(8 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberOn a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I apologise for interrupting the hon. Lady, but the deferred Division has less than 15 minutes to run, and the ballot papers have run out. There are no papers available to vote in the deferred Division. Could you tell us what you are going to do about this and whether you will extend the period of the Division beyond 2 pm?
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his point of order, but I am informed that this has now been sorted and that there are now ballot papers.
(12 years, 4 months ago)
Westminster HallWestminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Until the Procedure Committee introduces a change in the Standing Orders, unfortunately, we are unable to make proper mini-statements, so I invite hon. Members to intervene on me and, hopefully, this will take us no longer than 20 minutes, so that the important business that follows can take place.
I want to mark the occasion of the Backbench Business Committee’s finishing its first session and launching the end-of-term report, part of which is designed to feed into the Procedure Committee’s investigation into how the Backbench Business Committee has operated over the past year and a half to two years. It is important to give hon. Members the opportunity to comment or give further suggestions about the Committee’s operation.
I place on the record my thanks, and that of most of my colleagues, to the hon. Lady for her hard work in a ground-breaking role. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] I should also like to place on the record my thanks to members of her Committee.
I am not here to be an advocate, because as the hon. Lady has already identified, I, along with other Procedure Committee members, will have to be a judge in this matter, but I invite her to encourage as many colleagues as possible to let the Procedure Committee know what they would like to happen in future.
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that intervention. It is important that Back Benchers participate in this review of the Backbench Business Committee, because it is their forum to amend, adjust and use as they see fit. The best way of doing so is by participating in the review that is taking place under the auspices of the Procedure Committee.
Again, that is an important point, and I tabled an amendment to the Government motion on the Backbench Business Committee to allow minority parties membership of the Committee. That is an important change that absolutely must happen to make it truly a Committee of Back Benchers. The Committee cannot exclude one group rather than another.
Again, that is a helpful intervention; I thank the right hon. Gentleman.
I was talking about provisional approach that the Backbench Business Committee decided to take in its work. One of the most important decisions we took early on was to meet in public. That was not in the Standing Orders, but we were very aware that seven members and a Chair meeting in private almost one day per parliamentary week to decide which debates should be held would not be right. It was important for us to meet in public, to receive representations from our fellow Back Benchers and to be guided by what they brought to us, rather than by what we ourselves thought might be interesting debates. One of the Committee’s successes was to open it up to Back Benchers. That means we never have any idea what—if anything—will walk through the door, but it has added to the frisson of chairing and being a member of the Committee.