Timing of votes
29. Whilst the principal issue we have reviewed was
the programming of legislation, we have also considered whether
a way could be found which—without diminishing the capacity
of the House to deliver its judgements—would reduce the
number of occasions on which those judgements have to be delivered
in the small hours of the morning. One possibility we have considered
was that, without curtailing debate, there could be a cut-off
time after which votes would cease to be taken. They would instead
be deferred for decision at another point in the main Parliamentary
day.
30. We see clear advantages in having a mechanism
which would allow Members to debate business after 10 pm without
requiring other Members who did not wish to take part in the debate
to remain in the building late at night waiting for a division
which might in the event not take place.
31. We recognise that much of the practice of the
House is to debate a matter and then take a decision on it, without
a separation between decision and debate. However, the House's
current procedures provide in at least two instances for the postponement
of a decision. Standing Order No 54 (Consideration of estimates)
provides for the deferral until 10 pm of questions on Estimates
motions, even though the debate may have been concluded several
hours earlier. This is to ensure that divisions on matters of
the greatest practical importance take place at a predictable
time. The grouping of amendments in committee or on report also
has the effect of separating the debate from the decision, as
the attached memorandum from the Clerk of the House points out:
"¼where
a group of amendments are debated together, where the group includes
two or more themes, and where the amendments occur at widely separated
parts of a bill, the Chair's power of selection may be exercised
to permit a separate division on an amendment on a subsidiary
theme once the point at which it stands in the bill is reached,
though the debate (strictly speaking on the lead amendment in
the group as a whole) might have concluded much earlier."
We therefore see certain benefits in the deferral of divisions.
32. Whilst it might be possible procedurally, we
see no advantage in deferring parts of a sequence of votes beginning
at 10 pm, even if the second and subsequent votes fell after 10
pm. For example, on an allotted Opposition day, it would make
sense for the House, as we do now, having voted on the Opposition's
motion at 10 pm, to go on to vote on the Government's amendment
at 10.15 pm in order to dispose of the business. The same considerations
apply to Opposition amendments to Government motions; amendments
to the Loyal Address; proceedings following a closure; Budget
resolutions and Estimates resolutions (each of which leads to
the introduction of a bill); and to the sequence of divisions
which may be associated with the second reading of a bill (reasoned
amendment, main question, committal motion, programming motion,
etc).
33. This leaves a distinct class of free-standing
motions, without associated amendments, which it would be both
possible and sensible to defer if a division would otherwise occur
after 10 pm. These include:
— motions to approve
statutory instruments, whether debatable or decided without debate;
— 'prayers' against statutory instruments;
— freestanding Money and Ways and Means resolutions;
— debatable motions on the membership of select committees.
34. In the case of the items of business identified
in the previous paragraph, if the House was able to decide the
business without a division it would do so, as it does at present;
but if the Chair's opinion as to the decision of the question
was challenged, the question would be deferred.
35. Deferred votes need to be taken at a time which
is predictable and which is convenient for Members generally;
and they need to be conducted in a way which does not interfere
with the business of the House. Accordingly, we recommend that
such questions should be deferred to the next Wednesday on which
the House sits and should be decided between 3.30 pm and 5 pm
that day.
36. Between those times the division clerks would
attend in the 'No' lobby and Members would be able to record their
votes, either 'Aye' or 'No', on all questions which had been deferred
since the previous Wednesday evening. While this was going on
the House and its committees would get on with their regular business;
but if there were a division in the House the recording of votes
on deferred questions would have to be suspended until the division
was over. The procedures would be analogous to that used for private
Members' bills ballots with which the House is familiar.
37. It would not be possible for tellers to perform
their usual function, since the number of Members leaving the
lobby would not indicate how many had voted on a particular question,
or whether they had voted 'Aye' or 'No', so the counting would
have to done by the Clerk of Divisions from the division clerks'
lists, which should if possible be machine-readable. Once the
votes had been counted the results would be handed to the occupant
of the Chair (who would interrupt the business at a convenient
point to announce the results), and would be announced via the
annunciator. The full division lists would be printed in the Official
Report for that day.
38. In order to assist Members a paper would be prepared
setting out in full all the deferred questions which were to be
voted on. This paper would be available at the start of the day
and would be included in the Vote bundle.
39. Because there might be more than one question
to be voted on, and votes for and against each question would
be recorded in the same place, it would take each Member slightly
longer to vote by this procedure than in a conventional division.
Against that, substantially more than the normal time would be
available in which votes could be cast, so if there were queues
at the desks Members would have the option of coming back later
when the lobby might be less crowded. We believe Members would
be prepared to wait a few minutes to vote when the alternative
would be to pass through the lobbies, possibly several times,
late at night. Such difficulties may in any event be eased if
at a later date the House decides to make use of electronic methods
of recording votes in the Lobby.
40. However, when we took advice on deferring votes
from the Clerk of the House, whose memorandum is included in the
Appendices to this Report, he identified a particular problem
which would arise during the committee or report stage of a bill:
"Nearly every list of selected amendments contains groups
linking amendments closely related by topic, which nevertheless
fit into the bill at different places. Some decisions will therefore
depend on others which arose earlier...The House would not proceed
in logical sequence, connecting principle and details if...a decision
on the main issue were not taken...Either all the business on
the bill would have to stop, or the business would fall into real
complexity if the House abandoned the group and went on with the
next."
41. We accept the Clerk's advice that the deferral
of votes would not be practicable during the committee or report
stage of a bill or the consideration of Lords amendments. If a
bill were programmed, the programme itself could solve the problem
of late votes by ensuring both greater certainty in the timing
of votes and a limitation on when they would be taken. We therefore
further recommend that all programme motions introduced under
our proposals should contain provisions that proceedings on any
particular day should be concluded at about 10 pm (or 7 pm on
a Thursday), followed if necessary by consequential votes.
42. A degree of flexibility should nonetheless be
allowed. It would be undesirable if Ministers were deterred from
making statements to the House at 3.30 pm by the consideration
that they were taking time from programmed business. For that
reason we consider that programmes should be constructed by reference
to specified periods from the commencement of proceedings on the
bill, rather than by reference to specified hours. In that way
it should be possible to build in a reasonable margin to allow
for the possibility of private notice questions and statements
without prolonging business significantly beyond 10 pm.
Conclusions
43. The recommendations which we make in this
report are the logical conclusion of a debate which has continued
for many years. Our proposals do not, in any way, represent a
departure from those we put forward three years ago. They are
simply a development of what we then proposed, based on the experience
of what has happened in the intervening period, and the best practice
which has grown up since then. Their prime purpose is to secure
a better discussion of legislation and thereby a better final
product, and they offer real gains for all sides of the House.
44. In short, the Government gets its legislation,
the Opposition chooses what areas get the focus of debate, and
individual Members get greater certainty about the progress of
business and the timing of votes.
45. We envisage that these proposals, like our
earlier proposals for revised hours of sitting on Thursdays and
for sittings in Westminster Hall, should be implemented as an
experiment at the start of the next Parliamentary Session so that
the House can consider whether or not it wishes to make the new
Sessional Order a permanent feature of our procedures in the future.
If the House agrees to such an experiment, we will monitor the
progress of it and report to the House in due course.
12 First Report, Session 1997-98, The Legislative
Process, HC 190. Back
13 Report
from the Select Committee on Sittings of the House, HC 20-I, Session
1991-92. Back
14 Para
68. Back
