Parliamentary Commercial Department

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Thursday 12th June 2025 Lords Chamber

The people who will be spending huge sums of money, hundreds of millions of pounds, need to have a good commercial understanding and to recognise the importance of bringing this House with us. A new phrase has entered our discussions: we hear that “the administration thinks” this, that and the other. This is a self-regulating House, and the administration needs to take account of its needs and anxieties. Although I could highlight other examples, I have highlighted the front door because it is a classic example. If people had listened to what Members on all sides of this House were saying, we would not have wasted so much public money—I hope the noble Baroness the Leader will tell us exactly how much we have wasted—or embarked on a system that was untried and untested, with catastrophic results for not just our security but our ability to bring people to this House in the way that we all wish.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)]

I am not going to continue on the saga of the front door, although I agree completely with what the noble Lord has just said. Even I am considered occasionally a bit more diplomatic than the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth. He is right that there are now a number of areas for which there is joint responsibility, and one of them is security. I have been conscious of the fact that the House of Commons seems to dominate decision-making. Wherever it comes from, whether it is the Speaker, the House of Commons Commission, the Services Committee or whatever, they always get their own way and the interests of this House are not properly considered.

Neither I nor the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, are blaming the Leader of the House, who does everything she can, as do the Clerk of the Parliaments and the Lord Speaker, but we should back them up and say that where it is sensible to have Joint Committees, we should have them. There should be more joint working on catering, for example; it seems crazy that we have two completely separate catering departments. There are whole areas like that which could be brought more closely together, but, in doing so, the interests of this House must not be forgotten. I say that having been a Member of the other place and recognising its pre-eminence regarding legislation; but in terms of this Building, the use of it and our own interests, we are just as important as the House of Commons.

[Baroness Browning (Con)]

Can the noble Baroness the Leader confirm that all those individuals—and I mean individuals rather than collective groups of people—who sign contracts on behalf of this House have professional indemnity insurance? Can she explain to the House what that level of cover is and what decisions were made in determining how much it should be?