Scheduling of Parliamentary Business

Desmond Swayne Excerpts

Monday 17th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Valerie Vaz (Walsall South) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the scheduling of parliamentary business by the Leader of the House and the implications of a two-year session for Standing Orders requirements.

Mr Speaker, I thank you for agreeing that this debate should take place. This is not a debate about a debate. It is about an important point of principle: our parliamentary democracy and the role of this House. It is about the Opposition and other Members holding the Government to account, and it is about the sovereignty of Parliament. This House is not supine. Our constituents—the electorate —expect us to be here. They voted for us, in the official Opposition’s case, to set up our programme for change. This minority Government are not working.

The Standing Orders are set out in the Blue Book. Rules and procedures have to be consistent, certain and clear. What does the book say about Opposition days? Standing Order 14 says:

“Twenty days shall be allotted in each session for proceedings on opposition business, seventeen of which shall be at the disposal of the Leader of the Opposition and three of which shall be at the disposal of the leader of the second largest opposition party”.

[Interruption.] Will Government Members hang on a second? Given the Government’s announcement of a two-year Session, references to Sessions in Standing Orders should be interpreted as per year, with dates allocated pro rata.

The Government announced by press release:

“Rare two-year Parliamentary session…Double the length of a normal Parliamentary session”.

Therefore, the implication of those plain words is that the number of days would be doubled.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

The hon. Lady does not realise how lucky she is. When we were in opposition, we did not have the benefit of this Speaker in the Chair to call urgent questions with the frequency that he does now to the huge advantage of the House. We would have traded any number of Opposition days for the wisdom of the current Speaker—long may he remain in the Chair. By the time hon. Members actually get to an Opposition day debate, the Gallery is empty and the journalists have all pushed off having written their copy.

[Mr Speaker]

I am overcome with excitement. I am going to get very emotional in a moment. We are grateful to the right hon. Gentleman.

--- Later in debate ---

[Pete Wishart]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. She probably shares my concern about what would happen if that came to pass, and the inadequacy of Report stage. We would have everything baled into one, with Report, Third Reading and, probably, statements and other business on the same day. Intricate, important pieces of legislation require proper scrutiny in the proper Committees of this House, and it is incumbent on the Government to put that process in place. Any attempt to subvert the normal arrangements for Bills to go to Committee is clearly unacceptable, and I hope that the House will reject any such attempt.

We have heard quite a lot about how things are normally set up. I am almost disappointed that the hon. Member for—Chris Bryant, whatever his constituency is. [Interruption.] For Rhondda. I am almost disappointed that he is no longer here, because he is a keen student of the subject, and I think he actually gave us some figures. The Leader of the House said that we were in an unusual situation because we had had a June election. I was elected in 2001—I think you were elected before me, Mr Speaker—and I remember that in 2001 we had a June election, but all the Standing Committees and all the Select Committees were in place by the summer recess. The election in 2001 took place on 7 June, the Queen’s Speech was held on 20 June and all the Select Committees were in place and functioning by 19 July.

[Sir Desmond Swayne]

The reason for that is that in those days it was a stitch-up by the Whips. Now we elect the members of Select Committees, and that is the key difference.

[Pete Wishart]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman, because he reminds me of something that happened during the establishment of the Select Committees in 2001. He is right; it was a stitch-up by the Blair Whips, and he will remember when they tried to remove Gwyneth Dunwoody and Donald Anderson from the chairmanship of two Select Committees. That held up the creation of the Select Committees, but we still managed to get them in place. There is absolutely no reason why the same cannot happen now. The example of the year of 2001 is a good one.

I very much agree with the hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) when it comes to Opposition days and the setting aside of time for Back-Bench business. It looks as though Back-Bench business and private Members’ Bills will be about the most interesting features of this parliamentary Session.