Backbench Business Committee

Debate between Lord McCrea of Magherafelt and Cookstown and John Hemming

Monday 12th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

I am a glutton for punishment, because as well as being a member of the Regulatory Reform Committee and the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, I serve on the Backbench Business Committee and the Procedure Committee, so I follow the deliberations on these matters through the entire process.

I agree with the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) that the BBC should be a Committee of, as it were, the whole House. The Member who communicates with the minority parties should be a full Committee member and be elected by the whole House. I drafted a couple of technical amendments that would have ensured that the election for Committee members of the minority parties would have been the same as the election for those of the other parties, so that all are elected by the whole House. One reason for suggesting that is that not all political issues are party political.

Essentially, the Government and Opposition Front-Bench teams are trying to shift the balance of power back towards the Executive. Let us consider the elections at the start of this Session. I was uncontested as the Liberal Democrat representative, and the four Conservatives were also uncontested. There were three candidates to be the two Labour representatives, but there have not been any by-elections since. We could therefore argue that the proposal under discussion may not make any difference. In practice, however, it is still moving away from the recommendations of the Wright report, which state that Parliament should operate as a Parliament, and not do everything divided along party lines. We need representatives from the parties to make sure that systems of communication are in place and that Members know that there is somebody they can talk to.

[Dr McCrea]

Will the hon. Gentleman acknowledge the following fact: every other region of the United Kingdom can be represented—there can be a member from Wales, a member from England, a member from Scotland—but none of the three major parties have representatives from Northern Ireland? Who will speak with authority for the people of Northern Ireland?

[John Hemming]

That is why I think it is important to have somebody from the minority parties elected by the whole House as a full member of the Committee. There has been one vote on one issue, and the rest of the decisions have, in effect, been made by consensus. In a House business committee, there would, obviously, have to be a Government majority. In this case, however, there is clearly no need to add an extra Member of the Government parties when adding a full Member communicating with the minority parties.

My point is that the idea of having a BBC representing the Back Benchers of the whole House and elected by the whole House has worked very well and should not be changed.