Modernisation Committee

Lucy Powell Excerpts

Monday 9th September 2024 Commons Chamber

[The Leader of the House of Commons (Lucy Powell)]

I thank the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) for those points. I am sure he and I share many of the same frustrations, which is one reason we are establishing the Modernisation Committee. He may not be aware that the substantive motion establishing the Modernisation Committee was considered at length during several hours of debate before the recess. The motion before us is about the membership of that Committee, the names having been nominated by the party they represent.

In the debate before the recess, I said very clearly that I want the Committee to fully engage with all the parties and all the groupings in the House. It has not been possible to do more, because of the maths of the situation. For example, how would we pick which smaller party was represented on that Committee through a formal membership? However, both in the Chamber at this Dispatch Box and subsequently in writing, I have made it absolutely clear that the Modernisation Committee will meaningfully and continually, on an ongoing basis, engage with the smaller parties across this House. As the right hon. Gentleman says, their input will be vital to its work. I think that is the best way to represent all the different smaller parties and their very differing views about some of these issues.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

I am grateful to the Leader of the House for what she has said about inclusion. That is welcome of course, but it seems to me that an even better form of inclusion of the views of all parties in the House would be through membership of the Committee so that they are at every meeting, rather than dependent on the generosity or largesse of the Committee as a whole to invite them to give evidence.

[Lucy Powell]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman again for that, but this is a balance. The membership make-up of the Committee reflects that of all Select Committees of this House, and to achieve a proportion where one place would be available for a smaller party would mean a very big Committee indeed—even then, only one smaller party would be represented and not all. My approach will be to make sure that the smaller parties are regularly invited into the Committee, are regularly engaged and are regularly asked for their thoughts ahead of and during inquiries. That is a more meaningful way to collate all the views of the different parties and groupings in this place, given how the membership of the Committee has to come about.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I want to follow on from what the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) said, and to raise a specific query about my own party, the DUP. We have five Members, while there are other single Members from Northern Ireland as well, and there is a big interest in, for example, the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee. I do not expect an answer from the Leader of the House straightaway—I am not putting her on the spot—but I am very keen to hear her thoughts on the best way to do this. With our deep interest in Northern Ireland affairs, is it the intention of the Government, ever mindful of the statistical and numerical change there has been in this Chamber, to ensure that our party has representation to reflect that?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lucy Powell]

It has been the long-established practice, particularly on the Committees that relate to the devolved nations of the UK, that there is representation from all the parties that have been elected from that area. I think that has been a long-standing tradition, and I do not think there is any intention to change that at this stage.

Question put and agreed to.