Theresa May - shadow leader of the Commons

Question: What’s the party’s thinking on Lords reform and the proposals from Jack Straw which appeared in the papers last weekend?

Theresa May: We are part of Jack Straw’s cross-party working group on Lords reform that had been started by Charlie Falcolner, I’ve been to a couple of meetings. The Conservative Party has for a long time had a view that we believe in having a substantially elected portion of the house, and I myself – of course there was no party line the last time the House of Commons voted – voted for 80/20.

As for what Jack Straw is proposing I think there are some real questions, there’s not a lot of detail at the moment. I think there are some real questions over whether what he’s proposing will get rid of the cronyism that we want to get rid of in terms of the Lords.

Question: Do you see yourselves arriving at a position on this as a party?

Theresa May: I think we will carry on the discussions with Jack Straw and see where that takes us. There’s quite a lot of detail we still need to look at.

Question: There’s been speculation the Parliament Act could be used to force through some sort of reform, what would be your reaction to that?

Theresa May: I don’t think it’s appropriate for the government to try and push a constitutional change like this through using the Parliament Act. I recognise they’ve got something about this in the manifesto and the convention is if it’s in the manifesto the Lords don’t stop something from happening, but I think that this is a different type of legislation in that it’s about the constitution and the structure of parliament.

Question: What are your views on September sitting?

Theresa May: I myself am not in favour of September sittings. I think that September gives a good period of time when it’s possible for a member of parliament to be in their constituency and doing some of the things it’s actually very difficult to do at other times when you’re not there for most of the week.

We all have groups that for example might only meet on Tuesday evenings and tend not to meet in August, so unless you’ve got a month like September when you can go to things like that it’s very difficult.

Question: What about the idea that it creates a negative public perception of parliament having a long holiday?

Theresa May: We’ve done it twice and I don’t think it suddenly changed the public’s perception of politicians. I think changing the public’s perception of politicians is more about politicians delivering for them on the issues that matter and being honest with them than how long the house sits.

One of the things I would love to see, and this is a personal view, is we could come back and sit slightly earlier, come back at the beginning of October or end of September if we completely changed the party conference system.

My own view is that party conferences are in dire need of some radical change. I would dearly love our conference to be over a weekend rather than three weekdays. There was that kind of mood this year by having a Sunday session, but I’d like to see the conferences over the weekends with an expectation that people could have day passes rather than having to go to the whole conference, which they tend to at the moment. I’d like to see more movement around the country in where it’s sited, things like that.

At the moment the problem for all parties with their conferences is that if you’re going to go to a party conference you have to be able to take time off work, even ours which started at midday on Sunday and finished on the Wednesday afternoon. If you’re going to be there for the whole conference you’ve go to take three days off work, and not everybody has that sort of annual leave available, particularly if you’re someone with a family. I’d prefer to see much more flexibility.

I think that at some stage we will all start to change our party conferences. We did quite a lot this year, over the last few years in fact we’ve changed our conference. We did quite a lot this year - we changed the whole approach of our conference as well in having more external speakers, more debates that weren’t just focused on government departments but were focused on the sort of issues people are talking about - should there be advertising of junk food on television, what’s the impact of cheap flights on the environment.

I think that’s an important point for us as a party, to be actually focussing on issues that are foremost in people’s minds.

I think it reflects the new politics, that people are more interested in single issues than political parties, I think parties have to change to address that. But I think for some time now people have felt that politicians tend to talk about things in ways they don’t find terribly relevant, and that’s one of the problems with people’s cynicism about politics.

Question: The modernisation committee’s been around for about a decade now, do you think it’s had an impact on how the public perceives parliament?

Theresa May: It has had an impact on parliament and will continue to do so. It published a report on the legislative process earlier this year which will I believe, if put into place, improve the way this place scrutinises legislation which I think it important.

That’s good for parliament, it’s good in overall terms for the country. I’m not sure that that sort of thing is what excites people. I suspect in the Dog and Duck they’re not all saying ‘oh look did you see the House of Commons is going to have special standing committees called public bill committees in future?’

Ultimately we all as politicians need to think what we individually are doing to portray politics to our constituents and in our constituencies, and I think that is about recognising that we need to be there, working with people, campaigning with people on issues.

Question: Are public bills committees a good idea?

Theresa May: It is a good idea, because I’ve always thought the process in standing committees is a crucial part of what we do but not many people know about it, and also it’s surrounded by quite a bit of practice that makes it quite difficult for people to access it.

I think it’s sensible to say that we’ll have more pre-legislative scrutiny, more bills published in draft, and aim to have some of those people who’ve been involved in the pre-legislative scrutiny actually sitting on the public bill committee, because they then build up expertise on the issue and they know the questions to ask.

I think it does also make sense for what have been the standing committees to be able to take evidence during their consideration of the legislation, because otherwise at the moment what happens is external people have to put comments into the government, they put comments in to the opposition, they hope someone will pick up the amendments they’re suggesting. But actually be able on any point to take that external evidence I think would be of benefit.

Question: And post-legislative scrutiny, as suggested by the Law Commission?

Theresa May: I think post-legislative scrutiny is a very good idea. I haven’t had the chance to look in detail at the Law Commission’s proposals but I understand they’re proposing that there is the ability for a department to have a look at legislation and then a second tier approach of more external look at it. I think it’s very important. To most people in business it is very silly that we will pass legislation and then at no stage come back and say, 'Well has it worked, did it do what we wanted it to do?'

Now you could argue that the public makes a judgement on that once every four or five years when they vote in their government, but that’s a much bigger conglomeration of issues taken into account by the public, so I think there is scope for post-legislative scrutiny. Its success will depend on governments being clearer up front about the legislation they’re introducing.

One of the concerns I have at the moment is the extent to which this government is using secondary legislation, so we see less going on the face of the bill, and more being left to statutory instruments and order and regulations being set up by the secretary of state.

Statutory instruments if they’re debated get an hour-and-a-half debate, normally in a committee, very few reach the floor of the house and I think this means there is not sufficient scrutiny. Government should be putting more on the face of bills and leaving less to the secretary of state’s discretion thereafter.

My personal view is that we have too much legislation in this country, and I think if we were able to reduce the amount of legislation we could increase the amount of time parliament spends debating issues as opposed to debating laws.

Just to give an example of that, we’ve now had over 50 criminal justice bills, quite a lot of them have had something to do with anti-social behaviour, and yet I don’t think we’ve ever had a proper debate in this chamber of the house about the causes of anti-social behaviour. I think people would perhaps have a bit more confidence in their politicians if they saw us talking seriously about issues like that.

And on the basis of members being free to talk, I’m on record saying I think we should have more free votes. Government has to get its business through, but we could have more debates on subjects like the causes of anti-social behaviour, perhaps on a substantive motion, where there was a free vote so you could take a measure of parliament’s view on something before government actually puts legislation in place. At the moment all you get is 'right, government’s got this criminal justice bill, do you agree with it or not?'

Question: You were one of the first senior Conservatives to advocate an A-list-style system based 50/50 on gender. What do you think of the candidates the A-list is producing?

Theresa May: It’s working well, we’re getting some very good candidates selected, and I’m pleased to say we’re moving – slowly. There’s still a way to go, but we are getting a greater diversity of candidates being selected.

I think there are some issues for the party in terms of the background of candidates but I think actually some of them are issues that affect every party. There are only, I understand, four nurses in the House of Commons. So there are people with experience that is valid to bring into the house, who would make good MPs but are in areas of work and professions who find it very difficult to get into the house.

So I would like to see us being able to broaden the backgrounds from which we draw candidates. That’s starting but I still want to see more women being selected. I think we all agree there’s further to go.

Question: Do you agree that the A-list is still producing people from fairly homogenous backgrounds?

Theresa May: No, I think it’s because our overall list from which the priority list is taken is not as diverse as we would all like it to be, but actually if you look across the priority list there is a mixture of people. But it’s getting a greater balance in the sort of background of people, and I’m not just thinking about the novelists and Coronation Street star.

We’ve got, for example, a number of people on the A-list who have been involved in working with major charities, that’s another difference which brings a different experience in. There’s a delay in that people start coming into the party, getting through the process such that they’re then on the priority list, it just takes time.

Question: You famously once said the Conservatives were seen as the 'nasty party'. Has that changed?

Theresa May: I think it has changed. I think people, and particularly under David Cameron’s leadership, are seeing a different party.

I think they’re seeing a party that is more in tune with what matters to them. They’re seeing a party that’s more green, more local, more family-friendly but also just less arrogant about the things that politicians can achieve and do and more willing to recognise that actually we are all in this together, that social responsibility means we need to see what we can all do to resolve the problems that face us in our communities, and not simply assume as this government does that government has all the answers.

Question: Do you think the perception of the whole of the party has changed, or just of the leader?

Theresa May: I think most voters obviously see a very real change in the leader. In David Cameron they see someone who is not just young but is taking a different approach to politics, and I think they are beginning to see that from the rest of the party.

I think it takes time for it to feed down in people’s perceptions purely because the leader is the one they see most on television and read most about and it takes time to see it. But if you look at some of the things that for example some of our Conservative councils are doing across the country, there again they’re seeing people deliver on the issues that matter, the day-to-day things that make the difference between a good quality of life and being frustrated.

Question: David Cameron’s aspiration to end Punch and Judy politics is often quoted – but recently it doesn’t seem to have been much in evidence in the house. Do you agree?

Theresa May: I used to say no yah-boo politics – it doesn’t mean you can’t stand up and be very firm about your position and firm about where government’s got it wrong, what it means is not always jumping on a party political point.

The event that most people see David in of course is prime minister’s questions, but if you look back over prime minister’s questions yes he holds the PM to account, that’s his job, yes he challenges the prime minister when he’s not telling us the truth about things or not answering the question, but also he’s been raising issues that are not Punch and Judy issues, like international development, like goals on HIV/Aids targets to reduce HIV/Aids internationally, issues about climate change.

We have worked with other parties, we’ve said to the government work with us, and we believe this to be a long-term issues that needs consensus.