Restoration and Renewal Programme Board

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I too have no disrespect for the members who have been suggested. The composition of the programme board is common to noble Lords and external advisers. Can the Senior Deputy Speaker confirm that there is some oversight to ensure that the members appointed by the three bodies are gender-balanced? We have ended up in a situation where are spending significant public money and there are only three women—all appointed by the other place—on the programme board. In the run-up to International Women’s Day, we should be giving the best example to companies, charities and other bodies by having a gender balance on such an important body.

[Lord Blunkett (Lab)]

My Lords, first, I would like to be excused from any future museum of democracy. Secondly, I have a very simple question, as someone who served on the scrutiny committee for the now long-forgotten 2019 legislation: could the Senior Deputy Speaker give us an idea of the timeline for the first report back?

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, we should remind ourselves that we had agreed a plan in both Houses. Mr Rees-Mogg had other ideas. If the bill is to be placed on anybody’s desk, it should be on Mr Rees-Mogg’s.

I strongly disagree with what my friend, the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, said about museums and this building. To use the word rightly for once—it is misused almost every day—this is the iconic parliamentary building in the world. We have a duty to keep it as such, and to ensure that it is passed on to future generations as a living Parliament and that it is in good order. We need to resurrect the plan that was agreed and get on with it.