Liaison Committee

Baroness Royall of Blaisdon Excerpts

Thursday 21st March 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Royall of Blaisdon]

My Lords, it is sometimes a very lonely job being the Chairman of Committees. I just want to say that I and other members of the Liaison Committee are here and, as I know the Chairman will say, we will certainly take all these things into consideration when we next discuss these issues. I did not wish the Chairman to feel that he was alone in these matters.

[The Chairman of Committees]

I thank the noble Baroness very much. First, perhaps I may deal with the matter raised by the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, mainly because of the ringing endorsement he gave me for the way in which I have carried out the job. Knowing his interest in football and a far from gloriously successful football side, it felt a little bit like being the club manager whose team is languishing somewhere in the relegation zone, as soon as he started to make those comments.

It is true that the chairmen of virtually all our Select Committees have written asking that time be made available for the debate on their reports, that time has not properly and fully been made available at the moment and that there is a delay. To a very large extent, that is true. It will be discussed by, I think, the Procedure Committee at its next meeting. That is under way and being considered. The precise timing of when reports are debated on the Floor of your Lordships’ House is a matter for the usual channels and is not within the scope of any of our domestic committees. I am sure the usual channels would recognise the points that were made, particularly in relation to the additional week’s recess.

As regards the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, I will not go into details on the EU Committee, save only to say that if he is saying that the views of our EU Committee are not considered fully in Brussels, he should look at the proposals for the reform of a very difficult area of policy: the common fisheries policy. He will see that the Commission’s proposals follow almost word for word the recommendations made by this House’s EU Committee when it looked at the reform of the common fisheries policy some years ago. Therefore, at least in one highly controversial area of policy, the EU Committee’s voice is not only being heard but is being effective and carried out through implementation.

The noble Lord, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, also made various points about one particular topic not being selected. I am afraid that the quality of the submissions was such that there are bound to be a number of people who feel disappointed. We had 27 submissions for Select Committees, the vast majority of which one could have said yes to quite easily. It was a very high quality list of submissions, and it is inevitable that people will be disappointed. I have to say that the committee had previously set its face against being swayed by the number of people who had just signed up to support a topic. It really wanted to look at the quality of the topic, the importance and relevance of the topic and how it could bring forward a mix of topics that covered a broad and comprehensive range of subject areas.

Several noble Lords referred to foreign affairs. I hear and I welcome the comments that have been made and the argument to have a foreign affairs Select Committee. The established position of the House, which was repeated by the noble Lord, Lord Jopling, is that we do not duplicate the work of the House of Commons. In fact, we very rarely duplicate its work in the work of our Select Committees. We tend to bring a different perspective, a different set of skills and a different set of experiences to the consideration of what might seem to be the same topic or the same policy area, and a very different product is produced.

We have moved, let us say cautiously if not slowly, in establishing an ad hoc Select Committee in the foreign affairs area by looking at the use of soft power in supporting Britain’s influence in the world. That is something of an experiment. Let us see how that goes, see if it produces a distinctive value-added piece of work, and perhaps build from there out to have a more universal coverage of the foreign affairs policy agenda. That is something that I think we can judge perhaps better this time next year.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chairman of Committees]

My Lords, the noble Lord has tabled two Questions for Written Answer for me on this very issue. In the spirit of openness, transparency, accountability, motherhood and apple pie, I hope that we can end this debate with a degree of agreement. However, the noble Lord has made a good point. It is right that rather than having a sort of sexy title such as, “That the First Report of the Liaison Committee be agreed to”, we should put on to the Order Paper a brief description of the main issues dealt with in the report. I hope that that is the essence of the reply I will make to the noble Lord when his Questions are answered, and I am sure that he will be at least partly satisfied today.

[Baroness Royall of Blaisdon]

My Lords, I hope I will be forgiven for this, but I have to take this opportunity to correct a misapprehension that was mentioned earlier in this short debate. It was that the usual channels had agreed to the extra week’s recess that was announced a couple of weeks ago. The decision was not reached by the usual channels; it was the result of a discussion by Her Majesty’s Government.

[The Chairman of Committees]

I would hate to mislead the House. I think that all the issues have now been ventilated, and I beg to move.