Procedures Committee, 21 Sep 1999

Meeting date: Tuesday, September 21, 1999

Official Report 287KB pdf

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Summing-up

Item 12 concerns my letter to Sir David, which attempted to sum up the discussion from our previous meeting and indicated a desire for interventions. As I said in the letter, what matters is not the timing of the last minute of a speech, but the decision to sum up by the speaker who is holding the floor. The courtesy should be that when the speaker says, "No, I am summing up now", that is that. It does not matter whether the speaker takes a further minute or two, or whether the speaker is a minister or a member. The occupant of the chair ought to ensure that the rest of the speech is heard properly.

The difficulty arises when the occupant of the chair says, "I am sorry, the minister is summing up and is in his last minute", when the minister has not said that he is summing up and it might be two and a half minutes before he finishes.

The two and a half minutes is not necessarily the issue. If the minister has said that he is summing up and will not accept interventions, that should be that. If the minister has not said that, and is still developing a point, there may be a difficulty in closing the meeting on time. That is a matter not for us or for standing orders, but for the Presiding Officer to handle.

I moved a motion last week and I summed up when I saw the occupant of the chair indicating that I should do so. Closing speakers will probably resolve the matter best by accepting such a signal from the occupant of the chair. After that, members must not intervene. Subject to reasonable time constraints, we do not want any restriction in standing orders that would limit members' ability to make—or speakers' ability to accept—interventions. I tried to summarise that and I hope that the letter will add to the interpretation of what is still, to a degree, a moving picture.

Would it be possible to tighten up on the relevance of interventions?

That, too, must be a matter for the Presiding Officer. A member was silenced last week for asking an irrelevant supplementary question; the Presiding Officers must feel strong enough to do the same during an intervention. Members making interventions are still, as in virtually every other respect, finding their feet and learning their way. We will rely on good humour, good advice and experience to resolve such matters, rather than on standing orders.

So this committee has no role in advising the Presiding Officers, and must simply lay down standing orders.

We always have the role of expressing our view on a particular matter to the Presiding Officer. Just as we have given the Presiding Officer our opinion on interventions, it would be appropriate for us to express an opinion on relevance. If we decide to do that, perhaps we should prepare a proper report into all matters on relevance and ask the Presiding Officer to issue further guidance through the bulletin or to be tougher in his interpretation of the rules. Are you asking us to do that, Mr Gorrie?

My view is that the Parliament would benefit from greater strictness from the Presiding Officers on a number of issues. That is a personal opinion that others may not share.

I will not ask you to prepare a full report, but could you give some thought to the matter and return to a further meeting with some of the problems that you have identified? We could discuss the matter and send a further report or a letter to Sir David, asking him to issue guidance as appropriate. We are involved in an interlocking discussion, with a number of other committees, about the evolution of the Parliament. Some matters are not our job, but that does not mean that we do not have a role in shaping what is happening.

Donald Gorrie indicated agreement.