House of Commons - Procedure

Select Committee on Procedure First Report

3 Early Day Motions

59. In early 2006 we sent a questionnaire to all Members asking their views on the procedures for Early Day Motions (EDMs). We received replies from 264 Members. An analysis of those replies is published as an Annex to this report. In March 2006 we heard oral evidence from Mr Norman Baker MP, Mr Douglas Hogg MP and Mr David Kidney MP. In December 2006 we heard oral evidence from Dr Malcolm Jack, Clerk of the House of Commons, and Mr David Natzler, Principal Clerk, Table Office and Mr Paul Simpkin, Chief Office Clerk, Table Office. We have also received a number of written submission which are published with this report. We are grateful to all those who assisted us with this inquiry.

Uses to which EDMs are put

60. The memorandum from the Clerk of the House briefly describes the history of EDMs. From this it is evident that the procedure was not created with its present uses in mind. It developed over time in response to the demands and the ingenuity of Members. Perhaps as a consequence of that history EDMs are now used for a wide range of purposes. These are described in the Clerk's memorandum:

Most EDMs fall into one or more of the following categories:

expressing opinions on issues of general public interest, often to assess the degree of support amongst Members;

continuing the political debate (for example, criticism of Government or Opposition policy);

giving prominence to a campaign or the work of some pressure group outside the House;

highlighting local issues (such as the success of the local football team, the achievements of constituents, the need for a bypass, and so on).

EDMs are also used for narrower purposes:

for "prayers" against statutory instruments, usually in the name of the Leader of the Opposition or the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, which act as a trigger for reference of an instrument for debate in a Standing Committee on Delegated Legislation. Such motions normally account for 2% or less of EDMs in a session (0.9% and 1.3% in the last two sessions);

to criticise individuals (members of the Royal Family, Members of either House, a judge, or the Chair) where such criticism in debate would be disorderly; and

to set out detailed allegations against a company, other body or individual under the protection of parliamentary privilege.[53]

61. For many of these purposes there is no obvious other parliamentary outlet. As Mr Kidney put it to us, EDMs have 'long been called "political graffiti", but out of the graffiti come some important messages to us sometimes which have not got an outlet somewhere else.'[54] The Clerk of the House commented that 'There are no proceedings which give the width that early day motions give.'[55]

62. The rules governing EDMs rarely constrain the uses which Members wish to make of them. Matters which are sub judice may not be raised. Unparliamentary language is not permitted. Allegations against Members, members of the House of Lords and certain others must be made as the main substance of the EDM and may not be made in passing. In our survey of Members' views only 16% of respondents were opposed to retaining the current word limit (250 words) and the requirement that an EDM be drafted as a single sentence.

63. EDMs can be an effective way of connecting with the public. All Members will have received letters from constituents urging them to sign particular EDMs. It may be that many of these letters are promoted by the very pressure or campaigning group which in the first place persuaded a Member or group of Members to table the EDM. But this does not necessarily invalidate the process. As the Association of Professional Political Consultants put it:

for those outside Parliament EDMs are a reference point, identifying MPs who support (or oppose) a particular policy objective. EDMs can be cited in correspondence, for example with Ministers, as demonstrating a level of support for an issue in Parliament.

They went on to express their concern that:

any restriction on current arrangements for tabling EDMs would limit the ability of organisations (perhaps primarily charities, NGOs and other 'non-commercial' groups) to make use of this valuable campaigning tool. Moreover, there is no obvious other mechanism which might be used by such groups to draw the attention of Parliament and Government to an issue.[56]

64. On the other hand there a risk that some members of the public believe that the signing of an EDM is a more significant act than it seems to most Members. Mr Hogg told us:

one of the reasons I dislike signing them because I feel it is a form of humbuggery, that actually you are deceiving people into thinking you are doing something significant but you are not.[57]

One of the arguments against the introduction of electronic tabling of EDMs is that it would make it too easy to sign them and would therefore 'make them even more worthless than they are at the present time.'[58] On the other hand, many members of the public clearly attach importance to establishing where their MP stands on specific issues. It is perhaps also possible that some Members will sign EDMs, if they are asked to, even if they do not in fact fully agree with them. There is some evidence for this latter proposition from the few occasions on which EDMs have been selected for debate on Opposition days. Not all Members, who had signed such EDMs, supported them in the division lobby.

65. It is a widely held view that there are now too many EDMs. The number tabled has been rising fairly steadily since the 1950s and has more or less doubled since the mid-1980s[59] when our predecessor committee was concerned that the increase in numbers then had had the effect of 'devaluing the currency.'[60] This same phrase was used by both Mr Hogg and Mr Baker in evidence to us.[61] Mr Baker added, 'there are too many and therefore the good ones, and the use to which EDMs can be put, become diluted by the ones which are chaff.'[62] Mr Kidney made a slightly different point:

if there is a problem it is "Can't see the trees for the woods" problem; there are so many that we cannot pick out which ones are the significant ones. There is a danger then that something which could be quite useful becomes useless because there are too many others that are masking the one that is important.[63]

66. These are powerful arguments. The House has an interest in doing what it can to ensure the continuing effectiveness and usefulness of its procedures. We have therefore considered how the numbers of EDMs might be limited and what would be the consequences of introducing such measures. There are two approaches which could be adopted. The first would be to introduce some form of rationing of the number of EDMs which Members could table and sign. This might be accompanied by a requirement that an EDM is supported by a minimum number of Members before it could be tabled. The second would be to attempt to limit the subject matter of EDMs.

Rationing EDMs

67. The practical difficulties with any proposal to limit the number of EDMs which a Member could table were spelled out to us in the Clerk's memorandum:

a limit of, say, five EDMs would be seen by many Members as unnecessarily restrictive, but even a limit of five, if widely taken up, might make little or no difference to the number of EDMs;

?should the limit be upon EDMs tabled, or current? In other words, could a Member stay within the limit by withdrawing one motion and tabling another? If this were not allowed, the restriction (and perhaps the objections) would be greater; and a Member who, without being improvident, used up the allocation in the first half of a session might be disadvantaged later if, for example, serious constituency issues arose;

sessions are not of equal length, and the date of Prorogation is not known at the outset, so the application of such a rule would be approximate. By definition it is impossible to predict sessions which are shorter by virtue of ending in Dissolution. On the other hand, it is possible to predict that a session will be longer than usual, but not with any precision how long it will be;

a limit by calendar year would mean that Prorogation—when all EDMs fall—is likely to occur during that year. The application of a limit in these circumstances, with the pressure to table EDMs early in a session so that they are in play for longer, might produce odd results;

a limit by another calendar period (for example month or week) would have little practical effect, not least because the allowance would be refreshed at the end of the period; and

Members could easily circumvent the rule by "trading" EDMs. Member A would prepare a motion but ask Member B to be the first name, and so technically to be the Member in charge. If Member A subsequently withdrew his or her name, then Member B would become the Member in charge, but could plausibly claim that he or she had not sought this position, and that the motion should not therefore be counted against the limit.[64]

But there is also an argument of principle. If despite all the practical difficulties a robust rationing system was introduced, it would follow that at some point Members would be prevented from tabling EDMs on matters which they considered of importance, because their ration had been used up. In our view this would be an unacceptable restriction on the actions of individual Members.

68. For similar reasons we do not support the proposal that an EDM should have to attract a certain number of signatures before it could be tabled. As Mr Kidney put it:

the fact that only a small number of people hold a particular point of view does not make it a point of view that should not be listened to. It might be actually a very significant point that is being made.[65]

Limitations on subject matter

Triviality

69. As we noted above, the principal ground on which objection has been taken to the sheer number of EDMs is that 'there are so many that we cannot pick out which ones are the significant ones.'[66] A possible solution would be to find some way of classifying EDMs by their significance and then in some way removing or excluding the insignificant ones. As Mr Baker put it:

If we can find just some way of promoting those ones which genuinely raise important points, which genuinely are ones which Members feel strongly about, cross-party, then that will be doing a service to Parliament.[67]

There is currently no rule which would specifically prevent the tabling of an EDM because its subject matter was insignificant or trivial. As Mr David Natzler, the Principal Clerk, Table Office, explained:

Erskine May has a phrase that the Speaker, who ultimately controls what appears on the paper, can direct that notice of motion cannot appear if it is not a "proper subject for debate", and that phrase we would prefer, and very rarely apply. … it would be very difficult for the Office to apply such a rule [on triviality] without causing offence because even a motion tabled by a single Member on, let us say, railway line closure is obviously not at all trivial for the Member, and I do not think the Office would want to be in the position of saying that.[68]

The Clerk of the House, Dr Malcolm Jack, interpreted the phrase 'not a proper subject for debate' in the context of EDMs as follows:

I think it is a protective phrase, if I can put it that way, of the Speaker's discretion over early day motions or any other motion or matters on the Order Paper.[69]

Although there have been occasions when particular EDMs have been singled out, by the media or by others, as being trivial or inappropriate for some other reason, for example that they are intended to be humorous, we do not believe that significant numbers of such motions are tabled. Mr Natzler told us in December 2006:

I arrived in this office only three months ago, expecting to deal with and read a lot of trivial motions, partly because I sensed a lot of Members thought there were a lot of trivial motions on the Order Paper. I have difficulty in saying, in all candour, that I have seen one.[70]

Mrs Gwyneth Dunwoody MP commented, 'Sometimes the subjects are banal and would not be raised on the floor of the House, but they are nevertheless often important to constituents.'[71]

MINISTERIAL RESPONSIBILITY

70. An alternative approach would be that an EDM should have to engage ministerial responsibility. This proposal was put to us by Mr Kidney, who associated it with his support for a procedure to enable EDMs to be debated:

my proposal that we should have debatable Early Day Motions brings with it, I think, the corollary that therefore the Early Day Motions must follow the same requirements of adjournment debates, … they have to engage ministerial responsibility, and … they must not call for legislation.[72]

Mr Derek Conway MP proposed a somewhat similar restriction, that 'the issues should have some relationship to public policy.'[73]

71. We address the question of whether there should be more opportunities for debating EDMs in paragraphs 76 to 82 below. A requirement that an EDM engaged ministerial responsibility might reduce the number considerably, but it would also close off several of the uses to which Members currently put EDMs and for which there are no other obvious parliamentary alternatives. In the view of Dr Jack, such a restriction 'would be quite draconian and I think quite unpopular with a large number of Members of the House'.[74]

72. A requirement that an EDM should be related to public policy would be less restrictive, but, depending on how the phrase was interpreted, might still exclude significant numbers of EDMs. Purely local issues or matters relating to the circumstances of individuals or specific groups might be excluded, as well as those drawing attention to and soliciting support for certain campaigns. Occasionally Members have used EDMs to make allegations about the conduct of, for example, companies or local authorities which if made without the protection of parliamentary privilege might be actionable. Members should always use the protection of privilege responsibly and with care, but the freedom to make public statements on controversial or contested issues without fear of legal action should not be undervalued. The Joint Committee on Parliamentary Privilege stated in its report of 1999:

We consider it a matter of the utmost importance that there should be a national public forum where all manner of persons, irrespective of their power or wealth, can be criticised. Members should not be exposed to the risk of being brought before the courts to defend what they said in Parliament.[75]

73. We therefore conclude that attempts to restrict the total number of EDMs by restricting their subject matter would be misguided. Any acceptable definition of trivial would exclude too few to make a significant difference. Excluding EDMs which do not engage ministerial responsibility or relate to public policy might reduce the numbers considerably, but would also prevent EDMs from being used for a number of purposes, which are in our view both valid and valued.

74. Nonetheless we understand the concern of Members that the number of EDMs currently tabled makes it hard for them and for others to find and identify those which are of interest to them. There is no easy answer to this, but we do believe that there is potential through the electronic publication of EDMs to improve the present situation. We discuss the publication of EDMs on the parliamentary website in paragraphs 91 and 92 below.

75. We are also aware that the rising numbers have led to an increased workload for the Table Office. This is felt particularly acutely at the end of sittings, since Members may table EDMs, often with many hand-written signatures right up to the rising of the House. As a consequence staff in the Table Office can be required to stay on long after the House has risen deciphering those signatures. The right to table motions and amendments until the rising of the House is used on occasion by both the Government and the Opposition. We would not wish to take it away from backbench Members. On the other hand we do not believe that there is a similar issue of principle over the printing of all the added names. Mr Natzler suggested to us that:

It would be a help to give us some relief or some administrative freedom when there is a mass of signed motions coming in unduly late, and we would try, if we could not print the names of all those added to [an EDM], to give the numbers.[76]

We believe that this is a reasonable compromise. Accordingly we recommend that in the case of any EDMs tabled after the moment of interruption, the Table Office should have discretion to publish only the top six names and the total number of names in the following day's papers. The remaining names would then be published the next day.

Debates

76. 44% of the respondents to our questionnaire supported the proposition that it should be possible for some EDMs to be debated. 14% opposed it and 42% did not reply to the question. The three Members from whom we took oral evidence were in favour of enabling some EDMs to be debated, although they disagreed as to how those EDMs should be chosen and on what form the debate should take. A number of Members in responding to the questionnaire indicated that they thought that EDMs which secured a certain number of signatures should be debated. Mr Baker suggested that:

it would be possible to decide it on a factual basis by the number of signatures or the number of parties involved or some other mechanism… That then would make debates for those matters more pressing and more likely to occur.[77]

Mr Kidney on the other hand disagreed:

I do not support selecting an Early Day Motion for debate by the number of people who sign it, precisely because you would have some just ridiculous campaign for a large number of people to sign something which is totally not worth voting in Parliament.[78]

Similar concerns were expressed in the Clerk's memorandum:

To select a motion simply on the number of signatures it had acquired would have several disadvantages. A threshold would have to be set. 200 signatures? 300? Whatever the qualifying number, I think it is certain that such a requirement would send the "signing industry" into overdrive. Names would be sought and added not simply to indicate support, but to assist a motion's chances of debate. Outside organisations would be even more pressing in seeking support for EDMs that they had sponsored. The effect would surely be further to devalue the currency.[79]

77. Mr Hogg and Mr Kidney both proposed that EDMs should be selected for debate. Mr Hogg thought that the Speaker might make the selection.[80] Mr Kidney preferred the usual channels: 'why do we not accept what happens and let the usual channels make the decisions about which ones of these are debated?'[81] Both options have their disadvantages (as both Members recognised).

78. We do not believe that it would be appropriate for the Speaker to be asked to choose specific EDMs for debate. Given the number of EDMs and the range of issues they cover it would be extremely difficult to choose between them on the basis of criteria such as topicality or national importance in an objective or disinterested way. Inevitably the Speaker would be obliged to choose between statements of contention between the parties in ways which in our view would risk prejudicing the essential impartiality of his role. Neither do we believe that it would be appropriate to leave the choice to the usual channels. In proposing it, Mr Kidney drew an analogy with the Liaison Committee, but that is a formal committee of the House which discharges, in respect of the choice of subjects to be debated on Estimates days and on certain Thursdays in Westminster Hall, a duty placed on it by the House and set out in the Standing Orders.

79. A third approach would be to select EDMs for debate by means of a ballot. The practicalities of this approach are discussed in the Clerk's memorandum.[82] The conclusion reached is that a ballot of motions (as opposed to one of Members) would not be practicable. It would require that EDMs were separated into debatable and non-debatable motions. It is likely that Members would table more debatable EDMs to give themselves a better chance in the ballot. It would risk the multiplication of EDMs on particular subjects in order to give those subjects a greater chance of being drawn. Some selection in respect of topicality might also be necessary to avoid EDMs being drawn for debate long after the issue they addressed had been resolved or when the circumstances had so changed as to make the EDM no longer appropriate for debate. In short, we agree with the conclusion in the Clerk's memorandum, that if a choice is to be made by ballot, it should be by a ballot of Members, not of EDMs.

80. A ballot of Members was, of course, the method by which Private Members' Motions were selected before their abolition in 1994. Members could enter their names for a separate ballot for each Private Members' Motions day. The ballot was drawn in the Chamber; three names were chosen. The Clerk's memorandum suggests that a ballot of Members could still retain a link with EDMs: successful Members could table as an EDM the motion they wished to debate, or they could choose an EDM which they had already tabled. We agree that it would be perverse to insist that a Member successful in a ballot (presumably for a day a week or more ahead) should be obliged to choose to debate an existing EDM. Such a rule would militate against topicality; it would also risk encouraging the tabling of large numbers of speculative EDMs by Members against the chance that they were successful in the ballot. On the other hand we do not see the point of tabling a motion which is to be debated on a particular future day as an EDM. It should be tabled as a notice of motion for the day on which it is to be debated.

81. Consequently we do not see any advantage in creating a link between EDMs and a procedure for selecting motions for debate by way of a ballot of Members. A number of Members, and others, have argued for the reintroduction of Private Members' Motions. We are sympathetic to this. It is a matter of some concern that the House of Commons does not provide an opportunity for a backbench Member to have a substantive motion debated and decided. We are not persuaded, however, that finding some way to debate certain EDMs would be the best way of addressing that concern. Dr Jack told us:

I do agree with the sentiment that it is rather odd that private Members do not have the opportunity that you have alluded to, but somehow I do not think that this route is the right route, for some of the reasons we have already discussed; that in a way a lot of the purpose of early day motions is to give publicity to something or other that links, for example, … to the outside world in the sense of a campaign. And it actually may not be something that the Member would want to be debated in the House. I think that the matter of private Members' motions really is a separate matter and I think needs a different set of considerations.[83]

82. The Select Committee on Modernisation of the House of Commons is currently inquiring into the role of the backbencher and into the use of non-legislative time. We are aware that this issue has arisen in the context of those inquiries. We urge the Committee to give serious consideration to the reintroduction of an opportunity for Private Members to have substantive motions debated and, if necessary, voted on.

'TAGGING' EDMS

83. Mr Kidney proposed that EDMs should be debated in Westminster Hall on a motion for the adjournment.[84] He accepted that this would mean that they could not be voted on. In effect, as we understand it, the EDM would be tagged to the debate, much as a select committee report may be tagged. In other words it would be noted on the Order Paper as relevant but would not be formally part of the proceedings. The Clerk's memorandum considered this possibility:

It has been suggested that EDMs could be introduced into the current Westminster Hall procedure by being tagged; that is, noted on the Order Paper as relevant to a debate, as are some select committee reports. This might look rather strange in practice: the debate would be taking place on the adjournment, but set out on the Order of Business as "relevant" would be a (possibly contentious) motion which could not be voted upon. Members might find the process somewhat frustrating, and the rationale would certainly be difficult to explain to those outside the Palace of Westminster.[85]

84. There is currently no obstacle to Members seeking adjournment debates on subjects on which they have already tabled EDMs. Such debates are held from time to time, with the Member drawing the House's attention to the EDM in the course of his or her speech. It does not seem to us to be a great step from that to allowing a Member to draw attention to a relevant EDM on the Order Paper. We understand that in a strict procedural sense the result might be a little strange, but we do not believe that, in practice, it would be confusing or particularly difficult to explain to those outside the House. EDMs are widely understood to be expressions of opinion about, or means of collecting support for, particular issues. They are not tabled in the expectation that they will be debated.

85. We recommend that Members initiating an adjournment debate, whether in the House or in Westminster Hall, should be able to draw attention to a relevant EDM on the Order Paper by means of a tag. We suggest that the tag could read: 'An Early Day Motion (No. XX, [title]) has been tabled on this subject.' Only the Member initiating the debate should be permitted to authorise a tag.

Publishing EDMs

86. The rules governing the publishing of EDMs in the Vote Bundle are now some twenty years old. Following initial publication the day after the EDM is tabled, it is reprinted whenever a new name is added in the week of tabling and the subsequent week. From then on, it will be published once a week (on Thursdays) only if a new name has been added since the previous week. The Clerk's memorandum sets out the costs of printing EDMs in recent financial years up to 2004-05.[86] The cost in financial year 2005-06 was £627,000.[87]

87. The printing of EDMs is almost entirely for the benefit of those in the Palace of Westminster. The public and organisations outside the Palace largely rely on the parliamentary website. Within the Palace, the principal users are Members, although others, including staff and the press also use the printed version. As Mr Natzler put it:

Putting it crudely, the blues are for you … . So if there are no Members involved in this operation—which I know sounds absurd—then we would not print the blues.[88]

88. Under the House's contract with TSO, printing costs are calculated on the basis of the number of pages printed. Reducing the number of copies distributed would therefore not have any significant effect on the total cost to the House. If the costs are to be reduced, it can only be by printing less or by printing less frequently, or both. In response to a request from the Committee, Mr Natzler suggested two options. The first was that the Thursday reprint of 'mature' motions should list, for each EDM to which names had been added, only the title, number, sponsoring Member and the added names; not in other words the text of the motion itself. This might save around £200,000 a year. The second was that the Thursday reprint should be monthly rather than weekly. This might save around £100,000 a year.

89. There are disadvantages with both options. Many Members go through the Thursday reprint to decide which EDMs to sign. If the text was not printed, they would need to access it separately, presumably through the website. The usefulness of the reprint as a free-standing document would be severely compromised. We do not believe that printing notices of added names to EDMs without printing the text of the EDM would find favour with those Members who use the Thursday reprint. For this reason we also reject the suggestion in the Clerk's memorandum that the text of an EDM should be printed only once. This proposal was tried on an experimental basis in the 1970s, but was not pursued because Members tabled a large number of amendments, which required printing, and to be comprehensible required the reprinting of the motion itself.[89] The adding of a name to a motion is a formal proceeding of the House. We agree with Mr Natzler that allowing the notice of such a proceeding to remain unrecorded in the House's papers for up to a month is undesirable.[90]

90. We conclude therefore that the present printing arrangements for EDMs should remain. As long as the House takes the view that all formal notices must appear in print in the House's official papers, added names to existing EDMs will need to be printed. They need not be printed the day they are received. A delay of a week seems to us to be entirely reasonable. But extending that period risks delaying publication to a point where the printed notice ceases to have a practical purpose and the argument that it is the formal official recording of the act of tabling becomes harder to sustain. If added names are to be printed, it should be in a way which is of use to Members and others who rely on the House's papers. For this reason we do not support the proposal that the text of an EDM need not be reprinted.

Parliamentary website

91. Once an EDM has been tabled, it is entered on the Parliamentary Information Management Services (PIMS) EDM database. That database is accessible on the parliamentary website. Indeed there is a direct link to it from the House of Commons Business page. It was described to us by Mr Paul Simpkin, Chief Office Clerk in the Table Office as 'a good database [which] works and is reliable.'[91] EDMs can be searched for in a number of ways, by number, by the Members who have signed them, by individual words or phrases in the text or the title, or by date of tabling. We believe that the database is a powerful tool for accessing information about EDMs and can play an important role in overcoming the difficulty with finding an individual EDM among the hundreds which have been tabled. As we noted above, Members argued that this difficulty was the principal factor behind their desire to reduce the total number of EDMs.

92. We have, however, one suggestion which we believe might improve the service further. The database can be searched for key words or phrases which allow EDMs on particular matters to be found very easily, but it cannot be searched by category. For example, the database can be searched for all EDMs with the word 'health' in their titles or their texts, but it cannot be searched for all EDMs on health issues. We believe that consideration should be given to classifying EDMs on the database by a limited number of subject categories. The No. 10 Downing Street e-petitions site provides an example of how this might be done.

e-Tabling

93. Three-quarters of the respondents to our questionnaire on EDMs supported the proposition that it should be possible to table, and add names to, EDMs electronically. Questions can be tabled electronically. Earlier in this report we have supported in principle the establishment of an e-petitions system. It might seem to follow that we would support electronic tabling of EDMs.

94. There are however other considerations. An EDM is a formal motion. It has the same procedural status as a motion on the Order Paper. Experience with the e-tabling of questions has shown that the authentication procedures for electronic tabling are far from watertight. Parliamentary questions are important. They should be tabled only by Members. But they are requests for information; not expressions of a particular point of view. An EDM is a proposition on which, at least in theory, the House might reach a decision. One of the principal purposes of an EDM is to allow Members formally and publicly to record their support for it. We do not believe that the deliberately weak authentication requirements used for parliamentary questions are appropriate for EDMs.

95. Another difference is that the tabling of an EDM or the adding of a name is rarely a matter of urgency and, unlike the tabling of an oral question, does not need to be done by a particular time in order to be effective. Members can add their names to an EDM in several ways: they can sign the motion on the 'blues' or on a print-off from the website; they can sign a piece of paper with the number of the EDM or EDMs to which they wish to add their names; they can ask another Member to sign on their behalf or to authorise the addition of their name in person in the Table Office. We do not believe that Members are unduly constrained by their inability in addition to do so electronically. We have been told that it would cost around £40,000 to introduce an e-tabling system similar to that currently used for questions. As we noted above, a similar system would not provide strong enough authentication.

96. Unless significantly stronger authentication than is currently required for parliamentary questions can be guaranteed, we cannot yet recommend the introduction of e-tabling for EDMs. We will be considering issues of authentication in our inquiry into Written Parliamentary Questions and will return to this matter in the light of what we learn in that inquiry.

53 Ev 31 Back

54 QE 3 Back

55 QE 39 Back

56 Ev 50 Back

57 QE 4 Back

58 QE 25 Norman Baker MP Back

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