Scotland Bill

Debate between Lord Selkirk of Douglas and Lord Stephen

Thursday 26th January 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stephen]

My Lords, I agree very much with the first contribution that the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, made. This is essentially a matter for the Scottish Parliament, which has wide discretion in this area. Unfortunately, I cannot agree with the suggestions that he made in his most recent contribution. I agree with a great deal of what the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, said. I am sure that others who have been in the Scottish Parliament, most notably my noble and learned friend Lord Wallace of Tankerness, also agree with a great number of his suggestions, most particularly about the guillotining of virtually every contribution made in the Scottish Parliament. The noble Lord is absolutely right; it is impossible to make a full and weighty contribution when the guillotine constantly comes after sometimes less than four minutes. These issues should be addressed, and I hope that in addressing those issues the Scottish Parliament will look to the contributions of former Members and those who have had experience of the Parliament. But I do not think that it should be as a result of an amendment proposed through the House of Lords that those matters are best addressed. I am sure that the Minister will explain that those matters are being looked at; I understand that there is a concerted effort to look at changing the way in which the Scottish Parliament operates. That is all the more important in the context of more powers being granted to the Scottish Parliament; as the Parliament grows and develops, these issues should be tackled, and the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, made an extremely valuable contribution in pointing to the Parliament the way ahead.

[Lord Selkirk of Douglas]

If I may, I would like to ask a very brief question to the Minister in this connection. During the Calman commission, we recommended that more time should be given for the final stages of Bills in the Scottish Parliament. It seemed to us that with many Bills, voluntary organisations, charities or other worthy bodies would have recommendations to make but would get virtually no changes in the final stages of the Bill because procedures were so rapid and everything went so quickly. My understanding was that that was under consideration by the Scottish Parliament, and I wonder whether the Minister could give us the up-to-date situation on that subject, if he has the facts readily at hand.