Letter to Chairman from Chris Bryant MP,
Deputy Leader of the House of Commons (P 57 Session 2008-09)
Thank you for your letter of 14 May concerning
the tabling of amendments to public bills by select committees.
It is open to a committee, under the present
system, to table an amendment to which all members of the committee
put their name. However, it is not readily apparent to anybody
who is unfamiliar with the membership of the committee when this
is the case, and I think that a method of signalling the committee's
involvement on the Amendment Paper would be helpful for Members
and the wider public.
If we are to allow amendments to be tabled on
behalf of the committee, then there must be a process for the
committee to agree to the amendments formally, which it could
presumably do by Resolution. I also think that an amendment should
be tabled on behalf of a committee only where the committee is
unanimously agreed on the amendment. If amendments were tabled
in the name of the committee on the basis of a majority vote,
it could give rise to the impression that individual members of
the committee who had in fact opposed the amendment were in favour
of it.
2 June 2009
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