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Speakership: House Committee Report

My Lords, I hope that we can now reach a conclusion in this debate. It has been a good debate, but I am afraid that I certainly do not intend to try to reply to every point made by every noble Lord. Three amendments are before the House. As I said at the beginning, each amendment can be taken in turn and if, for example, Amendment No. 2 were agreed to after Amendment No. 1 had been agreed to, Amendment No. 2 would replace Amendment No. 1. I hope that that is clear to noble Lords. I must pick up one or two points that have been made. The noble Lord, Lord Waddington, gave me a very hard time indeed; he said that my Motion was a disgrace. I merely remind him that it was approved by the vast majority of members of the House Committee, a committee that is appointed and elected by your Lordships’ House as a whole and which I therefore hope has some authority in the House. As the noble Viscount, Lord Bledisloe, said—he was followed by many other noble Lords—the House has already approved the report of the committee of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd. We will get a Speaker. I know that some noble Lords still do not want one, but the House has agreed that already. The Lloyd report stated that we should refer this matter to the SSRB and we did so. That is what the SSRB came back with and that is why the Motion is before your Lordships today. The noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, said that the House had not always agreed with every recommendation of the SSRB. That is not my information. I have no example of the House ever rejecting a recommendation from the SSRB or its predecessor, the TSRB—going back to 1971—and then approving a different sum from that which was recommended.