Backbench Business Committee

Debate between Pete Wishart and Natascha Engel

Monday 12th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Natascha Engel]

Indeed. Such representation would give added flavour to the Backbench Business Committee.

[Pete Wishart]

It is more than that; the Committee must be for Back Benchers of the whole House, not just those of the Government parties and the Labour Opposition. There are five other political parties in the House; surely they should be represented if it is to be a Back-Bench Committee of the whole House.

[Natascha Engel]

That goes to the heart of the amendments. The minority parties are Back Benchers. They can never really be Front Benchers. It is very unlikely that we will ever see a member of one of the minority parties at the Dispatch Box.

Using the principle of proportionality is also wrong. The Committee has four members from the Conservative party, one from the Liberal Democrats and two from the Labour party, plus the Chair, who has a casting vote. An additional member from one of the minority parties would not automatically lose the Government their majority—certainly not during a coalition Government, and I see no reason why we should not consider expanding the number of members of the Committee if there were not a coalition.

The Backbench Business Committee is different from other Select Committees, in that it represents all Back Benchers of the House. At the moment, however, we do that very poorly by not having representation from the minority parties. The Procedure Committee’s report of October 2011 recommended that these changes be made, and that an additional place on the Backbench Business Committee be created in order that the minority parties be given representation. The right hon. Member for East Yorkshire has just made the point that, after the Procedure Committee had reported, we could table motions to amend what had been decided today. That is sort of true, but only the Government are able to table motions that affect the Backbench Business Committee. Quite rightly, we as a Backbench Business Committee cannot table motions that affect our own operation. What the right hon. Gentleman says is rather difficult unless it is within the Government’s agreement that the motions are tabled. That worries me. That brings me back to asking why the Government cannot simply wait until the Procedure Committee has produced its report and the Backbench Business Committee has told the House about its experiences in the one and a half years of its existence.

Let me briefly support the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) that deals with the issue of the whole House participating in the elections. This goes back to the point that the Backbench Business Committee is somewhat different from other Select Committees, in that it represents all Back Benchers. Therefore, the whole House should have a say in who it wants on the Backbench Business Committee.

Backbench Business Committee

Debate between Pete Wishart and Natascha Engel

Tuesday 15th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Natascha Engel]

They were indeed happy days, and very interesting. I am sorry that Tony Wright is not here to take part in the debate. I also want, especially, to say a big thank you to Mark Fisher, who did so much work with Parliament First, and to Evan Harris. He, too, is no longer with us. The Chamber misses him greatly, and I hate to think how he feels about not being in the Chamber any more; indeed, it does not bear thinking about.

I may not have agreed with the conclusions reached by the people whom I have mentioned, but I certainly agreed with much of the analysis of the problem that we had here in Parliament—in the context of scrutiny of the Executive, what we did as Back Benchers, and our control over our time. When I was on the Wright Committee I produced a minority report, but I consistently supported the establishment of a Back-Bench business Committee. I have always thought that, if established in the right way and for the right reasons, it could not just make debates livelier, but give Members much more control and a greater feeling of ownership of debates. Moreover, if we, as Back Benchers, could decide what issue to debate, by definition they would become more topical.

Many members of the Wright Committee are present today. I believe that our motivation was the same: we wanted to make proceedings in Parliament far more open and transparent. The detail is being discussed today, but the principle of the proposal was transparency. What people really objected to was not having an input, and not being able to see what was decided behind closed doors. The purpose of the Wright Committee was to begin re-establishing trust between not just the House, but us—its Members—and those who have elected us to represent and serve them. If we are to do justice to that intention, we must be much more open and transparent about what we do here. Without openness and transparency, people outside cannot have any say about what we do, far less have any influence on what we do.

In supporting the establishment of a Back-Bench committee, I think that we need to guard against a few things. We need to ask ourselves whether we are making a change for change’s sake. In the case of the Back-Bench committee, that is absolutely not the case—it is a necessary, good change. We also need to guard against unforeseen consequences. The hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) spoke earlier about the membership of Select Committees and said that the proposals on nominating Chairs and members excluded some of the minor parties. Those are all examples of unforeseen consequences. We need to take our time and to be careful to ensure that this is as open, transparent and fair as possible, so that we do not have unforeseen consequences—or even foreseen consequences.

My greatest concern—the thing that we most need to guard against, which I mentioned again and again when I was on the Select Committee and afterwards—is in relation to the transfer of power from one elite to another. The way that the Back-Bench committee is to be formulated and the way that its membership is to be elected means there is a danger of transferring power from the Whips Office, where deals are done behind closed doors and we learn what deal has been done when it is announced here by Front Benchers, to another back room where seven members and the Chair of the Back-Bench committee make the decision. I am not convinced that a member of that committee making an announcement of five minutes or less about its deliberations, or laying a report before the House about those deliberations, is enough. I would much rather see all the proceedings—every meeting—held in public. That is the only way in which we can ensure absolute openness and transparency. Not only that—it will engage people outside in what Back Benchers do in dealing with business here. It will engage them in a way that we have never engaged the public before. That would be a massive leap forward.

All of us would like to see an end to the current system of power and patronage held by the Whips, but we would be naive to think that, just by moving the power away from the Whips and giving it to a small group of Back Benchers, we will get rid of the patronage. We will not. If meetings of the Back-Bench committee are held behind closed doors, there will just be a direct transfer of patronage from the Whips Office to the Back-Bench committee.

[Pete Wishart]

The hon. Lady is making a powerful point about the transfer of power from one Westminster elite to another Westminster elite. Does she therefore not see some merit in the amendment that I have tabled to increase the membership of the committee to 16 to ensure that we get a bigger range of people on it? In that way, there will be a minority party member on it, as well Back-Benchers from all sides of the House.

[Natascha Engel]

That is something that we should look at. Smaller memberships are not beneficial—we should look at having a much wider membership.

I want to look at the ways in which we can participate better, not just as Members, but by engaging people who have an interest in this matter. Many democracy organisations and members of the public have a deep interest in what we do. The instinct to restrict the size of things is a bad one—I would much rather see it broadened out.