You wrote to me on 11 May asking me to give "a view from the Chair" on the operation of programme motions. My response has been informed by some detailed factual analysis of programme and guillotine motions during the Parliament; hence my delay in replying.

  In its First Report, 1997-98, the Modernisation Committee identified three criteria for an effective legislative process which were particularly relevant to the issue of programming:

"(a)  The Government of the day must be assured of getting its legislation through in reasonable time (provided it obtains the approval of the House).


(b)  The Opposition in particular and Members in general must have a full opportunity to discuss and seek to change provisions to which they attach importance.


(c )  All parts of a Bill must be properly considered."

  I agree with these objectives. I also agree that in general they are best secured by agreement between the interested parties, whether those agreements are enshrined in formal programme motions or are operated on a more informal basis, as they were before the advent of programming and still are to a considerable extent, notably in Standing Committees. The advantages of programme motions are that they are transparent to the whole House, open to the proposal of amendments if particular Members are seriously aggrieved by the suggested timetable (although no such amendments have in fact been moved to programme motions so far) and enforceable. Their off-setting disadvantage is that they can be less flexible than informal agreements and cannot be adapted to the changing needs of the House as debate progresses during a day.

  From the Chair's point of view, the procedural operation of a programme order is no different from that of a guillotine. But of course the fact that the programme motion has been signed by representatives of the main parties has an impact on the House's perception of the arrangements and tends to lead to more constructive and better-tempered debate. In particular the programme motions themselves have been debated for much less than the three hour period provided by Standing Order No. 83, have often been agreed "on the nod", and have only once been debated for significantly more than the 45 minute period originally suggested by the Modernisation Committee. A list giving details is attached.

  In general my judgement is that programme orders have been successful in securing the first two of the three objectives mentioned above. Their success in ensuring that all parts of a bill are properly considered has perhaps been more mixed; but the Chairman of Ways and Means, who has responsibility for proceedings in Committee and acts as Chairman of Business Committees appointed under programme and guillotine orders, may be in a better position than I am to give a detailed response on that point.

  I note that during the whole of the current Parliament to date 19 bills have been subject to agreed programme orders and 14 to imposed guillotines. But 11 of those programme orders were agreed to during 1998, and since the end of that year the eight bills that have been programmed compare with the eleven that have been guillotined. It is clear from those figures that the mutual consent that would be necessary to underpin a system of regular programming does not yet exist; and I am well aware of the parliamentary and political circumstances that have led to your Committee's review of this issue. It would be unwise of me to comment directly on a matter of current political dispute; but perhaps I may make a couple of very general observations. Firstly, the artificial prolongation of proceedings, by whatever means, does the House no credit in the eyes of those whom we represent and is rarely a productive use of the House's time. Secondly, and on the other hand, programming, while it may lead to more ordered and efficient use of the time available for dealing with Government legislation, does not increase the total amount of available time. Whatever procedural measures are adopted, there will remain limits on the amount of legislation that the House can cope with in a session while continuing to observe the Modernisation Committee's own criteria for an effective legislative process. As background to that observation, I note that Government legislation introduced in this House or brought from the House of Lords in the current session to date comprises a total of 2,537 pages (excluding consolidation bills). The equivalent figure for the long 1997-98 session was 1,901, and for session 1998-99 was 1,590.

  Finally I should take the opportunity to mention a small but important technical point relating to the drafting of programme motions. Some have contained complex sub-divisions of time in order to guarantee the opportunity to debate and divide on specified New Clauses or Amendments to which the Opposition (or another signatory party) attaches particular importance. But the motions may be (and in several cases have been) drawn up at a time when my selection of amendments has not been made or published. I was pleased that the recent programme order on the Transport Bill expressly recognised that potential difficulty, stating at the outset that its dispositions were "subject to the Speaker's power to select the amendments, New Clauses or New Schedules to be proposed". I would have strong objection if arrangements agreed through the usual channels and embodied in programme motions were ever to be regarded as pre-empting my discretion, under Standing Order No. 32, to determine the selection and grouping of amendments in accordance with the House's long-standing rules and practice. The same point of course applies to the Chairman's power of selection in Committee.