House of Lords: Remote Participation and Hybrid Sittings

Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted Excerpts

Thursday 20th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD) [V]]

My Lords, in considering whether to keep hybrid proceedings, I have viewed this from external perspectives in addition to my own experience: how is working from home regarded in the business world, and what are the outside impressions about how we work?

Permitting virtual attendance makes us more normal, more diverse and less London-centric. It enables valuable contributions that might otherwise be lost because of ill health, disability, immobility, location or caring responsibilities. We would not think much of businesses that did not make such efforts regarding their employees and we would not reflect society’s interests if we shut out remote participants now that we have the technology. It is a vehicle for greater diversity.

That basic premise extends to every activity, be it Questions, general debates, legislation, committees or voting. To my mind, the question is not whether to keep elements of remote participation but to determine the guidance on how often or why remote participation is requested. Why not be like businesses, with two days a week working from home as the new normal option, with extra days allowed if it is for health, caring or other personal circumstances? It might also help remove the “dinner club” perception of our House.

The hybrid procedures that we have experienced during the pandemic are not a fair sample of what hybrid working in normal times would be like. The social distancing restrictions in the Chamber and elsewhere, travel and the “pay for speaking” virtual allowances have all incentivised virtual contributions, while Covid business has simultaneously pressurised the schedules.

Schedule crowding seems to have eased a little as more have returned to in-person attendance, and there will be further changes, especially to atmosphere, once normal attendance in the Chamber is allowed. The murmurs, groans and spontaneous interventions from the Benches are important—not least when the House thinks it has been short-changed by a Minister on a Question—but that happens when we sit in numbers, not in rationed social distancing. The appetite for numbers will draw us back. If a few noble Lords were also contributing in a virtual way, it would not change the dynamic and take it back to the sterile atmosphere of the fully virtual or socially distanced hybrid arrangements.

When it comes to Select Committees—I have served on three during recent times—it has been a huge benefit to have a wider range of witnesses than the predominant usual suspects who can service London. I have not found remote participation worse; if anything, it has made Members more disciplined and stopped some hogging proceedings, as can happen at Question Time. Proceedings have also been a lot more audible. Some of our committee rooms have terrible acoustics—I went to get a hearing test a while back to make sure it was not just me. Face-to-face togetherness has benefits and will predominate because it wields greater presence, but I would rather a Member contributed virtually than missed a meeting, even if the reason is that the plumber or electrician is coming or the grandchildren need collecting that day. They have still worked on the papers, and what you notice in real time is always a little different from reading or watching it back later.

I have also contributed to all stages of a fair number of Bills in virtual and hybrid format. It has in fact been more exhausting than contributing in person and I expect that we can learn—as businesses are—about the effects of too much video. Going forward, the notion of treating virtual and in-person participation equally, and therefore not allowing in-person interventions, would need revising. I wish we had never had it—we are not being treated equally with half pay for virtual attendance, so it was always untrue anyway. In-person interventions and spontaneity could resume as normal, alongside a system of slot-booking for virtual participants. There might also be scope for expanding the Question Diary approach for remote participants. In some cases, that has already been used quite extensively.

Overall, hybrid working, as in the country generally, is part of the future—of modernising, being greener and spreading opportunity. We will be dinosaurs if we do not reflect that.