Procedure Committee

Lord Berkeley Excerpts

Thursday 24th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[The Chairman of Committees]

That the 1st Report from the Select Committee (House of Lords Reform Act 2014: consequential changes to the procedures of the House; Recess tabling of written questions; Legislative Consent Motions) (HL Paper 20) be agreed to.

[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

My Lords, I congratulate the committee on producing this report. However, I have a question for the noble Lord the Chairman of Committees on paragraph 12, on the tabling of Written Questions. I welcome the extra days which have been inserted so that we can hold the Government to account when we are not sitting. When we are sitting, there is normally a limit of six Written Questions per Peer per day, which seems perfectly reasonable. However, as we are not sitting for six weeks in the summer, will the noble Lord recommend the removal of this limit so that we can have the opportunity to table a few more Written Questions on 1 September?

[The Chairman of Committees (Lord Sewel)]

The noble Lord has been a worthy campaigner in this area for some time. I am tempted to answer him by saying, “This is the House of Lords, and the way in which change and reform takes place is a relatively slow process”. I know that he is asking to move a little bit further, but at the moment I think that I would counsel him to celebrate his triumph.