Examination of Witness (Questions 40 -
59)
MONDAY 10 JULY 2000
THE RT
HON MARGARET
BECKETT, MP
40. No, I think that is very revealing of the
Leader of the House.
(Margaret Beckett) If I recall correctly, I may be
wrong about this, I rather think that it was the governing party
deciding to pick someone different. I think it was cross-party
voting actually in which the Committee overturned what was the
recommendation of the official usual channels when we were not
the senior official usual channel.
41. By implication you are simply saying the
Government decides who the Chairman will be.
(Margaret Beckett) No, no, I am not saying that at
all, Mrs Dunwoody.
42. Under the present system we are capable
of ensuring it and if by any chance the wrong person—
(Margaret Beckett) No, I am not saying that at all,
Mrs Dunwoody, I am simply saying that as matters stand people
are put on Committees and often one looks and outlines the names
that come forward and often it is clear that probably people envisage
that X or Y might come to be the Chairman of that Committee, indeed
someone is added to the Liaison Committee on exactly that basis
in order to be a potential Chairman of that Committee. I am also
saying, however, that it does not always turn out like that. As
I understood it, and no doubt you will correct me if I am wrong,
one of the recommendations coming from this Committee was that
under the new system you propose an individual would be identified
by the three wise Members who would then emerge as the Chairman
of that Committee. All I am saying is that does not always happen
under the system we have now and I am not sure it would always
happen under the system that you propose.
Mrs Dunwoody: Well, I do not think we
can convince you of the truth of what we are saying, but I can
assure you that that is not accurate.
Chairman: You have taken the comments
a bit too far on that. We are not suggesting that the Chairmen
would be chosen by three people. Let us hear Nick Winterton.
Mr Winterton
43. Could I ask the Leader of the House whether
she believes that every person elected to the House of Commons
is equal?
(Margaret Beckett) Yes I do, and one of the concerns
that I have about some of the tenor of the discussions around
this Report—and I have said this to my own colleagues—is
that I believe this to be a Report which has potentially very
profound implications and one of the implications that I think
it has is that it does almost create an implication of there being,
can I say this without any offence, but it does immediately arouse
in my mind the feeling that maybe there will be a kind of two-tier
membership of the House and that those who put themselves into
the career stream for Select Committee membership are in some
way to be different from and perhaps even, dare I say it, slightly
above the ordinary backbench Member, and that is one of my concerns.
44. But do you believe, Leader of the House,
that it is appropriate for the Government to seek to dictate who
becomes the Chairman of a Select Committee?
(Margaret Beckett) No, but then I do not accept that
the Government dictates the membership either.
45. As you are aware, I have a personal experience
where the Government of the day first of all did not want me to
be the Chairman of a Select Committee and when I won the Chairmanship
in a particular Parliament with cross-party support—
(Margaret Beckett) They changed the rules.
46.—They then sought in the new Parliament
to create a rule which said that a Member of Parliament should
not be able to serve on a Select Committee for more than three
Parliaments. Do you think that it is right that the establishment
of a political party should seek to introduce a rule which has
never been debated or agreed by the House and to have the members
of their party on the selection committee so indoctrinated that
they were prepared to accept that ruling of the Government who
did not like the Chairman of the Select Committee because he was
doing a job that Select Committees are here to do?
(Margaret Beckett) I deplore it totally and I always
thought it did them no good at all.
47. That is true but this Select Committee,
being the Chairmen's Committee of all the Select Committees of
the House, is trying to prevent that occurring in the future.
Do you not accept the point that Mrs Dunwoody was making, that
we are seeking to shift the balance away from the Executive, away
from the usual channels so that the House can actually decide
who, first of all, serves on Select Committees without undue influence
from the political parties—all of them, Liberal Democrat,
Labour, Conservative and Unionist—and that the individual
Committee once it is established, once the allocation of Chairmanships
through the usual channels has been agreed, should be free from
any pressure by whips and parties to decide who they believe is
the best person to serve as the Chairman of that Committee?
(Margaret Beckett) I think what you are asking me,
Mr Winterton, is whether I accept the bona fides and the
genuine good intentions of this Committee in making the proposals
that you do. Of course I do and I have never doubted that for
a second. Equally, I hope that you at least—because you
and I have crossed swords on many occasions, and on occasion found
ourselves on the same side especially with regard to the manufacturing
industry—will accept that I, equally, am acting in good
faith when I say that nevertheless I have strong reservations
about the alternative that is proposed by this Committee, in all
good faith, as what they see would be an improvement and I do
see some real concerns and some real difficulties with those proposals.
48. While you agree the bona fides, would
you not agree that it would be appropriate that the recommendations
of this Committee should be put to the House and that the Government
should not use its authority on its members to get them to vote
in a particular way if we are to shift the balance back to the
House of Commons away from the Executive because at the moment
the balance is all in favour of the Executive, and that that would
be one way to deal with this matter? If I may introduce another
particular issue while I have got the floor. As Chairman of the
Procedure Committee in this Parliament, I have a particular problem
in achieving a quorum for many of our meetings because under the
Standing Orders we are in fact allowed 17 members but only 14
have been appointed. There are problems of achieving a quorum,
which is five. I have written to the whips of your party, my party,
and I have spoken to you as Leader of the House to express concern
about the difficulties which are being faced by my Committee because
of poor attendance. Some Members on your side have been told,
"You will stay on but you do not need to turn up." Is
that not a very odd way for the Government to believe in the authority
of the House? Do you not believe that you as Leader of the House
have a duty to deal with your side of the House, as I would bring
pressure upon mine, to ensure there are Members serving on my
Committee who are committed to what the Committee does and its
duties and responsibilities and that we should have Members who
are prepared to turn up, and a full complement of Members who
are prepared to turn up? Why have you not acted?
(Margaret Beckett) I certainly do not have a role
in appointment of Members to Select Committees when you say "why
have I not acted?" Can I also say of course I accept that
it is very disappointing to the whole House, and it must be particularly
disappointing to the Committee of Chairmen of Committees, when
for a variety of reasons with regard to their work and so on there
are not sufficient Members coming forward to staff some of the
Committees, but in a sense, Mr Winterton, you are asking me to
do precisely what you are all saying governments should not do.
I certainly cannot compel Members—
49. But what we are suggesting would in fact
remedy that because we would do it.
(Margaret Beckett) With respect, you could not compel.
I cannot compel Members to wish to serve on particular Committees.
Things come and go, as we all know. There are times when there
is vast competition for one Committee or another and other times
when there is less competition because something seems to be happening
elsewhere and this is where Members direct their attention. The
House cannot compel Members to wish to serve, I certainly cannot,
and I frankly doubt even if your new proposed structure could.
Chairman: Mr Davis?
Mr Davis
50. I would like to turn to something which
I thought was less controversial but which was turned down equally
brutally in the Government's response and that is the idea we
put forward of a Select Committee half-hour at the beginning of
the day one day of the week. When we proposed that idea of the
debate for half an hour, we suggested that the Tuesday Ten-Minute
Rule Bill should be moved to Mondays. In your reply you said that
you would be "reluctant to disturb the well-established procedures
for Private Members' Bills." All we suggested was not that
we change the procedure but that we simply moved the same procedure
to another day. Did you really mean that reason for turning it
down?
(Margaret Beckett) I did. I think there are two separate
elements here. One of them is whether we make another change of
the kind that was proposed to make room for this half an hour,
and the other one is whether having the half an hour is something
that is a strong and desirable recommendation. If I can take the
first one first. I can think of few things that cause a Government
greater difficulty than happily deciding to make changes to procedures
such as the Ten-Minute Rule Bill procedure which, however much
people from time to time may deplore it, does have a certain popularity
with our parliamentary colleagues. The notion that I should give
a ready assent, "We will move that out of the way. Why not?"—I
am a better politician than that, Mr Davis. That is my first remark.
My second is with regard to the notion of a Select Committee half-hour.
At first, as you know, although it seems a minor proposal, actually
proposing half an hour in prime time on the floor of the House
is not minor at all; it is very important and it is very significant.
That in itself is a proposal of major import to the House. My
second and in some ways perhaps my principal concern—and
I completely understand the natural feeling among Select Committees,
especially if the Committee has been beavering away perhaps in
some cases on a very major report for months on end, they have
got it all in their heads, they are imbued with all the ideas
and they want everybody to take an interest in it and to take
notice of it because it is a matter of great importance otherwise
they would not have spent so much time on it, so naturally they
want it to be given oversight, to be in the public domain as speedily
as possible, and why not on the floor of the House straight away
and forthwith? The difficulty with that is that is what the Committee
has been doing and they may have taken evidence from Ministers
and many others but not everyone else will have all of that in
their minds. While I can see the attraction for a Select Committee
I can also see considerable dangers in the suggestion that Government
should give a kind of off-the-cuff response to reports and proposals
of this kind. In many ways the more significant and profound and
detailed the response, the more difficult that is likely to be.
Again, I think one of the things I have at the back of my mind
perhaps rather more than it seems to me the Committee did is that
particularly if we are to move into an area where there is much
more joined-up working across departments, that again makes it
infinitely more difficult to give a kind of off-the-cuff response,
first thoughts response, first reaction response, particularly
to anything of real weight and consequence.
51. Two points on that. Firstly, I can understand
if we are talking about removing the Ten-Minute Rule Bill slot
but we are not, we are talking about moving it from Tuesday to
Monday. I would not argue very much if we went for Monday ourselves,
so I think we could bypass that problem. The second one is you
said there is a problem with the Minister having difficulty. That
was one of the reasons the Committee actually suggested that it
was opened by the Minister and the Minister then is not bounced
by questions that he is not expecting. Frankly, if Ministers in
any Government of any description cannot prepare in two weeks
to speak for five minutes on a Select Committee Report that is
a fairly poor show, but those were the arguments that you put
in your response. The other argument you put in your response
was in relation to the rights of back-benchers. You say in paragraph
29 of the Reply: "Extra rights for Select Committees should
not be at the expense of individual back-benchers." We are
talking about one per cent of a 45 hour working week on average
in this House. Let us get one thing clear. Could you confirm the
Government understands that the proposed half an hour would give
an opportunity to opposition front-benchers and to back-benchers
not on the Select Committee concerned? In other words, 20 minutes
for people not on the Select Committee and not the Minister. Then
you would actually get an advantage. You would have at least two
back-benchers involved in that response straight away. How is
that to the disadvantage of back-benchers?
(Margaret Beckett) I think you understand the reference
very well, Mr Davis, and that is there is a big difference between
somebody having an opportunity to comment on a Select Committee
report which is now in the public domain and a whole ten minute
slot for an individual which they have bid for and perhaps sat
up in the small hours trying to get their slot and so on and they
have the freedom then to make their case to the House in prime
time.
52. We are not talking about replacing that,
we are talking about something different. What we are displacing
is probably half an hour of Government time in truth. How is that
hurting the back-benchers?
(Margaret Beckett) I was referring to the proposal—
This is a response to the package of those proposals. I was referring
then to the proposal to move the Ten-Minute Rule Bills slot. I
accept that the notion of having half an hour is not something
that is particularly at the expense of back-benchers, it is a
notion in itself to take time from the floor of the House at prime
time which is a slightly different matter, a different aspect
of the proposal.
53. If for the sake of argument we took it on
a Monday and not the Tuesday, let us put that to one side to make
it very clear. Where is the drawback in that? You said that yes,
of course, it is significant, of course it is significant. You
said earlier in the meeting that you are very much in favour of
making Select Committees more effective and this would make them
more effective at a stroke. Why is it a bad thing? It is not hurting
back-benchers, it is simply taking one per cent of the parliamentary
week at the beginning of the parliamentary day. Where is the problem?
(Margaret Beckett) You said yourself that this is
an enormously important period in the parliamentary day. It is
a period when there is always a huge amount of pressure for time
and for business. I repeat what I said earlier: I am not convinced
that it is in the interests of the House or of Select Committees
for there to be, in effect, off-the-cuff reactions to what may
be, and to what ought to be, reports which are taken with very
great seriousness.
Mr Radice
54. The purpose of this idea is to give more
publicity and more immediate response to a Select Committee report.
Sometimes the problem with some of the responses is (a) that they
do not happen within the two month period, there are quite a lot
of the reports which are not replied to within the two month period,
and (b) it is extremely difficult to get a debate on those reports.
We are trying to provide a system in which you can get the key
Select Committee reports debated much earlier. I think that would
be good for Parliament. Do you not think that the principle is
right—you have put up some detailed objections to this—that
important Select Committee reports supported by a lot of back-benchers
are debated much earlier than they are at present? It is so easy,
as you know, for Governments just to lose those reports. If you
believe in Select Committees, if you really do believe, this is
a way of getting Select Committee reports debated more effectively
than they are at the moment. If you can think of a better way
of doing it than we have then do tell us because that is what
we are trying to do.
(Margaret Beckett) First, can I say that of course
I accept that successive Liaison Committees in successive Governments
have sought twice as much time for Select Committee reports to
be debated on the floor, or on occasions three times as much as
now and successive Governments have felt unable to grant that
request. Second, of course I do accept the validity of the argument
that the inevitable constraints on time on the floor have meant
that all too often very genuinely interesting and worthwhile Select
Committee reports have not been debated perhaps at all or over
a substantial period. One of the things which, with great respect
to the Committee, I thought was perhaps missing from the report
was recognition of the fact that it was under this Government
that potentially four times as much time for Select Committee
reports to be debated has been made available in Westminster Hall.
One of the things that is a source of some slight dismay to me
is that at the present time we are rather behind for precisely
the reasons that are identified in terms of the Government response,
of people knowing that subjects are coming up and so on. We did
suggest early on that a programme of the undebated reports should
be put forward and perhaps in the time that is found one might
try to take more than one Select Committee report on a given day
in Westminster Hall or, indeed, look for more time or more of
the time to be given to Select Committee reports. At the present
time we are awaiting nominations as to what undebated reports
could be taken. I do think that is one element that is missing
from the proposals, recognition of the potential and value. While
I fully understand that there are always those who feel that it
is time on the floor which is of most importance, we had some
interesting observations very recently from—I cannot recall
exactly how they described themselves—I think it was the
BBC's Regional Unit or something of that kind, saying what a huge
amount of use regional news media are making of the debates in
the Select Committee report debates that are taking place in Westminster
Hall. I fear, and I say this with great respect to all our colleagues
who are so engaged by it, that the time when we will get the parliamentary
lobby to take a greater interest and the Select Committee reports
is probably not as near as many of us in this room would like.
Certainly other news media are much more likely to take up and
to pursue subjects of interest and they are, indeed, already beginning
to do that.
Chairman: We will go on then to Martin
O'Neill.
Mr O'Neill
55. Margaret, there are some areas where we
are probably just about in agreement. Something where we are just
about in agreement is on pre-legislation. You make the point that
it does create an additional burden for Ministers and it creates
problems with Parliamentary Counsel and, indeed, perhaps for departments.
I would like to say that there is a wee bit of an inconsistency
here because if the Government asks for prelegislative scrutiny,
asks for assistance, then one assumes that they will have the
resource to back it. I know that you have been given notice in
particular about the shortage of Parliamentary Counsel. Perhaps
you could tell us what the position is regarding resources at
the present moment. Have there been increases in resource and
over how long a period has this been taking place, because I think
this is central to our consideration of this part?
(Margaret Beckett) First, can I say that I wholeheartedly
share everybody's view that one of the things that is highly desirable
is for us to have more pre-legislative scrutiny, whether through
draft Bills or other means, and I strongly support that. I think
all that is identified in our response to the report is not that
this is not highly desirable but that it is not as easy as it
might be at the present time. I ought perhaps to say in parenthesis
that we are doing a certain amount of work. I think most of the
Committee will know that a variety of different means of pre-legislative
scrutiny have been tried and experimenting with different mechanisms
is something that we want to continue. Also, we are trying now
to review and evaluate how it has worked in the sense that particularly
with some of the more technical legislation there is something
of a perspective that it may have identified problems but not
wholly resolved them. Perhaps it required even greater time than
one might have anticipated. So we are looking at those implications.
I entirely accept that one of the things we have made plain is
that a very real source of difficulty is the inadequacy of the
resources available by means of Parliamentary Counsel. As I am
sure you will appreciate, even more than in many other fields,
this is not something one can turn round overnight. Where we are
in terms of the changes that we have made are that the number
of Counsel has now been expanded—this is since the General
Election—by just about ten per cent. And also their pay
system has been restructured because it became apparent that one
of the reasons that Parliamentary Counsel were under-resourced
was because it was simply not competitive in terms of the people
that were needed. So at the present time there are 40 Parliamentary
Counsel.
Mrs Dunwoody
56. 40?
(Margaret Beckett) 40. They are part of the expansion
which we hope will lead to perhaps 47 over the next few years.
That is from a base of 36 which is what we inherited. There has
also been substantial investment in computer hardware and software,
which I understand was relatively absent, and in supporting administrative
staff. With regard to the financial resources, the current provision
has almost doubled since the pre-Election year in 1996-97. There
is a blip in the figures because there was a substantial capital
investment last year to take on the substantial changes that needed
to be made. So we have made substantially more financial resources
available in terms of equipment and of support staff and also
we have made available the resources to take on substantially
larger numbers of Parliamentary Counsel themselves[1].
Mr O'Neill
57. Have you found that Members in the House
are taking advantage of the pre-legislative scrutiny reports of
Select Committees when they go to Standing Committee and have
been able to deploy the arguments which have been raised or the
content and the questions? My experience is that we have in the
DTI Select Committee done about four or five pieces. They have
not been particularly controversial but they have been detailed
and we felt it was useful to get this body of information down
which takes a slightly different form from a Library brief. I
think we would feel that this is one of the useful tasks that
we can take forward and that it is not a confrontational issue
between the Select Committee and Government; it is an opportunity
to work in partnership.
(Margaret Beckett) I completely agree with that. I
think one of the most valuable things that involving the Select
Committees in any form of pre-legislative scrutiny can contribute
is that of course, by definition, these are Members who have built
up expertise and experience in this particular area whereas, as
we all know, for a variety of very good reasons those who are
appointed to a Standing Committee, although they may have expressed
a particular interest in the subject, may not have necessarily
built up the different kind of experience that comes from being
members of a Select Committee and hearing week in week out evidence
from expert witnesses on similar topics and things of that kind.
Mr Pike
58. I chair the Deregulation Committee and Deregulation,
as you rightly indicate, is the only one that has scrutinised
a Bill in this Parliamentary year and, in fact, we are meeting
tomorrow to look at a final part that the Minister has asked us
to have special further consideration of. Can I take it from what
you have said (you have really simplified my question) that it
really is what the report says in the Government's response in
the paragraphs that you have referred to, 38 to 40, and that the
Government therefore is just as disappointed as anybody else that
there has not been a higher level of draft Bills and pre-legislative
scrutiny and that there really is a commitment we will see far
more in the year ahead?
(Margaret Beckett) Absolutely. In a sense, I would
say we have been in a very unusual position this year. My perception
is that a very high percentage of time and resource has been taken
up by the Financial Services and Markets Bill, because that involved
huge technicalities being delivered in an area where the ground
underneath the feet is changing all the time, the area that is
being regulated. It is matters of that kind which have meant that
we have not been able to bring forward as many draft Bills as
we had hoped and as speedily as we had hoped. I do hope that is
something we can remedy. I very much take the view that this is
one of the most valuable areas that Select Committees can operate
in. If we on our side as Government are able to do more to improve
the way in which we bring legislation forward, I think over time
you could see a real change. I do believe that this would be a
real shifting of the balance in terms of the way the House operates
now and the way that our agenda now is dominated by a changing
picture in legislative terms.
59. Certainly in our case the Minister has bounced
things back to us and our corresponding Committee in the House
of Lords to define what the final Bill will be so that is useful
from everybody's point of view.
(Margaret Beckett) Absolutely.
1 See Memorandum p 13. Back
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