Downing Street Says » Honours and Peerages

The Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman (PMOS) ran through the detail of the announcements made by the Prime Minister at his monthly press conference.

First, honours: The way the honours system worked at present was that there were various committees that collated nominations from a range of people these were then passed through Downing Street via the Prime Minister to Buckingham Palace. In addition the Prime Minister could, at present, nominate some people for honours, although the Prime Minister had not exercised this prerogative very much. The Prime Minister was now proposing to take himself completely out of that loop and give the Cabinet Secretary the role of being the intermediary between the committees and the Palace.

Second, conflicts of interest: The Prime Minister was proposing that an independent figure should advise ministers when they first came in to office about any issues where there could be conflicts of interest. That same person should then be the person who established the facts, for the Prime Minister, if there were any questions raised. The final decision-maker in that process, as the Prime Minister had himself stressed, should remain the Prime Minister for all the reasons of accountability and constitutionality that had been set out earlier in the week. The benefit of this proposal was that there would now be consistency and coherence between the person advising ministers and the person establishing the facts. It also freed up the Cabinet Secretary and permanent secretaries to get on with their day jobs. The PMOS added, without prejudging the process of selection, that this person should be someone who was genuinely regarded as an independent figure by the public and someone that ministers had confidence in regarding confidential matters.

It was for ministers to discuss with the independent figure any areas where there might be potential conflicts of interest and the independent figure to offer advice on what should and should not be declared. It did not take the responsibility for abiding by the ministerial code away from ministers. The Prime Minister would remain the final adjudicator on any conflict of interest decisions.

Third, party funding: The Prime Minister believed that we had to look again at how parties were funded and whether we could further enhance state support for parties in return for placing caps on party donation and how loans were handled in the future. On the loans matter the Prime Minister had also said that he was quite prepared to have loans declared so long as that applied to all parties. In terms of party funding, a matter that the Prime Minister had been discussing with Sir Gus O’Donnell and others for some time now, he believed there should be an independent figure who talked to all the parties to try to establish a consensus. There was a need for as broad a consensus here as was possible on what should happen. The PMOS said that he would not prejudge who that person might be or what the process would be because it was important for discussions to take place with the others first. However this was where we thought it was heading towards – an independent figure who would talk to the parties and come up with proposals on party funding.

Fourth, the House of Lords: As the Prime Minister said what did not change, at the moment, was the ability for party leaders to, including the Prime Minister himself as a party leader, to nominate working peers. Neither would the process of appointing other peers change, either through people’s panels or the ability of the Prime Minister to appoint 10 personal appointees per parliament. All of these matters would be discussed as part of the broader issue of House of Lords reform.

The Prime Minister had, himself, said we would be coming forward with ideas in all four of these areas in the next few weeks. The reason he was able to say this was because a lot of thinking had already been going on in these areas.

Asked if the Prime Minister retained the power of patronage and the power to hire and fire ministers what had changed, the PMOS said that it took the Prime Minister out of the honours system. In terms of the ministerial code it established a more coherent system to advise ministers and establish facts. In terms of party funding it took the debate on how parties should be funded considerably further forward. There was already a discussion about the future of the House of Lords and it would be wrong to pre-empt that. People may be critical of the Prime Minister remaining the final adjudicator on breaches of the ministerial code, but the question you had to ask was what was the alternative and those who were at the press conference today had heard the Prime Minister say that in the end he believed that it was the people who judged politicians and therefore it was the people who were accountable to the electorate who should be taking such decisions.

Asked if it was the PMOS who was announcing the independent figure on party funding and whether the Prime Minister would be talking to David Cameron and Menzies Campbell about this and state funding, the PMOS confirmed it was a new announcement and that there would be discussions through the normal channels. The Prime Minister had said that we needed to look at whether we could enhance existing state support for parties in return for placing caps on donations. There were different ways of skinning a cat, but what the Prime Minister had always recognised was that there could be public opposition to state funding, equally he acknowledged that there were problems about perceptions of influence in the current system. Therefore you had to find a way through those two tensions. The Prime Minister believed that the best way to do that was to have an objective independent figure who could talk to all the parties and who then looked for a consensus. This was a matter that he had been discussing for some time with the Cabinet Secretary and a way forward was emerging but in all fairness the government needed to talk to the other parties before moving forward any further.

Asked why these announcements had been made today when they did not address the issue of peers and donations, the PMOS said on honours all people had to do was look at the coverage about names on the list around every honours list publication. We believed there was a misperception that there was in some way political influence when there was not. Therefore it was important to counter that misperception. This was why the Prime Minister believed he should take himself out of that role. In terms of the independent figure, we had been and continued to argue against the idea that the Prime Minister should surrender his role as the ultimate figure of accountability.

Leaving aside Sir Alistair Graham’s comments the important question was what was the role of the independent figure? Was it to establish the facts, as we believed it should be, or was it to act as the ultimate judge? We believed it should not be that. On state funding the precise issue arising from last night, without straying into party territory, was precisely about the funding of parties and how we dealt with that on a rational basis that also addressed peoples’ concerns. As for the House of Lords it was a fact that under the current system you had to have working peers. It was therefore a fact that until there was a new consensus you had to continue the system where party leaders could nominate peers. This was why we were not addressing the fourth issue at the moment.

Asked whether the independent figure for the ministerial code was different from the party funding one, the PMOS confirmed they were two different positions. Asked how the Prime Minister was out of the honours system when he still appointed peers, the PMOS reminded journalists that honours and peerage appointments were different. Honours were knighthoods, OBEs and MBEs whereas peerages were appointments to the House of Lords. The Prime Minister was removing himself from the honours process. As a party leader, like the other party leaders, he still kept his role in regard to peerages. Asked whether the Prime Minister would have a resignation honours list, the PMOS congratulated the journalist on the ultimate hypothetical question. That question would be addressed at the appropriate time, but this was not it.

Asked which part of the peerage system had the Prime Minister removed himself from, the PMOS said that the Prime Minister had not removed himself from the peerage process. The Prime Minister had removed himself from the honours system. The honours system was separate and different from the peerage appointment process. We still needed to have working peers and would continue to do so until people agreed a consensual way forward on House of Lords reform. Asked about the cap on donations, the PMOS, for clarity, read the third and fourth points from the Prime Minister’s script: we need to look again at party funding and whether we can further enhance existing state support for parties in return for placing caps on party donations and to look at how loans should be handled in future. The specific details were for the independent figure to discuss with parties. Point four: in any event we will bring forward the last stage of House of Lords reform. The issue of its membership and systems of appointment or election will obviously arise. Asked about House of Lords reform, the PMOS said that Lord Falconer was in the middle of discussions and he would not pre-empt the content or timing of those discussions.

Asked whether the Prime Minister would be taking Dr Chai Patel off the peers list, the PMOS referred the journalist to the Prime Minister’s comments at the press conference where he had said that he had never gone against recommendations of the appointments committee and that he could not see himself doing so. Asked if the Prime Minister hoped that the question of party funding would be resolved before he stepped down, the PMOS said that the Prime Minister clearly hoped that these matters could be resolved as quickly as possible. This was why he had been discussing these issues for some time and thinking his way through them. Asked if the Prime Minister was still open to appointing peerages to party lenders and whether he believed those names should be published, the PMOS said, as the Prime Minister had said at his press conference, that the Prime Minister was open to the idea that people who provided loans being known to the appointments commission so long as it was a level playing field.

However, his view was that someone should not be penalised or barred from the Lords because they had donated to a party. It was illogical to expect that working peers, who belonged to specific parties, should not have supported or contributed to their party however big or small that may have been. Asked if this had been discussed with the Chancellor, the PMOS said, as they all knew, they had regular discussions. Asked about the Queen, the PMOS said that Downing Street and Buckingham Palace were able to communicate on all relevant issues no matter where people were in the world.

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» Thursday, March 16, 2006

Honours and Peerages

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