Parliamentary Reform

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Thursday 3rd February 2011 Westminster Hall

[Mr Joe Benton (in the Chair)]

A lot of people have requested to speak and we want to allow as many as possible to do so. I appeal to hon. Members to be as brief as they can, and we will do our best to get everybody in.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

It is a pleasure to hold this debate under your chairmanship, Mr Benton, and I thank you for your guidance on how matters should proceed. No doubt that was appreciated by all hon. Members in keeping within the spirit of the debate. I am also grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for providing the opportunity for an initial debate on parliamentary modernisation and reform. I look forward to hearing about the experiences of other new Members, and to learning from those who have been MPs for longer.

This debate is part of a call for more open and efficient politics. If we do not continue visibly to modernise the way in which we work, I worry that the public will—rightly—fail to be convinced that politics has changed for the better. It is more vital than ever for Parliament to ensure that its work is efficient, transparent and accountable. Following my first six months in this place, those are not the first three words that come to mind as I consider the way we conduct ourselves.

Our political process is still struggling to regain its legitimacy and credibility in the eyes of the public. Following the expenses scandal, 232 new MPs entered Parliament in 2010. It is now time to shake off the image—and in some cases the reality—of the “old boys club” and move Westminster into the 21st century. I pay tribute to the extensive work that has already been done. In particular, the work of the Wright Committee led to important changes in the management of the business of the House, not least with the establishment of the Backbench Business Committee, which has allowed this debate to take place.

There is still a long way to go. Following the expenses scandal, public suspicion about the behaviour of MPs has not gone away, and many people seriously ask what exactly it is that MPs do. How does Parliament work on a day-to-day basis? How can we better scrutinise legislation and serve our constituents with maximum efficacy and efficiency? In years gone by, MPs were accused of being too Westminster focused and of not working enough in their constituencies. Now some suggest that the pendulum has swung in the other direction, and that some MPs spend too much time in their constituencies, and not enough time properly scrutinising the legislation for which they are responsible. Now is a good time to take stock of that, and discuss what the balance should be between time spent on constituency casework and scrutiny of legislation.

Our constituents want us to have the time to know what we are voting on and to hold the Government to account, but they also want us to deal with constituency work and to know about their concerns. How much time a week should MPs spend in understanding what they are voting on in Parliament, and how much time should they spend in their constituency? We will all hold different views on that. It strikes me that it might be interesting to see an official job description for the role of MP. That is not something I have ever seen, but if it existed it would be interesting, and people would probably have different views about the different clauses in it.

We all have our own views about the way that the procedures in this place could be improved, and I look forward to hearing from others during the debate. I have published some of my own ideas in a report entitled, “The case for parliamentary reform”, which I circulated to colleagues last November. Today, I make the same suggestion as in the report: the procedures and processes of the House of Commons are in urgent need of reform. That is hardly a new or novel observation. However, in a time of austerity when the rest of the country is urged to be more efficient with scarce resources, perhaps we should look at our own practices and at how efficient we are being with taxpayers’ resources in using our time in Parliament.

Some of the reforms in my report build on previous proposals by the Wright Committee and the now disbanded Select Committee on the Modernisation of the House of Commons. A few of the new proposals draw on experiences from other legislatures, while others were—I admit—rejected by previous Parliaments at a different time. However, that is no reason why a new Parliament in new circumstances should not examine those proposals again.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

I have read the hon. Lady’s paper; it contains some interesting and good proposals. Past reforms covered the hours in which the House sits, which were changed in 2001-02. One of the proposals in her paper is to change sitting hours on a Tuesday, but that is distinctly un-family friendly for people who want to do the school run in London. At times, some of the proposals have the feel of being not so much family as London friendly.

[Caroline Lucas]

The issue that the hon. Gentleman pinpoints is important. The perspective of family friendliness depends on where someone happens to sit, be that in London, the north or the south-west. However, the issue is broader than that; it is about what kind of symbol and signal we want this place to convey. I hope we want to give a signal that it is right for people to be able to work within set hours on a given day. People, including our staff, should be able to do that.

[Kevin Brennan]

I will not intervene again after this remark. However, on some occasions, it was extremely difficult for hon. Members to see their staff before Wednesday afternoon, because there was no thinking, preparation or meeting time when a Committee meeting started before 9 am on a Tuesday. My researcher wanted to work a 2 pm to 10 pm shift, so that she could do her job properly when those hours were introduced. The House changed its mind and went back to the previous hours a year later.

[Caroline Lucas]

The hon. Gentleman’s intervention indicates that changing the sitting hours alone is not enough. We must change what we do within those hours. I am sure that it is not beyond the wit of this Parliament to arrange our sitting hours so that people can do enough preparation for their Committees, and so that officials have time to prepare the speaker for urgent questions, or whatever. Do we want this House to set an example by working relatively family-friendly hours or not? If we do, other things will fall into place.

[Greg Mulholland (Leeds North West) (LD)]

I praise the hon. Lady for securing this debate, and for her reforming zeal. I agree with her on matters such as voting, and I think we should look at the shape of the Chamber. However, can we stop the myth of family-friendly hours? It is not a family-friendly job. When we talk about family-friendly hours, we are talking about not only MPs from London and the south-east, but those whose constituencies are outside London, but whose families live down here. I want to take my daughter to school, and that should be part of the debate. I want to cram things in as much as possible so that I can get home to my family.

[Caroline Lucas]

I do not think that family friendliness is a myth. The way this House works ought, where possible, to give some kind of signal about what we hope for and aspire to for those who work in the rest of the country. If we rearrange the way we work, it should be possible to sit on a Tuesday morning, for example, and get much of the work done. We would not then need to sit late into Tuesday night. If hon. Members want to have meetings at that time, that is up to them, but I do not see why that process should hold everybody else hostage.

[Joan Ruddock (Lewisham, Deptford) (Lab)]

There is also the consideration of people’s mental and physical health, and their general sense of well-being. Most of us function better during the reasonable hours of the day, such as those proposed by the hon. Lady, than we do very late at night. When I came to this House, 70% of sittings went till midnight or beyond. People died and were ill. We have to get a grip on the issue, and look at what will be best for most people’s health. We must also accept that some people will make choices. They will take their children to school, but they could still be here by 10.30 am or 11.30 am.

[Caroline Lucas]

I thank the right hon. Lady for her intervention. It points to the fact that one of the things that we are battling is something of a macho culture. Many people have asked, “If you’re not ready to sit till midnight and 1 o’clock in the morning, why are you doing the job?” That is not a good response.

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

I apologise to the hon. Lady because I will not be here for the whole debate. As well as an interest in this issue, I have a long-standing commitment to and interest in affordable credit, which is being debated elsewhere. I have something of a reputation in the north for being macho, but on this occasion I agree almost wholeheartedly with the hon. Lady and want to encourage her, not necessarily to pin down specific hours, but to look to provide certainty and to avoid what my right hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, Deptford (Joan Ruddock) described—by-elections every three months, which is what happened 24 years ago, when I came into the House.

If I may, I will encourage the hon. Lady not to get bogged down on hours, because other changes in this place could get us into at least the 20th, if not the 21st century, and allow us, with discretion, to vote more sensibly, provide certainty and, above all, demonstrate that we have understood the changes that have happened because of devolution to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and our relationship with the European Parliament, all of which have taken shape since I came—

[Mr Joe Benton (in the Chair)]

Order. I remind right hon. and hon. Members that interventions must be kept as terse as possible. An awful lot of Members want to speak this afternoon, and I want to be as fair as I can.

[Caroline Lucas]

I thank the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett) for his intervention, which was incredibly valuable. He rightly reminds me that the Procedure Committee is examining sitting hours. I am very glad about that. I hope that this debate can produce some agreement that at least there should be a mechanism whereby we can consider all these issues again. We may disagree about the details of family-friendly hours or exactly when different debates should happen, but I want to gauge how much interest there is for some types of change and, if there is some interest, how we can make progress.

[Jo Swinson (East Dunbartonshire) (LD)]

I, too, apologise, because I will be going to a conference later. It is about political engagement, so it is very much on the same theme as the debate.

I want to pick up on the point about the Procedure Committee conducting an inquiry on the sitting hours and the turnout today. Does the hon. Lady agree that there is perhaps an argument for another vehicle for pursuing the cause of parliamentary reform? We do not want it to stall after the Wright Committee, and the Procedure Committee has limited time. In fact, although it is conducting an inquiry on sitting hours, it has not begun that yet, and we do not want the issue to be delayed and put on the back burner. Should the House not find some way to take it forward, given the clear level of interest in doing so?

[Caroline Lucas]

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention, which was incredibly helpful.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

With great respect to the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson), the Procedure Committee has in fact started its work and we had a very useful opening seminar in Portcullis House last week to take evidence from a variety of sources. The work is under way.

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[Caroline Lucas]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. Having been at the seminar, which was very useful, I completely agree with him that that work by the Procedure Committee has started. I want to make it clear that nothing that I say this afternoon is in any way critical of what the Procedure Committee is doing—it does fantastic work. As we know, just this week it published findings of an inquiry into the release of information by Ministers, with a set of recommendations with which I wholly concur. My point is that the amount of work that we are potentially talking about in terms of the reforms that we need cannot be tackled by the Procedure Committee alone, so I completely agree with the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) about considering a mechanism complementary to the Procedure Committee—something that would run alongside it but would have more capacity to deal with some of the wider issues that we are talking about.

[Sir Peter Soulsby (Leicester South) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing the debate. May I take this opportunity to apologise for the absence of the Chairman of the Procedure Committee, the right hon. Member for East Yorkshire (Mr Knight)? As the hon. Lady may know, he had all the symptoms of flu yesterday afternoon. For his sake and for ours, he has wisely gone home, but he asked me to stand in for him. As she will have noted, other members of the Procedure Committee are present, and the right hon. Gentleman asked me to respond at the end of the debate on behalf of the Committee.

[Caroline Lucas]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that clarification.

Let me say a little about some of the specific proposals that I would like us to consider, not in the expectation that all hon. Members will agree with them, but just to put some ideas out there about how things could be changed. One change could involve electronic voting. I know that there will be a sharp intake of breath as I say those words. I have looked back at previous times when we discussed the issue in the House, so I do not expect an easy ride on it, but this is a time when we could consider it again, not least because it has been estimated that £30,000 of salary could be saved every week because of the amount of time that MPs waste while waiting to cast votes. We are talking about an hour and a half or more extra because of the way we vote. To put it another way, if a vote takes about 15 minutes and if, in the previous Parliament, there were about 1,200 votes, that means that an MP with an 85% voting record would have spent 250 hours just queuing up to vote. Those are hours that taxpayers have paid for, and I argue that they could be better spent studying amendments, scrutinising Bills or helping constituents.

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)]

We also waste a great deal of time—certainly I do—running from the chilly outer reaches of Norman Shaw North and back again. That causes disruption to meetings with colleagues and constituents.

[Caroline Lucas]

As a fellow inhabitant of Norman Shaw North, I share the hon. Lady’s pain. At least it gives us a bit of exercise.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

The hon. Lady is making a powerful speech, but is she really saying that we should press a button to vote? It is difficult enough at the moment to get people into the Division Lobby with any idea of what they are voting on. They would be pressing a button because the Whips had told them to, and parliamentary democracy would be destroyed.

[Caroline Lucas]

I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman raised that point because I have another proposal, which I will come to in a moment, that against each amendment there should be an explanatory statement that explains what it is about. That would mean that far more hon. Members had a better idea of what they were voting on. In terms of electronic voting devices, I am suggesting not that such voting should be done in the isolation of one’s office, but that there should be a particular time when we vote each day. That would deal with the point made by the hon. Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston) about not knowing when to start running over from Norman Shaw North. We would have a particular time when we would vote. It would be done by hon. Members either sitting in the Chamber or, because there is not room for everyone, in the Lobbies. People would still get the chance to lobby Ministers, but there would be a fixed time in the day when we could vote electronically. I will explain why we would have a better idea of what we were voting on shortly. From my experience in the European Parliament, I can tell hon. Members that six votes take a minute and a half with electronic voting. Six votes in this place take at least an hour and a half. I find it hard to justify that.

[Joseph Johnson (Orpington) (Con)]

Parliamentary democracy has not been destroyed in a large number of other parliamentary democracies where electronic voting works very well. The Indian democracy, for example, is one of the most vibrant in the world. In the US, people manage to vote in that way in both Houses very successfully. There is plenty of evidence to show that it can work well.

[Caroline Lucas]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for making that point. The Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly, the French Assembly and the US Congress all vote using elements of electronic voting, and I see no reason why we should not as well.

[Mr Mark Williams (Ceredigion) (LD)]

Does the hon. Lady agree that one of the good practices in the Welsh Assembly is having a block voting period at the end of the day? Rather than the constant disruption of meetings and all the rest of it, we could designate a part of the day specifically for voting.

[Caroline Lucas]

I absolutely agree. It would allow us to organise our business and our timetables much more effectively. I do not know what happened in days gone by. Perhaps MPs did not have so many meetings with outside bodies but I know that it is embarrassing, in the middle of a meeting with quite important people, suddenly to have to say, “I’m really sorry, I’m going to have to go. I have no idea how long I will be. I hope to get back to you some time soon.” That is not a good way to do business.

[Ann Coffey (Stockport) (Lab)]

The hon. Lady asked what happened in days gone by. Perhaps I can try to answer that. One of the proposals of the Select Committee on Modernisation was to introduce programme motions. Those were introduced following a recommendation of that Committee. The idea of such motions was to give more certainty to MPs about when votes would take place, so that they could better organise their day.

[Caroline Lucas]

rose—

[Mr Joe Benton (in the Chair)]

Order. Before the hon. Lady continues, may I point out that she is about 18 minutes into her speech, but that so far there have been at least 10 interventions. It is entirely a matter for the Chamber, but I suggest that to enable the hon. Lady to make her points we minimise interventions.

[Caroline Lucas]

It is probably out of order for me to reflect upon that, Mr Benton, but I would argue that one way to improve our debates would be to have more interventions and fewer set pieces. I hope that I am not being disrespectful.

I want to make one last point about electronic voting. If we make the process of casting votes less time-consuming, MPs could vote on more aspects of Bills. As a result, the public would have a clearer record on which to hold us to account. A system that inherently discourages voting on the specifics of Bills because it takes too long to vote is a problem. It also requires less thought from those charged with passing legislation through the House. Speeding up voting would enable us to be better legislators by giving better scrutiny.

[Greg Mulholland]

I share the hon. Lady’s desire to speed up voting; I was using electronic voting when a member of Leeds city council. To make it work in the House, do we not need to consider the reality of the Chamber? In most Parliaments that have electronic voting, Members have an assigned desk with a voting button, and many Parliaments use laptops, but we could not possibly do those things in the present Chamber.

[Caroline Lucas]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I passingly considered how radical it might be to propose that we do not sit in the Chamber, but decided that I should probably wait for a few more years before making such a proposal.

I discussed the matter with a company that specialises in the manufacture of electronic voting devices. It said that we could make them operable in the Chamber and in the Lobbies on either side—there is not enough space for all Members to be in the Chamber, as has been pointed out—but they could be made to work only within that area, so there would be no danger of people going to the pub with one in their pocket, with all the disrepute that would involve. There are ways of getting around the problem. I would be the first to admit that it would be much easier if each of us had our own place in the Chamber, but I believe that it is still possible to get around the problem.

[Mr Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight) (Con)]

Will the hon. Lady explain why it would be better to have people sitting in specific places?

[Caroline Lucas]

One reason is that it would make electronic voting an awful lot easier. Another is that it would make the Chamber more orderly than the sort of crush that we have when everybody rushes in. I know that it looks good on TV screens, but if Members have to stand they may not be able to follow the debate as closely; they certainly find it harder to take part in the debate if they are crushed at the back of the Chamber, far from the Speaker’s Chair. However, that is rather theoretical, because we cannot get away from the Chamber that we have.

I am aware that there was a consultation paper on voting methods back in 1998. I admit that at the time, 64% of MPs preferred to stay with the present system, but one reason given for that was that they did not want to lose the opportunity to speak informally with Ministers in the Lobbies. My proposal for a set time for Members to go to the Lobbies to use their electronic voting devices would still enable them to lobby Ministers.

[Joseph Johnson]

That advantage belongs only to Members of the governing party; it is not shared by MPs from Opposition parties. That argument cannot be used to justify a continuation of the Lobby voting system.

[Caroline Lucas]

The Government are by definition the majority. It struck me that, when trying to get measures passed, I could perhaps be kinder to the majority in addressing their concerns. I agree with the hon. Gentleman; I have not nobbled many Ministers during my time here.

I return to the subject of having votes held over to a certain time of day. The Modernisation Committee noted:

“Members seem interested in the possibility of holding divisions over, so that all votes could be taken after one another at a convenient time, instead of holding divisions immediately at the end of each debate.”

That was back in 1998, but despite the fact that a majority were interested, little has changed. Although 2004 saw the introduction of the so-called deferred Divisions, when some votes that would otherwise have taken place at the end of the day’s sitting would be conducted in writing on Wednesday morning and early afternoon, the option is seldom used.

I acknowledge that there will be occasions—the votes on tuition fees for example, or the vote on the Iraq war—when it will be appropriate to vote straight away, because of the significance of the vote and the public’s interest in it. However, the fact that there are certain exceptions to such proposals does not undermine the direction of the proposals themselves. I still believe that they are worth considering.

I shall talk briefly about abstentions. I got myself into trouble when talking about abstentions in the past, with people telling me, “Well, if you can’t make up your mind you shouldn’t be in Parliament.” Abstention does not mean that we cannot make up our minds. It does not mean that we do not know. Abstentions are often the result of being presented with two opposing ideas, but being asked to vote on them as one amendment. One may agree with one part of an amendment but not the other, yet there is no way in this Parliament of taking amendments in parts. I note in passing that in the European Parliament, which uses 20 languages, it is possible to take an amendment in parts, but we cannot do that here. We might then think to ourselves, “What shall I do? I know, I’ll abstain.”

It is difficult to abstain in this place. In 1998, a majority of MPs indicated strong or general support for an option to record abstentions, but 12 years later nothing has happened. Richard Taylor, the former Independent MP for Wyre Forest and the late David Taylor, the independent-minded former Labour MP for North West Leicestershire, were both known for voting yes and no. Of course, the media made much fun of them, making it seem that they were not able to make up their minds.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

A point of order was raised in the Chamber today about that precise point. Members were reminded that the Speaker has ruled that it is unparliamentary to vote both yes and no.

[Caroline Lucas]

I thank the hon. Lady for that intervention. What she says reiterates the fact that we need a formal way of registering an abstention instead of not voting; if we do not vote, those helpful websites that record how often we are in the Chamber will make it seem that we were not there.

[Mr Mark Williams]

I plead guilty; I was one of the four who did precisely that—to go through both Lobbies. We were unable to support a Labour motion referring to the record of the previous Labour Government and we were concerned about the Government’s policy, but there was no third way. Sitting on our hands could have been construed as our being absent from the House. The case needed to be made that we were there, but that we were concerned about both the Opposition’s line and the Government’s. For a third party that has sometimes not been in government, that is most important.

[Caroline Lucas]

I completely agree with the hon. Gentleman.

[Mr Douglas Carswell (Clacton) (Con)]

Although the hours that MPs might keep are important, and although the technical means by which they may vote is certainly important, does the hon. Lady not agree that when it comes to restoring purpose to Parliament, to getting this House off its knees and ensuring that the legislature can once more hold the Executive to account, there are bigger and more profound matters than those that she has mentioned so far?

[Caroline Lucas]

I completely agree with the hon. Gentleman that there are more fundamental matters to do with the power of the Executive. I am starting modestly, but shall come to those in due course. There are bigger issues, but after six months here, and with a degree of humility, I was trying to see whether there are ways in which the efficiency of this place could be improved. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to say that there are bigger issues, and I know that another hon. Member will talk about those shortly.

I return to some of the smaller points. Because they are smaller, it ought to mean that they are not resisted so much. We ought to be able to speed things up and get some of this stuff done. We would then have the time and space to get our teeth into the bigger, more fundamental issues. One of the small things that we could do is to include an explanation of the design or purpose of an amendment. It is particularly difficult for people outside Parliament, and sometimes for Members themselves, if they are not following the legislation in minute detail, to understand the implications of an amendment that states “clause 1, page 1, line 5, leave out subsection (1)”. It takes a lot of time to unpack what it really means; we need the Bill and the amendment, and we need to know some of the background. A simple explanation of two or three sentences would substantially increase transparency. MPs themselves would also have a better idea of what they are voting on, which might not please the Whips very much, but it would increase democracy and accountability.

It is a modest proposal and one that has been made before, but providing explanatory notes would, none the less, make a significant difference. It would give more power to Back Benchers and take a little more from the Whips, and enable constituents to follow better the proceedings of the House.

[Zac Goldsmith (Richmond Park) (Con)]

I echo what the hon. Lady says about explanatory notes. More often than not, Members have no idea what they are voting on. If the first 20 MPs leaving the Lobby later on today were asked what they had just voted on, I suspect that 19 of them at best would have no idea at all. Nevertheless, the big issue is not lack of knowledge about what we are voting on but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Clacton (Mr Carswell) has pointed out, the fact that Parliament itself absolutely fails to hold the Government to account. I hope that we will cover that issue later on in the debate.

[Caroline Lucas]

I completely agree, and I look forward to having another debate on exactly that subject. Let me raise a few more issues before other Members speak. Obviously, this is a well-subscribed debate.

I want to say a few words about the talking out of private Members’ Bills. The Bills, which are introduced by MPs who are not Ministers, are relegated to Fridays, the day when attendance at Westminster drops as most of us go back to our constituencies. Why not move private Members’ Bills to a mid-week slot so that they are better attended? We could then consider the implications of making Fridays a formal constituency day. I do not accept that it is beyond our wits to find adequate time for private Members’ Bills earlier in the week without displacing other legislation. Hon. Members will be well aware that our current system allows Back Benchers deliberately to waste the time allotted for debate on a private Member’s Bill in order to delay it. The vote takes place when there are likely to be far fewer Members present to support it as people leave to get to far-flung parts of the country.

The talking out of private Members’ Bills is an insult to other Members who want seriously to debate the Bill, to the Speaker and, most important, to the electorate who do not want to pay to run a debating chamber that is being mocked by its participants. There should be explicit rules that prevent the practice of talking out a Bill. The Wright Committee stated that “merely procedural devices” should not be able to obstruct private Members’ Bills, but again, we have not seen much change in that respect. That Committee also referred to the popular proposition that a maximum of three hours should be given for the Second Reading debate on any private Member’s Bill, which should be in cumulative and successive sittings, after which the question would be put to the Chamber on whether the Bill should receive Second Reading. In a sense, that would render pointless the act of filibustering. I shall take the fact that there was no intervention on that point as agreement, and I shall proceed with great speed.

[Joan Ruddock]

I support the hon. Lady. One of the easy things that we could do is make the Tuesday sitting compare with the Wednesday sitting, so that we start the day three hours earlier. We could then accommodate private Members’ Bills in the evening, which would give Members the choice on whether to stay. All House facilities would be kept open. That would be an ideal way. If Ministers, and I have been one, need to defeat a Bill, they must defeat it on the issues and its merits and not by procedural means.

[Caroline Lucas]

I completely agree.

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

I support the hon. Lady. Such a reform would also help with the House’s family-friendly policies. I make no complaint about that. I have not seen my seven-year-old son since Sunday night, and I will not see him until I get back at 9 o’clock tonight. I do not always want to stay on Fridays, not only because of constituency duties but because it is the only day of the week when I can take my son to school. My constituency is 225 miles away. The opportunity for a deferred vote on a private Member’s Bill on a mid-week day or consideration on another day would be ideal for both purposes.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

The hon. Lady has unanimous support.

[Caroline Lucas]

I shall proceed while I am on a roll. Another issue, albeit small, is the adoption of more accessible language, which would increase the transparency of this place and give some indication that we want people to understand what we are doing. All too often it looks as though we are deliberately mystifying what we do here to create the illusion that it is even more special than it is. There is a strong case for a systematic overhaul of the language to make it more self-explanatory. If the language of the Commons was made easier to understand, more people, especially younger people, would be more attracted to politics. MPs should be able to use each other’s names. We should drop phrases that, to the public, look at best like arcane jargon but at worst make Parliament seem inaccessible, distant and remote. Why should MPs not refer to each other in debate as Mrs Smith or John Jones? That would make proceedings more intelligible without reducing the necessary formality and without changing the practice of speaking through the Chair. A methodical overhaul of the language of the procedures and offices of the House based on the principle that it should be self-explanatory and easily understandable for the public should not be beyond something on which we can all agree.

In conclusion, we will all have many ideas about how we can improve the way in which this House works. The early-day motion to which this debate has been tagged is suggesting not specific changes but the idea that there should be some mechanism whereby a range of different ideas can be discussed and taken forward. I recognise that the Procedure Committee is doing excellent work, but it is already stressed in terms of its capacity to take on some of the very big issues that it is dealing with, such as sitting hours.

I hope that I have demonstrated not just my own wish list but also that other Members have ideas that need to be considered. I am passionate about the subject; Parliament has to become more effective so that it can better serve the nation. It cannot continue to be seen to waste taxpayers’ money and MPs’ time on antique processes that are not fit for purpose. Even where there is disagreement on the details, I hope that hon. Members will accept that my underlying concern is that much more can be done so that MPs are more efficient and more easily understood. Given that, we have a duty to be more effective about the way in which we work.

During the past couple of years, the public have heard a lot of warm words about a new politics. In the wake of the expenses scandal, hon. Members will recall the words of the right hon. Member for Witney (Mr Cameron) before he became Prime Minister. He said that

“this political crisis shows that big change is required. We do need a new politics in this country. We do need sweeping reform.”

Last year, the Deputy Prime Minister told the House:

“Every Member of this House was elected knowing that this Parliament must be unlike any other—that we have a unique duty to restore the trust in our political system that has been tested to its limits in recent times.”—[Official Report, 5 July 2010; Vol. 513, c. 23.]

In 2009, we heard similar things from senior Labour figures. The right hon. Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband), now Leader of the Opposition, said:

“Out of a set of terrible issues, this is a moment for big reform and government must take advantage of it. We need a more pluralistic political system where power is shared in different ways.”

The former shadow Chancellor, the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Alan Johnson), was right when he said with characteristic colour:

“The current public mood of anger and disquiet... demands a response. We need to overhaul the engine, not just clean the upholstery.”

I hope that my points this afternoon are not simply seen as “cleaning the upholstery.” The upholstery needs cleaning; we can make the way in which we work more efficient, but there are other more fundamental issues about how we hold the power of the Executive to account. I know that several other hon. Members will raise those issues as well, and I look forward to the debate.

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[Sir Alan Haselhurst]

I want to press on, because many hon. Members want to speak.

A lot of change has taken place in my time. Radio and TV have come in, and broadcasters have progressively achieved more flexible access. All-night sittings have almost been expunged, and sittings beyond 10 pm are now rare. The programming of legislation is now the norm. Departmental Select Committees were only set up in 1981. Notice for questions is now shorter, and topical questions have been introduced. Deferred Divisions have been set up. New technology is being cautiously embraced. Time limits have been introduced on speeches, and we could go further with that in Committee, on Report and during discussion of private Members’ Bills. The Backbench Business Committee has been established. Elections are now rife, giving more power to Back Benchers. The Standing Orders are continually being changed—the ink is hardly dry on the paper, such has been the pace of reform.

The Hansard Society paper has a great many good ideas in it, particularly regarding the legislative process. I do not want to go into that in detail, but I commend the paper as a subject for further discussion. Let me be up-front, however, about where I caution against change. This Parliament is a debating chamber—that is what distinguishes it from many other Parliaments—and our performance is of high quality. We should keep away from the idea of written speeches, which kill debate.

I would keep the indirect form of address. Having watched the Parliament and, worse, the state Parliaments in action in Australia, I have seen abuse to which the direct form of address gives rise, which is shocking. Our system acts as a filter, ensuring that debates are conducted in a civilised manner. The fact is that we also forget the names of colleagues across the Floor half the time, so referring to them as “the hon. Member” is a good cover.

The House should not press for the list of speakers in a debate to be published. Having spent 13 years handling such situations, I know that hon. Members are not entirely reliable in their relationships with the Chair. The Chair tries to make up for that by being considerate and juggling lists to enable hon. Members to go off and do things that suddenly arise. Under the list proposal, however, the hon. Member who did not turn up— unfortunately that happens quite a lot—would then find that the local press were on to them to ask why they had not been present for a debate. The proposal is not, therefore, quite the obvious solution it might be thought to be. Furthermore, someone who thinks that they know when they will speak in a debate might absent themselves for rather more of the time, so I am not sure that the proposal is entirely forward-looking.

I am very suspicious about electronic voting at a single time of day. There is the question of amendments being contingent one on another. If we want a process that increasingly divorces debate from decision, that is the way to go, but there are times when we have to dispose of one amendment before we can logically go on to the next, and that has not been sufficiently thought through.

[Caroline Lucas]

We have discussed that extensively with the Clerks, who have pointed out that it is perfectly possible to have a mechanism whereby the Chair could indicate which votes are contingent on other amendments. It is not beyond our wit to work out a system whereby we can vote electronically and in sequence, with the votes the way they have been put down.

[Sir Alan Haselhurst]

I take that point, but the hon. Lady possibly overestimates the skills of Members when they are suddenly asked to look at complicated things. For all the explanations that might be available, it is sometimes difficult for us to get our ideas straight, particularly when we have to vote instantly, rather than having a couple of minutes to think carefully about an issue.

I am not against private Members’ Bills staying on Fridays. The fact that a proposal is a private Member’s Bill does not immediately invest it with merit, and some pretty ordinary ones come up. It is interesting that the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion has suggested a mid-week slot, when the rest of her argument about the timing of sittings goes against spending time on such things in the evenings after a full day’s debate, which seems inconsistent. I would keep private Members’ Bills on Fridays. One argument is that if hon. Members cannot get 100 colleagues into the House to support them, their proposal may not be worth supporting, but I will not go down that line. I will go halfway towards what the hon. Lady has said by suggesting that private Members’ Bills should be on Fridays, but that there should be a specific three-hour slot for debate, with a deferred Division, at another time in the week. That would be a useful way of looking at the issue.

On the sitting pattern, it is important that we get the balance right between our duties in our constituencies and our duties in Westminster. The balance has moved too far, to the point that we are overly obsessed with what happens in our constituencies while we are away in Westminster.

We also have to decide whether we want predictability or an element of spontaneity as our guideline. If this place is to keep up with topical issues, we may need to adjust the Order Paper to take account of that. At the moment, the only person, beyond the Executive, who has the power to do that is the Speaker. Our Parliament treats the Speaker with greater puritanism than any other Parliament in the world. We say that someone becomes independent from the moment they become the Speaker and that they never go back to party political association. That being the case, we are telling every Member, even if they are the only Member representing a party or independent minority group, that they can trust the Speaker to give them a fair deal, because the Speaker has no axe to grind. If we accept that, do we want the Speaker to grant urgent questions or even Standing Order No. 24 emergency debates, which will simply shatter the business for the following day? Alternatively, are we content, as has happened in my experience, to have two Government statements and an urgent question take an absolutely huge chunk out of the time, when an important debate would otherwise have been scheduled for that day? We must think about that and get the compromise right.

I declare an interest as Chair of the Administration Committee, because in a sense that shows me another side of the practice of the House, which is keeping the turnstiles turning and the cash registers ringing. I have also been a distant Member of the House as well, having represented, for a period of years, the north Manchester seat of Middleton and Prestwich, so when I discuss family-friendly arrangements, I understand them from two different angles. We should not only discuss arrangements that are family-friendly for hon. Members who live in London, as the hon. Member for Leeds North West (Greg Mulholland) has mentioned in an intervention. If we think only from that point of view, what we decide will be self-fulfilling, and we shall put more pressure on hon. Members to live in London and visit their constituencies, and I am not sure whether the Selection Committee would be entirely enamoured by our doing that.

A Member who finishes at 6pm will not get to Manchester in time to tuck up the children in bed, and they will have to get up jolly early to be here by 9 am the following morning—or 8 am to put in a prayer slip to reserve a seat for that day. Mention has been made of a parent in London wanting to take the children to school, who might have difficulty getting here by that early hour. We should also think of our staff. Members should not forget the amount of preparatory work that must be done from the lowliest level up to the Clerks, to ensure that our business can start at the hour when it does. We may be forcing staff to get up terribly early— 4 am or 4.30 am—to get here to do the jobs they must do for us to function. We should take their welfare into account, too.

What is friendly in terms of making this Parliament operate more effectively? The Chamber is the heart of our system and at the moment other activities partly overlap with the sittings of the Chamber. If we go to a 9 am to 6 pm arrangement, as the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion has proposed, there will be a complete overlap for every other activity in the House, including Select Committees, Public Bill Committees and all-party groups. If hon. Members cast an eye over the “All Party Whip” they will see the wide range of all-party groups—scarcely a condition of the human body is not covered by one. Those are legitimate activities, and there are deep interests at stake for small groups of Members, who must be accommodated. There are also lobby events, where hon. Members want to hear from particular groups. Ad hoc meetings crop up, outside visits must be undertaken and there must be contact time with Departments of State, councils and other bodies to which Members are making representations on behalf of their constituents. How will all that fit in satisfactorily in human and logistical terms? Will all the rooms be available at the right time? It is difficult enough now to get attendance at Select Committees, but if they are to be effective and their reports are to be valid, attendance must be constant.

The competition for hon. Members’ time is intense, and fitting everything into a shorter period of time will, I suggest, be very difficult. It would create a risk that the Chamber would become even more sparsely attended than it sometimes is today. Alternatively Members will multi-task in the Chamber. That is part of the justification for having BlackBerrys and other devices in the Chamber. Members of the public are beginning to dislike that as much as the absence of Members from the Chamber, and Mr Speaker gets letters on the subject. The right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett), who left his place earlier, has also received representations from his constituents about that.