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Constitutional Reform and Governance Bill

I wanted to agree with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Justice that there was no golden age, but in the age in which we live, this measure has become a Christmas tree Bill of large proportions. We are used to such Bills, but this is a Christmas tree Bill for which there is no Christmas, which makes it even more unusual. My right hon. Friend prayed in aid the Public Administration Committee as a progenitor of the Bill, and in a sense, that is right. However, our Committee introduced a raft of amendments, virtually none of which have been accepted. Some of those amendments reflected years of work by the Committee on these issues, particularly aspects of the civil service. It was not possible to accept them in Committee, and now it is not possible to accept them on Report. What does that say about the relationship of the House to its Committees, if that is what happens when a Bill is introduced? Although I agree that there was certainly no golden age, I think that there could be a better age in which some of these deficiencies could be remedied, and I hope that that age will come quite soon.