Procedure Committee

Lord Sewel Excerpts

Tuesday 13th May 2014 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[The Chairman of Committees]

That the 5th Report from the Select Committee (Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee; Written Answers and Statements; Select Committee Membership; Maiden Speeches in Hansard) (HL Paper 167) be agreed to.

[The Chairman of Committees (Lord Sewel)]

My Lords, I beg to move that the fifth report of the Procedure Committee be agreed to. The report covers a number of different areas which I will cover briefly in turn.

The first part of the report recommends a change to the terms of reference of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee to add two new grounds on which that committee may draw the special attention of the House to a statutory instrument. This change is being made at the request of the committee. The two new grounds are: (e) that the explanatory material laid in support provides insufficient information to gain a clear understanding about the instrument’s policy objective and intended implementation; and (f) that there appear to be inadequacies in the consultation process which relates to the instrument.

The second section sets out rules for government departments to follow when submitting Answers to Written Questions. The need for new rules arises from the introduction of a new system to allow electronic exchange of Questions for Written Answer and their associated Answers between both Houses and government departments. The new Question and Answer system will automatically publish all Questions and Answers on the parliamentary website and send e-mail alerts to Members, who will have a dedicated web page for viewing and organising all their Questions and Answers. Answers should be received more quickly, as Members will not have to wait for the postal delivery. Answering bodies will be able to include attachments with their answers, containing tabular, graphic or illustrative material which cannot be printed in Hansard. The digital copy of Answers will be the definitive record copy, but a printed version will continue to be published and, in addition, while recognising that we may be somewhat behind the curve of the digital age, the Leader of the House has asked Lords Ministers to continue sending printed and signed versions of Answers to all Lords Members.

The third section of the report arises from a proposal made by the usual channels to reform the rules relating to Select Committee membership with the aim of increasing the opportunities for Members to participate in Select Committee work.

The first recommendation is that from the end of the 2014 Session—I stress that is not from the end of this Session but from the end of the Session which ends with the general election—the rotation rule for all Select Committees other than the House Committee should be three Sessions instead of four. The House Committee presently has a five-Session rotation. That will be reduced to four and then eventually to three. In the longer term, we also propose that the House Committee should come down to a three-Session rotation. To avoid a sudden loss of many Members by reducing the length of service by two Sessions at once, we recommend that this change be implemented incrementally.

Other recommendations include a new rule that Members who leave a committee under the rotation rule should be eligible for reappointment to the same committee, or any of its sub-committees, only after the lapse of two full Sessions. We further recommend that it be set out in the Companion that it is desirable for a Member to serve on only one sessional investigative Select Committee at any one time.

The final section of the report recommends that from the start of the next Session maiden speeches should be marked in Hansard. I beg to move.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab)]

My Lords, I want to make a couple of comments in relation to the report. However, as we are discussing procedure, I should say that I find it ridiculous that comment and questions on the Ukraine Statement were restricted to 20 minutes. I know that has been extended from 10 minutes but in the other place such discussion is unrestricted. My noble friend Lady Liddell and a number of other noble Lords tried to get in and some of us did not even bother to try as we knew that discussion was limited to only 20 minutes and that a lot of noble Lords wanted to comment. However, we are going to finish early again tonight and then we are going away for three weeks. This is a matter of great importance and it is a great shame that we will not have another opportunity to comment on it at this point. I hope that the Chairman of Committees will have another—

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wills (Lab)]

My Lords, I, too, welcome the proposals on Written Answers because they represent a considerable improvement on the current situation. However, given this new technology that we will have at our disposal, has the noble Lord given any consideration to grouping Questions together so that we can see any patterns in the Answers given by government departments, particularly with a view to spotting any systemic evasions and prevarications?

[The Chairman of Committees]

I shall deal with the last question first. Grouping Questions is an intriguing suggestion that is worth looking into. It would develop almost an internal commentary, would it not? It would be a worth while exercise to have a look at.

The noble Lord, Lord Jopling, made a point about late Answers. I can give him a full assurance that there will be no hiding place for departments that are late in answering Questions.

I did not quite follow the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, when he said that Select Committee rotation was somehow designed to make us work less. It is not. It is designed to make more people work more. That is generally a good thing.

I can assure the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, that the issue of tabling Questions in recesses is on the agenda of the Procedure Committee for 24 June, and will therefore receive attention.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

The Chairman has not answered two vital questions—on the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy, and on the length of Statements.

[The Chairman of Committees]

I apologise for not answering on national security. The national security committee is subject to a rotation rule. When it was established, Lords Members were put on a rotation basis. If we had not moved to a three-Session rotation but had kept a four-year rotation, which all our committees are on, we would have had six Members leaving the committee this year.

On the length of Statements, I am afraid that I am not in a position to give any answer.