Procedures Committee, 02 Nov 1999

Meeting date: Tuesday, November 2, 1999

Official Report 176KB pdf

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Priority Issues

We move on to agenda item 2, which is a letter that was sent to Sir David Steel after a previous meeting, giving him advice and guidance on a number of issues that had arisen. I trust that the letter adequately summed up the committee's views on a range of issues.

Yesterday, I had a reply from Sir David; it was too late to be included in the agenda papers. He thanks me for the letters about proposals to the Procedures Committee and apologises for not having responded earlier—he has been on his annual holiday. He says:

"I have read with interest the committee's recommendations on the referrals from the Bureau and look forward with interest to you bringing forward a report to be considered by the Parliament."

I want to pursue an issue that arises under the heading "Urgent Responses". The letter is not numbered but the text can be found about 10 pages in.

Perhaps we should make sure that, in future, such letters are numbered.

What bugs me at Westminster is that the Speaker system—not the lady herself, who does an excellent job—does not think that its job includes making ministers reply properly to questions. I think that its job should be to do that; what is happening is part of the creeping erosion of the power of the Parliament vis-à-vis the Executive. We should recognise that the civil service here is struggling to cope with a deluge of questions and letters. Perhaps the Parliament should give the Presiding Officer the power to tell ministers that they should bloody well reply smartly. If they fail to reply within two, three or four weeks, somebody should be able to crack a whip. Maybe that is an issue for the future.

The Presiding Officer has the power to find ministers in contempt of the Parliament's standing orders. However, during Andrew Wilson's members' business debate, Andrew was allowed to show his displeasure at the Executive's practice of issuing press statements and announcements to pre-empt such debates.

Members should refer inadequate written and oral answers to the Presiding Officer; it would be a significant sanction against the Executive if he chooses to raise such matters from the chair. There is no doubt that many Opposition members are very unhappy with the quality of answers—particularly written answers—that they receive and with the time that it takes to receive them. Many members are raising that issue with the Presiding Officer.

Some issues have been flagged up and will be included in the committee's long-term programme. Other matters will simply arise from continuing experience of working in the chamber. That is a fair point to note for future discussion.

Just to show that I have read the letter, I inform the committee that the section on holding answers mentions

"recesses of 5 days or more"

in the first paragraph of bold type. I thought that officials had decided that the 21-day deadline should apply to recesses of four days or more.

They had indeed. That will be changed in the standing orders.