THE Government's controversial Scottish Local Government Bill was
halted in its tracks yesterday when the parties at Westminster failed to
agree on the composition of the committee of MPs which was due to start
considering it line by line next Tuesday.
The Opposition parties held out for the Government to have a majority
of only one on a 25-person committee. The Government wants a majority of
two on a committee of 26.
The difference one makes is important on a committee which could be
sitting long and late on the biggest Bill the Scottish Office has
produced since the war, with one member, Scottish Secretary Ian Lang,
anxious not to miss Thursday Cabinet meetings held at the same time the
committee would be sitting.
Party strengths on standing committees, according to Commons standing
orders, are supposed to ''have regard to'' the balance of parties in the
Commons as a whole.
Labour's deputy Chief Whip, Mr Don Dixon, applying his slide rule,
worked out that the Conservatives, depleted by by-election losses and
the withdrawal of the party whip from one member, were entitled to
12.790 places (13 rounded up), Labour to 10.394 (10 rounded down) and
the minor parties, Liberal Democrat and SNP in this case, to 1.816 (two
rounded up).
Backed by the minor parties' representative, Liberal Democrat Whip
Archy Kirkwood, he refused to nominate members for the committee when
the Government insisted on a majority of two. The committee of
selection, an all-party body, decided to meet again next Wednesday to
see if a solution had been found by the parties.
As the usual arrangements for organising business have broken down and
Government and Opposition are seeking procedural advantages and to make
difficulties for each other almost every day, the prospect of agreement
does not look good.
The Government, anxious to have the huge Bill -- 169 clauses and 14
schedules -- out of committee by Easter, may have to back down.
The Bill tackles the reorganisation of the water industry, the
Children's Reporter administration, valuation and rating, self-governing
schools, and tourism as well as the creation of 28 all-purpose local
councils.
Mr Lang declined to comment last night and a Scottish Office
spokeswoman said the issue was a matter for the committee of selection.
But if the committee evntually gets under way a week late, Ministers
will certainly use their majority, even if it is only one, to try to
make up for lost time.
The Shadow Scottish Secretary, Mr George Robertson, pointed out that
the Opposition had allowed the Government a majority of two on other
Bills and the figures did not justify that on every committee.
Mr Kirkwood said: ''No-one should be under the misapprehension that
this is some sort of trick to waste time. It is designed to secure a
committee in which it will be easier to make constructive amendments to
the Bill.''
SNP spokesman Andrew Welsh, however, said: ''This should be the start
of the process of delaying, slowing, and stopping this Bill.'' He
claimed it was ''exactly the tactic'' the SNP put forward the day before
at a meeting at which the three Opposition parties agreed informal
co-operation on the Bill.
If the committee of selection cannot resolve the issue next week, and
it could be reluctant to divide on inevitably party lines, the Speaker,
Miss Betty Boothroyd, could be asked to rule on what the majority of the
committee should be.
Likely members of the committee who had expected to start a gruelling
schedule on Tuesday were tempering their pleasure at a week's respite
with the reflection that they will probably pay for it later.
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