Procedure Committee
Oral evidence: Accountability hearings, HC 277
Monday 28 November 2022
Ordered by the House of Commons to be published on 28 November 2022.
Members present: Karen Bradley (Chair); Jack Brereton; Chris Elmore; Patrick Grady; James Gray; Mr Kevan Jones; Nigel Mills; Gary Sambrook; James Sunderland.
Questions 46-85
Witness
I: Rt Hon Penny Mordaunt MP, Leader of the House of Commons.
Witness: Rt Hon Penny Mordaunt MP.
Q46 Chair: Order. I welcome the right hon. Penny Mordaunt—Leader of the House and Lord President of the Council—to our Committee. This is your first opportunity to appear before the Procedure Committee and we are grateful that you have taken the time to do so at the earliest opportunity. We have many questions for you and hope this will be a regular opportunity for the Committee to quiz you on your priorities as Leader of the House.
We admit to having been fascinated by some things you wrote in your book, Greater: Britain After the Storm—in particular your views on parliamentary procedure—so I will open with a big question: is the House of Commons a modern and effective legislature?
Penny Mordaunt: Thank you for that interesting opening question and for the chance to appear before you today. I very much look forward to working with the Committee. At this stage I will probably be more interested in what you have to say than you will be interested in what I have to say, but I do believe that what we should be doing in this place is continual improvement.
The reason we should be continually modernising Parliament—getting it to move at the speed that business and science needs it to, and ensuring what we are doing is really delivering for the people who sent us here—is because that is fundamental to rebuilding and restoring trust. In the last few weeks, several opinion polls and pieces of research have been published that show how little trust there is in this institution. Even though people admire it, the effect it has and the good it does around the world, I would like those numbers to be considerably higher. I also think being effective is just as important as all the issues around behaviour and wellbeing, and our procedures and processes.
There are five issues that I am particularly looking at focusing on. One is modernising, because of its links to restoring trust. I have been doing some work with the public—I have been holding a whole series of breakfast meetings, which I will continue to do regularly—and really asking them what they want to see from this place and what their impressions are. Themes that come out of that include our ability to address issues quickly. That is one strand of work. It is about delivery. I also think that we have to work with external organisations to a greater extent if we are to really grip some of the tougher issues we are facing, whether they relate to behaviour, culture or security, so I am exploring ways of doing that.
We should also be looking to make use of some of the innovation that happened during covid—for example, the use of technology, which I know the Committee is interested in—not just to ensure we have a fantastic working environment that enables Members of Parliament to be where they need to be and do the things they need and want to do, but also because the use of technology will be a key factor in doing R and R really well. I want us to be looking at those learnings and at what we have found. Modernising Parliament is key.
There are four other things, which I will outline briefly. I want us to be the best legislature in the world. We focus on a great many things, such as education and outreach to the public. We need also to focus on services to Members and ensuring that we are doing everything here to get them to be as capable as possible: looking at the research facilities we provide them with, and a whole raft of things to really improve their ability to serve their constituents and do what they want to do. That plays back into this Committee with regard to training, for example, on our procedures.
Strengthening the Union is incredibly important to me. If we are to be the best legislature in the world, how we interact with other parliamentary bodies and assemblies is very important. As you know, Chair, from when you were Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, the tearing of the social fabric of the United Kingdom and the unintended consequences of devolution were a deep concern to me. I want us to be able to answer clearly what it means to be a citizen of the United Kingdom. That is very much in my thoughts.
There is also defending democracy—there is a whole raft of things under that banner—and, of course, getting our legislative programme through. Those are the things that I am immediately focusing on. I have had a bit of background on some of the inquiries that previous iterations of this Committee have done, and I think that us working together effectively—you giving me ideas, and me telling you where I think there is space for us to do more and take things forward—would be incredibly helpful to all those priorities of mine, so thank you for seeing me early. I am sure—well, I hope—it will be the first of many such inquiries.
Chair: Thank you for that. I repeat what we have said when we have discussed issues privately: this Committee is at its most effective when we know we have the backing of the Government and the House in changes that are being made.
I cite the example of proxies for baby leave. That was a success in terms of this Committee delivering a workable scheme because the House and the Government had made it clear that the predecessor Committee to this Committee was expected to devise a scheme. If we had just been asked about what we could do to help new parents who are Members of Parliament, that would have been a much more difficult inquiry and probably would not have been as effective for Members. Many in this room have benefited from the proxy arrangements for new parents. As I say, that would have been much harder without knowing that the Government and the House were supportive. Thank you very much for your opening comments. Can we now move on to Gary Sambrook?
Q47 Gary Sambrook: Thank you, Leader of the House, for joining us today. Just pressing slightly more, are there any areas of the House’s practice or procedure that you think could be usefully reformed?
Penny Mordaunt: As the Chair alluded to, I have written about some of our practices and procedures. I think that you get the best out of people—and the greatest participation and engagement—if they understand the rulebook they are working to, so I am all for simplifying things where they can be simplified, giving people a better understanding of the procedures and what they are able to do as Members of Parliament, and ensuring they have the confidence to do that. Anything we can do to assist that outcome is very beneficial.
I know that the Committee has done a lot historically to look at Standing Orders. I am looking at Standing Orders and have commissioned some work on areas that are of interest to me, so I want to come back to the Committee on the particular areas we should focus on. As well as having a rulebook that is clear, that does not include things that are redundant, and that is consistent with the practices and norms of the House, I think simplicity and transparency are very good things to aim for.
Q48 Gary Sambrook: In respect of good housekeeping—not reform for reform’s sake—are there any points you would make about ensuring the engine room of democracy is working as well as it should? Are there any specific examples? Also, thinking about the peculiarity of the Welsh Affairs Committee being able to hold joint meetings with the Welsh Parliament, do you think that should be taken away or expanded to other Committees, so there is a bit more parity and clarity on that area?
Penny Mordaunt: Where we have tried things—where there has been innovation or particular initiatives—I would want to see how that had worked and what the potential benefits were. All these changes would only be made with the consent of the House, but I am up for innovations, and I want to see what the benefits have been of changing particular things.
Q49 Gary Sambrook: In that vein, when we have visited some of the other devolved Parliaments, we have looked at all-party groups in particular. We have been asking them questions about whether they would want to do joint parliamentary all-party groups between the UK Parliament, the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Parliament or the Northern Ireland Assembly. Do you think that would be a good thing? Would you endorse that?
Penny Mordaunt: One of the lessons of APGs over the years has been where, even just within this Parliament, all-party groups have pooled resources around particular issues, because many will be cross-cutting issues, and there will be many groups with a particular interest in an issue or some timely theme—for example, around a particular Bill or other piece of legislation. I think we should be being very pragmatic. There will clearly be particular issues, which might be devolved or might be within the auspices of the UK Parliament, but clearly lots of stakeholders will want to cut down their legwork in terms of talking to those different groups. Again, where there is a practical need, we should be open to things, but I will be looking for evidence and support from across the House on any innovation.
Q50 Gary Sambrook: One last question from me. A couple of other Parliaments, including the US Congress, have a bit of an open mic one-minute slot—not that most of our colleagues need an excuse to go off-piste sometimes. It allows a bit more flexibility in what can be talked about, especially if it is a local constituency issue or a broader interest, because sometimes the parliamentary Order Paper can be a bit rigid if there is not an opportunity to bob or to get a topical. Would that be something that you would be open-minded about looking into—having a slot each week, or maybe each day, where colleagues may be able to get in and give a one-minute pitch on a local interest?
Penny Mordaunt: First, thank you for giving me the chance to plug business questions. Issues can be very time-sensitive, such as a constituent in peril somewhere around the world; I hope people feel able to use that slot for some of those issues. I think we ought to bear in mind that people want to get topics on the record. They want to raise the profile of a particular cause—we all know how that works—but time on the Floor of the House is also really when the House is at its best, to debate and to allow others to also focus on those issues. Again, that is what I would be looking for: how does this enhance the whole House as well as provide an individual with another tool to further a campaign or to get a time-sensitive issue raised?
The final thing I would say on this is that one of the themes coming back from my breakfast meetings with people from all walks of life is the pace at which we can move, and how we can focus on issues that have real profile and are a concern to the public at a particular moment. That is something that I am interested in. My constituents can order something on Amazon and it arrives within three hours, and I have to try to explain to them why the thing they care about so much is going to take four years. There are some issues that grab the public imagination and concern, and they want us to grip them in a faster way, but not at the compromise of quality legislation.
Q51 Mr Jones: Can I ask the Leader of the House about the scrutiny of legislation? Not long after I was first elected, in 2002—post 9/11—we had the Civil Contingencies Bill, which was a major piece of legislation. A Joint Committee of the two Houses looked at the Bill in draft form. It then made a report, which went to the Government. I think we made 30-odd suggestions, which the Government then responded to, and I think the majority were accepted. It allowed us to take evidence from experts, and for people to write in and engage with the public on that major piece of legislation. I know we have changed the process slightly and Bills now have evidence sessions, but it is a bit of a rubber-stamping exercise.
I wonder whether there is an issue with following the procedure, whereby Bills are produced in a draft form, are scrutinised by a Committee of the House, and then go back off to the Government before they are introduced. I will give you an example of something I have been involved with these last few months, which could have done with such scrutiny: the National Security Bill—a major piece of legislation. I will not go into how chaotic the Committee was with three different Ministers, but it ended up that we only had two hours on Report and, I think, 15 minutes for Third Reading.
The Government had tabled, I think, 80 amendments on Report. The Bill goes up to the other House and it will be a radically different Bill when it comes back. People will say, “Well, the House of Lords is doing its business by scrutinising it.” I don’t accept that; I think a lot of it could have been done in this House if it had been properly looked at. This needs looking at, because we are passing Bills that have had very little scrutiny. That is a major piece of legislation—I have to say there is cross-party support on many issues in it—but it has certainly not been well scrutinised in this House.
I am just thinking about whether there are ways we can change the process. I accept that the Government want to get their legislation through, but we should be trying to get this end of the building at least looking at Bills in more detail.
Penny Mordaunt: As I said, that would fall into one of my priority areas—well, “the” priority area: are we the best legislature in the world? I think there are things we can do to improve. I quite agree with you; if you ask people outside this place what the House of Lords does, it is seen as the scrutiny Chamber—well, it is a scrutiny Chamber, but it is seen as “the” scrutiny Chamber. I also think there is huge merit to ensuring, in relation to good work that is done in either House—sometimes proactive work by Select Committees or, on the topic you mention of national and civil contingencies, the huge amount of work that the Lords did on that towards the tail end of the pandemic—that the Government are making use of that work and that information as part of their regular drumbeat.
Mr Jones: I will tell you why I think this is needed. I know Governments possibly will produce a draft Bill, but I think that if things change, it is perhaps seen as a failure. I don’t think it is; I think that if you are trying to engage the public and those outside this place in that process, trying to do it early provides an opportunity that is not there really—it is quite limited—at the moment.
Penny Mordaunt: That is helpful.
Q52 Mr Jones: Can I just ask about private Members’ Bills? We are still stuck on a Friday with a limited number of Bills that get through. We have talked in the past about whether we should shift them to another day—later in the evening on one of the days when we sit till 7 pm, for example. What are your views on looking at these?
Penny Mordaunt: I have commissioned some advice on this. There are a lot of good Bills that would not take up enormous amounts of time. I think it is one of the things that MPs have agency to do. I also know that as a Government we have handout Bills that have not been handed out. There is some good stuff to do. Again, it is a case of focusing on what is good for the country—what does the country need its Parliament to do? I have commissioned some advice on this and I am quite happy to consider these things.
Q53 James Gray: Leader of the House, I am glad you have been having your breakfasts. Some of the things that you have mentioned are eminently sensible, although some are being done anyhow. Some, of course, are a lot of tosh as well. It’s a bit of a mixed bag.
Can I just pick up on one thing you mentioned? You said that at your breakfasts it is obvious that the level of support for this place is significantly lower. Are you sure that is right? I think that what is significantly lower in the public’s esteem is the Government. They look at the Government and they say, “Government has been a terrible mess for the last six months or longer. What a shambles that is. We hate the Government.” That is what they are saying. My instinct is that people actually love Parliament. They think Parliament is actually extraordinarily good by comparison with the Government.
One of the things that I am constantly worried about is the fact that people simply do not understand what MPs do. They think we are the Government, to which I always say, “No, we’re not. I am the Government’s enemy. I like to stir up the Government and prod the Government a bit.” I suspect that some of what we should be doing is simply praising Parliament more and saying how important it is by comparison with the stinking old Government, who get things wrong all the time.
Penny Mordaunt: The statistics I was pointing to were not about support as such. I said, and I do think, that people feel pride in this place. They see it as the mother of Parliaments. They are proud of the country’s democratic traditions. I think that that is separate from a number of quite detailed reports that have recently been published and which put trust in Parliament at an all-time low.
Q54 James Gray: That is the point: it is not Parliament; it is the Government. People do not know what Parliament is.
Penny Mordaunt: I think, in these studies, they do. Parliament is probably polling higher than the Government, but when you look at the reasons why, it is about relevance to people. Part of this is about talking more about what we are doing. Quite often, when I am doing prep for business questions, for example, I just look at what has been achieved in a week. Good work done, but the public will obviously be completely unaware of a lot of it—ditto for Government, by the way.
There is very little comms support around private Members’ Bills, for example. People are either reliant on what they can produce in their office, or on the relevant Government Department. So I am agreeing with you: there is lots more we can do to raise the profile and understanding of what goes on here. But I do think the trust issue is in part about how relevant we are to people—how they see us.
Q55 James Gray: I would make a slight correction: in my 25 years, I have never met a single punter on a doorstep who raised the issue of the relevance of Parliament. They raise the issue of the Government all the time, and whether the Government have been good, bad or indifferent. I have never had one person saying, “Actually, Parliament is not what we want.”
My point, really—perhaps I am not expressing it very well—is that I do not think that the general public, the population of Great Britain, have any idea what Parliament is. They believe that Parliament is the Government; they believe that Parliament makes things happen, that it runs the Army. We don’t; we do the exact opposite to that, which is scrutinise what the Government are doing. I am not certain that you are right in saying that all these people out there are fussing about, “Is Parliament efficient or isn’t it?” They haven’t got the remotest clue what Parliament is.
Penny Mordaunt: As we all know, because we all knock on doors every week, people are concerned about the cost of living; they are concerned about all sorts of bread-and-butter issues. No one is having a cup of tea thinking about Standing Orders—well, you are, Chair.
No, I am not suggesting that for a moment, but if we were to think about what good really looks like—about how we could support MPs to do the most for their constituents over the time that they have here—part of that would be their constituents having a sense of what Parliament was here for, and how they could be involved, through their Member of Parliament or other means. I think it is important that we think about that.
Q56 James Gray: We have been around this track. We did petitions, we did parliamentary outreach and we did Parliament Week, and the Parliament Week package we got last week or a couple of weeks back bore no relation to Parliament. It was all about local communities; it was nothing to do with Parliament at all. We have been around this track, and it has not worked.
Penny Mordaunt: I agree with that, but I think it is not just about education and outreach; it is also about us being as effective as we can possibly be. What agency do Members of Parliament have to bring about positive change for their constituents? We have lots of tools at our disposal; a lot of it takes a long time. There may be some other things that we could be doing as well. That is the sort of thing I want to explore, and although all sorts of other issues are levelled against MPs, historic and current, reasonable and fair, and unfair—whether it is expenses, behaviour or all the other sorts of issues that people tend to focus on—fundamental to restoring trust is, “Can people say how this place made their lives better?” That is something we should focus on.
Q57 Patrick Grady: On private Members’ Bills, I encourage the Leader and, indeed, colleagues on the Committee to refer to the Procedure Committee’s third report of the 2015-16 Session, which can very usefully be dusted down. Speaking as the sole survivor from those days, we did a lot of work back then. I spend quite a lot of time explaining to constituents that we debate a lot of things in Parliament, but we do not necessarily decide very much. A few years ago, there was a big debate about whether Donald Trump should come on a state visit. It was in the news that Parliament was debating that, but we had no say in it whatsoever. We debated it but we did not decide.
There is an opportunity every now and again for Opposition parties to put propositions to the House in the shape of Opposition days. I did ask you very briefly about this last Thursday at business questions. Governments in recent years have increasingly either absented themselves or abstained on Opposition days. I wonder whether you have any reflections on the message it sends to the public when Opposition parties put proposals to the House in the shape of Opposition day motions, and the House then technically agrees to them, but nothing seems to come of them. Do you have any reflections on that?
Penny Mordaunt: Clearly, in recent years people have tried all sorts of things with Opposition day debates, including trying to grab hold of the Order Paper. It is clearly up to Opposition parties how they want to use those moments. They might be using them to provide innards for leaflets; we are all aware of that being one of the main reasons why awkward questions are put. I think Opposition days could also be used in a more constructive way, but that is a matter for Opposition parties. The Government are entitled to vote the way they want—or not—on any matter.
Q58 Patrick Grady: Then what is the value or the relevance of a resolution of the House? The House recently resolved that the former Prime Minister and the former Chancellor should be censured. It has resolved that Scotland would be better off as an independent country. In Margaret Thatcher’s day, a majority vote in the House of Commons in favour of independence would be taken as a mandate for independence. As it is, these are effectively glorified Backbench Business debates if the Government are refusing even to vote them down.
Penny Mordaunt: From memory, even some of the SNP didn’t vote for that independence motion. I did make that point on the Floor of the House, because Madam Deputy Speaker had to include herself and the Tellers in that vote to make it quorate. It is probably the topic under discussion that engages Members and draws them to the House, or they conclude that their time is better spent doing something else for their constituents. I say to Opposition parties, “Use your time well.” How does your Opposition day debate contribute for your constituents? Does it do something meaningful and helpful, or is it there just to create the leaflet that you’re going to put out at the weekend? If no one has shown up to a debate—if some Scottish nationalists haven’t shown up to a debate on independence—then the topic under discussion is probably not the draw that you thought it would be for other Members of the House.
Q59 Patrick Grady: So the Government are not interested in that? In your introductory statement you said that strengthening the Union was a key priority, but showing up to defend the Union and vote in favour of it is less of a priority.
Penny Mordaunt: On priorities—not to be dragged down a political rabbit hole—a lot of colleagues from across the House care deeply about the Union, but they also care deeply about healthcare and education standards across it, and all of those things. I and many other colleagues voted to have a referendum on Scottish independence; we voted for it, we had it, and I think we would like to talk about other issues. It is up to Opposition parties what they choose to discuss, but people cannot complain if the issue is so divorced from the reality of what people are really facing that Members do not show up to vote for it—even, in that case, members of the Scottish nationalist party.
Q60 Patrick Grady: In the 2017 Parliament, the Government, which had a slimmer majority than it does now, at least recognised that a resolution of the House meant something and undertook to publish a statement in response to any resolution agreed on an Opposition day motion. Is that something that the Government might consider reintroducing?
Penny Mordaunt: I think that Parliament is at its best when it is dealing with matters of substance that have a real impact in our constituencies. Opposition time is there for what Opposition parties want to do with it. The Government will reserve the right to treat each vote as it sees fit.
Q61 Chair: Thank you. I am going to move on now to another topic, which is a gender-sensitive Parliament and what more can be done to make this place inclusive. I am sure you have read the report from the Women and Equalities Committee about a gender-sensitive Parliament. Also, the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association has a programme for promoting gender-sensitive Parliaments and having gender-sensitive audits of Parliament carried out—not to find what is wrong, but to try to see where we can make improvements. I know that the Scottish Parliament has carried out one of those audits, and I think the Senedd has as well. What do you think your role is in helping to create a gender-sensitive Parliament?
Penny Mordaunt: Again, being guided by the House but also by the many helpful reports and suggestions that are put forward, I do think we have some unfinished business, particularly relating to the completion of the work that started with ministerial maternity allowances and that piece of legislation. We want some parity between the Government Bench and the Opposition Bench on that. We also want to look at adoption and other outstanding issues that that process, as the Bill was going through the House, committed the Government to. Since being in office I have raised that, and I would clearly want to make some progress on it as swiftly as possible, so I will keep you informed about that.
We have discussed what we do within sitting hours. Clearly, there is a lot more flexibility than we are making use of at the moment. I think Members also appreciate having the flexibility to be in their constituencies when they need to be, within certain limits. Again, I would be interested in looking at what we can learn from when we were really reliant on technology. What are the positives from that time that might provide us with more options going forward? I would be very interested in the Committee’s views on that.
I also think there are some general strains that Members of Parliament are under, which perhaps disproportionately affect women—the threats and stresses that we all know colleagues have to deal with—and that is not just the very high-profile ones. Personally, I have to say that—not just for Members of Parliament, but for staff—being subjected on a Wednesday to loud music being played continually on a repeat loop creates a very unpleasant environment for people to work in.
I think my job is really to enable anyone who works in this place, whether they are a staff member or particularly Members of Parliament, to thrive and not to have obstacles that they have to jump over every day, and to feel supported. I am interested in further innovations in that respect, particularly the use of the technology systems that we spent £1.3 million on and used for eight days, for example. I would be very interested in the Committee’s views on that.
Where I can prevent things like loud noise being blasted out in Parliament, I am very keen that the Met makes use of its powers to ensure that—while we are all used to noisy protests at certain times of the day, every day—when the main objective is to intimidate and harass people who work in this building, we deal with that.
Q62 James Sunderland: Leader, thank you for appearing. I am pretty clear as an MP that there are few barriers to participation here, so I am quite comfortable that if you want to become an MP, then you can, and that if you want to apply, then you can. I think we live in a society that is very fair, very balanced and very objective. I have an issue with the continual push in this direction, because I think that if there are barriers identified, then let’s remove them.
The question that I have for you relates to parliamentary terms and school terms. I am a father of two boys of school age, and in my three years here it has been almost impossible to marry up parliamentary recess with half-term and school holidays; it has been out of kilter completely. Can you perhaps look at this and make sure that more is done to support parents working in this place, so that we can perhaps spend a bit of time with our children in school holidays?
Penny Mordaunt: I would be happy to consider that. I have had representations from our farming colleagues about lambing season and all sorts of other things, so I am quite happy to look at that.
We have clearly just announced the recess dates until summer, but I am sure work has been done on this before. Obviously, different parts of the country will be in a different position in terms of dates. However, I will take that away.
Chair: It is one of the difficulties that the school holidays are not always the same; each local authority can have very different school holidays. We do need to make sure that we are here and that the public sees that we are here. We appreciate your difficulties, but I think that all of us who have experienced the October half-term—we have always sat during the October half-term—know the difficulties when there is very heavy business. Managing childcare then is not easy. So there is a plea from more members of the Committee than just Mr Sunderland to look at that.
Q63 Mr Jones: I agree about the sitting hours and holidays. One thing that was brought in was a September sitting. We know why it was brought in, but it does create problems, and you talked about renovation and work in this place. It has added a huge amount of cost. Is that something that you will look at in terms of whether we sit later into July and then come back earlier? To be honest, that short sitting in September is a fig leaf and has not worked practically in terms of how we run this place?
What you say about sitting hours is interesting. I remember—I am showing my age now—when we had 10 o’clock votes on a Thursday. If you have a new Government, you might get back to that. Do you think it is more about the political parties having to explain to people that being a Member of Parliament is not a normal job in terms of spending time away and so on? I hear the clamour for 7 o’clock votes, but many people have got families long distances away from London, so that makes no difference to them at all—it is convenient for people who live in and around the capital.
In terms of explaining to people what the commitment is, I think they sometimes do not realise that that commitment is there. As James just said, it is disruptive for family life and other things. I am not sure there is anywhere we can go in terms of shortening sitting hours or changing them. I can certainly foresee that, whatever the next general election brings, you may get back to what we had on Thursdays, and that will come as quite a big shock to people.
Penny Mordaunt: I think it is important that we explain any changes to people. On the issue of the September recess and R and R, you are right that we are taking a different approach to R and R. We are being much more practically focused on packages of work that need to be done and being smarter about how we fit those in to avoid—in my view—long, unnecessary and costly decants from the building. Technology has a role to play in that, as I said. You can use the September recess, but if you were also using technology, you could still be doing something useful, such as holding debates and so forth. We have all sorts of options. What we need to know is what people think about the experience we had using that technology. I know the Prime Minister has an ambitious programme for the remainder of this Session, but also for the fourth Session, and he will want to get some things done for the country. We need to support colleagues and explain to them what that means.
Q64 Patrick Grady: One of our areas of interest, as you touched on, is the territorial constitution and the relationship between this Parliament and the other legislatures in the United Kingdom. We have been to visit all three of them now and we had some interesting feedback on the LCM process. It is probably fair to say there is a certain amount of frustration in all the legislatures about the amount of notice, or lack thereof, they are sometimes given to deal with LCMs. There are also questions about whether consenting to an LCM makes any difference to the final fate of a piece of legislation. Do you have any general reflections on the process and how it might be improved?
Penny Mordaunt: As I indicated to the Chair, this is an area that I am interested in, and I will be interested to see what conclusions and advice the Committee has. I have a great deal of personal experience having gone through Brexit, but also through trade deals, working with Crown dependencies and now as the President of the Privy Council. I have seen the process and understand the frustrations, especially when you are dealing with things that are being negotiated in parallel, which can present serious issues. Where we can make improvements, we obviously want to, so I will want to hear what the Committee’s advice is, but I understand the difficulties that Ministers face with some of the issues that they have to deal with and with timeliness.
Q65 Patrick Grady: So the Government would be open, for example, to recommendations around how we can make it clearer in explanatory notes or on the face of a Bill whether a legislative consent motion is required at the outset and, as we track it through Parliament, around how Parliament is informed of when or whether legislative consent has been granted.
Penny Mordaunt: Yes. I know from the short time that I have been in this job that explanatory notes do not always explain things, and when you try to amend explanatory notes to explain things, you are given reasons why that cannot happen, and then you have to produce another communications product to enable the explaining to be done. Look, I am open to all ideas. How we work with the devolved Administrations matters, as does the service we provide to Members here in terms of people being able to understand what the processes are. This is all very important, so I am genuinely interested in what the Committee will say.
Q66 Chair: One of the issues that we have identified during this work is that of the Crown dependencies and overseas territories—I raised this with you when we met a couple of weeks ago. Nowhere in the legislative process can the overseas territories and Crown dependencies make representations. Very often, the legislation that we pass here has significant impact on them. We are considering whether there might be ways to bring representation from the Crown dependencies and the overseas territories into the process, a bit like the oral evidence sessions that we have for Bills, or some other way of looking at it. I understand that a recent Bill in Bermuda failed to get Royal Assent because of the conflict with an Act of Parliament here. No one had noticed as the Bill was going through the Bermudan Parliament that there was that conflict. Clearly, there are real effects if the different Parliaments are not talking to each other.
Penny Mordaunt: Again, I have more experience from the ministerial end of this. I am on the Christmas card list of most Ministers in the Crown dependencies, because I spent so much time with them over Brexit and during trade negotiations. Again, Chair, I am genuinely interested in what your recommendations will be on that front—where we can make improvements. From the ministerial end, a lot of work and consultation are done on a frequent basis, but clearly that is Government, not Parliament. You might pick up on other things that we should be focused on.
Chair: No parliamentarian can be expected to keep up to speed with everything happening in every Parliament that might have relevance to the work that we are doing here, but if we can build in some process so that parliamentarians have sight of or awareness of the impact of the legislation, that will be helpful. James Gray wants to come in.
Q67 James Gray: On the allied matter of English votes for English laws, can you imagine that ever being used again? Was it effective and well drafted, or is it just a dead duck?
Penny Mordaunt: Clearly, Parliament has reconsidered this issue. Are you thinking in a particular—
Q68 James Gray: The whole process of EVEL was invented by William Hague all those years ago and was only used a handful of times. It was pretty ineffective and difficult to operate. The question is therefore whether EVEL should be revisited.
Chair: Of course, during the pandemic double majority voting was suspended, due to the difficulties of how we were voting during the pandemic, and then the Standing Orders were removed completely.
Penny Mordaunt: I cannot comment as to whether I think the procedure as it was then constituted will be used again, but the issue remains with us, certainly.
Q69 James Gray: And the solution to that is what?
Penny Mordaunt: I think that in terms of how it operated pre-pandemic, apart from the initial confusion about the bells ringing, it operated in a reasonable way. However, the House has had a rethink on that. I am not here as an individual to put forward suggestions; in everything, I would be looking for consensus, but I think the issue remains for a lot of English colleagues.
Q70 Chair: Over the past few weeks, we have been taking evidence about correcting the record. It is quite a small, defined inquiry, but we are looking at what we can do to improve the way that corrections are recorded or how links could be clearer. Clearly, the record is the record, but if there is a simple factual error where an MP or Minister has stood up and said something that is factually incorrect, they may correct it through a point of order. But there is no easy way to link that through. There is the ministerial corrections section as well.
First, are you interested in looking at a mechanism that allows for corrections, when made by any Member of Parliament, to be more visible and obvious to the public? Secondly, what can you do as Leader of the House to make Ministers, where they inadvertently make false statements, correct the record as quickly as possible?
Penny Mordaunt: On the latter point, a lot of this is down to training. In the case of Ministers who have inadvertently said something or have been given a piece of duff information that they have read out from the Dispatch Box, it will quite often be their private offices that will flag that with them, so it is really important that private offices as well as Ministers understand what those obligations are.
I think that in this area and others—in part because the civil service has relied very heavily on people sitting next to each other to train up the next generation of private office staff and other staff, and that didn’t happen during covid—there is a huge training need across the civil service, but particularly in private offices. We have been thinking about how we can assist that, and already quite a lot of my time has been spent on trying to improve the knowledge in the civil service in a number of areas. If we get that right, that will help in this matter considerably.
It is incredibly important that, having corrected the record, someone that is searching to understand what the Minister’s views were or what was said on a particular date can swiftly see that something has been corrected. Again, I am very interested in any recommendations that the Committee will make.
Chair: Thank you. We will move on to questions on questions, written and oral.
Q71 Jack Brereton: I will start with written questions. The methodology for disproportionate cost thresholds has been linked to the cost limits for FOIs. Why do you think that change was made?
Penny Mordaunt: I think there is now a way that that threshold can be updated automatically. The methodology that is used sits with the Cabinet Office. I also think that a bit of gumption needs to be applied in this whole area. If half of the House of Commons is trying to find out an answer to something, that is a relevant factor.
Q72 Jack Brereton: We as a Committee have raised concerns about the current process, because it is tied to the limit for FOIs, which has not been updated since 2004, so cost inflation is having an impact on the questions that will get through that bar. Is there any way that that could be improved to try to address the limits that are now potentially going to be put on written questions?
Penny Mordaunt: It is linked at 140% of the cost threshold for FOIs. Again, there needs to be some flexibility in this. This is part of the reason I felt it was not appropriate for the person in my position to be adjudicating on this. As part of my role, I am not just the Government’s representative in Parliament but Parliament’s representative in Government, so if this is an issue in a particular area, then I should be able to flag it and raise it and argue that information should be published.
Q73 Jack Brereton: Is there any likelihood of us going back to the system that was used previously, which did take into account inflation and wider cost rises?
Penny Mordaunt: I am aware of the Committee’s concerns. It is an issue for the Minister for the Cabinet Office, but I am happy to take these issues up. But I think he has just made this decision.
Jack Brereton: Okay. I want to move on to oral—
Chair: Jack, before we go on to orals, can I bring in Chris Elmore and Kevan Jones?
Q74 Chris Elmore: Good afternoon, Leader of the House. I just wanted to press a little bit in terms of the costs, because obviously some Departments will answer almost zero written questions, or a very limited number—maybe the Attorney General’s office, the Wales Office or the Scotland Office. Could those budgets be reallocated? Could the costs be looked at in a different way?
I recall that when he was a Minister of State in the Health Department, Ed Argar would come in front of us, because obviously Health was overwhelmed during the pandemic and the costs were exponentially higher than maybe they were for Ministers in the DfE at the time—that is probably not the best example, but Health obviously had a huge increase. Is that something that you would look at as the new Leader of the House, so to speak? Would you consider the costs and the practicalities, where some Departments have little to nothing in terms of civil service cost or time?
Penny Mordaunt: Again, this is a yardstick—it is a policy in place to help civil servants make judgments—but we need to be acting pragmatically. I am not the Minister who will set these thresholds; my job is to make representations where I think there is an issue. Clearly, if Departments can save money, they will be saving money, but what we want to ensure is that Members of Parliament can get access to information that it is reasonable to get, and if there is a case to be made to Government with a particular Department or a recurring problem that is coming up, my role is to make that case, just as I have called in the Home Office perm sec about other matters that have been raised with me. That is how I see my role in this place.
Q75 Mr Jones: I understand what you are saying about civil service and private office culture, but there has been a tendency in the last few years for this to be used more often than it has in the past. I am not sure it is to do with cost, because I have put down several questions that I have put down before; I got them answered last year, but this year, it is suddenly a disproportionate cost. Whether it is, like you say, a loss of corporate knowledge or that an administrator does not want to answer them, this is an area of frustration, because with some of the questions that are asked, I think it is used as a bit of an excuse for not answering.
The other one, which irritates me like hell, is when you ask a Department a question and it gets passed to a non-departmental body. I have raised it in this Committee before, because we can obviously hold the Minister to account, but when you get a PQ passed and you get the answer from someone who you cannot question in any way or follow up with, that is an issue. Again, I am wondering whether or not it is an issue that private offices should be dealing with through the Minister, rather than just thinking it is convenient to pass it over to a non-departmental body that covers that area.
Penny Mordaunt: Some of the issues that this Committee has historically raised, including this issue of the arm’s length bodies, have been addressed through the new guide to parliamentary work, but I would be interested to see if you think we should be doing more on that front, particularly on that issue. I know that generally, part of the frustration for Members—particularly over the last few years, when departmental responsibilities were not published for all sorts of reasons—is in finding out exactly who to write to. If correspondence is then transferred, sometimes several times, between Departments or bodies that they are responsible for, it all adds to the time taken in getting an answer. Again, I am very keen to hear any other suggestions that the Committee might make on that.
Q76 Mr Jones: I just think that it is important that we can actually hold Ministers to account. We cannot hold some of these individuals to account, and it seems as though the Department is just passing it off as though it is somehow none of its responsibility, which is pretty fundamental. I am glad to hear you say that the advice has changed.
Penny Mordaunt: Yes, it has. Clearly those organisations are accountable to Parliament through Select Committees, but I take the point that you make.
Chair: Thank you. Let’s move on to oral questions.
Q77 Jack Brereton: Thank you, Chair. The main things that I want to ask, particularly about oral questions, are about timetabling. In terms of the days when particular Departments are timetabled, these are fixed. We often have that, as you will know, with International Trade, Transport and some others—for example, DEFRA is always on a Thursday. We have this question about why those Departments cannot alternate with those that are scheduled for a Monday, so that they have much more coverage and more people attending these oral questions.
Penny Mordaunt: Again, I am happy to look at that. Following what I said before about how the parliamentary day runs, I am happy to look at any recommendations and suggestions that the Committee makes on that front. We clearly made some changes because of COP questions going, and we will now have a full hour for DEFRA. I take what you say; it is more convenient for Members if they have the opportunity to stay and question someone in the week, whereas they might have to disappear to their constituencies on a Thursday if they are on a one-line Whip. I do take that.
Colleagues do also welcome some regular drumbeat to that cycle of questions. I know that it is tremendously helpful in Ministries, particularly in highly operational ones—it can be a great assistance. I am happy to hear all suggestions that are made, but there needs to be consensus with the House.
Q78 Jack Brereton: Another question that we discussed previously as a Committee was on some of the smaller questions—things such as Church Commissioners and the House of Commons Commission. What views do you have on—and is there a possibility of—some of these questions being taken in Westminster Hall?
Penny Mordaunt: Again, I suspect that there would be pushback on that. They are not a huge amount of time. I know that they are still of great interest to a lot of colleagues; indeed, there are many colleagues who would like to have DCMS questions be longer, for example. It is again about finding that kind of—
Jack Brereton: I think that is the point really; it then eats into DCMS for another—
Penny Mordaunt: Yes, time on the Floor. I completely get that.
Q79 Jack Brereton: Particularly when there are a lot of colleagues who want to raise broadband issues and things such as that.
The other question that I wanted to ask is about the geographical representation of some of our questions. Particularly for Northern Ireland questions, it could be the case that we would not have a single Northern Ireland colleague asking a question at that session, similar to some of the other devolved question sessions that we have. Has any thought been put into how we can ensure that there is effective representation from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland at those dedicated question sessions?
Penny Mordaunt: I have seen the correspondence with the Select Committee. Certainly, if it is an issue that the Committee is getting representations from Members on, I am happy to look at it. With regard to Northern Ireland questions, people had been able to get in, it was just that there had been a couple of incidents where someone was not able to. If it is an issue for Members, I am certainly happy to look at it.
Q80 Chair: But the key problem is that there are no topicals on the territorials. A Member is reliant on having something in order. There are some ingenious ways of shoehorning things in in an orderly way, but it is a previous, historical problem. My understanding is that when the modernisation work was done, topical questions were only for longer question times; then, when those shorter questions like Women and Equalities and COP were introduced, they had topicals in them because it was just seen as the norm, whereas the territorial offices have never had them. Would that be something you would consider looking at?
Penny Mordaunt: I would be happy to look at it. I am clearly aware of the representations that were made in that correspondence, but, if you have any other representations, making my office aware of them would be helpful.
Chair: I will bring in Chris Elmore and then James Gray.
Q81 Chris Elmore: I think you have touched on this already, but I want to try to understand it. You mentioned that COP questions will cease to exist and about the DCMS orals and those that are linked to AG orals. What will COP be replaced with on that Wednesday, or is it just going to come out of the shuffle?
Penny Mordaunt: Attorney General questions will be on the Wednesday; they will be 10 minutes longer. DEFRA will now be an hour. DEFRA was chosen over DCMS by an analysis of where the demand was. I understand that there will still be people who want DCMS to have a full session, as well.
Q82 Chris Elmore: Part of the issue, as I see it—maybe speaking more as a Whip than as a member of the Committee—is that DCMS is now a huge Ministry, and it isn’t just the broadband issue. It is also digital services and obviously culture and sport. The Ministry now handles everything from the coronation to the late Queen’s passing and all the things that go with the ceremonial element of the United Kingdom. A lot of it, as I’m sure Mr Grady would agree, is reserved. It deals with all the digital infrastructure issues. Lots of these things are of interest to Members right across the UK, so there is also that additional pressure.
I am not in any way questioning any of the analysis or decisions that you have made around this work, but DCMS is growing at pace and that should, perhaps, be acknowledged through question time. There is always pressure from Mr Speaker about DCMS questions and how he could fill the time twice, and I know that’s the same for DEFRA.
As Jack has said, there is real pressure around DCMS, which seems to be growing. More constituents are becoming more aware of what their digital megabit or gigabit might be and there is therefore more pressure on Members to pose those questions—never mind Channel 4 and video-on-demand services and everything else that constituents care about. I am aware that you are aware of that, but it is just a general point.
Penny Mordaunt: I know. Representations have been made from all sorts of organisations that digital should be a stand-alone Department, such is the size of its interest. I do appreciate that, and I will keep looking at it.
Chair: I managed to get it up from 30 minutes to 45 minutes when I was the Secretary of State, so we did make some improvements.
Q83 James Gray: Do you think topical questions are topical? They are not really, are they? Most people use them for constituency-related matters of one sort or another. If they are no more topical than the substantive questions, is there not therefore an argument either in favour or making them all substantive, and doing away with topicals altogether, or, indeed, making them all open questions, like PMQs? Is distinguishing between substantive questions and topical questions really realistic?
Penny Mordaunt: I think it varies how people use those sessions from Department to Department. I think people welcome the opportunity to have the freedom and the immediacy of dealing with something that has just cropped up or is particularly in the news agenda, with other colleagues not having to try to shoehorn in the question they are trying to ask and trying to make it fit into another question in the substantive section. Again, open to ideas—
Q84 James Gray: The idea was that if something has happened, we should use topical questions to raise it immediately. Of course, that does not really work, because of the shuffle. Therefore, the person who has the extremely important topical matter probably is not on the Order Paper anyhow. Very rarely do you hear a topical question on something that has happened today or yesterday; that would tend to be UQ territory. Most topical questions are open questions, rather like during Prime Minister’s questions. I just wonder whether it is useful for this purpose.
Penny Mordaunt: I think it does help question sessions run quite efficiently, because obviously people who have a topical will not necessarily wait for it; they might bring it in earlier. My personal view is that they still have a place and are useful, but again, if Members think it could be organised differently and modernised, I am quite happy to listen.
Q85 Chris Elmore: On the point in the papers about topicals being answered by the Secretary of State, I wonder if there is any analysis of whether that actually is the case. Purely anecdotally, I would argue that a lot of the time—I am sure it was the same when we were in government—the Secretary of State will point and the Speaker will spend a good 10 seconds saying, “Who’s doing it, then?”, and a Minister will step up rather than the Secretary of State. It is not for today, but I would be curious to know how much that happens. If you could come back to us, I would appreciate it, because, anecdotally, it would be correct to say that some Secretaries of State are better than others—I guess like in all things in life.
Chair: The recommendation from the Modernisation Committee was: “We anticipate most or all of the open Questions would be answered by the Secretary of State.” That is not how it has worked out.
Penny Mordaunt: No, I think that is not established practice, but I also think that topical 1, which always should be answered by the Secretary of State, is sometimes not—very occasionally—so I do take your point. I think the Front Bench will want to be able to give people the best and most up-to-date answer. If a Minister who is sat next to the Secretary of State has just visited the country or the firm, or has been dealing with it, sometimes it is actually in the interest of the Member asking the question that the other Minister answers. But it is always understood that having Secretaries of State answer most of those questions should be the norm.
Chair: Thank you very much for your time. We really do appreciate your coming to see us so early on, and it has been fascinating to hear your responses. I feel that we have been encouraged that we can come forward with recommendations, which is always a very nice thing to happen to the Committee. Thank you very much for that.