FOURTH REPORT
The Procedure Committee has agreed to
the following Report:—
THE PROCEDURAL CONSEQUENCES OF DEVOLUTION
1. On 1 July devolution will go "live",
and the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly will become
operational. This report sketches some of the changes which may
be required to House of Commons' procedure as a result. We agree
with the Government and the great majority of our witnesses that
there should be an "evolutionary" approach;[1]
our recommendations are intended to assist the House in the first
stage of this evolution since some issues need to be resolved
at a fairly early stage, even though the arrangements made may
well have to be adapted in the light of experience. We do not
attempt a definitive account of all the changes which might be
needed; in the light of this the Committee intends a full review
of the procedural consequences of devolution in due course.
2. Moreover, as a general principle, we do not believe
any final statement can be made about the procedural consequences
of devolution without experience of the new Parliament and Assembly.
Part of the reason for considering changes to the way in which
the House operates must be to provide the means for healthy dialogue.
This will be impossible if we do not take into account the views
of the other legislatures within the United Kingdom. In the long
run we believe that it may be necessary to establish some sort
of "constitutional affairs committee" to consider the
relationships between the constituent parts of the United Kingdom;[2]
in the short term, as the Leader of the House suggested, we ourselves
intend to remain alert to any consequences of devolution which
may make procedural change desirable.[3]
3. In this Report we have concentrated on those matters
which need to be addressed before July; we have consulted widely
and we are very grateful to all those who have given us evidence.
We are particularly grateful to those from outside the House who
submitted evidence, including the New Northern Ireland Assembly,
which sent the Report of its Ad Hoc Committee on the Procedural
Consequences of Devolution and the Clerk of the Legislative Assembly
of New South Wales. In addition to the numerous letters and memoranda
we have received from our colleagues, we took oral evidence from
Chairmen of each of the Grand Committees and from the Chairmen
and Members of the Select Committees on Northern Ireland Affairs,
Scottish Affairs and Welsh Affairs, the Leader of the House and
the members of the Study of Parliament Group Study Group on Welsh
Devolution. We also had the benefit of informal meetings with
Mr W R McKay, the Clerk of the House of Commons, and with Mr Ian
Harris, Clerk of the House of Representatives of the Parliament
of Australia.
4. In its evidence the Government identified a number
of areas for consideration. They may be summarised as the relationship
between MPs and Members of the devolved legislatures, including
consultation on European Legislation, and ways of maintaining
harmonious relations; Questions; Grand Committees; Select Committees;
Legislation and Subordinate Legislation; Budgets. Our report does
not follow the structure of the Leader of the House's memorandum,
or restrict itself to the points she raised, but we have attempted
to deal with each of these matters in the course of our argument.
We have also attempted to consider what changes, if any, will
be required if responsibilities are successfully devolved to Northern
Ireland, as we hope they will be, and some of our recommendations
will need to be interpreted in the light of the stage of devolution
attained by Northern Ireland.
1 HC (1998-99) 148, Appendix 1, paragraph 1, QQ 148,
176, 197-8, 204, 244-5. Back
2 See
Q 209. Back
3 Q
271. Back
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