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Report from the House of Commons Reform Committee on Rebuilding the House

May I say what a pleasure it is to follow the hon. Member for Cannock Chase (Dr. Wright). I thank him for the work that he did in chairing his Committee and I thank the other members of the Committee. When the hon. Gentleman started his comments, I rather thought that he wanted to give the impression that the history of his Committee until this point was not an example of exactly the ills that he described, but he proceeded to give us myriad examples of precisely why Executive control over the procedure of the House holds up the proper scrutiny and proper initiation of business. If we wanted a more up-to-date example, however, we had only to listen to the comments of the Leader of the House. I do not think that it was deliberate provocation, but she boasted that only the Government had tabled the motions to allow the debate to happen, apparently oblivious of the fact that only the Government can table them, because that is what Standing Orders say. If we want an illustration of what is wrong with Parliament, it is the fact that only one Member of Parliament is in the position to table a motion for reform of the procedures of the House. If she chooses not to table a motion, as she did for a while, there is absolutely nothing that any other Member of the House can do about it. The Leader of the House went on to say that this is an historic day. I suppose that it is historic in that we have a new carpet in the Chamber, which I admire, but I am less convinced that it is historic in terms of the reforms before us. I see these reforms as necessary, but as a very small step in the right direction. Reform ought to be a tide coming in. At this point, we have perhaps reached high water in terms of Executive power, but it will be high water only if Members of the House are prepared to accept their responsibilities and actually do something in the Lobby over the next week or so. Reform of the House is necessary and urgent, but the Government's view is that that urgency has yet to be demonstrated. The hon. Member for Cannock Chase was very polite about the numerous procedural barriers that appear to have been put in the way. Let us remember that the Prime Minister himself initiated this process. Soon after he became Prime Minister, he said that wanted reform of the House. What happened? Nothing. Eventually, we had the proposal to set up the Wright Committee. What happened? Nothing. Eventually, at the last possible moment before the summer recess, the Committee was set up and it did wonderfully expeditious work in bringing forward its proposals and reporting to the House. What happened? Nothing. After we had asked week after week when we would have the opportunity to debate the matter, we eventually got the extraordinary procedure before us. In another illustration of what is wrong with this process, we are not allowed to debate the Committee's recommendations in their totality; we are allowed to debate only what are described by the Leader of the House as big tickets. Issues with small tickets are apparently destined to oblivion; those with big tickets, as defined by the Leader of the House, can be debated. When I questioned the Prime Minister on the subject a few weeks ago, I suggested that the Government's sense of urgency was such that they exhibited all the dispatch of a particularly arthritic slug on the way to its own funeral. I might have added, "In a snowstorm." A number of pedants came up to me afterwards and said, "You can't have an arthritic slug, because a slug is an invertebrate," but I have to say that, given the progress of these proposals, the metaphor is all the more accurate. As has already been said, this issue ought not to be determined by those on the Front Benches. It should not be for the Leader of the House—or the shadow Leader of the House, or me—to determine what will happen. It should not be for anyone to dictate to the House how we are to conduct our business. It should be for each and every Member of the House to take a view as to whether they believe that we conduct our business in an acceptable way—whether they believe that we fulfil the expectations of those who send us here to scrutinise legislation and to hold the Government to account. If Members think that they do fulfil those expectations, they will vote for the status quo. I have to say that I believe that the vast majority of people outside this House think that at present we do our job extraordinarily badly. Part of the reason for the opprobrium that has been heaped upon the House in recent weeks is that people do not understand why we allow this situation to continue, and why we allow this House to be so ineffective in doing its work. It has been suggested by some that the proposals constitute an argument in favour of the separation of powers, but in fact we currently have a separation of powers: we have a separation between this weak, ineffective, useless House and the House at the other end of the corridor, which is unelected and has no mandate, but which has the time to scrutinise our legislation properly and to amend it and make appropriate suggestions. What sort of political arrangement is it that allows this House no power while allowing an unelected and unaccountable House all the power in the world to hold the Government to account? That cannot be right.