Administration and Works Committee

Lord Higgins Excerpts

Thursday 12th July 2012 Lords Chamber

[The Chairman of Committees (Lord Sewel)]

My Lords, this is a short and straightforward report. On 10 March 2011, the House agreed the committee’s first report, which recommended new rules to clarify where electronic devices can and cannot be used in the House. In that report, the committee recommended that Members should be able to use hand-held electronic devices when addressing the Chamber or Grand Committee. That report also recommended that,

“for a one-year trial period in the first instance, Members taking part in proceedings should be able to use electronic devices to access Parliamentary papers and other documents which are clearly and closely relevant to the business before the House or Grand Committee”.

This subsequent report recommends that Members should be able to use hand-held electronic devices in the Chamber and Grand Committee,

“for any purpose, provided that they are silent and are used with discretion”.

This is in line with the rules adopted by the House of Commons. It also recognises the current reality and the impossibility of policing the purpose for which a device is being used. I see that the opposition Chief Whip is taking a close interest in this.

While reviewing the rules for Members, the committee also considered that the rules should be applied to officials advising Members in the Chamber and Grand Committee. The committee felt that it would be sensible to apply the same rules to officials as for Members, and therefore recommended that officials should be able to use hand-held electronic devices for any purpose, provided that they are silent and, again, used with discretion. Furthermore, the committee specifically recommended that officials should be able to use such devices to access information for use in debate and communicate directly with Members in the Chamber or Grand Committee. Nevertheless, these proposals would deprive the House of the innocent pleasure of observing the cavalry, in the form of the government Whip, riding to the rescue of a besieged Minister grasping a vital note from the Box. Similarly, Ministers would be spared the task—and I speak with some experience—of desperately trying to decipher an illegible note. I hope that both these factors will be of benefit to the House.

The recommendations contained in this report recognise and reflect the evolving use of electronic devices by Members in this House. I believe that the recommendations are a sensible and logical way in which to simplify the current rules and allow Members to use electronic devices in a way that supports them in their parliamentary duties, should they wish to do so. I beg to move.

[Lord Higgins]

My Lords, does my noble friend agree that the convention in this House, and indeed in the House of Commons, is that speeches should not be read and therefore that it would be inappropriate to read a speech off an iPad or similar device?

[Lord Sewel]

I thank the noble Lord for that question because it gives me the opportunity to make an important clarification. The use of electronic devices should be used in the same way that notes are used. They should not be used as a means of presenting an entire speech.