Psychoactive Substances Bill [HL]

Lord Stoddart of Swindon Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd June 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cormack]

If that question was addressed to me, I should perhaps have given way earlier. There is every case for the most wide-ranging, critical scrutiny of any Bill. The point that I sought to make—I did not do so aggressively at all—is that in this House we tend not to vote in Committee but rather to reserve our votes for Report. There have been only a handful of such occasions in the past five years. That is all I am saying and I commend it to your Lordships.

[Lord Stoddart of Swindon (Ind Lab)]

It seems to me that the noble Lord has changed his mind. I want to be very clear. A convention is a convention and it is almost legally binding in some cases. Now he is saying that a habit has grown up that we do not vote in Committee. But it is only a habit, and in my view it is quite a bad habit. I hope that the House will not be swayed into not allowing voting in Committee to become a convention.