Clause 5 - Setting-up date and terms of reference
Inquiries Bill [Lords]
2:30 pm
Mr Alistair Carmichael (Shadow Minister (Northern Ireland), Northern Ireland Affairs; Orkney and Shetland, Liberal Democrat)
The Committee will recall that I was speaking as the whistle blew this morning. I do not know whether that entitles me to make another point, but I had just drawn to the Committee’s attention the fact that both amendments would give the Minister the opportunity to consult other parties on the terms of reference for any inquiry to be convened under the Bill. The intention is to widen the range of people who should be consulted.
I acknowledge that the Government conceded, properly, in the other place that consultation should take place between the Minister responsible and the person nominated as chairman. However, there is a great deal to be said for the consultation being as wide as the Minister can make it. This suggestion perhaps moves on from what the hon. Member for Huntingdon (Mr. Djanogly) said about openness and independence. If there is scope for consultation on the terms of the remit with interested parties beyond the chairman, it would be in the interests of the standing of the inquiry to carry that out. Currently, the consultation is fairly narrowly circumscribed by the Bill and it takes place purely with the chairman. Other parties would not have to be consulted on every occasion, but it would be sensible for the Minister to have the power to consult them.
The two amendments would have a broadly similar effect. Amendment No. 38 may sit more easily in the Bill, but there is no great distinction to be drawn between them. They represent a fairly modest extension of the Bill that I think will find favour with the Government, so I leave it to the Minister to choose which to accept.