Procedures Committee,

Meeting date: Tuesday, May 9, 2006

Official Report 184KB pdf

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Motions and Decisions

There has been a survey of opinion to which there was not a huge response, as is normal on these occasions. The paper that members have sets out the responses. Since the paper was prepared, a response has been received from Margaret Curran on behalf of the Executive, which generally supports the propositions in the paper but makes the specific point that business managers should be given two weeks' notice to allow them to take motions to their groups and to discuss matters with the members concerned before agreeing the removal of motions rather than, as happens under the present arrangement, receiving the bureau papers on the Friday prior to the Tuesday meeting. The Executive is saying that it wants two weeks' notice to be given under the procedure that we are suggesting. That letter could be included in our paper.

There has been a small amount of opposition to our efforts to put into the standing orders what has hitherto been customary practice. One or two people have disagreed in principle, but on the whole there has been support for the proposition. The argument was put that, if customary practice works, we do not need it to be in standing orders. However, it was our view that, to avoid any troubles in the future, we should encapsulate the present way of doing things in standing orders. Do members agree to ask the clerk to produce a formal paper on the issue—a draft report—that we will consider in private at our next meeting? Traditionally, we discuss such reports in private.

Members indicated agreement.

Bruce McFee raised another matter. The paper "Voting thresholds—application to committees" sets out the issues and, in effect, acknowledges the point that Bruce made. It proposes that the rule change that was suggested be dropped. The member gets one brownie point.

There we go.

I thank Bruce McFee for his helpful suggestion.