fulfil their potential in employment, training or any meaningful social activity. They have no hope of getting even a small amount of support to live the fulfilling lives which admirable government policies have spelled out for them.

The gap between the vision of government policy and reality is stark. While central government may be committed to establishing a support organisation of disabled people in every social service authority, those organisations are the first to be cut when council funding is short. Currently, Liverpool People First, in common with many other such organisations, is in danger of losing all its core funding. Core funding is the essential element that enables these organisations to survive, yet trusts and funding organisations are loath to fund them. As People First points out, local councils’ duty to consult disabled people is severely impaired if local organisations of disabled people do not exist. As a result, local councils’ commissioning of services to meet need is bound to be faulty and inadequate. People First calls on the Government to set a baseline for funding those local disabled people’s organisations that councils are unable to fall below without financial penalty.

As the Learning Disability Coalition points out, the current lack of funding for adult services lies at the heart of the widespread human rights abuse that was detailed in the Joint Committee on Human Rights report A Life Like Any Other, which was published earlier this month. The report found that the human rights of people with learning disabilities were being violated by public authorities, local councils and NHS trusts in an alarming number of areas and concluded that:

“For many adults with learning disabilities, the violation of their human rights is seen as a normal part of their everyday lives”.

If that is the current picture, what is the prospect for the future? There are a number of demographic changes and social trends that mean that the pressure on services will only get worse unless they are properly addressed by the Green Paper. For one thing, improvements in neo-natal care have resulted in an increasing number of babies surviving with profound and multiple learning disabilities. There is the rise in single-parent households and the consequent pressure, mostly on mothers, which can lead them to breaking point. The tightening of local authority eligibility criteria means that many more people with learning disabilities are forced to stay at home as day activities are cut, which increases the pressure on families. Moreover medical improvements mean that people with learning disabilities are living longer, but that means that they are outliving the ability of their families to help care for them. It is estimated that 60 per cent of those with a severe or profound learning disability in England live with a family carer, so provision needs to be made for the time when that family carer is too old or frail to continue. Yet Mencap’s report The Housing Time Bomb found that only two in four local authorities was even aware of the number of people this affected and only one in four had planned alternative housing for people with learning disabilities who were living with parents aged over 70. The Learning Disability Coalition is keen to hear from the Government how they will use the Green Paper to ensure that there will be sufficient funding to provide adequate support for people with learning disabilities when they leave their family home.

It is this lack of awareness of the extent of need and the conflicting predictions by social care statisticians of future demand that the Learning Disability Coalition calls on the Government to address urgently. Can the Minister assure me that an up-to-date assessment of the future demand for social care for people with learning disabilities will be carried out before the Green Paper is published? Unless the provisions proposed in the forthcoming Green Paper are based on an accurate forecast, it has no hope of closing the yawning gap between the Government's admirable policies for people with learning disabilities and the reality of their needs.

I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Rix for raising this important subject in a Question for Short Debate, even though he has skilfully and clinically dispatched some of my birds. On quoting his phrase, “the usual suspects being here”, I can honestly claim to be not guilty on that score, strangely enough.

However, I must declare an interest in these matters, as chairman of a small residential home for women with physical and learning disabilities in Hampshire and as the honourable vice-president of MCCH, an organisation which provides services for those with mental illness, learning disability and autism in London and the south-east.

The debate is timely because earlier I had the honour of hosting a launch in this House for the Mental Health Helplines Partnership, a much-needed and exciting initiative by the Department of Health, NHS Direct and a media company.

It is entirely right that, ahead of publication of the Green Paper, we should be singling out one critical aspect of adult social care—the needs of those with a learning disability. These needs are inevitably more complex and diverse than those in other categories of social care, acute though they may be; that includes issues such as housing, employment, further education, home support, health, life enhancement—I could go on with such a list.

I believe that the strain on funding, and therefore on services, has never been greater, at least in my time, which is quite long. Whether it is the threat to day services and what they are able to offer clients, or to respite care facilities, the danger of cuts is evident on every side.

The critical factor is surely the evident dysfunction which exists between the entirely understandable and laudable aims of the various agencies in this field and the financial resources which are likely to be available for these purposes. You could argue that this is—indeed it is—an age-old problem, but I believe that it has never been so acute and as apparent as it is now.

Speaking in general terms and non-technically, I have become increasingly puzzled by the rationale which allows two systems to run in parallel—care provided by the NHS and care provided through the social services departments of local authorities. Perhaps a short personal example will illustrate the point. The home with which I am associated is in a serviceable building, is quite modern and is capable of accommodating 20 clients. On national criteria, however, that is 10 too many. So, until we rebuild, we will get no further referrals. Without these our income drops until ultimately we implode. Contrast that with the recent case—admittedly exceptional—of Orchard Hill in Sutton, run by the NHS with, so far as I can recall, over 100 residents and the subject of a damning report 18 months ago. Are they down to 10 yet—I wonder? The phrase “level playing fields” comes to mind.

There has been much speculation about the transfer of learning disability from the NHS to local authorities. When is that going to take place? Will wholly adequate resources be made available to fund the transfer so that those affected will not be disadvantaged in any way? Furthermore, there is a general move away from the commissioning of block contracts to spot purchasing. Will provider organisations be allowed the time to make new arrangements? Will there be guidance in the Green Paper on how commissioners can move from one system to the other without serious disruption? We know how common a disease serious disruption has been in this country in recent years.

When local authority budgets are under severe strain—18 months ago it was estimated that three-quarters were in the red—and in view of the parlous financial situation for the foreseeable future, it will be essential that the Green Paper deals with today’s realities, among which are, as we have heard, carers getting older and being unable to cope. I do not apologise for repeating that 60 per cent of those with learning disabilities live at home. People with learning disabilities are living longer. Last but not least are the alarming findings of the report from the Joint Committee on Human Rights, which states that, for many adults with a learning difficulty,

“the violation of their human rights is seen as a normal part of their everyday lives”.

I echo calls for the Government to undertake a thorough evaluation before the appearance of the Green Paper of the likely demands on special care from those with learning difficulties—that is essential. The heart of this and previous Governments has been in the right place in valuing people policies. No one doubts that for a moment—certainly not this speaker. But, since the demand for resources to back these policies up has never been greater, we are rapidly approaching a last-chance saloon in providing a satisfactory framework for the needs of our most disadvantaged citizens. If the forthcoming Green Paper does not meet these concerns head on and offer practical—I stress that—solutions, a great opportunity will have been lost. I am confident that the Minister will have regard to those anxieties when she replies.

When the noble Lord, Lord Rix, talked about the usual suspects, I could not but help feeling guilty as charged. This is an interesting debate not because anything new has come up, but because the Question has been asked as the policy paper is being commissioned. We are starting to co-ordinate a response to government, because, as has been said, they seem to be making the right noises and commitments. But the question is how parts of government tie together.

That we should get bits of government to co-ordinate is one of my usual cries. We should take it as read that Chinese walls exist in Whitehall, but how do many of the problems that have been spoken about today—for instance, the fact that social care needs are not being met—impinge on other government policies? The noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley, should be here to talk about carers, as they probably underpin the whole approach. If carers are let down and they ultimately fail and say, “We cannot cope any more”, one’s entire strategy is torn apart. Those with mild and moderate learning disabilities will suddenly have acute problems, because local provision for those acute problems will suddenly disintegrate as a result of the maths not balancing out. The problems will get worse without the carers and the support workers at home who are part of the demographic process which the Green Paper addresses. To make the thrust of the Green Paper work, one must have a strategy that addresses what happens to those groups; otherwise, everything will break down.

How does one tie in adult social care with other groups? When discussing the previous welfare reform package of legislation, we spoke about welfare to work and getting people involved. How do social care budgets tie in with that? The question does not apply if one is talking about those who require care predominantly for reasons of age; it does apply if one is to try to get those with mild and moderate learning difficulties into work to provide themselves with some social support and outside stimuli. That the Government have said that they will enable people to gain qualifications will mean that the day courses in colleges which have already been referred to face acute problems as well, because one is accentuating problems arising from people being at home for too long.

How this is co-ordinated is the big question for government. As the noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, said, it is not that the Government—indeed, all who are involved with government: we all must take some responsibility here; it is anybody who deals with Whitehall, either as direct lobbyer or organiser of the system—lack good intentions. But how will they make the parts come together? There are two ways of doing it: either one tries for joined-up government, or one says, “We can’t do it” and goes for a silo defence of one’s budget. We must hear from the Minister which one of these is favoured. Will she simply say that a criterion will look after this problem within these strategies, which is often the way we go forward and have to deal with it?

How do mild and moderate learning disabilities fit into the thinking? Another of my clichés is that we have reverse battlefield medicine here. In battlefield medicine, you patch up very quickly those you can get back out to be shot at again, but the state tends to deal first with those with the most severe problems. This means that those who are the least easy to spot, or who are muddling through and achieving at the moment, are ignored. Then, when they are pushed over the edge, they suddenly become a new problem. How the Government intend to deal with that and work such people into the system is an interesting question.

Although the Minister has taken on her responsibilities only comparatively recently, I am sure she has already noticed the similarities across many of these debates. She nods her head. The fact is that if you have a middle group that is undiagnosed, unhelped and unsupported, it can become a much bigger cost later on. Can we please have some indication of how the Government are starting to work this group into the system? Will the Government continue to try to get government and parts of Whitehall working together, or are they going to make sure that there is an understanding and commitment, with something written up front, that all new policies will include this group? I am sadly coming to the conclusion that that may be the only practical way forward.

I, too, thank the noble Lord, Lord Rix, for raising this matter. By doing so, he has put a challenge to the Minister and to the Government which I am sure the Minister will be able to rise to today.

The whole question of support for vulnerable adults is mired in controversy, and it should not be. It is to be hoped that the Green Paper will bring common-sense solutions to the fraught question of who pays for what. There is a crying need, too, for coherence in relation to the question of how responsibility can be borne or shared for those who need care, either because they cannot provide it for themselves, or because they have no one to provide it for them, or because their requirements, either practical or financial, are beyond committed families to provide.

It is well recognised that for our older population, irrespective of their financial means, there is a need for sensitive, practical care, either to help keep people in their own homes or in supported housing. Those who are most at risk of not finding such care are those who fall outside the criteria for the limited social care support, about which we have heard a great deal today, but where paying for their own care is beyond their means. Currently local authorities—I declare an interest as an elected member of one in London—which either give support themselves or commission it from private providers, are able to do so only for the most needy, a point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, very specifically. For the rest, what can be given is either extremely limited or non-existent. In many cases, local authorities are not even providing advice or practical assistance to anyone who does not meet their criteria. That seems to be as true for those with learning difficulties as for elderly people who need help.

No one who has listened to the noble Lord, Lord Rix, today, or has read the briefing provided by the Learning Disability Coalition, can have failed to be moved by what both have said. Of course, as with other people who are vulnerable, there are gradations of need. Many of those with learning disabilities can, given a modicum of help and the support and drive of their families and teachers, achieve virtually normal lives, a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Addington, and the noble Viscount, Lord Tenby. They can maintain jobs applicable to their own capacity and an independent existence. However, others are almost totally reliant for the whole of their lives on social or healthcare support.

We have already noted that medical improvements ensure that those with learning disabilities live longer than in the past and, in many cases, may outlive their parents. They either then become the responsibility of their siblings—if they have any—who may find assuming responsibility for them too onerous or too intrusive on their own lives, or they may require help from the social or health services. Regrettably—again, as we have heard—a recent audit by the Healthcare Commission found that, where health services are provided, insufficient attention is paid to safeguarding those who are most vulnerable, they are poorly planned, and residential care provided by health services is largely in institutionalised settings. I recognise, as the noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, said, that there are private organisations which provide this care, but the report related specifically to services provided by the state. As I said, they were found to be institutionalised, but is that still the case? Institutionalised settings should have gone out years ago.

The commission concluded that it had concerns about the quality of care overall in most establishments. The noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, raised a very important point in referring to one particular home. Many homes for the elderly—and, now, for those who are vulnerable in other senses—are being driven out of existence by care standards. In my own borough, I know of two large private homes for the elderly that gave up simply because they could not meet the very exacting physical standards demanded of them. I just hope that that will not happen across the board. No one wants establishments that do not have proper facilities or are unable to provide nice surroundings but, equally, do we want some of these excellent places forced out of existence simply because they cannot practically provide a room with an en suite bathroom?

As other noble Lords have pointed out, help from social services is not necessarily an option either. As the social care inspectorate found, by the end of 2008, 73 per cent of local councils’ finances will support only those who have substantial or critical needs. Local authorities will tell you that there is enormous pressure on their social care budgets, but being able to provide only a proportion of what is required, and then only for the most seriously affected, will leave many questions still to be answered.

As with the whole question of adult social care, for years solutions have been sought to the unequal conundrum of who pays, who receives and who loses out. The report, Valuing People, which was published in 2001 and has been referred to already, set out the Government’s commitment to improving life chances for people with a learning disability. Valuing People Now went further into how the principles outlined in the former report could be extended. However, fine words cannot deliver the goods if there is insufficient money in the system to enable that to happen.

There is a not unreasonable expectation that, where they can, people should self-fund at least a proportion of their care, and it is anticipated that this will be promulgated again in the Green Paper. However, this concept—I think it was the noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, who raised it—does not readily lend itself to those with learning difficulties, who are unlikely to earn sufficient to make any contribution to their present or future needs and who, in many instances, have been maintained by their parents, often at enormous personal cost.

The aim of the Green Paper is to ensure that care funding is,

“a sustainable system that targets resources effectively”.

That seems to be as relevant to the concerns about those with learning difficulties, who in adulthood become increasingly vulnerable, as it is to those who are elderly. The problems relating to both are not going to go away. Demography tells us that, if nothing else does. The distribution or sharing of resources, standards of care and responsible authorities are germane to both. I look forward to the Minister’s response to the case which I believe has been made out by noble Lords that this widely anticipated Green Paper should not address itself to adult social care alone but should include those with learning difficulties.

My Lords, I start by paying tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Rix, and by saying how much I admire his dedication and work in support of people with learning disabilities. As I am learning in my job, in which now I am not so new, many noble Lords have huge expertise in these areas, some of whom are represented here today.

Social care is a vital part of the lives of many disabled people, including people with learning disabilities. In 2005-06, a total of £5 billion was spent on social care for 18 to 64 year-olds, of which 56 per cent was spent on people with learning disabilities. That indicates the scale of the issue that needs to be addressed when we consider the future. While we have become better at identifying and supporting people with learning disabilities, there are now many more people with learning disabilities that survive into adulthood and older age and require continuing care. We have a responsibility to ensure that people can access that support. We recognise that the voices of people with learning disabilities and their carers have not always been heard in the debate on social care. Now, as we face fundamental reform of social care, it is of great importance to the Government to consider the needs of people with learning disabilities in the whole debate around social care.

Demand for social care has increased in recent years and is set to rise even further in future. The main reasons for this is down to the major changes happening in our society, which have serious implications for the care system: an ageing population; people with learning disabilities living longer and fuller lives; higher expectations about what services should deliver; and technological changes. All this is excellent news, and a tribute to the advances in medicine and in care over recent decades, as well as the effectiveness of organisations such as Mencap under the leadership of the noble Lord, Lord Rix. But we cannot underestimate the challenge that this represents to social care services.

A recent report produced by the King’s Fund estimated that the cost of providing the current levels of social care for those over 65 will increase from £10 billion per year in 2002, to £24 billion per year in 2026. We also know that by 2021, there will be over 1 million people aged 15 and above with learning disabilities in England, and the number of adults with learning disabilities aged over 60 is predicted to increase by 36 per cent between 2001 and 2021.

Although it is clear that continuing research will be needed to underpin the developing policy, we already know that there is a huge challenge before us. It is the shared ambition across government to put people first, including people with learning disabilities, through a radical reform of public services, enabling people to live their own lives as they wish, confident that services are of high quality, are safe and promote their own individual needs for independence, well-being and dignity. That is why in December last year we published a cross-sector concordat, Putting People First, which establishes collaborative framework between central and local government, the sector’s professional leadership, care providers and the social care regulator. It sets out the shared aims and values, which will work across agendas with users and carers to transform people’s experience of care and support services.

The challenges to delivering the ambitions set out in Putting People First are significant. In recognition of this, we are providing councils with £520 million over the next three years to support them to make the system changes and, more importantly, the cultural changes required to empower citizens to shape their own lives through the support that they need.

However, the noble Lord is right to seek clarity about how we will meet the needs of those with learning disabilities through these reforms. For far too long the needs of people with learning disabilities have not had the prominence they have deserved and needed in the debate on social care. We are committed to listening to the views of people with learning disabilities and their carers, and that is why we are currently consulting on Valuing People Now: From Progress to Transformation. This sets out the priorities for the provision of services for people with learning disabilities for the next three years. Valuing People Now sets out how we are working towards transforming people’s lives—for example, through prioritising jobs and housing for people with learning disabilities—through the public service agreements on socially excluded adults.

Through Valuing People Now we are setting out the Government’s strategy to tackle a number of serious concerns raised around how health services are meeting the needs of people with learning disabilities. In May 2007, the Secretary of State established an independent inquiry into the healthcare of people with learning disabilities. This was in response, of course, to Mencap’s report Death by Indifference, which highlighted the tragic deaths of six people with learning disabilities who were under the care of the NHS. Sir Jonathan Michael is chairing the inquiry and we await his report to the Secretary of State early this summer.

We are committed to considering the feedback from people with learning disabilities and their carers. We shall look with interest at the views of groups such as the National Forum, the Task Force and the Learning Disability Coalition and will look to publish the final document in the summer. Valuing people now, which was referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, and others, and Putting People First are vital to achieving our aspirations for supporting people to live independently through choice and control. However, the challenges of an ageing population and the facts that disabled people are living longer and that higher expectations remain mean that a radical rethink is required of the care and support system to meet these long-term pressures.

The Green Paper mentioned by noble Lords will push forward the commitments made in Putting People First and address the long-term outstanding issues around funding, a point mentioned by my noble friend Lady Wilkins, the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, and others. Over the next 10 years the Government want to create a new care and support system suitable for those with learning disabilities and their families. This is why the Government announced in the Pre-Budget Report last year that they would be producing a Green Paper on the reform of the care and support system. The Green Paper will look at options for developing a sustainable care and support system and whether it will be possible to develop a new system for all adults, not only for people over the age of 65. This is important for those with learning difficulties as a large proportion of them are of working age rather than pension age. The issue of ageing parents, a point raised by several noble Lords, is clearly part of the consideration of the Green Paper.

At this stage, the Government remain open-minded about the solutions and are keen to work closely with a number of learning disability interest groups throughout this process. These groups will play a vital role in shaping the success of the reform and the support system. My honourable friend Ivan Lewis announced on 6 February that the Department of Health will commence a public engagement process in the spring which will engage with people of all ages about the problems facing the care and support system. In order to capture the views of people with learning disabilities, the Government will ensure that the public engagement process and associated literature are accessible, available in a wide range of formats and appropriately publicised.

Turning now to specific questions raised by the Committee, the noble Lords, Lord Rix and Lord Addington, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Wilkins and Lady Hanham, particularly mentioned the issue of the eligibility criteria—one of the themes with which the noble Lord, Lord Addington, said I would become familiar. The Government have asked CSCI to carry out a review of the criteria for fair access to care services, their application by councils with social services responsibilities and their impact on people, and to address the issues, particularly for those with mild or moderate disabilities.

We will receive a full report from CSCI in the autumn. This will assist in providing evidence to inform the Green Paper—which addresses one of the points raised by noble Lords—and we will use its findings to look at the right models to promote best practice in prevention and enablement, alongside good access and information about social care services where they are required.

The noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, raised the issue of people with low and medium-term needs. The range of ways in which local authorities support people with low and moderate disabilities has to be addressed, including support for housing and leisure programmes.

The noble Lords, Lord Rix and Lord Addington, asked about carers. From our outset in 1997, the Government have recognised the value of carers, and since 1999 we have had a policy for carers, which is now being reviewed. We are increasing the amount of money that councils can use to support carers to £185 million this year, and we have made £25 million available to councils to help them support carers who are in a crisis situation. The noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, and the noble Lord, Lord Rix, also raised the issues of research and how to look at unmet need when planning the Green Paper. Research underpins the reason why the Green Paper is being written. It is, by definition, difficult to identify how much unmet need there is out there. The research that has taken place looked at the overall level of demand and modelled the forward trends. The Green Paper has not been planned on specific research but has been planned and led by the Treasury.

The noble Lord, Lord Rix, asked what the Government are doing about modernising day services. We want people with learning disabilities to be more independent. Valuing People Now has been published, and one of its priorities is what people do during the day, at weekends and in the evening. The deadline for responses is tomorrow.

The noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, asked what the Government are doing to ensure that people with learning disabilities are not socially marginalised and have access to housing. We have committed to a public service agreement to prioritise support into employment and to enable people with learning disabilities to have security in housing.

I shall turn briefly to the issue raised by the noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, about when the Government are transferring funding from learning disability into the NHS and local government. In response to the investigation of learning disabilities in Cornwall, the Government’s commitment was to strengthen the commissioning of learning disability services, including giving consideration to a stronger role for local authorities. The current Valuing People Now consultation is seeking views on a proposal to transfer funding of commissioning responsibility for the social care elements of learning disabilities from PCTs to local authorities. I am not answering the question of “when” because my brief does not tell me, but I will find out and write to the noble Viscount.

I think that I have nearly run out of time, but I want to address all the other issues raised by noble Lords. I shall make two more points. The noble Lord, Lord Addington, quite rightly raises the issue of joining up on every occasion. The concordat Putting People First was signed by six departments. The review for the Green Paper is similarly cross-governmental and is being led by Her Majesty’s Treasury. I hope that we are making progress. The noble Lord always recognises when we are.

The Green Paper needs to have practical solutions. The options put forward by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and Sir Derek Wanless are being considered. They will provide a menu of options that will need to be considered when the Green Paper is published.

The needs of those with learning disabilities are a central policy issue that is being considered in a number of high-profile government agendas. The Green Paper on the reform of care and support systems is a unique opportunity for the Government to consider the needs of large numbers of people with learning disabilities who are living fuller and longer lives. It offers those with learning disabilities an opportunity to create a new system aimed at fulfilling the roles and responsibilities of citizenship by enabling them to have choice of and control over the support they need to live their everyday lives.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Rix, and other noble Lords. I will answer in writing those questions I have not directly addressed.

[The Sitting was suspended from 2.53 to 3 pm.]

asked Her Majesty’s Government what actions they are taking to tackle the issue of fly-tipping.

The noble Baroness said: Contrary to the Order Paper, this debate is about fly-tipping—not “fly-tapping”, which sounds much more interesting, but it is not a problem of which I am aware.

Fly-tipping makes one’s blood boil, particularly when out in the countryside, enjoying a walk and one comes across a pile of rubbish. It can absolutely incense people. It also appears to have given rise to a whole new industry. Last week, I saw a van with the words “Aquatic Retrieval Unit” on it. Mystified, I asked the driver what he did, and he said, “I fish Tesco trolleys out of the river”. That is another example of the costs generated by this very anti-social behaviour of fly-tipping.

I have mentioned the fact that it is a blight on the countryside, but 88 per cent of fly-tipping incidents occur in urban areas—it is just more obvious if one is in otherwise pristine countryside. According to figures issued by local authorities, there has been a 4.5 per cent increase in incidents in the past year.

I would have thought that reporting fly-tipping would be quite a straightforward matter, but as usual it is not. Having looked into the matter a little more, I have discovered that there are local authorities that will count someone who puts out their bin bag a day early as a fly-tipper. That makes it difficult to work out the exact figures. I am assured that such local authorities have been removed from the figures that I have just given. Clearly, there is a serious problem.

The costs are very high. Local authorities estimate that they spend £74 million clearing up fly-tipping and another £25 million on enforcement and the Environment Agency has costs on top of that. It is so depressing as this problem need not exist. It is not due to some enormous social or economic ill; it is a combination of certain circumstances, to which I shall turn later, and predominantly downright anti-social behaviour.

I am not excusing fly-tipping in the least, but we need to make it simpler for people to dispose of waste easily. I shall take a moment to tell the Committee what happened to me three years ago. I was clearing some ground at my new cottage and I was filling up a skip. A piece of asbestos—about the size of an A4 piece of paper—was in the rubbish. The skip lorry driver would not take it, which was fine, so I drove to the civic amenity site, where I was told that they could not take it and that I would have to go to the main tip. That was a 12-mile drive. There I was made to fill in a form, drive over the weighbridge, drive for 10 minutes through the site, come back, be weighed again and pay £70. That was for a piece of asbestos of that size. I suggest that very few people would have gone to that trouble. We have to make it easier for people who are genuinely trying to help.

To an extent, that exemplifies a problem that we see all through modern life: everyone is so keen to manage their own costs and keep within their own framework that they tend to shunt costs on to someone else or on to the public and do not think about the impact that such a policy might have on the behaviour of the public. Certainly, the Environment Agency has argued that the costs and complexity of managing waste lawfully encourages some people to dump their waste and to fly-tip. We should certainly not ignore the Environment Agency, which after all is the expert in this area. The law of unintended consequences is familiar to all of us.

Operators of civic amenity sites often install height barriers; they create bureaucratic systems. They do so for good reasons—for example, to sort out commercial from domestic waste—but there are many examples of people who get caught out by them. They are simply householders who are trying to behave in an orderly way and find themselves unable to do so. It is increasingly the case that small contractors who come to change the kitchen or perhaps the bathroom will not take the old goods away because they do not want to pay for them to be tipped, which leaves the householder with them. Some householders, who are unable or unwilling to deal with them in any other way, will simply dump them. I am not sure that the name “civic amenity site” is terribly useful. A lot of people do not know what it does. I am not sure why we call it that.

Local authorities probably do not pursue fly-tippers as vigorously as they might because there is a high cost involved. The debate is similar to that which we used to have about speeding fines, where the police would not stop people for speeding because it cost more to prosecute them than to let them speed. Is there not a solution in that? Should we not consider hypothecating fine income? What happens to fines for fly-tipping offences? The Environment Agency says that its court actions last year resulted in £422,000 being levied in fines. Does that go the Exchequer?

The Government’s waste strategy is very helpful—I know that they take it very seriously. Their proposals with regard to recycling, reducing packaging and a more draconian enforcement regime are welcome. There is a maximum penalty in the magistrates’ court of £50,000, but, according the Environment Agency, the average fine per prosecution is £3,298. Is that because there were no cases serious enough to warrant the maximum fine, or is it because magistrates are reluctant to impose high fines?

The waste strategy also proposes an increase in the landfill tax escalator of £8 per year. Having served on the board of the regulator, Entrust, for eight years, I am familiar with the landfill tax. The landfill tax credit scheme has certainly provided funding for many useful projects. However, I am worried that the increase in the level of landfill tax will encourage people to fly-tip. The bulk of landfill tax money simply goes straight to the Treasury. Have the Government considered giving some of the income from the escalator to local authorities and the Environment Agency to clean up if more fly-tipping results from the increase?

Last year’s local elections were rather odd in that they did not seem to be won or lost on political lines. They were “bin” elections, where councils across the country won or lost according to whether they were moving to fortnightly waste collections. A lot of high-flown rubbish was written about what was going to happen, some of it apocalyptic. Where are the Government on that subject? How much do they know about what is likely to happen if we move to fortnightly waste collection? Is there any evidence that it encourages fly-tipping? That question is even more relevant to “chip and bin” schemes. Will the Minister update the Committee on the Government’s thinking, especially on how it is possible to create incentives which should in theory create less waste but may also provide an incentive to fly-tip?

I am grateful to other noble Lords who have agreed to speak in this short debate. I look forward to their contributions and to the response of the Minister.

I welcome the words of the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, and agree with everything that she said about this problem. It is an area where the balance between penalties and incentives is wrong. The problem is getting away from us. Incidences of fly-tipping are increasing dramatically, but we are not managing to defeat the problem by bringing prosecutions with the current level of fines. I believe that we have the balance wrong between the factors that affect law-abiding people who try to do the right thing by disposing of their waste correctly, the level of penalties that can be applied and the vigour used to pursue illegal fly-tippers.

Much of the problem is caused by jobbing builders of one sort or another—small-scale firms for which the hassle and cost of disposing of their waste is just too much for them. It is all very well to say—and I shall be absolutely staggered if the Minister does not say it at some stage during his remarks—that the polluter should pay. Of course the polluter should pay, but the way in which the incentives are structured at the moment, it is not the polluter that pays but householders, through their council tax, and landowners. The levy is just too easy to evade. The countryside is a big place and fly-tipping takes place in urban areas as well. People will be irresponsible and they will dispose of their waste similarly irresponsibly. I in no way condone that but we have to recognise that as a fact.

Therefore, first, I think that we should at least seriously consider whether it would be more economically and environmentally effective to allow trade waste up to perhaps a weight of one tonne or a volume of two cubic metres—approximately what can be carried in a pick-up truck or light van—to be disposed of for free, as for a householder. If we did that, we would remove at a stroke a significant degree of fly-tipping in this country. I should like to know whether the Government have done a cost-benefit analysis of making such a change—what it would cost and what the benefits might be in terms of a reduction in fly-tipping. Perhaps this could be trialled as a local issue and we could see the results. Such a suggestion would also be helpful to householders who turn up in anything that looks like a commercial vehicle. These days, plenty of people own pick-up trucks, SUVs or a trailer—perhaps a horse box or something of that nature—and want to dispose of rubbish, but they are faced with bureaucracy at waste disposal centres. The other day at Question Time I heard the Minister rebutting that but I have had experience of it. One is made to feel not quite a criminal but when trying to do the right thing one is put through the wringer before being allowed to dispose of waste.

Secondly, I think that we should forget all thoughts of bin taxes and recycling penalties for householders. That will lead only to more plastic bags being slung out of cars—and all to avoid a tiny penalty for something which then costs a fortune to clear up. If we apply financial incentives for misbehaving, we should not be surprised when that happens. The noble Baroness referred to the law of unintended consequences. They may be unintended but they are fully foreseen, and many people, including Members of your Lordships’ House, have warned about them. We see the landfill tax increasing, and if people have incentives for disposing of their rubbish illegally, I am sure that they will continue to do so. Therefore, let us make it easier for people to obey the law.

Thirdly, we have to get on top of the enforcement fees. Can the Minister tell us the ratio between instances of fly-tipping and successful prosecutions? According to the figures given by the noble Baroness, the figure for the latter is minuscule. I have some personal experience of this. Near to where a relative of mine lives, repeated fly-tipping takes place in the lane that is used to access the house. One day, this got too much for me. I sorted through the rubbish and found an envelope with a name and address on it. I then got out my map and went round to the householder whose address was on the envelope. I asked what had happened and was told that a firm of jobbing builders had come to pitch for some work replacing guttering—the rubbish that had been disposed of was guttering. Feeling like Hercule Poirot, I then contacted the local authority to say that I had the rubbish, the piece of paper, the evidence from the householder and the name and address of the building firm that had dumped the rubbish, and I asked the authority to move to a prosecution. I was asked, “Did you see them dumping it?”. I did not, but that is rather like saying that, unless you actually see someone murdering someone else, it is not possible to prosecute them. That struck me as an extraordinary attitude. It turned out that this family firm was very well known for this sort of thing. The local authority officers were intimidated by the extended family and decided to take no action.

My third suggestion is that we should consider whether private contractors should be allowed to pursue fly-tippers on a “bounty” basis to bring forward successful actions. We know the vigour, for example, in London with which one is pursued for being more than one second over the time allowed on a parking meter. One is suddenly presented with a fine of £100 for that terrible offence. Compare that with the illegal dumping of rubbish. These are two totally different things, but, if one has a firm with people highly incentivised to pursue misdemeanours, why can they not use the investigative qualities demonstrated in that instance? It would be welcome if the Minister could address that.

Finally, I would like to ask the Minister about rats. We are told that instances of rodent infestation were up 32 per cent in the last period. Is there any thought that this is connected with the improper disposal of rubbish?

Fly-tipping is a serious problem. It blights the countryside. The economic costs are huge. With a better balance between the stick and carrot I believe that we can make some progress on it.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market, for introducing this short debate. Fly-tipping is a serious problem whether you live in urban or country areas. I understand that 93 per cent of rubbish is fly-tipped in urban areas, and that leaves 7 per cent in rural areas. It seems in the rural areas to be bigger; it is certainly more unsightly and more obvious. It is that small area that I want to focus on this afternoon.

I declare an interest as a member of Countryside Alliance, which has produced this very good and timely leaflet that has already been mentioned—Time for Action. It contains a lot of information and a lot of useful and worthwhile suggestions. The noble Viscount, Lord Goschen, has already talked about landowners. I want to amplify some of his points. Fly-tipping is a big problem for landowners. The acreage involved for the landowner is immaterial. All you need to have is a driveway, a gateway or a lay-by alongside your land and you will be a target for the fly-tipper. We understand that it is a major problem for three-quarters of all landowners. Put another way, it affects 67 per cent of all farmers. I live in a rural area, and all the farmers I have spoken to have, without exception, said, “We have a big problem”.

The cost of getting rid of the problem, so far as Defra is concerned, is the £47 million visited on the farmer or the landowner, but I would think that that is a highly conservative estimate; one could easily speculate that it could be half as much again, or even more.

What do you see? We have all seen everything from cars and used nappies to fridges, furniture, and mattresses. Fifty per cent of rubbish tipped is in black bags, which you can conclude comes from domestic sources and not just from the jobbing builder; and 53 per cent—again roughly half—of what is dumped is estimated by volume to have come from a small van or a car. There is an indication of the sort of people who are fly-tipping in the countryside.

We have speculated on the reasons for fly-tipping. They are fairly obvious. It could be because of increased charges for disposal of rubbish from your home; laziness plays a big part; perhaps increased regimentation in how councils are beginning to put out a whole range of different coloured bins for us to sort our rubbish, and some people just do not want to do that; and of course the hike in the landfill tax, which has already been mentioned.

What is the landowner to do? I focus on the landowner, as I said at the beginning of this short address. He will find that local authorities will vary between those who are sympathetic to his plight to those who are at the other end of the scale—almost bone-headed.

The landowner has the problem. The rubbish is dumped, by definition, on private land; if he moves it to the verge, which is an obvious answer for him, he immediately runs the risk of committing an offence of depositing litter in a public place from a private place. He is open to prosecution. He is all right if he has already entered into some sort of verbal contract with the local authority, because some local authorities will pick the rubbish up from the verge and take it away for him. It is lucky for the landowner if that is what happens, but many local authorities will not do that. He is then faced with either leaving the litter on his land and ignoring it, certain in the knowledge that one lot of litter will attract more to it like a magnet, or he can pick it up in his own trailer, pick-up truck or lorry and move it to a civic amenity site. There, as we have already heard, he can be met with a variety of responses. He may get a helpful response, which allows him to dump it on the civic amenity site, but more often than not at the site—which may be managed directly by the local authority or by an agent on its behalf—he will be met with an interrogation which frequently finishes either with him paying a fee to dump it as a commercial user or with him being turned away. What does he do with the rubbish then? One option is to dump it in some other neighbour’s yard or field—but I leave that question open because the point that I make is fairly self-evident.

The problem is similarly met by do-it-yourself handymen, who have a sink, a bath and a couple of bits and pieces of rubble. They are met with the same problem at civic amenity sites. That leads me to say the obvious—that there is a need for a sympathetic standardisation of approach at civic amenity sites for people seeking quite properly to get rid of their rubbish in that way. It is very unfair to penalise and make life difficult for the landowner, who is after all at the very end of the litter trail. We do not penalise people who have been inconvenienced or sustained damage to their properties in a burglary or assault. Those are both criminal offences—and this, too, is a criminal offence. The victim in this sense is the landowner who has found the car or mattress on his land, who is penalised because he very often has no redress and it is a lottery according to which local authority area he lives in.

We should not ask the Government to legislate on this, as we have too much legislation in the public domain already, but the Government are well placed to use their best offices to influence local authorities—probably through the LGA—to sort out a code of best practice for themselves to make life easier for those trying to use those civic amenity sites. As has been said, we should try to encourage magistrates to take the subject seriously, not through Defra but through government ministries. Then we could see just what a problem it is, where according to statistics half the litter in the country is fly-tipped. I hesitate to say whether those figures are true or not, but that is what we are led to believe. There is a problem, however, and magistrates need to be aware of the size of it.

Putting a cart before a horse, I think that we should press for more and better enforcement from local authorities. The noble Viscount has already spoken about that—although there has been a 46 per cent increase in enforcement from 2005-06 to 2006-07. We need to look at local authorities providing more adequate civic amenity sites. I live in a rural area in north Gloucestershire, where we have just gone through the exercise of having new bins and a new regime to collect rubbish, for which we are paying. In the literature that came to me through my door last week, I was told with a note of pride that there are two civic amenity sites that I can use; the nearest are in Cirencester and Wotton-under-Edge. That is fine, except that one is 30 miles away and the other is 48 miles away, for me or anyone else who wants to use them. The distance to be travelled really defies anyone wanting to use that sort of service.

I conclude by echoing the words that have been said and precursing some of the words that will be said in this short debate. It is not really for government to do anything other than influence others, but the real problem lies with the local authorities and can be remedied by them. I ask the Government to use their best offices in that direction to encourage them in a more standardised and sympathetic approach.

I, too, am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, for bringing this issue once again to the notice of the “House”.

She mentioned the fly-tipping of domestic waste. This practice has an educational element because an unfortunate by-product of the increasingly rigorous categorisation of waste, and the EU directives on which much of it is founded, is that fly-tipping becomes a way of getting around it.

I declare an interest as a farmer whose business has benefited from the recovery of old railway sleepers, telegraph poles and a great deal of second-hand equipment. I hope that the Environment Agency does not try to gold-plate some of the regulations, one of which is that anything that has not been used for 12 months should be classified as waste. On a farm, as long as items are kept tidy, a use can be found for them long after 12 months of not being used.

The noble Lord, Lord Dear, mentioned that 67 per cent of farmers suffer from fly-tipping, some of which can be costly to remove. There is a question of how to distinguish between fly-tipping, which is the main subject today, and litter. A great deal of the disfigurement of the countryside is caused by litter, which people throw from their car or from their backpacks and leave lying around. The most extreme example in our area—this raises embarrassment with the police—is that people go to a shop such as Millets, buy a tent, camp out in a remote area and then walk away and leave the tent when they have had their night’s camping. Someone will see that the tent has been sitting there for a day or two and inform the police that there might be a dead body inside it. Several policemen then have to investigate the situation, only to find that the tent has been abandoned. These are the kind of strange developments that our throwaway society can produce.

One of the current problems for the ordinary public is to know what rules and regulations the local authority has at its disposal sites. Do the Government publish any guidance on best practice—I am treading on the same area as the noble Lord, Lord Dear—which would enable greater publicity and transparency for the public? Obviously each local authority will invent its own rules but it would help if there was a general guidance which set out what materials a local authority tip will accept. Again, the question of quantity and whether a tip will accept only a certain amount may arise. It is obviously terribly frustrating to turn up with rubbish and for someone to say, “I am afraid your car is too big. We cannot let you in here. It is a question for the commercial dump”. We should somehow urge local authorities to show more flexibility and gear the hours when the sites are open to more useful times of the day so that people can carry out their own domestic disposal.

Has any correlation been made between fly-tipping and the scarcity of local authority disposal points? This is as much an urban question as a rural one, although in rural areas people are geared up to drive a little further than people in urban areas.

We have touched on the introduction of bin taxes. The Minister will be familiar with our dealings on the Climate Change Bill and the introduction of his five pilot schemes. It is important that the Government should monitor whether there is some correlation between fly-tipping and the areas where the pilot schemes are running to see whether they are having any effect.

On the question of the increased categorisation of what constitutes waste, the Minister will know that his colleague in another place announced that the statistics for Flycapture, the Government’s scheme, showed a massive increase in the incidence of fly-tipping between 2004-05 and 2005-06. In fact it went up from just under 1 million to over 2.5 million incidents in one year. Statistics are always open to interpretation.

Another point was referred to by my noble friend Lord Goschen: if someone is found fly-tipping, what powers does a farmer or an occupant have? He referred to the fact that if you have not actually seen someone fly-tipping, there is nothing you can do. Even if you see it happening, the problem is that a guy with the back of a lorry open just has to put his foot on the accelerator and you will have a hard job catching up with him.

I think we would like to see—it may be up to the individuals concerned—more information for magistrates on what powers are available to them. I know that vehicles can be confiscated—I hope that that will be applied to repeat offenders—but it is obviously a very stern disincentive to anyone who might carry out that activity. There are those who have a reputation for fly-tipping. I gather that the Environment Agency may have a power to take vehicles when the offence is discovered. Perhaps the Minister could tell us how that is likely to apply.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market, for bringing this subject to debate. She is to be congratulated. People feel strongly about the subject and many feel that nothing is being done. I do not accuse the Government of that. Much may be being done but the perception is otherwise. I too am grateful to the Countryside Alliance for their briefing.

I shall start my contribution by relating direct experience. I declare an interest as a farmer and someone who, in many ways, is a victim of fly-tipping. This morning, I spoke to my nephew who has to deal with it daily. He said, “Can I have a video link so that I can tell them?” I thought it might be more dispassionate if I relate what he said to me.

I wish to do justice to the anger felt by those who regularly have to deal with fly-tipping on their property. As he said they are losing the battle and the problem is getting worse. I do not live near a large metropolitan area; I live near a country market town; but my nephew tells me that at least once a month he has to send out a tractor and trailer with a couple of chaps to clear up the rubbish that he has discovered around the place. He is not prone to exaggeration and I believe that that is an accurate account of how frequently he has to do that. He also has a truck and frequently picks up stuff. He has to collect litter from roadside verges, green lanes, hedges, dykes, gateways and sometimes well into a field. People will not take rubbish to a tip but they will put it 50 yards into a field. It is quite unbelievable. It can be just general rubbish, as my noble friend the Duke of Montrose has mentioned, but much is in plastic bin liners, so people have put it in bags but have failed to put it out for domestic collection and it is dumped on someone else's land. There are tyres, fridges, TVs and general builders’ rubble, frequently containing asbestos and sometimes clearly hazardous waste. That is dangerous for cattle and livestock, it is damaging to farm machinery and it blocks drains, dykes, sluices and pumps in the fens, which is a major problem for drainage boards that have to deal with such waterborne rubbish.

Theoretically, local authorities will come along and clear roadside verges, but they are overwhelmed. If one does nothing about it and waits for them, one just encourages more litter. As the noble Lord, Lord Dear, said, litter encourages litter, and fly-tipping encourages fly-tipping. Local authorities will collect things from the yard, such as WEEE items, but we have to pay. For asbestos, we may have to ask a specialist contractor to take it away; otherwise, we have to take it to the site to get rid of it.

As has been said, 67 per cent of farmers report incidents of fly-tipping, though I suspect even more experience it. The Flycapture report states that local authorities prosecuted in 2006-07 only 1,371 people. There seems to be a disparity between people’s experience of the problem and how often people are brought to book for it. My nephew tells me that he has found envelopes with addresses on them, taken them to the authorities and said, “Look, this person has dumped rubbish on my land”, but no prosecution has ever resulted from such an incident.

A Written Answer of 3 December 2007—in Commons Hansard at col. 777W— lists fly-tipping incidents reported in the West Midlands during the three years ending in 2007. The region contains 34 councils which are responsible for waste disposal, 20 of which, including Birmingham City Council, did not report a single prosecution. Some incidents involved very hazardous and polluting materials—we are talking of genuine criminal activity in certain cases.

Many of the problems that trouble private landowners and public authorities—they, too, are victims of fly-tipping—are low-level. They are a consequence of idleness, unwillingness to pay and a minimal risk of being found out. However, someone has to pay; in many cases, it is the farmer. A report for the Environment Agency, which the Countryside Alliance has reproduced, cites £47 million as the per-annum cost to land managers and farmers. I believe that it may be more.

The guidance on fly-tipping from the Environment Agency, produced in 2004, states that,

“if someone dumps rubbish on private land the landowner must get permission from the appropriate agency before paying a registered waste carrier to take it away … if someone dumps rubbish on private land the landowner must devise a transfer note to accompany the rubbish should he wish to accumulate it on a neighbour’s property … if someone dumps rubbish on private land and the landowner decides it will rot down he must register the site for composting”.

Is this guidance still operational? If so, does the poor landowner have to pay for the various permissions and does the Minister find such charges fair? Does the Minister agree with Joan Ruddock, who said in a Written Answer on 20 February that,

“to place a duty on the authorities and the Environment Agency to remove waste from private land would create a fly-tippers' charter”.—[Official Report, Commons, 27/02/08; col. 1625W.]

If so, will he explain the reasoning behind that comment?

As I said, I do not accuse the Government of doing nothing. The Minister will no doubt tell us that the Environmental Protection Act 1990 and the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005 give local authorities and the Environment Agency powers to tackle fly-tipping, and courts the power to impose penalties. The Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005 introduced specific measures to deal with fly-tipping—I have the details in front of me. The Government have a waste strategy for England which they produced last year. So I do not accuse the Government of doing nothing, but we can do more. There is no quick fix, but we can do some things, which I hope have emerged in the debate today.

Everyone has mentioned the issue of improved access to civic amenity sites. The noble Baroness, Lady Scott, gave a vivid illustration of the difficulties she had with her single sheet of asbestos. The noble Lord, Lord Dear, made it quite clear that in some cases the tips are so far away from where people live that it is difficult for them to get there. My noble friend the Duke of Montrose mentioned the hours that the tips are open. They are civic amenity sites and should provide a civic amenity.

I am fortunate to have a sunshine home in France, which I enjoy greatly. There they have a different approach which may be worth considering. This does not remove all fly-tipping but it localises the centralisation of the municipal tip. The déchetterie is nearby—most people can get to it—and you can recycle everything. There is no doorstep collection in rural areas in France; people have to take their waste to a central depot. So what they are saving in that they are reinvesting in this. There is less fly-tipping there than here at home.

We should also encourage greater support for the relationship between local authorities, farmers and public bodies who have to deal with this problem. It should be solved by co-operation, not by putting landowners under the pressure of feeling almost the guilty party when they seek to dispose of waste that has been illegally dumped on their property. I hope we can give a proper briefing to prosecuting authorities and magistrates on the cost of fly-tipping and the damage it causes.

I do not know whether the Flycapture database includes every reported incident that takes place on private land. It has been mentioned before that the statistics are questionable. Certainly a million incidents in Liverpool seems beyond belief. It is difficult to reconcile with figures from elsewhere.

My noble friend the Duke of Montrose referred to the Climate Change Bill and the five pilots therein. It is important that we encourage the local authorities which commit to these pilots to monitor fly-tipping incidents in parallel, both before and after the introduction of the schemes, because we would not want a situation arising whereby in order to provide more efficient local waste collection systems we also increase the amount of fly-tipping. There needs to be a reconciliation between these issues. The noble Viscount, Lord Goschen, has some interesting ideas about ways in which we might ameliorate this problem.

All noble Lords agree that this is a serious issue which needs high priority attention. I hope the Minister can assure us that the Government share this view.

Along with others, I welcome the debate introduced by the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market. It has been really useful. We could have spent more time discussing this issue in the Climate Change Bill, although it is ancillary to the five pilots. No pilot will be allowed to go ahead unless it has an active plan for dealing with fly-tipping; that is part of the process. Any council which wants to become one of the five pilots to test out different systems for household collection recycling has to have certain rules for the kerbside collection of a number of different items and a good plan for dealing with fly-tipping.

I, too, compliment the Countryside Alliance on its report. It is first class. It came out some time ago now and nobody has done anything better. If I could stand here and say that we could accept and implement all the recommendations I would be happy to do so. They are all sensible and practical. Of course there are cost issues on some of them.

This week, Joan Ruddock, the Minister for fly-tipping—and this is the first time this week that no one has blamed Defra, which is nice—met the Countryside Alliance to discuss its report. So there are ongoing discussions about this. As I have informed my colleagues, when they get the Climate Change Bill in the other place I suspect that there will be a lot more interest from the elected Members of Parliament on the clauses at the end of the Bill relating to waste, than there was in this House, simply because of the pressure from local authorities and constituents. I suspect that they will hone in very much on that.

Funnily enough, this morning I was on a brief visit to look at some areas of catchment-sensitive farming practices alongside the River Kennet near Hungerford. Although it was not the purpose for my visit, as I was leaving I said to one of the two farmers that I had met, “I have got to go now and get back to the House of Lords, but, by the way, what is the story on fly-tipping around here?” His immediate estimate was that it had doubled in the previous two or three years. I did not see any rubbish this morning. I was around tracks; it was certainly fly-tipping country. I do not want to encourage anybody, but the view was that it had doubled and was becoming a real nuisance. So it is a serious issue.

I think that I can answer most of the points when I turn to my speaking notes. I turn to the statistics. Noble Lords will have read the briefings and those from the department, and I read the very interesting brief from the Countryside Alliance. I knew that Liverpool was the culture capital of Europe this year, but I do not think that it really wanted to be the fly-tipping capital of England. The way the figures are recorded has made it so. It is quite clear that it has penalised and counted people as fly-tippers who have put out rubbish a day early. It is not good for us in terms of policy making if you do not have common statistics. Nobody has made a point about different local authorities, and I do not want to bandy those statistics around, but there are some serious issues.

There is no argument that, whether it is rural or urban, fly-tipping undermines the quality of life. The noble Lord, Lord Dear, is right that although the percentages look smaller for the countryside, the impact on life is greater because the rubbish is not hidden up back alleys and so on. It is visible and dumped in such a way that it encourages others.

We are in the early stages of collecting data on this. There is no doubt that over recent years fly-tipping has increased. We have 1.3 million recordable cases in England. We use the figure of 1.3 million. It would be ludicrous to use the 2.6 million because the other 1.3 are all from Liverpool. It just does not make sense. We have examples. I will not name the authority, but I will give an example. A small district council in 2005-06 had 41 recorded incidents. The other district councils in that county had around about 300 to 400, and one had 900. The following year, 2006-07, all the other councils were still about the same, but the council that had 41 now had 277. Clearly, the 41 figure was wrong; it was undercounted. It is a serious issue. It really does not matter what the statistics are. It is costing landowners and local authorities a fortune, and it is diminishing the quality of life for people in urban and rural areas. We have to do more about it.

The Waste Strategy for England, published in May last year, included a waste crime action plan. That sets out measures that we are introducing over a period of time to deal with fly-tipping. It focuses on better prevention measures and simplifying legislation and guidance to encourage compliance. That is fundamental, as is simplifying access to the recycling sites. I agree that they should all be called recycling centres. It is a complete nonsense to have different titles for what are, in effect, the same things.

The plan also focuses on enabling more joined-up action and prosecutions by the Environment Agency and local authorities. There is a fear in local authorities that the lawyers and compliance people will say to them, “You can’t spend all that money on prosecutions. It isn’t worth it. You don’t get the money back, because the money goes to the Treasury. Give them a warning”. Some local authorities are more active than others in this regard. I do not have the figures to back this up but I am told that Leeds, in particular, is very vigorous and has succeeded in cutting the amount of fly-tipping. This morning, I was given the example of two adjoining counties, one of which has a much more vigorous attitude to prosecution. The local people I was with from the Environment Agency and Natural England said that there was less fly-tipping in the county where it was known that prosecutions were followed vigorously. Therefore, taking such a stance can have an effect on people’s behaviour, and we want to ensure that the enforcement tools are practical.

Next month, site waste management plans will become mandatory for all construction projects in England worth over £300,000. I accept that I am not talking about a small jobbing builder working on someone’s loft conversion, but we have to make a start. The plans will strengthen the duty of care requirements and force construction businesses to track more closely the waste that they produce. In enforcing the plans, local authorities will have an extra tool at their disposal for dealing with the 30 per cent of fly-tips which involve construction waste.

Later in the spring, we will consult on our plans to strengthen the powers of local authorities to stop, search and seize vehicles suspected of being involved in illegal waste activity. I think that that partly covers one of the questions that I was asked about seizure. Effectively, there will be a consultation process. These powers will allow local authorities to take habitual offenders out of action much more easily and, it is hoped, undermine their illegal activity. I fully accept that local authority officers can sometimes be intimidated by these people, and I appreciate their difficulties.

We will also consult on our plans to reform controls on the transfer of waste. We need to ensure that waste producers and carriers take responsibility for the waste in their care. Householders and businesses can be duped into paying illegal operators whom they believe will deal with their waste and relieve them of their responsibility, but then these operators dump the waste around the corner. The waste duty of care is the main control that we have to ensure that waste is handled responsibly, and we have to ensure that the registration system is more effective and user-friendly. We also need to make sure that people are more aware of their responsibilities by giving them access to the information that they need to be certain that their waste is being removed legally. The fact that there is a duty to do that is important.

Believe it or not, we are still going to spend money on research into why illegal waste activity occurs. It is evident from what noble Lords have said that it tends to happen where the sites are some distance away. However, the one that I use near Bishop’s Cleeve seems to be a bit closer to where the noble Lord, Lord Dear, lives. It is within Gloucestershire, so it should be all right for him to use it. Although I cannot say that people are not turned away, I have never seen it happen. There may also be an issue of practicality—for example, there may be a problem relating to the size of vehicles or the opening hours. Some sites open seven days a week and close only on Christmas Day. However, others do not open seven days a week and that causes real difficulties. Opening is also restricted during hours of darkness.

We hope to do some further research into organised waste crime. In some parts of the country, waste disposal is an organised criminal activity. There is a lot of money to be made from it because payment of the necessary taxes can be avoided. I know that we are dealing with England but my experience in Northern Ireland was certainly that organising the illegal disposal of waste was a major activity. On the other hand, the more we can do to encourage recycling and the creation of businesses and assets out of recycling, the more people will realise that there is gold in waste. There are plenty of examples of that around the country but on a much smaller scale.

Many authorities work closely with landowners. I fully accept the difficulty that landowners face. With regard to the fly-tippers’ charter, it was thought that if everyone knew that what got dumped in the countryside would be taken away, that would simply encourage people to avoid the proper landfill arrangements because they could have their waste taken away for free. However, the present situation is clearly unsatisfactory. We need to build up a better picture of the problem of fly-tipping on private land, and we are exploring the possible development of the Flycapture database to capture such incidents.

At a national level, Defra and the Environment Agency meet bi-monthly with major stakeholders such as the NFU, the CLA, Network Rail and the National Trust through the National Fly-tipping Prevention Group. Their objective is to explore ways of improving the system of controls over fly-tipping. I understand the concerns that have been raised, and I will write to noble Lords regarding the detail of some of the points. If a landowner has to move fly-tipped waste from his land, he must use a registered waste carrier, and it is very unfair on him if he has to make arrangements to do that.

Standardising practice in recycling centres, as I call them, is difficult because each local authority has to deal with its own area and you cannot have a one-size-fits-all system. It might be possible to do something about the days and hours of opening and about not excluding cars. Someone said that their car was too long to be able to use a recycling site. However, if it was a car, it was not a van, and there is a limit to what you can get into a car, however big it is. It is ludicrous for someone to be turned away because their car is too big. If you take an estate car to these sites, you should not be turned away. We shall need to look at this matter because difficulties can arise where people live on boundaries between local authorities.

The ratio of prosecutions to fly-tipping incidents is low but, as I said, local authorities will have to be told that they must act proportionately, and they will be given that information by their lawyers.

Data show that there is no obvious correlation between collections on alternate weeks and an increase in fly-tipping, but there might be if the nature of the collections, charges and penalties and so on were changed. Therefore, the five pilot areas must have an anti-fly-tipping strategy in place; otherwise, they will not be allowed to act as pilot areas.

We will certainly take any ideas that have been put forward today and put them into the pot for the Minister. We may need to look at different methods of enforcement. If you give people a financial incentive and create businesses, it is possible to snuff out—or at least control—an activity. That has happened with parking, although the system is abused by the clampers, but it has certainly been better at keeping the traffic moving than was the case in the past.

I have gone over my time, for which I apologise. We will make a note of any issues that I have not dealt with and I promise to write to noble Lords.

[The Sitting was suspended from 3.58 to 4 pm.]

asked Her Majesty’s Government whether they will use the migrant integration policy index to inform debates on migrants in Europe.

The noble Lord said: First, I thank the British Council for its work on the migrant integration policy index. My thanks also go to the Migrant Policy Group in Brussels, which co-ordinated the contents of the research that provides the basis of my contribution today. The debate comes at a crucial time, with the Prime Minister and the President of France today discussing the issue of immigration. Only this morning we saw a most disturbing report on the treatment of asylum seekers in this country.

MIPEX uses indicators to compare the legal provisions across Europe to promote the integration of non-European Union migrants. This is a timely measure. There is often a confused debate in this country about a cohesive society, particularly when issues of multi-ethnicity and multi-culturalism surface. There is a kind of schizophrenia on matters of immigration on the one hand and community cohesion and a pluralist society on the other. The progress that we have made in achieving some sort of multi-culturalism is too valuable to be played in a cynical manner. This is often backed up by a perception of the majority population that, despite all our history and all our pride in tolerance, the majority are somehow not able to live as part of a community of communities.

Some of us have spent a lifetime of work in the field of race relations. The United Kingdom has been at the forefront of legislation and other machinery to establish equality of opportunity for all our citizens. There is now a strong emphasis on race, disability, gender, age, faith and sexual orientation. The law puts a new emphasis on promoting good relations between people of different groups. It is clear that bench-marking is commonly used in the private sector and particularly in the field of justice, security and freedom; however, the exercise remains a relatively new phenomenon for immigrant integration. It is here that MIPEX provides a constant and reliable stocktaking with the ability to track policy advances and reversals.

Let me at the outset avoid the confusion about migrants. We are talking about—MIPEX uses the term in this way—third country nationals legally residing in an EU member state. It covers six policy areas which shape a migrant’s journey to full citizenship. I am delighted that the debate in the UK has moved to citizenship. The six policy areas that are covered by MIPEX are labour market access, family reunion, long-term residence, principal participation, access to nationality and anti-discrimination.

There is clear evidence that now links MIPEX with debates on the impact of European co-operation in the areas of national law, measuring integration outcomes and other indexing exercises. The outcome has demonstrated that best practices flow from such initiatives. It would be helpful to know the Minister’s response on this point. How often do we use such information and has this assisted our law-making process on matters of integration and citizenship? I have always argued that the pull factor on immigration is not just restricted to the United Kingdom but affects other EU countries as well. It is estimated that more than 16 million people from non-EU countries form the migrant diaspora across Europe. Commentators, both politicians and those in the press, have pointed to the impact of globalisation, devolution, asylum and immigration issues as relevant to this process. Thomas Huddleston, the MIPEX research co-ordinator, has pointed out:

“We expect to see further synergies activities in the upcoming year, as the MIPEX, one of the few sources for comparative information on integration policies in Europe, stimulates new projects that aim to move forward national, sub-national, and European debates”.

I want to ensure that we, in this country, are part of this process. It would also be helpful to have an assurance from the Minister that the Government will use the study at many levels of governance. This is a positive way to take the integration debate forward.

We all accept that the old political spectrum of left and right is less important now and politicians are competing to promote concepts such as community cohesion. However, frequent political debates and statements lack strategic thought. Political agendas often fail to take into account the systematic benefits of planned migration. MIPEX has moved national agendas forward by raising potential areas of improvement and greater European co-operation. The conclusion reached by MIPEX was that making policies themselves the subject of evaluations, through good indicators, may bring significant improvements to the appropriateness and quality of a country's integration strategy. It is for this reason that a viable national policy on immigration and integration must take into account the European dimension and that best practices identified by MIPEX ought to be at the core of such debates.

Other important issues are identified by MIPEX, such as equality and access, which have been the cornerstone principles in many of the definitions of integration policy across Europe. There can be little dispute that equality of opportunity and access allows migrants to have full confidence to lead an active and purposeful life. The United Kingdom has a proud record of anti-discriminatory legislation. Successive Race Relations Acts have helped to outlaw discrimination, but the promotion of equality of opportunity and good relations between different groups is established in our legislation.

However, the reality is different. The former Commission for Racial Equality has repeatedly reported an increase in race discrimination cases. Law is an unequivocal statement of public policy in a democratic institution. Citizenship and nationality mean very little if that process is flawed. MIPEX found that, when this is translated into laws and policies across Europe, the six policy areas covered by the MIPEX report favourably about traditional countries of immigration. I am glad to record that the United Kingdom fits into this category.

Some European countries seek out best practices from countries such as the United Kingdom. To an extent this has helped to set the legal framework in those countries. We should therefore exercise great care that policy formulation on migrants is based on objective criteria, as explained by MIPEX. Nowhere is this more important than in the matter of family reunion. Of course, practices such as forced marriages, human trafficking and abduction should have no place in a civilised society. We are right to outlaw such practices.

However, we must respect a right to a family life. If there is one criticism I have to make of our Government, it is their subjective approach to marriage and family reunion. The MIPEX report stated that reuniting families gives a migrant a sense of social and cultural stability in their countries of residence that makes for more stable, diverse societies. A fair, flexible, transparent, expeditious procedure does not introduce bureaucratic conditions that aim to keep families apart. The state aims to protect a migrant resident's right to live in a family. Based on the equal treatment of men and women and the rights of the child, the country ensures that a migrant and his family members enjoy the same rights. Independent status and equal access promotes equality within the family and offers opportunities to integrate into all areas of life in the country. I hope that any policy consideration on such matters in future legislation will ensure that bureaucratic considerations do not keep families apart. The Minister will be aware that the migration in the 1950s and 1960s was predominantly from male members and in the case of Bangladesh it took years before family reunion was established. That had a direct impact on those communities.

I draw the Minister’s attention to matters relating to access to nationality. The UK's policy scored fifth, although to be fair most first-generation migrants are eligible for British citizenship after five years. MIPEX reports that migrants are compelled to pass conditions that score halfway to best practice, including the newly introduced test. The test is based on a government-provided study guide, though the significant failure rate has been blamed on the guide's historical inaccuracies and the test's obscure questions. The applicant's individual abilities are not taken into account. Those who have been naturalised can lose their citizenship for various reasons. We should note that the UK's score decreased in this second edition of MIPEX due to the additional vaguer ground for withdrawing nationality,

“if the Secretary of State is satisfied that deprivation is conducive to the public good”,

which is contained in the Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Act of 2006. Has any individual had his or her nationality withdrawn under this Act?

I conclude by saying that MIPEX has shown a way that will help the process of integration leading to the cohesive community for which we all strive. Let us hope it will be the basis of future policies on immigration and integration in this country.

I declare an interest as chairman of the British Council. I offer my warmest thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, for initiating this debate and by that means highlighting the purpose and value of the index. Like the noble Lord, I thank the Migration Policy Group and its researchers in the Free University of Brussels and in the University of Sheffield, the reputable organisations in 16 EU member states, Canada, Norway and Switzerland who have worked with the British Council in the past four years to produce the second edition of the index and the European Union's programme on preparation for the integration of third-country nationals—INTI—which met more than 70 per cent of the costs of the project.

The migration integration policy index is the product of practical and pragmatic study. It offers dispassionate, collated evidence of the conditions encountered by people migrating inside and into Europe by focusing on the six policy areas listed by the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, all of which are clearly among the prime factors that determine whether people have satisfactory conditions for employment opportunities and basic human security.

In our time, the levels of provision and practice in these areas patently have particular significance for two main reasons: first, and very obviously, a combination of economic realities, transport, technological advances and statutory freedoms of movement within Europe means that migration in and into our continent has increased and, if demographic deficits are to be countered and economic growth sustained, that migration needs to continue. Secondly, in those circumstances, insularity is unrealistic, indeed, unattainable, as well as economically negative, and the movement of large numbers of people is a reality and a necessity. Effective integration of those people in the societies to which they move is therefore a vital safeguard of employment and civil rights for incomers and, I emphasise, for the host population as well as being an essential ingredient of social stability and serenity. However, such integration is feasible only if there is manifest equity in the treatment of newcomers and if accurate information about that treatment is available to migrants, host populations and local, national and international policy makers.

The index therefore exists to provide that information by assessing the policies of individual countries with objectivity, by making comparisons between the records of those countries and by benchmarking that performance mainly against standards set in EU directives agreed by member states, in Council of Europe conventions ratified by member states or in European presidency conclusions. In short, the body of information produced by MIPEX for use by policy makers and the general public has substantially been compiled with reference to standards which democratic Governments have already agreed. There is therefore particular authority in the MIPEX analysis of what has been achieved, what has not been achieved and what needs to be improved in establishing and operating policies that will foster integration and, through that, benefit migrants and host societies.

It is clear that the assessment of policies in the index is thorough and factual and that the comparisons are made with the constructive objective of clarifying best practice and identifying areas in which that standard is or is not met. They are not made for any invidious purpose or with any naming and shaming motive. It is also clear that the intended outcome of this work is to provide a common framework for informed public and political debate which can, it is to be hoped, lead to advances in policy design and policy application by Governments and by other major influences on the statutory, economic and civil environment in which migration is taking place. It is that which gives particular resonance to the Question of the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, and I hope that my noble friend Lord West will be able to give a positive response which recognises the utility of the migrant integration policy index for informed debate and for policy development based on that debate.

I am grateful for the opportunity given by this short debate to say why the British Council is strongly engaged in the MIPEX project. As the Committee knows, the British Council has been the UK’s leading international organisation for cultural relations for more than 70 years, successfully sustaining its primary mission of promoting understanding and appreciation of the United Kingdom by anticipating and responding to changing realities and changing needs. That is happening now in this post-Cold War, globalised, increasingly interdependent, interactive, mobile century where, as well as being a dynamic enriching asset, cultural diversity in social proximity can also be a source of tension between human beings.

In such conditions, the British Council has recognised that migration and the success or failure of the integration of migrants is manifestly central to cultural relations. It is therefore quite naturally involved in MIPEX with its purpose of clarifying what is happening at high and low standards of migration and integration policy performance, promoting reasoned discussion and encouraging alignment between declared national policies and applied national practices. If that consistency between policies and practices is attained, it is more likely that social cohesion will be strengthened without sacrifice of identity or of freedom by migrants and host societies. If that consistency is not achieved, the millions will still move, but that is likely to be accompanied by avoidable inequities, avoidable resulting resentments and avoidable social and economic division and disability for those who arrive and for the communities which receive them.

Obviously no research project can prevent such appalling negatives. It can, however, help to chart a course to productive positives. I hope my noble friend, with his distinguished professional expertise, will ensure that the Government navigate that positive course.

We are indebted to the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, for stimulating this short debate. It is a privilege to follow the chairman of the British Council because it contributes so much to the well-being of our people and those with whom we live in this world.

It is a golden rule in the House of Lords that you sit still and maintain your silence unless you know the subject and have something worthwhile to say. For the first time in 10 years, at least in my opinion if not in the opinion of many others, I am breaking my rule because, having had my attention drawn to this index, of which, I confess, I had never heard, I realised its importance and potential value. I wanted, by the very act of imprudently standing up, to make the point that it is very important and valuable in enabling us to know ourselves and, in the light of that knowledge, to identify opportunities for action to make our community more integrated and at ease with itself.

I shall illustrate the importance, or potential importance, of indices to those who will read them. In December 2006, UNICEF published indices of the well-being of children in economically advanced countries. Out of 21 countries, we were bottom. It was a shock. It may be that the analysis was not perfect, but the message was very strong. There were two areas in which we came resoundingly bottom—in matters relating to parenthood. I cannot argue that those indices published in December 2006 were the cause of the measures that the Government have taken since, which are so relevant. There is an old Latin tag which I forget that warns against such presumption. But to recapitulate, there was the creation in the summer of a Department for Children, Schools and Families, which brings together those matters that are so central to the well-being of children. There has also been the Children and Young Persons Bill, which has just been debated, to strengthen delivery of welfare services to children and to state the clear duty of the Secretary of State to promote the well-being of children in England. The Bill makes provision to strengthen our arrangements, including those for immigrant children. Then, on 1 November, the Prime Minister announced the Government’s intention to consider extending the right of parents of six year-olds to ask for flexible working hours to children of older years—the very years in which young people were most at risk of embracing some of the practices of their elders that are not to their own good. So there we have an example of a shock from an index followed by action. I cannot argue—and happily it is not the case—that the MIPEX index points to any such great basis for shame. However, it has the potential in what it says to draw attention through the indices to better practice overseas in stimulating policy initiatives.

The reason why I wanted to speak, underlined by speaking from no knowledge, is the danger we are in from having an increasingly fractured society, based very much, to give one dimension, on increasing disparities in wealth and incomes and the creation of ghettoes and disadvantage, which leads to fissures in society. Then there is the challenge to the wholeness and integration of society of the increasing rates of immigration, to which we have to respond. That has led to tensions relating to income policy of communities—for example, in the north of England some years ago. Fundamental to the integration of immigrants, particularly those from distant countries with very different cultures, is language and facility in the use of the English language. I understand that there are proposals that financial support for lessons to enable immigrants to increase their facility in English will be limited to those who are unemployed and on income support.

I question the wisdom of that because it is so important to integration that they all should come to have a greater facility in the use of the language. We must do much more proactively for the poor and unemployed, for whom languages will be available without charge, to cause them to come into learning. I am thinking, for example, of mothers from distant countries who come to this country with no language. They live in poverty because, without the language, it is difficult to get a decent, full-time, regular job. There are many households of this kind without anyone in it having a full-time, regular job. Such people are diffident about going out and sitting down in a class to learn the language. They need to be coaxed, encouraged and offered the opportunity in an environment where they feel at home.

We have to look abroad to discover what lessons we can learn from there and, perhaps, look at the indices and what emerges from them to see what we can do. I endorse the tail end of the Motion of the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, in which he invited the Government to use this material. I believe they should use it not only in debates but also in policy making. I hope the Minister will feel able to encourage us on that matter.

I congratulate my noble friend Lord Dholakia who, as always, has raised an important subject. The Committee will be grateful to him for drawing attention to it because many of us did not know about the existence of the index. I was particularly interested in the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Kinnock, who is chair of the British Council, in which he explained why the British Council became involved.

One of the difficulties with the debate around immigration and societal cohesion is misinformation, and anything which can improve the position is to be welcomed. Sections of the media, extreme political parties and others use misinformation to create fear and apprehension. The best counter to that is to have correct facts of the kind laid out here widely available. The noble Lord, Lord Dearing, quite rightly mentioned the current topic of fractures and tensions in society. This is explored in an interesting way in the BBC’s “White Season”. The programme examines these issues and is a particularly worthy attempt to examine some of the more complex feelings surrounding how we choose to live together.

The Government’s recent announcement of their citizenship proposals was met, at best, by a lukewarm response. The real work on making cohesion happen has to be undertaken at community level. Given the enormous variations between cities and small towns, rural areas and the north, south, east and west of the UK, the most that should be organised centrally is a framework and an aspiration. The index that we are debating today considers the framework and tests how adequate it is against a benchmark. That is why it is an especially useful piece of work.

My noble friend mentioned the scale of what we are talking about: 16 million people from non-EU countries form the migrant diaspora across Europe. The index does not address illegal economic migrants, asylum seekers or those moving within the EU. All too often, people coming from abroad are defined in the resident population as falling within the same category, and it is very useful to concentrate the mind on exactly what we are talking about.

Of the six categories covered by the index, access to citizenship causes the most contention in policy terms. Liberal Democrats have a significantly different policy on it from that of Labour or the Conservatives. We would open a path to earned citizenship for those who are already here but are currently in limbo. They are unable to contribute to the tax base. If they work, they are doing so illegally, with poor access to all kinds of services. They are a much more pressing issue than those who may yet arrive in the UK. The Government’s response has been to impose a much heavier penalty on employers, which has had astonishingly awful results for members of the Chinese community, for example.

We Liberal Democrats believe that there should be a route to earned citizenship. The index is a helpful tool in debating this matter, because it enables us to see clearly what is happening in the rest of Europe. As legislators, we are constantly asked to debate and approve changes in immigration policy. To make good, informed decisions, the index provides exactly the kind of information that we need.

We need to know the norm across Europe; we need to ensure that legislative changes are producing a more integrated society. Apart from helping us get better in areas in which we do poorly, the index would help us track situations where we are getting worse, which is important, because policy does not always produce an upward trajectory. However, it is not all bad news. Seeing where best practice is producing especially good results should be encouraging. I appreciate that this area of policy is an uphill struggle for whichever Government are in power; it is not simple. The index is updated bi-annually, so it will not become out of date. It will give us a clear benchmark for how we compare with our European neighbours.

Preparing for this debate gave me the opportunity to study the index. I liked especially the interactive maps. As I tried them out, I was surprised to find that the UK scored as well as it did, because the constant background hum of negativity around immigration made me think that we would come out worse. A desire to change the background noise is not to be equated with having a totally open-door policy to mass immigration, but it is often taken as such. It increasingly takes brave politicians to point out the immense benefits that immigration has brought and continues to bring.

It is our responsibility to ensure that the legislative frameworks are informed by fact and not the background hum which the media, particularly the red-top newspapers, encourage. I have mentioned the good practice adopted by the BBC in encouraging a more informed debate. I accept that legislative frameworks are only the beginning of the process. Public perception, economic push-and-pull factors, access to public services and availability of housing all play a role that is at least as, if not more, important.

Before we become complacent, it is worth noting that we score very poorly on political participation—I was disappointed, although not entirely surprised, by that. Political participation is critical, because ensuring that communities have their rightful voice in the democratic process is an essential step in making sure that they are part of it, want to be part of it and see democracy alone as the route to change. If I took away one lesson from the index, it was that.

I thank my noble friend for introducing this debate and for drawing my attention to the index. I look forward to developments involving it over the years.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, for introducing this short debate. Having listened to other Members, I say with less temerity than I might otherwise have that I did not actually know about the index before the debate was generated. I am grateful for having a whole new world and lots of maps opened up before me. I accept that this is, and will remain, a very important instrument for those of us who have to deal with immigration policy.

The Government's record on immigration in general hardly bares scrutiny. Belatedly, they are trying to catch up with the new points system, but a previous absence of any sense of urgency about bringing in immigration controls and the fact that the citizens of 25 EU countries have unfettered access to our country, means that stable doors are not only being slammed after the horse has bolted, but are still more than half ajar.

The migrant integration policy index is not totally complimentary about the inadequate preparation by the Government for the arrival of migrant workers from the new EU countries in 2004. The arrival of such large numbers has led to problems for local government and the police, although many of those who have come have brought skills and expertise with them, for which this country has great need. However, as with migrants from all parts of the world, they have to be helped to integrate into where they want to live, to be housed, employed, educated and, in many cases, supported both financially and practically, particularly when they cannot work, find a suitable job, or speak English sufficiently well to integrate fully.

The migrant index concentrates on policies for integration. Other noble Lords have already listed the main areas: access to the labour market, family reunion, long-term residence, political party participation—I was very interested in the words of the noble Baroness, Lady Miller, access to nationality, and anti-discrimination.

Some countries—not just this country but all 25 EU states, such as the newer EU states—are given very poor ratings for their efforts at integration. As has been said, this country has a long and proud record of welcoming migrants so it is disappointing that in some of the measures it does not fare at all well. Does the Minister accept that at least part of the problem is that there are just so many people coming in so fast that many parts of the country are simply being overwhelmed?

One of the greatest problems of uncontrolled immigration is ensuring that those who are coming here to live permanently are absorbed into the local communities in which they live. Community cohesion has become a byword for describing the need to enable mixed communities to not only live amicably together, but to pass between them the many benefits of their cultural and national peculiarities. This requires a maturity from the indigenous population and those joining it. It is not helped by those who promulgate division and separatism, undermining our society, and, sadly, often drawing young people into disenchantment or, at worst, extremism.

Community cohesion is not the same as multiculturalism, which has developed connotations of being the retention of separate identities and communities, rather than a coming together. No one expects that people from other nationalities and cultures will not want to congregate together to share common memories, customs and experiences, but that becomes destructive when it is not combined with the acceptance that to live in the adopted nation means to become part of it. On the other side of the coin, it becomes discrimination when distrust builds antipathy to those who are trying to live their new lives in their new communities.

As the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, so rightly pointed out, the power of language is central to promoting cohesion, as well as an ability to live fully in society. So one of the first requirements of migrants must be that they commit to learning to speak the language of the country to which they migrate—in our case, English—either before they come or shortly after arrival, if they do not do so adequately when they come. Without access to language, education, jobs, leisure and communication on a social basis become impossible, and integration is not a reality.

While the Government say it is up to local councils to manage migration into their areas—and I support that because it is to some extent a local problem—success depends on the support and help they are given by the policies and framework of central government, which have, in many cases, been woefully lacking. There has been a tendency—the Government have acknowledged being at fault—to assume that one size fits all. Any of us who live in areas with a multiplicity of cultures, as I do, know that that cannot work. Each local council must be able to adopt practices and policies that support variety and recognise the diverse customs and expectations of its residents old and new.

I am enormously grateful that the noble Lord, Lord Kinnock, is here; if he had not been, I would have had to ask what the role of the British Council in this was. However, I dare not do that now as we have been given a great explanation and, with the chairman of the British Council here, I would not dare go any further. I might have asked the Minister about the nature of the British Council’s support and whether it helped with the compilation, and influenced, financed or researched, I do not now dare. I would not want to put those words anywhere near the Minister.

Migration within and to the European Union is a fact of life. There is a great need for comparability and access to information about how migrants are absorbed. Inevitably some of the migration will be short-term because an improvement in the circumstances in their own state, family ties or disenchantment with their new lives will mean that some migrants will return home, but others will move permanently or semi-permanently, become part of the communities they join and seek citizenship. We welcome that, and a lot of the policies have developed towards it. Perhaps it is not only the Government who will need to use the migrant integration policy index, but all those who have a responsibility in the area of helping migrants to become part of their local communities. They can compare what is happening elsewhere and see if there is good or different practice that they can develop. It is clearly valuable to have real-time research and a means of monitoring what is going on across the whole of Europe. I can see that my internet bill will go up enormously as I download all sorts of fascinating information from this index. I do not even have to do that—there is a book! I will consult the one on the opposite Bench.

I will send you one free.

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, for drawing our attention to it.

I, too, welcome the opportunity given to us by the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, to discuss an increasingly important aspect of migration policy, which is the integration of migrants.   I also pay tribute to his strong commitment to bringing about real improvements in cohesion and racial equality through his work with the Commission for Racial Equality and the Commission on the Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain. His tireless energy in seeking to tackle racism and disadvantage is something that all of us in this House welcome, support and commend.  I also thank other noble Lords who contributed to a useful and lively debate, and I will try to deal with the points they raised. I thank my noble friend Lord Kinnock for his work with the British Council and its involvement, with other bodies, with the Migrant Integration Policy Index. At lunchtime, I spoke to Thomas Huddleston, because like some other noble Lords—I am glad they admitted it first—I knew nothing about this matter before this debate. It is a terrible thing to have to admit, but I am glad to say that the civil servants in the Home Office knew a lot about it, which was very reassuring.

Having looked at it now—I have not read the whole thing, but I have looked at the introduction and been through some of the graphs—I commend the authors for their efforts in producing a very helpful and independent assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of integration policies across the EU. The six topics that they chose for assessment, pointed out by the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia—labour market, access and so on—are all areas that we should seek to develop and to improve if we are to continue to be seen by others as a country that champions fair play and as a key player on the global economic stage. That is all part and parcel of this because there is no doubt that migrants bring a huge amount to the country. While I believe that the United Kingdom has done well—ninth out of 25; the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, was a little disparaging about that, but I thought it was quite good and perfectly acceptable—that is not a ground for complacency because there are still things to do.

The noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, referred en passant to asylum policies—a report came out today. As a Government, we are totally committed to upholding our traditions of offering protection to those who need it. We fulfil our international obligations under the UN refugee convention and human rights commitments. The system is balanced. As I said on the Floor of the House the other day, each one of these cases is an individual tragedy which is part of the problem and that is why they are so difficult to deal with. One needs a policy. I believe that we are fair and rigorous in the assessment of claims.

I have been to Croydon and talked to the people involved. We have some very dedicated and hard-working case workers who have huge loads but they take their jobs very seriously. Each case is very difficult to deal with. The case workers are also humane. One may be able to point out examples where that does not appear to be so, but overall we are humane. The accommodation that we provide may not be the best in the world, but I have visited Tinsley House at Gatwick where the family accommodation was rather better than the first married quarters I was offered as a young lieutenant, but that is not an excuse for having to put people there. No one wants to put families into detention, but it is normally the last resort before they leave the country. We try to make the accommodation nice but we have to be firm as well as humane, which is where the difficulty comes in.

A large number of people do not want to leave, which clearly is a personal tragedy. I do not believe that the picture is as black as people paint in the media and in some of the reports. Many people work very hard to maintain a sensible policy. There is no doubt that, in terms of the numbers of asylum seekers, the matter has got a little out of hand over time, but now it is within a sensible framework.

The noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, also mentioned the links with MIPEX and co-operation in the EU in areas of national law and the development of integration policies. I am glad that my noble friend recognises that the UK is one of the countries to which others turn for examples of best practice. That keeps us on our mettle and it means that we have to do better. We are a key player in a number of expert groups: the EU National Contact Points on Integration network and the Forum on Intercultural Dialogue that was instigated by Germany when it had presidency of the EU. There is a constant exchange of good practice and ideas among those groups, which is invaluable and extremely useful. Part of this document has caused that. We look to countries mentioned by the noble Lord and others to see whether we could use some of their ideas.

On family life, which the noble Lord mentioned, immigration rules make clear provision for people to come to the UK on the basis of family reunion. The importance of that is reaffirmed in the Green Paper, The Path to Citizenship, referred to by a number of speakers, where there is a key route to naturalisation for family members of British citizens and permanent residents. It is important to ensure that the necessary application process is smooth and efficient to make it easier for them, as the noble Lord mentioned. We always take into account human rights issues, including the right to family life, and the MIPEX comments as we take forward our work on all those proposals.

On a point of detail, the noble Lord mentioned that the significant failure rate in the citizenship test was attributable to historical inaccuracies and obscure questions. The test questions are not in the public domain and, although there is a chapter on history, no questions are based on it. The chapter was revised extensively for the new edition of the handbook in April 2007. There are still no questions on history and, despite the test now covering a wider range of topics, the current success rate is some 74 per cent. That probably suggests that we have a meaningful test with the right balance of accessibility and difficulty. It is interesting that the new citizenship test introduced in Australia last year effectively copied ours, so I think that we probably have it about right.

We felt that it was right to have some provision to enable deprivation of nationality, albeit in exceptional circumstances. In fact, only one naturalised person has been deprived of citizenship under these provisions, which include a right of appeal through the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal.

I have already referred to my noble friend Lord Kinnock. I support wholeheartedly his ringing endorsement of the report: it is a superb publication. As a number of speakers have said, in a way it is a shame that we do not have that sort of guidance in other areas, because it is a very useful piece of work on which to draw.

I also agree with my noble friend Lord Kinnock that we need migrants’ skills. Our country is successful partly due to the quality of migrants and what they have added to our vibrancy and economic capability. The new points-based system that we are introducing—it went live on 29 February—is designed to help to attract more individuals with the talents and skills that we need. The use of the English language was mentioned, and we will expect the vast majority of workers to speak English. That will enhance their ability to integrate, and points will be awarded on advice from the new Migration Advisory Committee, which we have created to attract to the UK people with the right skills. We need such people and they need to be fully integrated into our society, as has been touched on.

The noble Lord, Lord Dearing, referred to children and gave the example of indices to show how something can stimulate us into action. I think that the Government now have a good tale to tell in terms of what we are trying to do in relation to children, although there is no doubt that the UNICEF report was rather shocking. One can argue about the data and so on, but we are now doing a raft of things to improve the situation. The noble Lord touched on those and I thank him for that.

We agree with the noble Lord about the importance of language. When we have asked the British public for their view, they have made it plain that they feel very strongly that people should learn English if they come to this country. Last year, the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills introduced a new series of language programmes, and the ESOL for Work suite of qualifications focuses on those skills. Therefore, again, I think that we have a very good tale to tell in that regard.

The noble Baroness, Lady Miller, touched on the Green Paper concerning the new deal for citizenship, where the rights and benefits of British citizenship are matched by responsibilities. I mentioned how we had talked to a large number of people around the country—ordinary citizens and interest groups—about this, and there is no doubt that there is a feeling that people who come here should speak English. People want them to work hard and pay tax. They should obey the law and get involved in, and contribute to, community life. The vast majority of those who come here want to do that, and indeed do so. I was also very glad that the noble Baroness touched on the fact that there is too much negativity in relation to some aspects of immigration. On some things, we do rather well.

The noble Baroness, Lady Miller, also mentioned political participation, which is an important area. Although there has been some generic research into that, it has been fairly limited and I think that more can be done. It is crucial and I share her view.

The noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, always tries to luff me up or cross my stern. I cannot agree with her that the Government’s policy on immigration is a shambles. I do not think that she quite used those words but that was the feeling that I got. In fact, I believe that we have a remarkable grip on the issue. Speaking as a new boy, I think that perhaps over many years the matter has not been tackled as well as it should have been by lots of people and lots of parties. Now we are beginning firmly to get to grips with it. We need to because the British public expect it. We are doing rather well and the fact that we are ninth out of 25 is quite a good sign. As to uncontrolled numbers, the new Migration Advisory Committee achieves a great many things for us in this respect.

I round off by emphasising the sweeping reforms that we have taken forward. First, we have robust border controls now, managed by a unified border force, and the introduction of compulsory ID cards for foreign nationals, which is a good thing. Secondly, we have the new points-based system which went live on 29 February; there are some very good things there. Thirdly, the Department for Innovation, Universities and Schools introduced last year a new series of language programmes, which are very satisfactory. Fourthly, on 20 February we published our Green Paper, The Path to Citizenship. The noble Baroness said it was not well received. I am not so sure; I think it was quite well received. This shows that we are thinking and going in the right direction.

Finally, the United Kingdom has a long history of welcoming to its shores migrants and those seeking better opportunities, as well as those fleeing persecution. I can assure noble Lords that the Government value the insight that the Migrant Integration Policy Index—a very useful document—has given to our integration policies. We shall, of course, take account of its findings as we determine the future direction of our policies on integration, and we will continue to encourage newcomers to become full and active participants in our rich and vibrant society, which owes so much to immigrants over the years.

[The Sitting was suspended from 4.56 to 5 pm.]

asked Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to improve the preparation of legislative proposals to Parliament.

The noble Lord said: With the publication earlier this week of the Government's draft Constitution Renewal Bill, this is a well timed debate. I am very grateful to the Leader of the House and others of your Lordships here present, one magnificently accoutred, for being here to debate it. I begin by acknowledging what the Government have already done in the area covered by this Question. It was immensely encouraging that the first act of the new Prime Minister's administration last July was to publish the Governance of Britain White Paper, which included proposals to redress the balance between the Executive and Parliament. That theme was carried forward in the Statement from the Lord Chancellor this week, when he said:

“The accountability of Government is fundamental to the health of our democracy”.—[Official Report, Commons, 25/3/08; col. 21.]

Again, it is Parliament, the seat of our democracy, that is central to the programme of constitutional renewal.

What gives the greatest hope is the Government's apparent recognition that enabling Parliament to play its proper role is good for governance, good for the people of this country and therefore ultimately good for the Government themselves. It may seem curmudgeonly to use the word “apparent”, from which your Lordships will deduce my view that there is more that the Government could do to the end than they have stated. It would be naive to deny that there is a paradox in the relationship between the Government and Parliament. Because part of the role of Parliament is to scrutinise the Executive, there is bound to be an adversarial relationship, which is enhanced by the fact that Parliament is the platform for the opposition parties. In consequence, over nearly 200 years, the Executive have progressively sought to corral and dominate Parliament, with a good deal of success. Even so, I grew up professionally in a Civil Service tradition that honoured Parliament; not only honoured it but found it exciting. It was the cockpit in which our Ministers stood or fell. We shuddered at the thought of causing the Minister inadvertently to give inaccurate information to Parliament. We would not have dreamt of doing so advertently.

The imbalancing of the relationship between the Executive and Parliament is reflected in how successive Governments have brought legislation before Parliament. Because the Executive can take it for granted that they can get their legislation through, they produce too much legislation and do not prepare or even argue for it properly. One gets the impression that some White Papers are produced with an eye more on soundbites for the media than critical analysis, although I am told by people more expert than me that the recent White Paper on nuclear energy was a distinguished exception to that. We can all produce examples of the Executive taking Parliament for granted.

An example which particularly struck me was when I had occasion to look up the parliamentary proceedings on a section of the Finance Act 2005, which contained 106 clauses, 11 schedules, amounting to 202 pages of law in all, covering income and corporation tax, trusts, film relief, stamp duty and various anti-avoidance measures. But I could not find any discussion of the section in which I was interested, because in the lead-up to the general election 2005, the House of Commons passed all stages of the Bill in one day, four hours and two minutes, and your Lordships passed it in 24 minutes on the following day.

A system which can pass complex and important legislation as cursorily as that, even as part of a desk-clearing exercise before an election, cannot be right. Nobody could say that such cursoriness was necessary, since, following the election, the Government introduced a further Finance Bill three months later, which covered much the same ground with a further 72 clauses and 11 schedules and added a further 159 pages to the statute book.

No one would defend a proposition that legislation be introduced when it is not necessary or that policy proposals be ill-prepared. Why should anybody defend it? I am asking today that the Government commit to processes designed to avoid those outcomes by adopting standards against which they can be held to account and tested by Parliament.

We all know that there have been approaching 70 Home Office Bills in the past 10 years. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe of Aberavon, has said, if the people could be given a voice, the cry which would be most likely to go up would be:

“For God’s sake, leave us alone”.

I have been working with an all-party group, the Better Government Initiative, preparing proposals in this area for Parliament and government to consider. The proposals are wide-ranging and interlinked, and can be found at the Better Government Initiative website, which is www.bettergovernmentinitiative.co.uk. The proposal to which I want to draw particular attention is the suggestion that the Government commit to accompanying their policy and legislative proposals with a public document that certifies that they have gone through the steps of: exploring why action is desirable and, in the case of legislation, operationally necessary; analysing the costs and benefits and defining the objectives in terms suitable for post-legislative scouting; setting out the reasons for the preferred action and showing its practicability; and carrying out consultation with those principally affected. I think that we would all agree that all those steps are good practice. In Germany, I understand, legislation requires the Government to satisfy these tests, but I do not propose that they should be added to the constitutional renewal Bill; for one thing, it would be yet more legislation.

A parliamentary resolution would be sufficient to have an effect. It would be similar to that which the Government are proposing in order to commit the Executive to consult Parliament about decisions on going to war. Such a resolution would commit the Government to these unimpeachable principles for proposing legislation, and impose a parliamentary requirement that the Government declare that they had observed them. If that served to increase the quality of legislation, even at the cost of reducing some of the quantity, it would be no bad thing.

Above all, such a move, like other proposals in the Governance of Britain White Paper, would be in the interests of good governance and the public, which is the point of government itself. I urge the Government to consider this move as part of their proposals for improving government, and I urge colleagues in both Houses of Parliament to press them to do so.

It is a pleasure and a privilege to follow the noble Lord in this debate. I underwrite and agree with everything he has said and I share his respect for the relationship between government and the Civil Service. I have had the privilege of working alongside him for longer than I care to remember—certainly from my first Budget of nearly 20 years ago. As I say, I underwrite his search for improved preparation in legislative proposals, starting with his emphasis on the need to improve the quality of law in that sense. I also underline his subsidiary point of the need to consider not only the quality of the law that is introduced but also the quantity. The sheer volume under all Governments has been, and continues to be, excessive.

A long time ago a young man, here depicted, produced a pamphlet entitled Too Much Law? That was in 1977, when I committed the incoming Conservative Government to make fewer laws and to make laws fewer. We did not do too well at it but my commitment remains unchanged.

However, it is not only the quality or quantity of law that I am concerned about. I underline the interest of the noble Lord, Lord Butler, in this matter; in regard to the quality and quantity of the underlying policy. The quality of law, the draftmanship and so on are important and need to be improved, but it is the extent to which the underlying policy proposals have been thought through, examined and scrutinised by Parliament ahead of their introduction that is the main concern.

That is why I was slightly less than polite when we had the Statement this week on the Government’s proposed constitutional consolidation or reform. The sheer volume of that alarmed me, as did the prospect of a torrent of what could so easily be half-baked upheaval. In an example I gave at the time, I said that the abolition of the Lord Chancellor’s office involved 150 subsidiary provisions in the legislation. I apologise for having misled the House: it was not 150 but 250. That is a measure of the scale of change foreshadowed in that Bill.

It is important not to have too much faith in too much law. Indeed, I hesitate to enthuse over the formula proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Butler, because I am wary of the belief that by merely passing a code of that kind we might persuade ourselves that we have solved the problem. I have often repeated my proposition that law is greatly exaggerated in the importance of its impact. I said earlier this week that, as Lord Moulton said

“there are three great domains of human conduct. The first is where our actions are limited or forbidden by law. Then there is the domain of free personal choice. But between these two is a third domain, that in which there is neither law nor unfettered freedom … where people do right although there is no one and nothing to make them do right but themselves.”

Edmund Burke said:

“Manners are of more importance than laws. Upon them, in a great measure the laws depend”.

Judge Learned Hand, a notable American judge, said:

“I often wonder whether we do not rest our hopes too much upon constitutions, upon laws and upon courts”.

It is easy to believe that by having established a code one has achieved what one wants to achieve, but it is the way in which one responds to the spirit of that and the way in which one conditions one’s approach to policy change that is so important. We need, therefore, not much less law but, in my judgment, much less change. The temptation to say, “We are a reforming Government”—there is a temptation for the candidates in the American election now to say, “We stand for change”—implies that one should be living in a period of constant institutional upheaval. We have seen a great deal of that under the present Government—not uniquely—in the whole of the licensing legislation, the whole of the gaming legislation and the whole of electoral law; and, as the noble Lord, Lord Butler, pointed out, the whole of criminal justice has been changed so much and so decisively that a great deal of wisdom has been cast to one side. One very striking example of that arrived helpfully in my mail this morning. It is the document produced by the demised Commission for Patient and Public Involvement in Health. Its document started by saying:

“The Commission may be unique as a public body in that only months after it became operational it was informed that following a review of ‘arms-length’ bodies—it would be quickly abolished. This change in Government strategy … was followed by five Government postponements of the actual closure date … Over the five year period there was little clarity of direction and Government leadership”,

and so on. That is one example of upheaval before one round of constitutional change had even set.

My concern, therefore—I come to what the noble Lord, Lord Butler, said—is that we need not just fuller consideration of policy and pre-legislative consideration, but fuller, deeper and more patient consideration in advance of policy by Parliament, ahead of the production of a White Paper or a Green Paper. There is a huge mount of talent in both Houses of Parliament. Governments should have greater confidence in the ability to consult with that talent and to slow down the pace of change and upheaval. As the noble Lord said, when I go into any boardroom, committee room or staff room as a politician and ask, “What would you like us to do?”, the response is invariably, “For God’s sake, leave us alone”. I do not mean do nothing, but be thoughtful and careful, and be ready to consult with Parliament at a measured pace before one proceeds, with or without legislation.

This is, indeed, a timely debate for all the reasons the noble Lord, Lord Butler, gave. I congratulate him on his choice of subject and for raising it this afternoon.

It is always a little daunting to follow the noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe, with his great experience in all sorts of fields; it is even more daunting when he honours us by appearing in front of us so splendidly arrayed.

Recently, there has been increasing concern about how legislative proposals are put to Parliament and, flowing from that, the relationship between Parliament and the Executive. I share those concerns. There are two stages: first, how is policy formulated; and, secondly, how is it enacted when it gets to the parliamentary stage? I am concerned that so much legislation comes from the House of Commons in a form that has not been sufficiently scrutinised and, indeed, in some cases has not been scrutinised at all. The illustration given by the noble Lord, Lord Butler, of the Finance Act is certainly not unique. The result is that the quality of legislation overall produced by Parliament depends increasingly on the efforts made by the second Chamber to remedy the faults of the first. That is no way to legislate properly. It throws on the Government a greater obligation to produce legislation in the first instance which is comprehensive, precise and thorough. Unfortunately, as we all know, that is not always the case.

However, if there is a perceived need for reform, how do we best go about it? Merely to complain that the House of Commons does not do its job properly is no real answer. The issue raises fundamental questions about the relationship between Parliament and the Executive.

For some years now, the power of the Executive has increased and the consequent power of Parliament has declined. Furthermore, within the Executive, the power of the Prime Minister and the diminution of power by the Cabinet has produced a constitutional distortion. It surely should be basic that in any major decision the Cabinet should be consulted on the basis of proper Cabinet papers and proper discussion in Cabinet itself. While I realise that that may be time-consuming, even frustrating, for Prime Ministers, cabinet government is after all supposed to be the fundamental principle of our parliamentary constitution. Fortunately, I understand that the present Prime Minister is infinitely more assiduous in implementing this principle than perhaps was his predecessor.

Even if cabinet government were to be properly restored, as I think it is now on the way to being, there remains the issue of what the relationship between Parliament and the Executive should be. I share the views of the noble Lord, Lord Butler, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe, on the desirability of a parliamentary resolution. That would seem to be an admirable way of establishing the scope and nature of the relationship between the Executive and Parliament.

Reading the text of a possible resolution, there is very little in it with which Ministers could disagree. On the other hand, it is easy to pay lip service to the terms of the resolution and much more difficult to implement it in practice. I shall illustrate. A possible resolution that has been floated is that:

“Ministers have a duty to Parliament to ensure that their policy and legislative proposals to Parliament have been thoroughly prepared”.

That is unarguable. Everybody could accept it because it is, of course, true, but it would be very difficult to implement. It would require a heightened degree of political commitment to ensure that Parliament was placed in a realistic position to consider that legislation properly. The terms of a possible resolution would also have to include the main elements of the thorough preparation that would be necessary for legislative proposals to be properly considered. They are again basic and difficult to disagree with but, if implemented, they would undoubtedly have a profound effect on the quality of legislation produced by Parliament.

I shall illustrate that by taking two of the possibilities: First,

“Defining the problem and explaining why action is desirable or, in the case of legislation, why it is operationally necessary”.

That is again unarguable and everyone would accept it, but if it were implemented it would help Parliament enormously, and at present it does not happen. Secondly,

“Setting out principles and arguments which lead Ministers to the proposed option.”.

I have made the point twice already and will not repeat it. Indeed, one is sometimes driven back to the somewhat mournful conclusion that what is required more than anything else is a decision by the Executive that relations between them and Parliament have to improve. Once that is accepted, a great deal becomes obvious and possible that is at present opaque.

I am pleased that my noble friend the Leader of the House will respond to this debate, but I urge her and the Government to be open and generous in their response. A great deal depends on it, but the issue must not be left here. A one-hour debate in the Moses Room late on a Thursday afternoon is no substitute for proper consideration by the House as a whole. Indeed, if ever there was a matter that should be considered by the House as a whole, this is it. While I understand, of course, that my noble friend will not be able to commit herself to the expenditure of parliamentary time—no Leader of the House ever can, although he or she is often asked—nevertheless an indication that the Government would like the issue to be further discussed would be very helpful.

I, too, congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Butler of Brockwell, on raising this important Question. In terms of the preparation of legislative proposals, the time may be coming when we need to review fundamentally the way in which we draw up legislation in this country. Despite improvements in recent years, the basic nature of the process lends itself to confusion, certainly to the public and even to Members of both Houses. However, in the limited time available, I wish to focus on the process as it exists. Out of the several points I would have liked to make, let me focus on two. They stem from the premise that there needs to be greater rigour in the legislative process, and they follow the distinction made by the noble Lord, Lord Richard.

My first point first relates to pre-legislative scrutiny. The Constitution Committee in its 2004 report on the legislative process—I chaired the committee—stressed the value of pre-legislative scrutiny. The Government accepted the value of such scrutiny and have continued to do so. However, there has been something of a regression. In 2003, the Deputy Leader of the House of Commons, Phil Woolas, said that it was the Government's intention to increase the amount of legislation that was subject to pre-legislative scrutiny and in a Westminster Hall debate the following year he stated that,

“a Bill should be published in draft form unless there are good reasons for not doing so”.—[Official Report, Commons, 24/2/04; col. 19WH.]

However, that particular Session—2003-04—proved to be the high point as 12 Bills were published in draft. As the more recent report of the Constitution Committee on pre-legislative scrutiny in the 2006-07 Session has shown, the number has declined since then. In the 2003-04 Session, the ratio of draft Bills to Government Bills was 1:3. In 2005-06 it was 1:15, and in 2006-07 it was 1:9.

Why are more Bills not published in draft? In response to the committee’s latest report, the Leader of the House in a letter of 20 March, somewhat echoing the Government’s response to the Liaison Committee in the other place, said:

“The main practical obstacle remains the need to have the freedom to bring forward much legislation on a timetable which does not allow the publication of the proposed legislation in draft form”.

Can the noble Baroness explain exactly what that means? I can understand the Government not wishing to tie their hands by committing themselves to publishing every Bill in draft. The Constitution Committee recognised that that was not always possible. However, it does not really explain why more Bills are not published in draft. If Bills are introduced on a staggered basis and subjected to pre-legislative scrutiny, then they are eligible for carry-over. The so-called “practical obstacle” to more Bills being published in draft is not really an obstacle at all. Following the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Richard, I suspect that the obstacle is the culture in some departments or the attitude of certain Ministers. It may be that the Leaders of both Houses are keen on pre-legislative scrutiny but that they face resistance from particular departments—hence the noble Baroness’s expression of disappointment in her letter at the number of Bills published in draft.

Is it not time that the Government embraced the recommendation of the Constitution Committee and, in effect, the words of Phil Woolas to ensure that every Bill is published in draft unless there is a compelling reason not to do so? If a Bill is not published in draft, can we ensure that in the Explanatory Notes there is a statement by the sponsoring Minister explaining why that has not been done? That, at least, will constitute a useful starting point.

My second point—some comments have already been made about this—concerns being clear about the objectives of a Bill and how its effectiveness can be measured once enacted. We now have impact assessments, and the template process requires policy-makers to be mindful of post-implementation review and to identify policy objectives and the intended effects of the policy. This is clearly relevant to post-legislative scrutiny, and I very much welcome much of what is contained in the Government’s response to the Law Commission report on post-legislation. I say “much” because there is one omission that I will deal with when we debate the Government’s response.

However, on the preparation of legislation, the commitment to identify policy objectives and the criteria for review following enactment is to be welcomed. The crucial point, as I think the Minister will concur—I believe this is the point that the noble Lord, Lord Richard, was making—is to ensure that the Government’s good intentions are translated into practice. Here, I revert to the recent report of the Merits of Statutory Instruments Committee on The Management of Secondary Legislation: Follow-up. The key comment to which I wish to draw the Minister’s attention is in paragraph 35. Referring to failings in respect of establishing clear and realistic criteria in two particular cases, it stated:

“This is poor management and demonstrates a tendency by Departments to use IAs as a tool ‘to justify policy rather than a policy-making tool’”.

It is vital that this does not become a formulaic or ticking-the-box exercise. The good intention is there but it is essential to ensure that departmental cultures change if the setting of objectives and measurable outcomes are to be achieved.

The Government’s response—in effect, their stated good intentions—is a necessary but not sufficient condition for improving the preparation of legislation to Parliament. Again, I think that is the point that the noble Lord, Lord Richard, was making. There has to be the political will to deliver. That is the real challenge. I look forward to hearing how the Government intend to ensure that departments do deliver.

Good things often come in small packages and the quality of the debate this afternoon has amply justified the initiative of the noble Lord, Lord Butler, in calling it. As I reflect back on what has changed over the years, it seems to me that Parliament has, if anything, improved its act over legislation. Pre-legislative scrutiny is a vital and important breakthrough. In the Commons now, although not alas in your Lordships’ House, Public Bill Committees—what used to be the useless Standing Committees—take evidence before they go through a Bill, which is a tremendous step forward. In your Lordships’ House, we spend much more time on Bills and are far less willing to accept a ministerial “no” than used to be the case, with the result that Commons Ministers are finally waking up to the fact that they must take account of the views of this House if they are to get their legislation through. Therefore, it seems to me that Parliament is doing better than it did.

The problem arises with the raw material with which Parliament is asked to work in the form of legislative proposals that come before us. I am not a great one for golden- ageism. The first piece of legislation that I came across in detail was the Housing Finance Bill, which was before Parliament when I started work for Tony Crosland. The Bill was the brainchild of the great Walter Ulrich, one of the finest civil servants of history. As your Lordships will of course recall, the Housing Finance Act was designed to achieve a faster rise in council rents than would otherwise have occurred, but, because of the inflation that then took place, it had the immediate effect of achieving a slower rise in council rents. Therefore, legislative proposals, even in those days, were not perfect. However, there are regards in which I think there has been a decline, and I want briefly to single out just one—White Papers.

It would be wrong to claim that White Papers never contain unclarities—even in the 1970s, when I first came into Whitehall and government. However, you knew then that, if there was an unclarity in a White Paper, it was there for a reason. There may have been something that had to be disguised or papered over but which might later be resolved. However, when you read White Papers now, I am afraid you feel that a lot of the unclarities are there not for a reason but because someone could not be bothered or did not have the ability to write the right words to encapsulate what they were trying to say. Too often today, I pick up a new White Paper in a spirit of hope only to find that I have in my hands, once again, an exercise in vacuity, a triumph over reasoned argument of contentless guff. Parliament and the people deserve better.

I, too, am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Butler of Brockwell, for initiating this debate. Because it is a very short debate, I begin by accepting both his diagnosis and his principal recommendation to deal with what is wrong in our legislative process. In my opinion, his recommendation that Parliament should pass a resolution put before it by the Government has the merit of being a simple proposal that could be grasped without legislation and advanced quickly. Having said that, I do not think that it goes far enough. I would wish it to happen but I do not think that it goes nearly far enough to address a number of the issues that were alluded to very forcefully in the committee’s recommendations on the Better Government Initiative, to which the noble Lord belonged and which was chaired by Sir Christopher Foster.

This is not a problem unique to this parliamentary democracy. It is, I think, sensible to consider what is done in other countries and to consider whether at this time, when the Government are contemplating a considerable process of constitutional reform designed to strengthen Parliament, there are ideas and lessons to be learnt in other parliamentary jurisdictions. I draw the Government’s attention, in particular, to the experience in New Zealand. In a notable speech made about a year ago, Sir Geoffrey Palmer, former Prime Minister of New Zealand, concluded—he might have been talking about the United Kingdom—

“From where I sit the real problem is that we still legislate too easily. We give insufficient thought to what we are trying to do when we legislate. And then, having legislated, we do not examine whether we even achieved what we were trying to. We amend too readily when often we should start again. We fail to assess properly the economic consequences of many of the regulatory mechanisms in which we engage … I think the time has come to put a lot more thought into the legislative process before it starts. In a system where statute is Emperor, we need better methods of statute design, manufacture and maintenance”.

In New Zealand there are two advisory committees in place to try to achieve some of this betterment. Sir Geoffrey has admitted that he does not think that they are sufficient and has suggested that they should be “melded”, to use his word, into one.

Another example that we should look at is that of the Council of State in the Netherlands, which is a body considered to be one of the high councils of state, appointed by the Government. It is a relatively small body but it has a very large staff; it provides a very useful service, considering whether the problem being addressed is one that could or should be solved by legislation. It asks whether a Bill is necessary and whether its necessity has been demonstrated, whether the proposed legislation will be effective and the proposed solution efficient and balanced as regards costs and benefits. It asks, too, whether it will be possible to apply and enforce the Bill or to monitor its effects. This comes at a time when the future of this Chamber is under consideration and its very important revising role is to some extent at risk. Let no one imagine that a representative body of elected Peers will perform its revising role in anything like the same manner as the present House of Lords does, because it—like the House of Commons—will be looking for the political headlines. Should we consider a third institution as part of Parliament? I believe that we should.

Sir Geoffrey Palmer, in looking at the experience of New Zealand’s advisory council said that the trouble with it was that it was not at the heart of the legislative process. I think that that is what we need; there should be a council of state of people appointed who reflect the kind of expertise that there is in this Chamber—not only lawyers, as in New Zealand. The body would have pre-legislative and possibly post-legislative scrutiny role. The elected second Chamber could then act as it will, as a political Chamber, holding the Government to account and ending—even blocking—legislation, without the close, detailed work on legislation being sacrificed by those political considerations. I saw it reported this week that 450 Members would be elected to an upper House. That may be utter nonsense, but you would need something like that to bring together the expertise that you have. It is inconceivable that we would have an elected Parliament of 1,000 Members.

I commend that in outline to the Lord Chancellor as a field of inquiry.

I, too, thank the noble Lord, Lord Butler, for bringing this matter to the attention of your Lordships. Like him, I have had the privilege to take part in the Better Government Initiative, where this issue, which affects the relationship between the Executive and Parliament, was extensively discussed. It is important because that relationship in turn affects the attitude of the public to their institutions and the extent to which they think that representative democracy serves their needs.

There have been a number of reviews and reports on this subject produced by both governmental and non-governmental bodies over the years. It is a reflection of the intrinsic importance of the issue being discussed, even if it does not immediately grab widespread attention. It is regarded as something with which the experts are inclined to deal, but we are not necessarily wrong in being interested. The quantity of law is going up, which I do not regard as particularly beneficial, but the quality of law is not keeping pace. As my noble and learned friend Lord Howe—this bird of plumage next door to me—said, the underlying policy can be affected by that and a situation could arise in which the Executive can pay the price of poor law being passed, because poor law is harder to implement in good policy.

Let me give some practical illustrations of the kind of difficulties we can get into. The number of Bills published in draft form has fallen since 2004. Only seven out of the 30 Bills in this Session were so presented. I hope that this debate will revitalise the Government’s commitment to enforcing their own proposals, for which I commend them. It is important to live up to your standards and not just rest on fine words.

There has been a thorough exploration of how pre-legislative scrutiny can be expanded and clear proposals have been made. The noble Lord, Lord Butler, rightly, has again put forward guidelines of a kind which the Government should take seriously. But the 2003 standard text on parliamentary procedure, Griffith and Ryle on Parliament, states that the development of pre-legislative scrutiny,

“depends more on Government than on Parliament”.

We can say what we like, but it crucially depends upon the Government taking seriously their role in relation to Parliament. The Government’s enthusiasm, or lack of it, for implementing these proposals will be key to them becoming standard.

You can see the price paid when this does not happen. Look, for instance, at the Government’s legislative timetable for this Session and you realise how badly prepared Bills can damage the Government’s programme. In 2004, the Pensions Bill took nine months to proceed through both Houses. In the process it had 78 new clauses inserted and 450 government amendments were made to it. As the shadow pensions Minister of the time commented in another place,

“if ever there were a piece of legislation that cried out to start its life as a draft Bill and be subject to the pre-legislative scrutiny procedures of both Houses, this is it”.—[Official Report, Commons, 16/11/04; col. 1192.]

I am sure one could say the same thing about other legislation. Another example with which we are living now is the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill, which has limped through eight days in Committee and has just started Report. It has had countless clauses and whole parts added and removed at all stages. The Government have admitted that many of their amendments are to correct flaws resulting from lack of consultation. It is time that we learnt some of the lessons.

It is a remarkable fact, for example, that the provisions inserted to place the Commissioner for Prison Complaints on to a statutory footing were so ill thought through that even the commissioner publicly opposed them while supporting the intention that lay behind them. That must be a waste of time.

The properly managed resources and expertise of the private and charity sectors form an important part of the consultation process. We all recognise that these days the charity sector or the voluntary sector—the Government call it the third sector but I prefer to call it the voluntary sector—plays an increasingly important part in our public life. How is it brought in? How are its views heard? One of the important ways in which that can be done is through the process of pre-legislative consultation. If the Government are able to develop and implement rather more thoroughly their own guidelines in future, that would be a very good thing.

I contrast with that the benefits of pre-legislative consultation. I take as an example the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill, which deals with enormously controversial issues, as we now see in another place. However, the quality of the debate in this House has been widely commented on and was very great. One reason why it was so good was that the Bill had been through a process of pre-legislative consultation, so the issues had been identified and clarified to a greater extent. The quality of the debate here and of the service that this House was able to give to the legislative process was accordingly greatly enhanced. It is interesting that the Bill came to public notice and got picked up by the media only when it reached the Commons, but I have no doubt that the other place will benefit greatly from the work that we were able to do in this House on the basis of pre-legislative consultation. The case is made for greater effort and attention being given to that stage of the process.

A previous speaker rightly said that, even if it is very careful and diligent in its scrutiny of Bills, this House or a future House cannot compensate for defects that could be remedied in other ways. Bad-quality legislation causes enormous difficulties for those trying to implement and enforce it. The noble Lord, Lord Butler, set out some steps that could be taken to improve all this and they seem to me to be good guidelines for this Government and future Governments. It would be helpful if the Minister could say why the Government have not published more Bills in draft and whether she feels that they will be able to remedy the situation in future. It would be good to hear that the Government’s intentions in this area will be reflected in their future conduct.

I am extremely grateful because, although this is not the gap, the Minister has invited me to speak. As one who served on the Joint Committee that examined the draft Human Tissue and Embryos Bill, I have come to the conclusion that pre-legislative scrutiny should be an essential part of every complex Bill. As I said on the Floor of the House, it does not replace the line-by-line, clause-by-clause examination by the House as a whole but, as my noble friend rightly said, we were able to deal with a vastly better Bill than the one that was introduced to the Joint Committee.

I am grateful to the noble Lord and agree with what he said. I, too, pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Butler, who was kind enough to give me an indication of the issues that he wished to discuss, both in the context of the work that he and others have been doing and also specifically for today. I thank all noble Lords who have contributed and agree that this subject is worthy of greater discussion. It may feel a little introspective at times but it is very important. As my noble friend Lord Richard said, as Leader of the House I cannot possibly commit to anything in terms of time, but there may be many opportunities where we can do more on this, and I would welcome that.

The noble Lord, Lord Butler, began extremely well in describing what The Governance of Britain was trying to do to redress the balance between government and Parliament and with regard to accountability to Parliament. That is precisely where my right honourable friend the Prime Minister was seeking to take this debate. I think the noble Lord said that it is good for governance and for the people of this country and therefore it is good for the Government. I endorse that. We achieve that by anything that we do that ensures that Parliament and accountability are put in a proper framework—a better framework, perhaps.

I also agree that there is more to be done—this is an ongoing process. Noble Lords have taken a slightly different view from that of my noble friend Lord Lipsey about how Parliament has progressed, although I saw noble Lords nodding when my noble friend talked about what is happening in another place—for example, Public Bill Committees receiving evidence—but we should be ever watchful because there is more to be done.

I love the idea that the Civil Service get very excited about the cockpit of Parliament. That has cheered me up no end.

On the specific point about passing Bills before elections, a lot of work goes on with what we lovingly describe as the “usual channels”. These are not deeply controversial Bills. Some Bills that I would have expected to have gone through that process—for example, the Charities Bill—did not as there were issues to be resolved. So it is not quite as simple as was perhaps suggested.

I will not comment on the length of Bills as I do not have the statistics, so do not trip me up on that. On the number of Bills, in 1979 a new eager Government came in and there were 251 Bills between 1979 and 1983. In 1997 to 2001, there were 159 and in the last full Session there were 136. So, in theory, the number of Bills is dropping. I take the point, which I know somebody will leap up and say if I do not—the noble Lord, Lord Norton, is nodding at me—about the length of Bills. None the less, it is important that we get the perspective on what the Government seek to do.

Noble Lords have talked a lot about the importance of recognising the Bill as part of a package. For a Minister in a different department, it is often difficult to explain to other organisations—this is particularly true of the voluntary and charitable sector in many but not all cases—that a Bill is merely a part of what one is offering in terms of policy for government. People tend to focus on the Bill as being the way we take forward a policy. But noble Lords are completely right that the package is important. One of the things that I feel quite strongly about is that as parliamentarians and politicians in government we need to get better at explaining where a Bill fits into a package that is on offer to people, because it is often only a narrow part of what is there.

My noble friend Lord Richard supported the noble Lord, Lord Butler, as did the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Jones, and other noble Lords on the idea of a resolution. The noble Lord, Lord Maclennan of Rogart, said that it was a simple proposal that did not go far enough. My difficulty with it is that I cannot see—but this may be my fault—how it could be enforced. I wonder whether one would not fall into the trap of looking at how you would assess whether it is implemented, because it could in a sense be a political judgment. Whether we have implemented something depends on where you sit in the grand scheme of things, or it can on occasion. I do not accuse the noble Lord, Lord Butler, of that, but I will accuse my colleagues in the political parties of looking at what happens post-legislation in the wider context of thinking through what has happened. Those are my reservations about the idea of a resolution as a solution. I thoroughly endorse the principle behind what the noble Lord seeks to do in terms of trying keep a watch on ensuring that we have better legislation. I shall talk a little about that in a moment.

The noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe of Aberavon, who is looking stunning, had a fabulous pamphlet with a very attractive young man on the front of it. I was wondering who he was. I want to say something about the underlying proposals. Consultation is a very important part of what government should and, I believe, do—certainly in my experience—to try to get to the point of working out what is the package and what within it should be the essence of the law that needs to be changed or added to, if that is what has to be done. I agree with noble Lords about the value and importance of pre-legislative scrutiny. The noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, in his tiny intervention, and the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Jones, described the particular role of the committee that was looking at what became the Human Embryology and Fertilisation Bill. I agree that the work done on that committee and in your Lordships’ House will be of immense importance to another place as it begins its discussions and deliberations on it. The noble Lord, Lord Norton, spent a bit of time focusing on that.

The noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Jones, and other noble Lords asked about the numbers of Bills that have pre-legislative scrutiny and the reasons why we do not always do that. There are many. One reason, which noble Lords would accept, is that there is not time. With proposals that are considered urgent—Northern Rock is perhaps the latest example, but there are others—it is not possible to do so. We encourage departments to publish draft Bills when we do not get a successful bid for legislative time. Indeed, the courts and tribunals Bill, which I consider to be one of my greater triumphs, was published ready for a programme in which it did not have a place. I relied on the fact that not all Bills are ready at the right moment, and indeed I was right. Noble Lords may recall it was the very first Bill into your Lordships’ House in the previous Session. It was a good example and was held up as such to departments of how they can get the legislation into either House by having it ready to roll, as it were.

The number of Bills that we expect to publish in draft this Session is seven. It is not, as the noble Lord, Lord Norton, said, the three-to-one ratio that we had in 2003-04, but at least it is heading back in the right direction. We encourage departments to try to do it as far as possible; I cannot give one explanation that would cover why Bills are or are not presented in that way. I agree particularly with what the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, said, when he used the phrase “complex Bill”. The examples that we have seen, particularly this latest example of the human embryology Bill, demonstrate the value of having that pre-legislative scrutiny on something that is complex to understand but needs to be understood for people to be able to reach the conclusions that they need to reach, whatever they may be, rather than be bombarded—as can happen with issues such as this—by external media or others, who wish to put a particular point of view that may or may not be one that noble Lords would agree with. So we are pushing to ensure that we do as many Bills as possible in draft—and I shall use the fact that your Lordships have pushed me even further on this to take that back as a business manager and say that we really need to do more. That way, as noble Lords have said, we end up with a better Bill that can potentially go through more smoothly—although I flag up the case of the Legal Services Bill. It had pre-legislative scrutiny, but that did not help me one bit when it came to putting it through your Lordships' House.

At the other end of the spectrum, on post-legislative scrutiny, the noble Lord, Lord Norton, made a very important point about making sure that we look at what happens. Noble Lords will have seen proposals that have been published for memorandums to be produced between three and five years post the legislation and for the Select Committees in either House to have the opportunity to determine which they wish to scrutinise, for obvious reasons. I hope that those will go some way to ensuring that we do this, as I have always believed that it is very important to look back and to see what happened as a consequence, not least because I am sure that over the history of legislation there are occasions when consequences that have come about are not necessarily those intended. It is also good to go back and to see what has been successful and how it can be built on. I take the point that occasionally that means not amending but going back to the beginning and saying that it is better if we look at that more effectively.

The noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe of Aberavon, said that we should remember what a “reforming Government” means and not just change things for change’s sake. I agree with that—but I am very mindful, too, that circumstances change all the time. We live in a world that I would argue becomes faster and faster in terms of the changes that take place, which means that one has to be mindful of the law that follows. It does not mean change for change’s sake. But there is a balance to be struck there.

The noble Lord, Lord Norton, talked about the impact assessments. There is a whole history of better regulation that goes back to the previous Government, the Deregulation Task Force and so on. I completely accept that the previous regulatory impact assessment process had its faults; we reviewed it and the process that we have put in its place is a much better one. It answers some of the points that have been raised, such as what the objectives of the policy are, why we need to intervene, what options were considered and when the benefits will be reviewed to establish what actually happened, as well as what the costs and benefits were, doing the cost-benefit analysis to underpin it. That will take us in the direction that noble Lords are looking for, not using it as an excuse to justify but rather to confirm that the process is proper and the outcome is to be desired—in other words, that it is the best way in which to achieve what is proposed.

I agree with my noble friend Lord Lipsey that the programme that is now in operation, particularly in another place, is better. I take his point about guff and White Papers, although I shall not comment further on that. The noble Lord, Lord Maclennan of Rogart, has addressed his point to me before, with regard to his ideas. The problem is that it is worthy of a debate in itself. Sir Geoffrey Palmer’s words are very important; we should not make legislation too easily, we need to assess whether it is successful and so on. I do not accept the premise that revision cannot be done by an elected Chamber, but I take the point of ensuring that it has the right role and responsibilities to do it effectively.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Jones, says, we are trying to move to the point when we do not have poor law. I agree that if you have poor law, it is much harder to understand, never mind implement.

I cannot comment on the Pensions Bill. Sometimes we have lots of amendments because, in your Lordships' House for example, lots of good ideas come forward, so I cannot always say that amendments are a negative thing—quite the opposite. My experience is that we get far better amendments when we sit down and work out together what ought to happen. Sometimes government amendments are noble Lords’ amendments transferred. The business managers are important players in this and do their very best to ensure that the legislative programme runs smoothly.

Committee adjourned at 6 pm.