---

Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill

My hon. Friend is making sound points in criticising the adequacy of the veto offered. Will he reflect on whether a veto is totally reassuring? As my right hon. Friend the Member for East Yorkshire (Mr. Knight) just pointed out, the former Minister repeatedly gave assurances in various forums that nothing that was controversial would be taken through in this way. I take that to mean that a substantial number of Members of the House saying that a measure should be subject to the parliamentary process should be adequate to stop the procedure being used. If all that is offered can simply be overridden by the working majority of the Government of the day, very controversial measures could be taken through using this simple, scarcely parliamentary procedure. Just a bare majority of Members of the House of Commons would make sure that an unsuitable process was used to override a significant section of public and parliamentary opinion.