Business of the House

Baroness Wheeler Excerpts

Wednesday 25th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Evans of Bowes Park) (Con)]

My Lords, the Coronavirus Bill and the Contingencies Fund Bill will receive Royal Assent this evening, and that will be notified to both Houses tonight. This means that the House will no longer sit tomorrow or next week. Noble Lords who have tabled an Oral Question will receive a written response from a Minister.

The House will return after Easter on Tuesday 21 April as planned. The usual arrangements for the recall of Parliament will apply, should the House need to meet before then. The previously announced adjournment for the VE Day bank holiday weekend will go ahead as planned.

When we return, we will make some changes to the way that our business is arranged. In light of the circumstances, and having consulted the usual channels, it has been agreed that, for the first three weeks after Easter, the House will sit only on a Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. So the House will sit on 21, 22, 23, 28, 29 and 30 April, and on 5 and 6 May, when we will rise for the VE Day long weekend. Further discussions will take place to inform what happens after that.

It has also been agreed that until the Whitsun Recess—until Thursday 21 May—we will not consider any Private Members’ Bills, balloted debates or ordinary Questions for Short Debate. No Back-Bench Member will lose out. My noble friend the Chief Whip, who I am pleased to report is feeling better, will be in touch with those Members who had an agreed slot for their business to discuss alternative arrangements.

For the convenience of Members and those staff who have to come in, the House will sit earlier on Tuesday and Wednesday, at 1 pm on Tuesday and at 11 am on Wednesday. This will enable business to conclude at around 7 pm on both days rather than the usual 10 pm. Tuesdays and Wednesdays will be used as, they are now, to scrutinise the Government’s legislation. Grand Committees will be scheduled only if absolutely necessary. Party debates and topical Questions for Short Debate will continue on Thursdays, so the Opposition parties, Cross-Bench Members and Back-Bench Members will retain the ability to initiate debates to maintain the House’s key function of holding the Government to account. Oral Questions will continue as normal at the beginning of every sitting day, with a topical Question asked on each day the House sits. A new Forthcoming Business will be issued as soon as possible.

We will also have to think about how we conduct our business, not just what we consider and when. We will have to look carefully at what sensible adjustments can be made to our working practices and procedures. We will continue to work with the usual channels and the House authorities on these issues, but I can tell the House that a working group of senior officials from both Houses and the Parliamentary Digital Service has been set up to develop effective remote collaboration and videoconferencing. The Parliamentary Digital Authority is doing all it can to enable rollout to Members as soon as possible.

The social distancing measures we have put in place this week will need to continue for the foreseeable future. Noble Lords who do not need to attend the House should not do so, and that particularly applies to those in the vulnerable groups. We have all seen noble Lords in their 70s and 80s in their places this week. I simply say, as the Speaker said last week, that as parliamentarians we have a duty to show leadership and to heed the advice of the public health experts.

Finally, I am sure all noble Lords will join with me in putting on record our thanks to all those members of staff who have supported us so ably in recent days. On a personal note, I express my thanks to my fantastic team for all the help they have provided to me ever since I became Leader. I know that all staff will continue to work very hard on our behalf in the weeks ahead, and we are lucky to have them. I beg to move.

[Baroness Wheeler (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Leader of the House for her Statement today and for the constructive usual channels discussions held away from the Chamber, including with my noble friends Lady Smith of Basildon and Lord McAvoy, who have, while working at home, continued to be active and involved throughout the week. It is vital that Parliament continues its essential role of scrutiny, particularly at a time of crisis, and this House must continue to play its part. It is right that the Leader of the House referred to the programme planned for after the Easter Recess, which has been discussed by the usual channels. It is also right that the business that the Government outline keeps to a more limited programme while ensuring opportunities for scrutiny of ongoing legislation, as well as preserving time for Opposition parties and groups. She will know that the leaders in the usual channels are all fully committed to keeping in close contact between now and when we return.

The Leader will know that Members across the House are very keen to see the introduction of changes to how we work in future, using new technology such as remote collaboration and videoconferencing. For example, committees can meet online, but there are many other ways in which we can fulfil our obligations and maintain social distancing, as a number of noble Lords have outlined in speeches this week. Many businesses are being far more innovative, and we should also be taking a lead on this. I underline that the working group the Leader of the House referred to needs to work with a sense of urgency so that new technological solutions to the current situation can be agreed and introduced as soon as possible, preferably in time for when we return from the Recess.

I also thank her for emphasising that the House returns on 21 April, as previously planned, as there was some confusion in the media, not for the first time, on this issue. Normal procedures will apply, even in this situation. However, should there be any significant change or action required, a recall of Parliament has to be an option.

I also thank the Leader of the House for her comments about the staff of your Lordships’ House. I too thank all the staff of the House, including the cleaners and the security and catering staff, as well the House administration and party staff. Whatever decisions are made on the future working of this House, we must consider them, too.

[Lord Oates (LD)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the Leader of the House for her statement, and I join other noble Lords in giving immense thanks on behalf of these Benches to all the people in Parliament who have worked so hard on our behalf. We understand the decision that has been made that the House should rise early, but there are some reservations in the country because we are facing the greatest national emergency in my lifetime.

I share to some extent the concerns highlighted earlier today, for example by the noble Lord, Lord Adonis. As he mentioned, we understand that the self-employed package will be announced on Friday. It is a big worry that there will be no ability for Parliament to scrutinise that. I also believe that other regulations and SIs will be laid on Thursday to put the powers in place to implement what the Prime Minister announced on Monday. Again, there will be no scrutiny.

There are also a whole series of other issues that people raised to do with PPE and testing which Parliament will not have a chance to scrutinise. Will the Leader of the House absolutely guarantee that Parliament will come back on 21 April, because the Leader in the other place seemed to suggest that there was a slight caveat to that? I really hope that it will, because it is very important that we are here. Could she also tell us whether it would be possible to arrange immediately a substantive debate on the emergency on that day, so that these issues can be discussed in detail?

I was pleased to hear what the noble Baroness had to say about remote working. My noble friend Lord Newby raised these issues in his Second Reading speech yesterday. He, my noble friend Lord Stoneham of Droxford, and a number of other Peers on all sides of the House have made many sensible suggestions. We know that Select Committees in the other place will meet virtually; indeed, I think one of them already has. Can the Leader of the House tell us that Select Committees, indeed any other committees of this House, can meet virtually immediately? If not, can we make very rapid progress on that?

There have been wider suggestions to do with how Members could ask Questions remotely. It should not be technologically impossible for them to also take part in debates remotely, and we should be ambitious about that. Given that a number of noble Lords have particular expertise on technological issues—I am not one of them—perhaps they might be consulted and be able to input into the committee which the noble Baroness mentioned. Can she ensure that that committee, and the House in general, has discussions with the various organisations that provide videoconferencing technology, as they may very well be willing to advise the House on how it could facilitate remote contributions? The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, mentioned in the debate yesterday that her party’s conference had been held using a service called Hopin. We should investigate all these things; there are technologies out there that we could use. The noble Lord, Lord Anderson, told some of us earlier how the Supreme Court locked up its building and moved immediately, and its cases are continuing remotely. I really hope that we can move on that.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Wheeler, said, it is really important that we use the time between now and when we return to do this. It just will not be on for us to come back and find that progress has not been made. We cannot have this Parliament, and this Chamber in particular, being represented only by those of us who are younger, or more closely located geographically, or who do not have underlying health problems. Now, more than ever, when the people who are most affected are older people and those with underlying health conditions, not hearing from other representatives is a really bad thing.

I heed and understand the Leader’s point about the example that we as a House need to set for the public and the advice for people aged over 70. However, in our debates over the last two days, we have had some excellent and important contributions from noble Lords and noble Baronesses who are over that age, and the only way they could contribute in that way was by being here. We should not berate them for coming here; we should berate ourselves for not having put in place processes by which they could contribute remotely. We must not lose their contributions.