Part of Office of Communications Bill [Lords] – in a Public Bill Committee at 4:30 pm on 5 February 2002.
With the greatest respect, I am only trying to help the Minister. It is his Bill that imposes a time scale, unless I am reading clause 5(2) incorrectly. It clearly states:
If . . . it appears to the Secretary of State at any time after the end of 2003.
I would prefer it to say that it should be soon after the end of 2003. However, that point has been well made and I do not wish to be repetitive. There are other issues that we wish to discuss on this final day of our proceedings.
Will the Minister clarify the affirmative procedure? I understand that to exercise any objection to an affirmative resolution, one has to enter a prayer against it within a very short time scale.
I hope that the Minister will accept those few comments in the spirit of helpfulness in which they were made.