Report
1. On 24 February 2009 Chris Bryant MP, Deputy Leader
of the House, wrote to the Procedure Committee, outlining the
Government's proposal to experiment with publishing bills in a
different format.[1] Whereas
a bill is usually presented to the House accompanied by a separate
document containing Explanatory Notes, the Government's plan is
to publish the bill and the Explanatory Notes in a single document,
with the text of the Bill interleaved with that of the Notes so
that the two texts appear in parallel on facing pages. The Government
intends, subject to the approval of the House, to test the usefulness
of the new format by experimenting with a single bill in the current
Session, probably the Equality Bill which is due to be presented
to the House shortly. The Deputy Leader of the House has asked
us to take a view on the publication of bills in this way and
has indicated that he would welcome the Committee's advice on
this matter.
2. The interleaving of bills and Explanatory Notes
has already been piloted with the draft Coroners Bill in 2006
and the draft Marine Bill in 2008. We therefore asked the Commons
members of the Joint Committee which examined the draft Marine
Bill whether they had found the innovation useful. The responses
which we received indicated that, on balance, Members considered
the new format to have been helpful, rather than otherwise.[2]
We also asked the Chairman of Ways and Means and the Chairmen's
Panel for their views. The Chairman of Ways and Means had "no
strong objection" but suspected that "there may be little
enthusiasm on the part of Chairmen".[3]
3. The Deputy Leader of the House invited us to report
specifically on the "practicalities of such a move"
to change the format of bills.[4]
In the time available to us, we have not been able to conduct
a full inquiry into this matter. We have also received conflicting
views about the desirability of the change, and ourselves have
some reservations about its value. In particular, we recognise
that Members may find the new document cumbersome and that those
who prefer the traditional format may be disappointed that during
the experiment they have no choice over the form in which the
bill in question is presented. Printing costs also make it unlikely
that a choice of formats would be made available in the future.
Nevertheless, we consider that the only way to establish the
acceptability and usefulness to Members of the proposed new format
would be to conduct an experiment with a real Bill. We therefore
recommend that the House endorse the proposal that the Government
should experiment with the format of interleaving bills and Explanatory
Notes in the case of a single bill in the current Session.
We intend to monitor the outcome of any experiment by inviting
comment from Members on all sides of the House on the usefulness
and practicality of the new format and may take the opportunity
to report further, including looking in greater detail at what
will be available on-line to allow Members to access the bill
and notes in the most user-friendly way, should the House be asked
to approve the use of the format for further Bills in the future.
1 Ev 1 Back
2
Ev 1 from Linda Gilroy and Joan Walley Back
3
Ev 2 Back
4
Ev 1 Back
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