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Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

It is necessary because, as the Bill is constructed, there are trigger mechanisms to cause an election. There has to be certainty as to what causes that election so that it has legitimacy. One of them is to certify that two-thirds voted to trigger a Dissolution. In the context of votes of no confidence, if we seek to take power away from the Executive and the Prime Minister to determine what would be a vote of no confidence, it would be self-defeating then to say that the Prime Minister himself or herself could determine what is a vote of no confidence. Therefore, we give it to the person who is recognised as being independent to certify that there has been a vote of no confidence in the Government and that 14 days have elapsed. That is factual: that there has been a vote of no confidence and that 14 days have elapsed without any vote of confidence in a new Government having been passed. There is a distinction between a certificate that certifies a fact—hopefully, that could not bring the Speaker into any kind of controversy—and the Speaker being asked to certify or indicate what he or she would consider to be a vote of no confidence. That brings us into the territory of earlier amendments, and those to be spoken to later by the noble Lord, Lord Cormack.