Lord Speaker’s Statement

Lord Fowler Excerpts

Wednesday 29th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

My Lords, I would like to make a short Statement about Parliament’s response to the tragic events of last Wednesday.

As would be normal after such events, we are seeking to make sure that any lessons are learned. We will do this through two reviews. First, Mr Speaker and I are commissioning an external independent review of how the perimeter of the Parliamentary Estate, including outbuildings, is secured and protected. We plan to produce a preliminary report by the end of April.

Secondly, at the same time, the Clerks of both Houses are commissioning an externally led review of the lessons learned from the operation inside Parliament of the incident management framework. This is to report by the end of June. All Members will shortly receive an invitation to contribute their views and their experiences of that day to aid these reviews.

Members will be aware that today marks exactly a week on from the shocking events of 22 March. Once again, we send our condolences and sympathies to all those affected. Our thoughts will be, in particular, with the Metropolitan Police as they mourn their colleague, PC Keith Palmer.