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3.44 pm

Mrs. Angela Browning (Tiverton and Honiton): I begin with one of the later points that the Leader of the House made. Hon. Members from all parties have asked her about the Government's intentions for the report. She has suggested that our discussion constitutes the first debate on it. We must conclude from her words that she has in mind a plan, which she believes to be sensible, for considering the proposals and ultimately making decisions about them. We must therefore also assume that she has a timetable in mind.

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The Leader of the House values the opportunity for the House to consider matters in a timetabled manner, so I hope that before the end of the debate she will spell out the way in which she intends to proceed and the timetable that hon. Members--who obviously have a great interest in the report--can expect before we see, in terms, Government proposals that we can possibly amend and on which we can vote. I agree with her that although there is much support for the Liaison Committee report, we want to explore some aspects further through amendments and votes.

I must begin by taking her back to the commitment that the Prime Minister made to the House in the Opposition day debate on 13 July about Parliament and the Executive. The Prime Minister was asked specifically about the Liaison Committee report and the conduct of votes. The hon. Member for Pendle (Mr. Prentice) raised the matter. I make no apology for putting on the record again the discussion between the Front Benches. The hon. Member for Pendle began:

The Liaison Committee report has huge support across the House . . .

He said that 211 Members--the vast majority were Labour Members--had supported the early-day motion. That number has subsequently increased. He continued:

If the Liaison Committee report is a parliamentary issue rather than a matter for the Government, may we have a free vote on it?

He was not asking about general matters, but about the Liaison Committee report.

The Prime Minister replied:

There we are. That is the legitimate voice of Back Benchers speaking . . . This is a matter for the House, and of course we shall have a position on it.

The Leader of the House has today spelled out the Labour Front Bench position. The official response to the Liaison Committee report further elaborates the Government's reaction to the Committee.

In the debate on 13 July, my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) said:

I do not think that the Prime Minister has given a full answer to the hon. Member for Pendle (Mr. Prentice). The hon. Gentleman asked whether, in view of what the Prime Minister has just said about the importance of free votes on House of Commons matters, members of his party could have a free vote on the Liaison Committee report.

My right hon. Friend was not asking about general matters that affect the House, but about the Liaison Committee report. My right hon. Friend continued:

Opposition Members will have a free vote. Will the Prime Minister do the same as me, and--as a party leader--undertake to vote in favour of Select Committees no longer being appointed by the Whips, as is suggested in the report?

Again, that question was specifically about the report. The Prime Minister replied:

Yes, there will be a free vote, as I have just indicated.--[Official Report, 13 July 2000; Vol. 353, c. 1099-1100.]

In the course of many debates in the House, we experience the way in which language can be manipulated, but in anybody's language, the Prime Minister made a commitment, in terms, about the way in which votes would be conducted on the Liaison Committee report. I readily accept that Labour Front-Bench Members will have views on the Liaison Committee report and will not wish to accept it lock, stock and barrel. [Interruption.] Of course they have views;

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we all do. However, in the interest--and rights--of Back- Bench Members to be able to determine a parliamentary matter, the right hon. Lady must now introduce a timetable that will allow us to understand how each Member, especially Opposition Members, can make a contribution to the report, which should not just be discussed today in an Adjournment debate and then kicked into the long grass. That will allow us to see exactly how suggestions in the report can be taken forward. There is no doubt that many of those suggestions have mutual support across the Floor the House.

The Parliamentary Secretary, Privy Council Office (Mr. Paddy Tipping) indicated assent.

Mrs. Browning: The Parliamentary Secretary is nodding. We should move forward on issues on which we can find common ground and conclude our deliberations with activity that will both improve the way in which Select Committees work and acknowledge the importance of Select Committee procedure in the democratic scrutiny of legislation.

Mr. Bercow: My hon. Friend has just caught the Government leg before wicket and, as she did so, the right hon. Lady was chuntering in apparent disagreement. Would it be helpful if the right hon. Lady indicated that she stands by the words that the Prime Minister uttered on that occasion? If we have no such assurance, how can we believe anything that the Government say?

Mrs. Beckett: I resent the implication of dishonesty. As I have repeatedly said from the Dispatch box to the hon. Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow), the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young) and the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Mrs. Browning), I do not accept that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister gave anything other than a commitment to the fact that any decision taken about the House on this or any other issue is taken on a free vote. I do not accept that there is any implication for the timetable, as we have not even started the debate. I do not accept that there is any implication for when the debate may be carried forward, when it may be concluded and when or whether a vote may be taken. I accept none of those implications, and the position is precisely that which I set out, as the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton knows, which is why she and her hon. Friends keep asking me about it.

Mrs. Browning: I appreciate that the right hon. Lady is speaking in that way because she is under considerable pressure from her colleagues in the Cabinet. This is a parliamentary matter, and it is the will of Members on both sides of the House that it is dealt with as such. I am new to the job of shadow Leader of the House, but I believe that one of the primary tasks of the Leader of the House is to consider carefully the views and will of hon. Members on both sides of the House.

I am sorry that the right hon. Lady, in an uncustomary manner, is denying the will of the House and not accepting what is on the record. The Liaison Committee's report is referred to on more than one occasion in the exchange of dialogue on 13 July. There is no ambiguity

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about that, and it is clear that the Prime Minister made a commitment. I shall not embarrass the Leader of the House by pressing her further, but I hope that she will look carefully at the wording of Hansard.

Mrs. Beckett: I was there.

Mrs. Browning: The right hon. Lady says she was there, but we were all somewhere at sometime, and we are discussing the record of the House and the word of the Prime Minister of this country. If she is to do justice to her position in the House, she must agree to go back and look at that wording. There can be no doubt about what was intended and meant in that exchange of dialogue.

Mrs. Beckett: I do not accept the case made by the hon. Lady. I was present on that occasion and heard what the Prime Minister said. I am perfectly well aware of the substance of the exchange and the attempt to pretend that, in some way, I am saying something different to the House from what I have repeatedly said, either on my own account or that of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, in the weeks and months since the Liaison Committee report was produced is simply not justified.

Mrs. Browning: I do not intend to press the right hon. Lady any further on the matter. As Leader of the House, she must stand by the words that she has spoken today, which will be on the record. When we have a record, such as that for 13 July, which is interpreted differently by the Leader of the House, then the determination of hon. Members will be that the House must sit in judgment of her. It is not for me to do so.

I hope that the Leader of the House will bear in mind the fact that there is overwhelming evidence on both sides of the House that the Liaison Committee's report is worthy of the House's attention. We should scrutinise the report today, and--I put it no more broadly than this--take forward those parts that will improve the House's democratic process and involve a shift of power from the business managers of the House to those people who represent their electorate through the Committee system of the House.

I must seriously ask the Leader of the House to reflect on her words today. Will she make recommendations on what the next steps will be and give the House some form of commitment so that hon. Members may be assured that they will be able to take the proposals forward within a reasonable time?

Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Cotswold): Did my hon. Friend notice the inconsistency in the right hon. Lady's approach to events in the House on Tuesday, when a substantive vote was taken? Those events may well have the effect of increasing Back Benchers' power, whereas today's proposals, which may have the same effect, are not to be taken on a substantive vote.

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