Business of the House

James Gray Excerpts

Wednesday 14th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sir Alan Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (LD)]

I am slightly surprised at the sudden growth of opposition to this motion among Labour Members. I wonder whether there is any other aspect of today’s timetabling, or other matters, that may have entered into consideration, but I could be wrong about that.

I want to welcome the action the Government are taking, but before doing so let me say that the hon. Member for Nottingham East (Chris Leslie) made what is in principle an important point: sessional discipline is significant in the way in which the House operates. It brings pressure to bear in circumstances where, otherwise, Government majorities tend to prevail; it causes them to stop and think as a degree of blockage occurs in the Lords at that stage of a Session.

We are talking about Bills—Finance Bills—founded on a Ways and Means resolution for a limited, specific and entirely explainable purpose related to the whole financial timetable of both the House and the Government. I was bemused by the idea of what state a Government trying to carry over a Finance Bill through three Sessions could possibly be in, other than the one envisaged by some Opposition Members in dealing with our current financial circumstances. This is not the debate to go into that, however.

I will deal first with the increase from three to five in the number of estimates days for this Session, which is a long Session. That is welcome, but I must put on the record the Liaison Committee’s request that there be five estimates days in normal Sessions, and our desire that that request be properly considered when we resume Sessions of the normal duration. There has been some Government resistance to that request—wait until we have at least seen more of the impact of the Backbench Business Committee. We have already seen the beneficial impact of that Committee, though, and I see no conflict there at all. Indeed, the Liaison Committee and the Backbench Business Committee are developing good ways of working together to ensure we maximise use of House time as Members want it to be used.

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Sir Alan Beith]

I have a choice. I will give way first to the hon. Member for North Wiltshire (Mr Gray), then to his hon. Friend.

[Mr Gray]

Does the right hon. Gentleman not agree that the number of estimates days will properly be a question for the House business committee, when it is established, and will he not press the Government to hasten the progress of their plan to do precisely that?

[Sir Alan Beith]

I am an avid and long-standing supporter of the principle of a House business committee. I think you would rule me out of order, Mr Deputy Speaker, were I to stray too far into that subject, but let me say that that is indeed a matter that could be so resolved were that committee in existence. For the moment, however, we must look to the Leader of the House to do such things for us.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Heath]

With the leave of the House, Mr Deputy Speaker, I shall respond to the debate. I am most grateful to the right hon. and hon. Members who have contributed to this brief debate. I am particularly grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith) for his comments. He is right to say that there are wider questions and more far-reaching changes to the way the House scrutinises spending plans which we need to discuss at some point, but I think that those wider reforms would be best debated in the context of proposals from the Liaison Committee, rather than from Government. It may well be that there are better ways of organising our business. The hon. Member for North Wiltshire (Mr Gray), who is not in his place—

[Mr Gray]

I am here.

[Mr Heath]

I beg the hon. Gentleman’s pardon; he is not sitting where I expected to find him. He made an important point about the advent in due course of a House business committee. We are looking at that, as we said we would, but even under existing arrangements it is open to any Select Committee, through the Backbench Business Committee, to seek time on the Floor of the House to debate a motion relating to departmental spending plans. The great advantage of that method is that the time constraints and procedural limitations arising from estimates procedure are absent.

The hon. Member for Poole (Mr Syms) asked why, during estimates day debates, we talk about Select Committee reports on matters that are either at some distance from or fairly peripheral to the essential element, which is scrutiny of Government accounts. Although that is a good question, it is one for another day, as it does not fall within the narrow confines of the motion.

I am grateful to the Chair of the Procedure Committee, the right hon. Member for East Yorkshire (Mr Knight), for his assistance. The idea that this is somehow a rushed process, when we put the proposals before that Committee for its consideration back in February and it is now, let me remind the House, December, or that we did not think of these things in advance, when we passed the proposals for consideration before the announcement of the change to the sessional timetable, is something of a nonsense. These are matters on which we needed the advice of the House; we have received that advice through the Procedure Committee, and that is why the motion has been brought before the House.