Good evening.
I want to talk to you tonight about the Government's constitutional reform programme.
This is an area where the Government has made huge progress, since coming to power in 1997.
As a government we have embarked on, and delivered, a substantial programme of constitutional reform.
This may not catch the headlines in the way that crime or asylum does, nor is it a vote-grabber like health or education. But it is no less important.
The essential purpose of the constitution is to define the relationship between people and the institutions that govern them. This is a vitally important relationship, indeed the critical relationship, in any liberal democracy.
Institutions, and how citizens relate to them, shape our public sphere, and the context in which our public services are delivered.
And without trust in these institutions, people cannot be confident that the government adequately understands their concerns, or represents their interests.
Nor can people have faith in the government's ability to deliver the education, health and criminal justice systems they want.
If people don't have faith, they become detached from politics - not just nationally, but also in their communities. We lose the energy and vitality - and the trust - that we need if we are to make a difference in areas that really affect people's lives.
People must have faith in the institutions themselves, if they are to have faith in the institutions making changes that affect their lives.
When the government came to power in 1997, there was a real dissonance between our values as citizens of a liberal democracy and the nature of our constitutional arrangements.
Change was urgent.
There were a lot of dissatisfied people in Scotland and Wales who didn't feel Parliament in London was properly able to listen to their concerns.
We had a convention on Human Rights but our citizens had to go all the way to Strasbourg to have those rights enforced.
There was a culture of secrecy in Government.
And a second chamber full of hereditary peers that the vast majority of people in the UK didn't want to see there.
These issues have formed the focus of our constitutional programme.
The aim has been to try to re-connect our public institutions with the people that they serve. To reshape the constitution so it is fit for today's Britain.
After a long, long period of constitutional stagnation, since 1997 we have made important reforms.
These reforms are most certainly not about throwing away everything from the past. Far from it.
We should take pride in our constitutional heritage here in the UK. Our institutions are rightly respected. Our justice system is renowned throughout the world for it's probity, impartiality and judgement.
But, at the same time, a strong reputation should not prevent us from looking again at how those arrangements are working in the 21st century.
We must be informed by our history, but not dazzled or paralysed by it.
We should challenge and re-examine our constitutional arrangements. To identify where they are working well, and preserve them. But to develop and improve them where necessary.
So since 1997, we have the first Human Rights Act in the UK's history, the devolution of power to Scotland and Wales, freedom of information legislation, and reform of the House of Lords.
These measures are a very significant package of reforms for any Government to pass, and would, I suspect, command wide popular and political support.
But the programme is not complete: we have, in the last year, embarked on a major Constitutional Reform Bill that radically reshapes and clarifies relationships between the judiciary, the executive and the legislature.
Our Bill aims fundamentally to reform my own role as Lord Chancellor, create a Supreme Court independent of our legislature, and establish an independent Judicial Appointments Commission.
Pursuing these reforms has certainly not been the easy option. There are often powerful opponents of the changes, who argue that we are modernising for it's own sake and that we are undermining the country's heritage.
So why do we think that the present reforms are so necessary? Why are we spending political capital on changes that some people see as ‘constitutional vandalism' and others see as parochial?
We believe that these changes are essential to ensuring that we are a state under the rule of law, both now and in the future. We believe that these changes continue our drive to ensure that our constitutional arrangements are fit for purpose in the 21st century. They are essential to improve the delivery of public services and to facilitate public consent in the way in which changes are delivered.
The first of these changes will be to the office of Lord Chancellor.
In 1885, the Lord Chancellor was supported by a Permanent Secretary and an office comprising just seven officials. It remained a small organisation staffed almost exclusively by lawyers until 1972, when the Lord Chancellor assumed overall responsibility for the administration of the higher court system as a whole following the Courts Act 1971.
Since then, the budget has grown from £26 million to over £3 billion pounds. And with the introduction of Her Majesty's Court Service next year we will see our staff numbers rise to an estimated 23,000.
The ministerial role of the Lord Chancellor has completely changed in this time. He has become a central figure in the delivery of public services, namely courts, dispute resolution and legal aid. If we are serious about ensuring that our constitutional arrangements contribute to dealing with the key issues that people care about, we need to respond to that change in his role. And this is what we are doing.
So, under our proposals, the role of the Lord Chancellor will be updated and reformed.
My role will be more clearly a ministerial one, focusing on delivering the important services for which he is responsible, like the courts and legal aid. This is vital if we are to make lasting changes to the way we are governed, and the way people experience living in this country.
It's a big change. It means changing the outlook of the whole Department which the Lord Chancellor has traditionally headed.
For years, indeed decades and centuries, the office of the Lord Chancellor has been focussed on the lawyers and the judges.
And they are important people - we need them to make justice work.
But the new Department is different. We are not the Lord Chancellors Department with a different logo - we are fundamentally different.
The reason the DCA exists, is not for the judges or the lawyers; the constitutional thinkers or the academics, but for the people who rely on the system to protect them and support them.
So the reform of the Lord Chancellor will mean a clearer focus on providing better public services.
Better for all court users. Better for the victims of sexual assault who deserve a court service which helps them, makes them feel safe and supported. Better for victims of domestic violence or for families who are on the receiving end of anti-social behaviour. Better for children who get caught up in the care system. Better for witnesses anxious about the process. Better for those who need help.
This is where we can make a real difference. This is why we are changing the way the Department works and why we are making the changes in the Constitutional Reform Bill. It will bring greater clarity and accountability. It will focus on the people who the courts exist to serve.
The Bill will also implement the Concordat agreed between the Government and Judiciary - clearly setting out a disciplinary process, how judges are deployed, who is responsible for training. That agreement marks a fundamental change in the relationship between these two arms of the State. It provides clarity, transparency and a guarantee of judicial independence.
We will also put in place an independent Judicial Appointments Commission.
Under our proposals, a single Minister will no longer be responsible for making all judicial appointments. The Commission will provide the transparency that the public expects of a modern appointments system. And crucially, it will also drive an increase in judicial diversity. It will open up the system, and widen the pool of applicants - without diluting merit in any way. We need, as I have repeatedly made clear, to make progress in terms of diversity even before the new Commission starts.
Increasing diversity will make a real difference. Not immediately in the decisions reached in individual cases, but in both the confidence the country has in the judges, and in their outlook. It is inconceivable that over time a bench of 50/50 men and women judges would not make a difference to the decisions made by the court.
I recently visited Canada, and saw the progress that can be made when there is a strong will: four of their nine Supreme Court Justices are female. In the UK we have only recently appointed the first female to our highest court and the first BME person to the High Court. There is more work for us to do.
It's worth me saying here a little about the Judicial Pensions Bill.
There are some particular circumstances that have given rise to this piece of legislation. Circumstances that can't be explained in a headline or a sound-bite. So let me explain in a little detail what we are doing and why.
Firstly, the pensions and pay for judges are dealt with in a way that is different to normal pension arrangements. And for a very important reason - to avoid any suggestion of interference in judicial independence, judge's pay and conditions are governed by statute. We need primary legislation to amend their conditions. If the executive could change their conditions, people would quite rightly argue that we were meddling, or potentially meddling with their independence.
That explains why we need legislation - let me explain what the Bill intends to achieve.
The Finance Act 2004 changed the tax relief arrangements for pension funds that exceed £1.5 million. When a fund exceeds this amount some of the tax relief obtained while building up the fund should be repaid.
If people want to opt out of the system, if employers want to pay people's pension at a higher rate - to attract highly-skilled people, for example - they should be free to do so. And the 2004 Act was not intended ot affect that.
So - a high-earner, with his or her pension paid for entirely by their employer may make the decision to opt out. Indeed, most people would probably do so.
But, because the judges pension arrangements are set in statute, they are unable to do what everyone else is entitled to do in the same circumstances. To be able to opt out, they need legislation. This is what the Bill does. And this only relates to judicial pensions, not to any private pension they may have.
It does not give judges an advantage. In fact, it removes a particular disadvantage. We are only maintaining their current financial position - and it is critical for the justice system that we attract and retain the highest standard of judges.
Moving back to the Constitutional Reform Bill - we will establish a UK Supreme Court. It is fundamental in a liberal democracy that the highest appeal court is separate from the legislature. The Supreme Court will be demonstrably independent - a court that all citizens can look to in vindicating their rights and freedoms.
We need to be realistic about our present arrangements. Judges appointed by a member of the Cabinet, and sitting in Parliament, decide whether the detention of 12 suspected terrorists in Belmarsh is lawful. That's where we are at the moment. A committee of one house of the legislature deciding whether the Bill passed by that House was in accordance with the Human Rights Act.
Of course, everybody in this room knows that there will be no political bias in the decision reached by those judges. We know that. But that's not good enough. We need our commitment to judicial independence to be public and demonstrably clear. The Supreme Court will achieve that.
Just as the people who have sat in the Appellate Committee of the House of Lords have established a world-wide reputation - so, I have no doubt, will the members of the Supreme Court.
But, in making these changes, we are clear that important values that have always been there in our system of government are being not only preserved but deepened and better protected.
We are a country that plays by the rules, nationally and internationally.
Adherence to the rule of law is a critical part of the constitution of our country. Independence of the judiciary is vital to that. The Lord Chancellor has always embodied the values of judicial independence and the rule of law. The protection of those values must not be lost with the abolition of the Office. In important ways, it will be enhanced.
The rule of law is not just a critical part of British political culture, one that we have been working to strengthen, it is a critical part of international legal culture, crucial to the grain of the age.
Especially since 1945, the countries of the world have bound themselves together through a body of international law, formulated by international organisations such as the United Nations, and contained in agreements such as the UN Charter and the European Convention of Human Rights.
In a sense, it is remarkable that we have something resembling an international legal culture. One spanning countries, continents, societies of such different sorts. However, it is also a testament, I believe, to what we share as human beings. An essential dignity. A desire for freedom. A belief in government that empowers the human spirit.
We also owe a debt to organisations such as Reuters. When there was still no telegraph line between Brussels and Aachen, Paul Julius Reuter, the founder, in one of his first ventures, linked the two cities using pigeons.
Now Reuters links yet more remote parts of the world to one another. Part of the reason why we have come to care deeply about human rights and the rule of law in far-off places is that organisations like Reuters have linked us to those places, have shown us what happens there, have built connections.
The UK has long been involved in developing a culture of respect for rights and the rule of law. We helped to produce the international community's statements of ideals. And we play a major role in meeting the challenge of turning those ideals into reality.
Just at the moment, my Department has two flagship schemes working with the Chinese Ministry of Justice and Supreme People's Court, on practical projects that broaden the international experience of lawyers and judges in China, with a commitment to the basic principles of freedom and the rule of law. We see the alumni of these projects as potential future leaders in their professions.
We have been involved in working with a number of new EU member states, looking at budget forecasting for courts in Slovenia; working on data protection procedures with Cyprus; and exchanging information and experience about courts administration with the Ministry of Justice and courts in Poland. This year we worked with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office on human rights seminars for the Turkish judiciary, delivered by Turkish judges with UK lawyers' guidance. These foreign links matter. They contribute to an international order of rights and the rule of law.
Another broad area of international engagement is Britain's role in the development and liberalisation of the global market for legal services. The effects of globalisation have brought the winds of change sweeping through international business. Few major business areas remain untouched. But the issues at stake are often seen as more complex when it comes to international legal practice, because the law is so closely associated with a nation's identity and heritage. The law plays a unique and important role in society. It is the champion of people's rights and the upholder of their interests. So it is understandable that nations think carefully before opening up their legal services across borders.
At the same time, there are very real benefits to be had from opening up to the international perspective. We should not overlook the fundamental principles shared by lawyers across the globe in the exercise of their profession. Principles like upholding the rule of law, defending people's rights and - above all - helping people.
An active, committed, principled body of legal services providers is therefore essential to any system of justice.
My Department has been involved in trying to encourage the liberalisation of legal services. We are contributing, via the European Union, to the World Trade Organisation's negotiations on this issue.
Since British law firms do have an excellent reputation, since they do have so much experience of working with lawyers from so many other countries, both in London and abroad, we are supporting their attempts to provide services in other countries.
So, the reach of our system is way beyond our own shores. Reforms at home, are matched with a commitment to supporting progress with other nations. Where we can find common ground and shared values we should act.
The relationship between citizens and the state is simply too important to be left - unchecked, unreformed and out of touch. As long as this Government remains in power, we will continue to make reforms to the constitution. And for a purpose - to better meet the needs of citizens in a modern, 21st century Britain, and to uphold the rule of law.