House of Lords Reform (No. 2) Bill

John Bercow Excerpts

Friday 18th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh]

We cannot let the Minister off the hook. He is speaking very early in the debate, which surprises me, and he appears to want to avoid any wider debate. We need to know from the Government something about their plans. What are their present attitudes to further reform of the House of Lords? Just to say that this is a very modest Bill and we should support it, giving the House no intimation of the Government’s wider plans, is not good enough.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Let me say that the Minister has spoken early because he was keen to do so, and I thought there was nothing disorderly or improper about that in any way. Just in case the hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) has any trepidation on this point, I can assure him that there will be very full opportunity for other right hon. and hon. Members who wish to speak to catch the eye of the Chair.

[Greg Clark]

Of course my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) takes a great interest in these matters and I have the greatest respect for the contributions that he has made on that. My remarks are about the Bill before us. It is not the Government’s Bill; it was presented by my hon. Friend the Member for North Warwickshire, and my comment is on the provisions in the Bill.

I think my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough knows well the Government’s position. There is a commitment in the coalition agreement to bring forward reforms to the House of Lords but it was not possible to make progress with it. I suspect that it was in the light of those developments that my hon. Friend the Member for North Warwickshire introduced these provisions today. Of course, as Mr Speaker says, it is open to hon. Members to air the wider questions, but if the Bill proceeds to Committee, it is to consider the specific measures that my hon. Friend is proposing. The Government are prepared to support the Bill today and to see it go into Committee because it provides for the introduction of some sensible, specific and relatively small scale changes to the House of Lords.