Legal Services Bill [Lords]

Part of the debate – in a Public Bill Committee at 10:30 am on 12 June 2007.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Simon Hughes Simon Hughes Shadow Attorney General, Party Chair, Liberal Democrats 10:30, 12 June 2007

I welcome you to the Chair, Mr. Cook, and I am happy to serve under your chairmanship. For the avoidance of doubt about interests—we may as well deal with the matter at the beginning—I am a barrister and a member of chambers in the inner temple, although I do not practise, and have not for the long time that I have been in this place.

I support the Programming Sub-Committee’s decision; indeed, I participated in making it. It has taken a balanced view, especially in the light of the fact that, as we all know, the reality is that the second sittings on Tuesdays and Thursdays are open-ended, and we are therefore able to adjust the amount of time to accommodate the work load and progress. It means that we have three weeks, two days a week and two sittings a day, which should mean that we have the opportunity to deal with everything.

The Government amendments that will reverse the seven major changes made in the Lords were not unexpected—they were highlighted on Second Reading. Other amendments are consequential. If the Minister tables many more, the Liberal Democrats might protest, but we will leave such decisions until later.

There are two other matters that are worth registering. First, the pilot scheme for having explanations of amendments is valuable. It will help those who follow our proceedings and who have an interest in understanding what is happening, and those in the Government’s service when they consider Opposition amendments. It might also help us to understand the amendments that we debate. It would not be the first time that some of us have been in a Committee in which the intention of amendments eludes pretty well everybody, including, sometimes, the people who tabled them. The explanations might therefore reduce the number of amendments that have no great purpose.

Secondly, as I said to the Government Whip, my preference is for two weekends between Second Reading and Committee. I think that that is best practice, although I was not over-excited about that on this occasion. This is a large Bill. The bigger the Bill, the more reason for having the two weekends. If we have a timetable by which we are governed until the end of June, it is imperative with such a large Bill to have two weekends between the end of Committee and Report and Third Reading.

All of us and those who help us will have to do a lot of work in the next three weeks if we are to do justice to the Joint Committee on the Draft Legal Services Bill, on which my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley and others served. We need to do justice to the Lords who have done a fantastic amount of work. I am glad that the Bill started there and not here, because it has taken some of the burden off us. But to do justice to everyone with an interest in the Bill, we will need to give proper time to it and to use the opportunity provided by the flexibility of the evening sittings and the time after Committee to deliberate so that amendments can be tabled for Report.