CONDUCT IN THE CHAMBER
SPYING STRANGERS
55. Formerly it was the practice
that strangers were not admitted while the House was sitting.
Accordingly Standing Order No. 163 provides that if any Member
draws attention to the presence of strangers, (which is normally
done by shouting "I spy strangers"), the Chair is obliged
to put the question immediately "That strangers do withdraw".
56. Nowadays there are two real
reasons why Members "spy strangers". The first is when
a Member or group of Members is genuinely concerned to raise what
is a legitimate grievance, and feels that there is no other means
available. The second, quite separate, reason is to use the opportunity
of a guaranteed division to try to reveal the absence of a quorum
(forty Members including the occupant of the Chair plus the four
tellers). If there is no quorum the business under discussion
stands over to the next sitting. This procedure is most commonly
used on Fridays devoted to private Members Bills, and is certainly
more likely to succeed on such days than with Government business.
57. If the question were carried,
not only would the public gallery be cleared, but the press and
Hansard would have to leave and the televising of proceedings
would be stopped. This is unnecessary-the Speaker already has
power to clear the public gallery without stopping the reporting
or televising of the House.
58. We believe that this archaic
practice has long outlived any useful purpose it may once have
had, and that some new safeguard is needed which does not have
these unintended consequences.
59. So far as grievances are
concerned, there are already procedures in existence, notably
the use of what is normally called a "dilatory motion",
usually a motion to adjourn the debate or a variant thereof.
The current Standing Orders governing such motions (S.O.s No.
34 and No. 35) allow the Chair either to put the question forthwith,
decline to propose the question, or allow it to be debated. Whatever
the decision, the Chair will normally allow the Member concerned
a brief explanation of why this course of action is being suggested,
and will then give a decision in accordance with the Standing
Order.
60. For the purpose of testing
a quorum, a new procedure needs to be devised since there is no
guarantee that the Chair will allow a division on a dilatory motion.
The House of Lords has a procedure which allows any Lord to move
"That the House do proceed to the next business". (The
House of Commons by contrast only has a totally incomprehensible
procedure, known as the "Previous Question", which involves
the Chair uttering the words "The Question is, That the Question
be not now put"). The form of words used in the Lords describes
precisely the purpose which is behind the spying strangers formula
as currently used to attempt to kill Private Members' Bills.
61. In the House of Lords a "next
business" motion is debatable. For the purposes we envisage,
the current rule relating to spying strangers is far more appropriate,
in other words the Chair should be obliged to put the question
forthwith. Like spying strangers, the new procedure should not
be used more than once a sitting so that it does not obstruct
the business of the House.
62. We therefore recommend
that:
Standing Order No 163
should be amended so as to read "The Speaker or the Chairman
may, whenever she thinks fit, order the withdrawal of persons
other than Members or Members of the House of Lords from any part
of the House"; and
a new Standing Order (Next
business) be made, as follows:
"If during any business
a motion is made that the House do proceed to the next business,
the Speaker or the Chairman shall put forthwith the question thereon,
which may be decided at any hour, though opposed:
Provided that such a motion
may not be made more than once at any sitting".
POINTS OF
ORDER DURING DIVISIONS
63. There may of course be legitimate
points of order which have to be raised during a division, and
which relate essentially to the conduct of the division. For
example the division bells may not have been heard in a particular
outbuilding; or there may be extreme traffic congestion in or
around Parliament Square; or there may be some technical reason
why the question should not have been put. Many other matters
which have been raised during a division are matters which could
perfectly well be raised after the division was completed, and
indeed be more appropriately raised then.
64. At present, if a Member seeks
to raise a point of order during a division, he or she must speak
"seated and covered"[3].
In practice this means that an opera hat which is kept at each
end of the Chamber has to be produced and passed to the Member
concerned. This inevitably takes some time, during which the
Member frequently seeks to use some other form of covering such
as an Order Paper. This particular practice has almost certainly
brought the House into greater ridicule than almost any other,
particularly since the advent of television. We do not believe
that it can be allowed to continue.
65. We believe that the proper
course for Members who have, or think they have, a genuine point
of order affecting the division currently in progress is to go
to the Chair and explain the issue. If it is one of the matters
to which we have referred, the Chair itself will intervene, announcing,
for example, that in view of the congestion, the doors would remain
open for a further x minutes. If the Chair determines that the
matter is one which would more appropriately be raised after the
division is over, it will advise the Member accordingly. In the
relatively rare event that a Member considers that, notwithstanding
the advice of the Chair, the point of order must be raised during
the division, we would expect the Member to do so by standing
in the normal way, but from a position on the second bench as
close to the Chair as possible, from which he or she can be heard
both by the Chair and by the Official Report without obstructing
the movement of Members into the lobbies. We so recommend.
If the House agrees to this recommendation we will monitor
its effectiveness.
SANCTIONS
AGAINST MISCONDUCT
66. There are currently three
Standing Orders which deal with what may broadly be called misconduct
in the House. S.O. No. 42 gives the Chair power to order a Member
whose speech is irrelevant or repetitious to discontinue his speech.
S.O. No. 43 gives the Chair power to order a Member or Members
whose conduct is grossly disorderly to withdraw from the House
for the remainder of the day's sitting.
67. In a more serious situation,
or if the powers available under S.O. No. 42 and S.O. No. 43 have
proved insufficient, S.O. No. 44 permits the Chair to name a Member
who has disregarded the authority of the Chair, or has persistently
or wilfully obstructed the business of the House by abusing its
rules or otherwise. A motion is then immediately moved, normally
by the Leader of the House, that the Member be suspended. For
the first such naming the Member is suspended for five sitting
days, for the second offence for twenty sitting days, and on a
subsequent occasion for the remainder of the Session or until
the House itself decides that the suspension shall be ended.
68. While we are satisfied that
the existing sanctions are sufficient to deal with serious cases
of gross misconduct, we are concerned that the existing Standing
Orders are somewhat inflexible to deal with what could be a very
wide range of offences. It has to be borne in mind that on many
occasions a Member has quite deliberately engineered his own suspension
or naming for some particular reason, and has informed the media
in advance in order to get maximum publicity. In such cases the
very act of naming and suspension itself causes disruption.
69. Following reports from the
Committee on Standards and Privileges or its predecessors the
House has suspended Members from the service of the House for
a specified period and also suspended their parliamentary salary
for the same period. We have considered whether a Member who
is suspended from the House having been named should also lose
his parliamentary salary as part of his punishment. It looks
odd that a Member who has been suspended from the House for misbehaviour
should continue to be paid; and there should be some consistency
in the sanctions imposed on Members who are suspended, irrespective
of the reason for their suspension. Accordingly we recommend
that Members who are named by the Chair should lose their parliamentary
salary for the period of their suspension.
QUESTIONS
AND ANSWERS
70. The period between 2.30
pm and the start of debate on the main business of the day is
when the House is at its most full, and the Press Gallery actually
occupied. This is right and proper; the combination of regular
Questions to Ministers on their responsibilities and statements
by Ministers on matters of national or international importance
or on their plans for new policies should be the ideal opportunity
for as many Members as possible on behalf of their constituents
to ask those governing the country to explain their actions and
policies.
71. Because the House has much
other business to transact, the time for both oral Questions and
Ministerial statements is severely limited. Question time is
limited by Standing Orders to one hour each day (and no time on
Fridays). There is no formal limit to the time that can be spent
on statements, but quite clearly the Speaker has to protect the
main business of the day. It is probably because of this strict
time limitation and to protect the rights of all those who wish
to ask questions that clear rules are laid down for the conduct
of Question time and (by analogy) of procedures for Ministerial
statements.
72. These rules are set out
in Erskine May, but they need to be spelled out in this Report
so that there can be no possible doubt what should happen. "The
purpose of a question is to obtain information or press for action;
it should not be framed primarily so as to convey information,
or so as to suggest its own answer or convey a particular point
of view, and it should not be in effect a short speech" (May,
p.296). So far as answers and supplementary questions are concerned,
"An answer should be confined to the points contained in
the question, with such explanation only as renders the answer
intelligible, ... and supplementary questions, without debate
or comment, may, within due limits, be addressed to them, which
are necessary to the elucidation of the answers that they have
given ... A supplementary question may refer only to the answer
out of which it immediately arises, must not be read or be too
long, must not refer to an earlier answer or be addressed to another
Member, and is governed by the general rules of order affecting
all questions" (May, p.305).
73. Concern has been expressed,
over recent years, that there has been a growing tendency for
supplementary questions not to meet all the criteria set out in
Erskine May. In particular, the Speaker has periodically referred
to the length of questions and answers and the resulting slow
pace of progress at departmental Question Times, most recently
on 11th February in the following terms:
"In the last Parliament,
I found it necessary on a number of occasions to seek the cooperation
of the House in making better progress at Question Time. I was
concerned that both questions and answers were becoming too long
and that there was a growing tendency to regard Question Time
as an opportunity for comment and for debate, rather than for
question and answer. As a result, too few hon. Members with questions
on the Order Paper could be called, and too few other hon. Members
could be called to put supplementary questions.
Following my statement, there
was some improvement at that time, but I now have to inform the
House with regret that progress in this Parliament is significantly
worse. The number of substantive and supplementary questions that
I have been able to call has been further constrained. I must
now renew my appeal to Ministers and hon. Members to cooperate
in securing a fastermoving and more profound Question Time.
Members should bear it in mind
that the primary purpose of questioning Ministers is to hold the
Executive to account. Questions should relate to matters of public
policy or administration for which Ministers are responsible.
I have to tell Back Benchers that the purpose of a question is
to obtain information or to press for action. It should not be
a short speech.
As for Ministers, answers should
be confined to points contained in the question, with a short
explanation only when necessary to make the answer intelligible.
I tell the House that there are good reasons for these and other
longestablished rules on questions. Members would do very
well to educate themselves. They would find, if they looked at
pages 295 to 305 of the 22nd edition of "Erskine May",
the reasons for these rules. In essence, there is a marked distinction
between Question Time and debate. What is required above all are
short questions and brisk answers. In the interests of the House,
I shall not hesitate to intervene if I think a question or an
answer is too long, but it would be much better if the House were
to discipline and regulate itself. I hope it will do so, and I
look forward to the Whips from all parties seeing that all hon.
Members and Ministers are informed of this statement."
74. We believe that it is important
to treat Erskine May as a framework and not a rule book. We would
certainly not recommend the imposition of arbitrary and inflexible
time-limits on the length of questions or answers.
75. However, there is no doubt
that the House operates best when, in general, questions and answers
are concise and to the point. A brisk exchange provides the opportunity
for the largest number of Members to ask questions on behalf of
their constituents and ensures the fullest possible accountability
of Ministers to the House.
76. We would encourage Members
asking and answering questions to bear in mind the limited time
available and the fact that many other Members may be seeking
to have their questions reached or to catch the Speaker's eye
to ask a supplementary question. Questions should be genuine
attempts to elicit information and they should not begin with
thanks to the Chair or other unnecessary preambles, especially
where these are designed principally to provide an opportunity
for the Member to offer his or her own views on the matter in
question. Answers, in general, should be concise, confined to
responding directly to the terms of the question.
STATEMENTS
77. Oral statements are
an important aspect of Parliamentary life. They are the means
by which major changes of Government policy are announced to the
House and the country. They also provide a means by which the
Government can bring to the attention of the House urgent and
important matters which may arise at short notice. As a reflection
of their importance, oral statements are regularly broadcast "live"
by the media and are extensively covered in news programmes later
that day.
78. In those circumstances,
the Government Minister making an statement will often wish not
just to set out the terms of his or her announcement but to explain
the reasons which underlie them. Similarly, the responses from
the Opposition front bench and the spokespeople of the minority
parties will tend to indicate, briefly, the broad reaction of
their parties to the content of the statement as well as seeking
further information or clarification on points covered in the
statement. We believe that, within limits (see the following
paragraph), this is justified and plays an important part in informing
the public of the views of the different parties to a major announcement
of Parliamentary and public concern.
79. However, as has been noted,
oral statements take time away from the business of the House
on which Members will be seeking to contribute to the debate on
behalf of their constituents and parties. It is important therefore
that, with the caveat mentioned above, statements and subsequent
questions should follow the general advice given in paragraph
76 above. In particular statements should not normally last for
more than ten minutes and, with brisk subsequent questioning,
it should generally be possible for all Members who wish to be
called so to be and for business to resume usually no later than
45 minutes after the beginning of the statement.
80. The same general approach
should apply to Private Notice Questions, though these usually
run for less than 45 minutes following a Minister's answer of
normally just a few minutes.
CONCLUSION
81. We urge the House to accept
this Report in its entirety. Each of the changes we have proposed
is, we believe, valuable in its own right, but as a whole it represents
the essential balance between the rights of individual Members
and the rights of the House. It is this balance between inevitably
competing interests, whether between Government and Opposition,
front bench and back bench, one Member and another Member, which
is crucial to the effective operation of the House, and which
we have sought to achieve not only in this Report but in our Report
on the legislative process. It will now be for the House itself,
under the guidance and authority of the Speaker, to ensure that
this proper balance is maintained, and the quality of debate thereby
enhanced
3 May
p.373. Back
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