You might not have realised, but the vote in the House of Commons last week on the government’s proposals to introduce university top-up fees was only the Bill’s second reading. It’s not actually law yet.
The Bill now passes into the committee stage, where a cross-party group of MPs can examine the proposals in more detail.
“Erskine May” is the book of Parliamentary protocol and practice, which details the rules by which the examination of a Bill at each stage is governed. Whilst not technically ‘law’, the guidelines laid out in it are generally followed, as they’ve shown over many years to produce well-balanced legislation. One of the rules laid out in Erskine May states that the strength of opinion expressed in the Second Reading of a Bill should be represented in the composition of the Standing Committee that goes on to look at the Bill in more detail.
Reading the Hansard log of the Bill’s Second Reading, Douglas Hogg MP expresses concern that the close nature of the Second Reading (a government win by only five votes) might not be represented in the Committee.
Unfortunately, this has turned out to be true.
The government has allocated only two of the Labour seats on the committee (out of nine) to rebels, and of those two only one actually voted against the Government (the other abstained).
Understandably, the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats are kicking up a bit of a fuss about this. Whilst the government is not obliged to respect the rules laid out in Erskine May, it’s considered very bad form not to do so.
But the government has no qualms about this, so desperate are they to push the Bill through the Committee stage as quickly as possible.
It really makes me despair…