| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
8.43 pm
Mr. Eric Forth (Bromley and Chislehurst): I oppose the proposal and dispute almost every aspect of both it and way in which it has been presented in the report. I want to take issue immediately with what I see as the report's rationale, which is contained in paragraph 3. It states:
- "There is almost universal agreement that there are matters which the House should discuss,"--
- "which a large number of Members would wish to discuss,"--
- "but for which there is simply not enough time."
Mrs. Beckett: I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman was here--I know that he listens with great assiduity to what is said in the Chamber--when I pointed out that the time proposed in the report would suffice for 200 extra debates. I doubt whether we could accommodate those, even in an extra day.
Mr. Forth: I was coming to that point. The Leader of the House should not be so impatient. I am developing my initial thoughts, and I do not think that she wants to detain me for too long at this stage of the debate.
Having demonstrated the extent to which we lack time by sending the House away unnecessarily early, the Government have also, in effect, abolished Friday sittings. The House used to sit on Fridays; we used to regard our job here as a proper job that would take up our time. Apart from private Members' Fridays, Friday sittings have now all but gone. We have casually tossed aside parliamentary days. That strikes me as slightly odd when we hear that we are short of time.
Business in the House is often unnecessarily prolonged by the Whips for the convenience of Members. People outside the House do not understand that matter fully--perhaps mercifully, for hon. Members. However, we all know that, because a vote is timed for 10 o'clock, if a debate naturally comes to an end before that time, the Whips will encourage Members to come into the Chamber to prolong the debate for the convenience of other Members returning at 10 o'clock. To allow the debate to finish naturally at 6 o'clock or 7 o'clock, as many debates would do, allowing us further time to carry out other business, would inconvenience many Members because they would have to be in the House. That is the last thing that Members want. They always want to be somewhere else on Fridays--
Mr. Forth:
Here is one of them. I give way to the hon. Gentleman.
Mr. Gapes:
I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. Has he considered his role in wasting parliamentary time, over many weeks, on Fridays and late at night?
Mr. Forth:
The hon. Gentleman obviously believes that to be in the Chamber and to participate in debates is wasting time. That is where he and I fundamentally disagree. My point is that, for those of us who believe that participation in debates should be most of what we do, it is important that that time should be used properly. We like to spend time in the Chamber; we believe that that is a valuable exercise. The hon. Gentleman does not share that view--
Mr. Forth:
Here is another. I give way to the hon. Gentleman.
Dr. Ladyman:
I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. May I put the point slightly differently? Is it
Mr. Forth:
That might seem to be a clever point. However, as the hon. Gentleman is never here on Fridays, he will not be aware that my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border is in the Chamber every Friday that I am here. He and I believe that it is important to be in the Chamber in order to discharge our parliamentary duties. I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman's constituency is further away than Penrith and The Border--I doubt it--but if my right hon. Friend can take his duties that seriously, I suggest that the same should be true of most hon. Members.
Dr. Ladyman:
The last time that I was in the Chamber on a Friday, I heard the right hon. Gentleman and the right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean) filibustering a Bill that was supported by almost everyone else in the House. That was wasting parliamentary time.
Mr. Forth:
The hon. Gentleman was obviously not here last Friday, when his Government talked out a Bill that also enjoyed a wide degree of support. I do not think that it is useful to trade those sort of exchanges, although I shall gladly do so because, to date, the Government have objected to more than 30 private Members' Bills--a total to which even I cannot remotely aspire.
Mr. Maclean:
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way. I too was going to point out that the Labour Government have blocked more than 30 Bills so far this Session. Will my right hon. Friend bear in mind that, on most Fridays, Ministers have congratulated him, and sometimes even myself, on tabling amendments that improved Bills? I will give the hon. Member for South Thanet (Dr. Ladyman) the references if he wants me to do so; I have used them extensively in press releases.
Mr. Forth:
I hope my right hon. Friend will share those references with me. I would probably find them useful as well.
The time element is bogus. The truth is that, if Members wanted to find more time, they would be perfectly capable of doing so. The tragedy is that there is a conspiracy among those who manage our time: they send Members away from here as much as possible, but then have the gall to come here and say that there is not enough time.
I also dispute the notion that there is huge demand for the change. It strikes me as bizarre that it is proposed that the quorum of the exciting new development, for which there is such demand, should be three. We have been told by those who have participated in the debate that the new Chamber will be crowded with excited Members who have important matters to debate--but the quorum is to be set at three. That does not suggest any great demand.
Mr. Andrew Dismore (Hendon):
Would the right hon. Gentleman remind us how many Members voted on Friday at the end of the debate on the private Member's Bill?
Mr. Forth:
Yes, three Members voted on Friday. That only three of them were here to vote is surely a disgraceful condemnation of the 417 Labour Members of Parliament. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that the number voting was a shameful display of Labour Members' lack of interest in the House of Commons.
I doubt that the change is to be carried out as an experiment. We have heard that before and we know that change is a one-way street. I remember hearing that televising the House was to be an experiment, yet it was automatically continued because of a sort of momentum that such developments gather. We know that changes that are designated experiments are rarely reversed, because a sense of ownership develops among those who have a vested interest. I also doubt the reassurances in respect of expenditure.
Mr. Tyler:
I am fascinated by the right hon. Gentleman's new line of argument. Is he saying that we should never experiment or make any change; or that, if any change is to be made, it should not be experimental? He would appear to be arguing in favour of one or the other of those propositions, but I do not understand which.
Mr. Forth:
I am not a great advocate of change and I make no secret of that. I am generally rather satisfied with the way the House runs under your excellent tutelage and guidance, Madam Speaker, so I am in no rush to make gratuitous and unnecessary changes.
Mr. Maclean:
Those hon. Members who are in favour of the new system and suggest that it is somehow evolutionary ignore the fact that Prime Minister's Question Time has been changed, initially without Madam Speaker's consent, and that the House of Lords is to be abolished. Wholesale changes are being made to Parliament, so to suggest that the proposed development is a minor change that can be treated in isolation is preposterous.
Mr. Forth:
My right hon. Friend is absolutely correct. Therefore, I feel no sense of shame when I say that I am not a great advocate of or enthusiast for change.
To return to the subject of expenditure, I was about to refer to appendix 4, headed "Further Letter from the Serjeant at Arms" and dated as recently as March 1999. The Serjeant at Arms gives the total cost of this foolish exercise as £870,000 and adds, most revealingly:
"there is no provision for expenditure of the order of £870k on the Grand Committee Room in next year's estimates . . . and the indications are still that a Supplementary Estimate will be required for the Works Vote to cover the costs of the work."
So much for the bogus claims that the proposal carries no financial implications and can somehow be fudged through under existing expenditure plans.
| Next Section
| Index | Home Page |