International Criminal Court Bill [Lords]
10:00 am
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)
On a point of order, Mr. Cook. On behalf of the Committee, may I say that I am delighted that you are here and that nothing untoward has befallen you? As you rightly said, in 10 years, you have never been late for a Committee, and I think that you are allowed to be late once every 10 years. We are delighted to have you in the Chair. Members on both sides of the Committee were worried about you.
My serious point of order is not necessarily for you, Mr. Cook, but for the authorities that look after the procedures of the House of Commons. In our first sitting, when we were debating the programming motion, I said,
``Far be it from me to suggest this, Mr. Cook, but the Chairman of the Committee might unaccountably be detained and not show up. I believe that there is no mechanism in the Standing Orders of the House for reclaiming lost time on the debate and scrutiny of any Bill.''—[Official Report, Standing Committee D, 10 April 2001; c. 6.]
That observation sprang from my experience in the Committee on the International Development Bill, where the same thing happened. An untoward event befell another Chairman and he was late, so time was lost for scrutiny of the Bill.
You might not want to comment on that now, Mr. Cook, but I wanted to put the matter on the record. A Chairman can be replaced by any member of the Committee, with its permission. I request the authorities of the House of Commons to examine whether there should be a mechanism by which we could start proceedings in the Chairman's absence, so as not to be impeded in our examination of the Bill.