Arrangement of Business
Debate between Lord Kennedy of Southwark and Baroness Falkner of Margravine
Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)
I thank the noble Lord for those comments. Obviously, I am happy to chat to him outside the Chamber, but we have allocated the proper time of 40 minutes—20 for the Front Benches and 20 for the Back Benches—which is quite normal for these Statements.
We should now move on to the next business, but again, on behalf of the whole House, I thank our colleagues, the doorkeepers and all the other staff who assisted our friend and colleague, as well as the ambulance staff who dealt with our friend so professionally.
Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB)
My Lords, before the Chief Whip sits down, he has been sorely missed in this Chamber today because the conduct of business has been all over the place, including on the Private Notice Question. While the Whip sitting here on the Bench exhorted people to be extremely brief and to ask questions, that was entirely disregarded by the Chamber.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)
I am sorry to hear that. Maybe it is time for me to make another announcement to the House in the next few days. It is important that the Government are properly scrutinised, and that during Questions we ask questions that are short, sharp and to the point. What we do not want at any time is speeches and stuff. If need be, I will come back to the Chamber fairly shortly to remind colleagues of how the Companion should be operated, and that we all need to work to ensure that the Government are properly scrutinised. If we follow the Companion, we will not go far wrong.
Arrangement of Business
Debate between Lord Kennedy of Southwark and Baroness Falkner of Margravine
Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)
I thank the noble Lord for his point. I genuinely understand that; I am very conscious of that. I do not wish to cause any Member who is Jewish, or of any other faith, distress, inconvenience or problems in their faith by sitting beyond 3 pm. It is why I suggested that people could leave without hearing the debates, but that may not be acceptable to some colleagues. I am aware of that. I will discuss what else we can do, but I apologise. It is not my intention to cause noble Lords who are Jewish distress or problems with their faith.
Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB)
My Lords, I would like a point of clarification from the noble Lord. Before I express that, I think I speak for the whole House when I say that we understand what a difficult position the noble Lord finds himself in, and how fair he is trying to be to all sides in attempting to resolve this. I am certainly extremely grateful to him for the consistent fairness he has displayed to the House.
My point is about the procedures of the House. When we had that unusual Motion last week, the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell of Beeston, a former Leader of the House, raised an important point at the end: does this affect precedent and future procedure on Private Members’ Bills? I do not think she got an adequate response.
While I appreciate the noble Lord’s flexibility in allowing noble Lords to leave before the end of the debate on a particular amendment—I completely endorse all the comments made by colleagues who live further away from the House about the troubles they would encounter—when we change the procedures of the House and more or less drive a coach and horses through the Companion, are we not expected to have a debate and make it clear that we are not setting precedent? Should we not be having a vote on that?
Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)
I thank the noble Baroness for her very kind comments, which are much appreciated. We are a self-regulating House. We have a Companion; we do not have fixed rules, but we have conventions, and we all try to work around those. That enables the House to work in the unique way it does. In some ways it is not like the House of Commons. I know colleagues who come from the House of Commons say how strange they find it when they first arrive here, but it does work.
Although the Companion advises us to rise at around 3 pm on Fridays, I checked and since 2021 we have sat beyond 3 pm on PMBs 24 times. We have already sat beyond 3 pm on the two days of Second Reading for this Bill. Although it is advisory and it is the convention, it is not a hard and fast rule. We do not have those sorts of hard and fast rules.
On the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell of Beeston, because we are self-regulating, I do not think it sets a precedent. At the end of the day, this House can decide what it wants. As I said earlier, if noble Lords want to adjourn at 3 pm and carry a Motion on it, then we will adjourn at 3 pm. However, I accept that this is a very important Bill and there are strongly held views on both sides. People want to give it scrutiny and we have to have the flexibility to ensure that is what happens.