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Mr. Paul Tyler (North Cornwall): In addition to the reassurances offered from both sides of the House, would it further reassure the hon. Gentleman if "additional" were given a capital A? The motion states that the four Members named will act as "additional Deputy Speakers". By making that "Additional Deputy Speakers", would we not make matters different? I take the hon. Gentleman's point that, if the experiment extends to a year and appears to be successful, the precedent may have been set.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: I appreciate that the hon. Gentleman seeks a compromise, but even that arrangement would be wrong. The four Chairmen are not Deputy Speakers of the House of Commons as I understand that office. They would not avoid conflict in the Chamber. Indeed, some of the four appointees are controversial Members with very strong views. I welcome the controversy that they bring, and have done over the years, but giving those four hon. Members the title "Deputy Speaker" would undermine the position of Deputy Speakers under our current arrangements.
Mr. John Bercow (Buckingham): At the risk of inflicting grave damage on the hon. Gentleman's reputation, let me say that I entirely agree with him. Does he agree that the issue is not whether the new arrangements work or not? In fact, we do not even know what "work" means in this case. If all we mean is that the four newly appointed "Deputy Speakers" should behave when they chair proceedings in Westminster Hall, we shall learn nothing that we cannot guess from the characters of the four distinguished hon. Members concerned. The point is that it is wrong in principle to designate them Deputy Speakers. It is clumsy and stupid, and we have an opportunity to prevent it.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: I agree entirely with the hon. Gentleman, and I have no difficulty in doing so as this is a House of Commons occasion, not a Government matter or a political debate. We are discussing the credibility and integrity of the House of Commons. I appeal to the
Minister not to proceed with the motion as it stands. The four named hon. Members will be Chairmen of debates in Westminster Hall. We should call them Chairmen, not Deputy Speakers.
Mr. Soley: Let me try to take my hon. Friend with me. I agree that he is a great parliamentarian--[Interruption.] I think that he is. The House must face up to the fact that, if we are to modernise--and everyone keeps telling me that they want modernisation--
Mr. Soley: Well, not everyone on the Opposition Benches, perhaps.
We cannot dot every i and cross every t, but we can revisit matters later. My hon. Friend is forgetting that, in addition to the ability of the House to revisit the matter, the Modernisation Committee will examine how the proposals work and will recommend changes if necessary. My hon. Friend's point is a good one, but we should not use it to hold back change.
Mr. Campbell-Savours:
I believe that Governments can table motions at any time that they want. There is always time to debate a motion that must pass through the House of Commons. We have learned that lesson over the years. I have never been convinced by arguments about Government time.
I am worried--I shall repeat the point so that there is no misunderstanding--because the office of Deputy Speaker is a non-political office in this Parliament. It has been so during the 20 years that I have been a Member. Long should it remain so.
Mr. Tipping:
This has been a narrow debate around two issues. The first concerns the appointment of four people to chair sittings during the Westminster Hall experiment. The second is the date on which the experiment will start. I stress that we are discussing an experiment, perhaps one of the largest modernisation experiments that the House will consider during this Parliament. As with all experiments, some things will undoubtedly go right, and others wrong.
My hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) made his point well. Indeed, he made it three or four times to make sure that I got it. I did, and senior members of the Select Committee on Modernisation, including my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, Acton and Shepherd's Bush (Mr. Soley), also got the point. Several hon. Members have tried to reassure my hon. Friend that we will examine the point and learn from the experiment.
I was asked whether Westminster Hall would be ready. Preparations are under way and we will be ready to start on 30 November.
I agree entirely with the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young) that Westminster Hall must get off to a good start. It is an important experiment, giving Back-Bench Members much greater opportunities. There will be 140 extra Back-Bench debates, the chance to debate three dozen extra Select Committee reports and the possibility of 17 or 18 general debates. Those figures give the lie to any suggestion that the Government are denying Back-Bench Members the opportunity to raise issues.
My hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock(Mr. Mackinlay) said that he had read the report and the motion superficially--
Mr. Mackinlay:
No, I did not. I did not read them superficially. I said that anyone who read the motion superficially might think that it was about Deputy Speakers. It is, in fact, about much more.
Mr. Tipping:
My hon. Friend used the words "on a superficial reading". One thing that I admire about my hon. Friend is that, when he reads things--even superficially--he has a tendency to read things into them. I can assure him that there has been no collusion between the usual channels about how the four names were selected. The method of selecting the names came directly from the proposals of the Modernisation Committee. Discussions have been held with the Chairmen's Panel, but the panel does not, in my experience, collude with the Government. The panel's voice is very much independent, no matter how uncomfortable that may be for the Government or for the Opposition.
We have had a long debate over whether the name Deputy Speaker is right. The hon. Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Winterton) pointed out that these would be additional Deputy Speakers sitting in Westminster Hall. These are new creatures, and their roles will develop. I do not say that we have necessarily got it right, and I repeat my undertaking to look again at that matter.
Mr. Bercow:
The Minister has used the word experiment, a word used many times. If he insists on describing what we are doing as an experiment, with the unstated implication that it will be up for review, will he be good enough to tell us the criteria by which its success or otherwise will be evaluated? Will the criteria include the considerations to which the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) has drawn attention--that is, the capacity of people outside the House and outside the United Kingdom to interpret the difference between the additional Deputy Speakers and those who hold the existing office?
Mr. Tipping:
That may well be one of the criteria by which the matter is judged. The issue of whether it is confusing to have one group of people bearing the name "Deputy Speaker" or one group with the name "additional Deputy Speaker" is a fairly small one by which to judge success. The success or failure of the body will depend on whether Back-Bench Members of Parliament have the
Mrs. Dunwoody:
I understand the problem that hon. Members express; I would be happy to consider some other title. I have been called many things in my life--not always parliamentary. Surely, we have overlooked one aspect of the matter; many members of the Chairmen's Panel have the ability to swap roles. When one is in the Chair, one is impartial. All of us also participate in other parts of the parliamentary programme. Indeed, if the Chairmen, who are all volunteers, or pressed men and women, were dependent on being chosen by the usual channels, the Chairmen's Panel would be very different from the one that we have at present. That is a mildly unrealistic description of the situation, if my hon. Friend the Minister will forgive for saying so. At present, all of us take the Chair, sit there for many hours and I hope--indeed I know--that we are impartial. However, we then do other things without any difficulty. If a change of nomenclature is all that is needed, I can think of a dozen different words--including some of the things that I would call some of my right hon. and hon. Friends.
Mr. Tipping:
With her great experience, my hon. Friend makes the point fairly and more forcefully than I could. Earlier, the hon. Member for Macclesfield said that he wore two hats. If the experiment goes ahead, he will have yet another hat to wear.
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