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Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. and learned Gentleman must know that this is a matter for debate. If the House moves into Committee, these matters can be debated then. That, indeed, is the time for all those points to be considered. Any amendments or intended amendments will be taken into account then; we cannot have this matter debated as a point of order.
Mr. Deputy Speaker:
Order. I advise the House that we are now moving into Committee. We must complete that process—[Interruption.] Order.
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Orders of the Day
Prevention of Terrorism Bill
[Sir Alan Haselhurst in the Chair]
[Relevant documents: First Report from the Joint Committee on Human Rights, Session 2004–05, HC 389, Prevention of Terrorism Bill: Preliminary Report; Memoranda laid before the Constitutional Affairs Committee, HC 323–II, on the Operation of the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC); and Uncorrected Minutes of Evidence taken before the Constitutional Affairs Committee on 22nd February 2004, HC 323–i, Session 2004–05, on the Operation of the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC).]
4.30 pm
Mr. Douglas Hogg (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con): On a point of order, Sir Alan. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough (Mr. Garnier) has pointed out that substantial amendments have been tabled to the initial clauses of the Bill. The problem is that there are so many amendments that if we debate the initial clauses at the start, we will be unable to debate the later ones, which may remain in the Bill. Can we invite the Home Secretary to tell us which clauses are going to be so substantially rewritten that we need spend only a relatively short period debating them? Otherwise, we are going to debate clauses that are not going to form part of the Bill. In those circumstances, the schedule that the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) wanted to debate, for example, may not be debated at all.
The Chairman of Ways and Means (Sir Alan Haselhurst): I have to tell the right hon. and learned Member that that is entirely a matter for the Home Secretary. If he seeks to catch my eye, he can deal with the matter. No doubt he will have heard what the right hon. and learned Member said.
Mr. Kenneth Clarke (Rushcliffe) (Con): Further to that point of order, Sir Alan. I, too, have read the letter mentioned by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough (Mr. Garnier). None of us was aware of it until the Division provided an opportunity to get it. As I read the Home Secretary's intentions, if the Bill is amended as he proposes, it will make the entire first group of amendments otiose and unnecessary, so we could be about to waste a considerable amount of time debating amendments that will fall by the way. Will you, Sir Alan, invite the Home Secretary to table in manuscript form as quickly as possible the amendments that he describes in the letter? We must know exactly what we are debating. As far as I am aware, the only reason for not debating the amendments that have been proposed so far is that the Government do not want the Committee to discuss them. They prefer to wait until the Bill goes to the other place, where there will be more time to deal with them.
The Chairman:
I would have to say to the right hon. and learned Gentleman the same as I said to the right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North
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Hykeham (Mr. Hogg)—that the Home Secretary could clarify the position if he were to catch my eye early in the debate. It would then be for the Committee to determine the amount of time that it wished to devote to each group of amendments that I—in good faith, I would add—have selected.
The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Charles Clarke): Further to that point of order, Sir Alan. I would be happy to clarify the position. To be candid, I thought that I was being helpful to the Committee in respect of its consideration of these matters by writing the letter that was mentioned. Since Second Reading last Thursday, I have been considering as fully as I can many of the issues raised on both sides of the House. The choice that I faced was whether to respond to the debate on the first group of amendments, summing up my conclusion at that point, or to seek to help the Committee by letting the position become clearer at an earlier stage of our proceedings. That is why I wrote the letter.
In response to the points of order, and if it is convenient to you, Sir Alan, I would be happy to set out clearly the conclusions that I summarised in the letter in order to help the Committee's consideration at this stage. If, on the other hand, you would prefer me to deal with that later, I would be happy to take that advice, too. I defer to you, Sir Alan, as to which of those two courses I should follow.
Mr. Eric Forth (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con): Further to that point of order, Sir Alan. Is not the problem facing us, notwithstanding the Home Secretary's attempt to be helpful, that we cannot prejudge whether the Lords would accept any of the amendments that he said he would submit to their lordships rather than to this Committee? We must debate the Bill and the amendments as they are before us, because even if the Home Secretary has generously decided to tell us what he thinks he will do in another place, he cannot know whether the other place will accept the amendments.
The Chairman: I shall try to help the Committee as best I can. For the sake of good order, the clarification and debate should take place not on a point of order, but on the first group of amendments. I can give the Committee an undertaking that the Home Secretary will have an early opportunity to catch my eye. Then, depending on what he tells the Committee and its reaction to that, it will be able to judge what speed it wishes to make on the first group of amendments. I shall be as flexible as possible, to help the Committee to cover the substantive matters for discussion.
The Chairman: Order. We are taking time from the debate. The Home Secretary said that he was anxious to say something of substance to the Committee. I am trying to say that for the sake of good order, that should be said on the substantive debate, which I am anxious to start.
Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire) (Con):
Further to that point of order—I am trying to be helpful, as you are, Sir Alan. In view of what the Home Secretary said in his letter and at the Dispatch Box, would it not be sensible for the Committee to have a brief suspension so that the Home Secretary can table some amendments that we could then debate?
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Otherwise, we shall debate amendments that are, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Mr. Hogg) said, otiose.
You have already said, Sir Alan, that you are willing, in principle, to consider manuscript amendments. The Home Secretary clearly knows the sort of manuscript amendments he would submit and if the Committee suspended, even for a quarter of an hour—certainly no more than half an hour—that could be done.
The Chairman: I do not believe that a suspension would be to the advantage of the Committee, because that would take further time from the debate, on which the House has agreed a programme motion which is slightly more generous than the previous one to which the House agreed. I advise the Committee that it would be better now to proceed to the substantive discussion. In the light of what the Home Secretary says, the Committee will know how much of the time in the programme motion it wishes to devote to it.
Mr. Mark Fisher (Stoke-on-Trent, Central) (Lab): On a different and short point of order, Sir Alan. Having agreed the programme motion, what procedure is available to the Committee to take advantage of the Opposition's offer of an extra day's debate? Is it only the Government who can table an amendment to the programme motion that we have passed? There seems to be a general feeling in the Committee that we are short of time to discuss such an important Bill and that an extra day given by the Opposition would be approved.
The Chairman: That is not a matter on which the Chair can adjudicate. I must deal with the fact that the House has agreed a programme motion, which sets the agenda for today. I advise that we proceed on those lines.
Mr. William Cash (Stone) (Con): On a point of order, Sir Alan—
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