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	The House of Commons Commission Report:Connecting Parliament with The Public
	Mr. Mark Lazarowicz (Edinburgh, North and Leith) (Lab/Co-op): Like others who have spoken in the debate, I welcome the opportunity to discuss the work of the House of Commons Commission. I endorse the suggestion that we should have a yearly debate on the Commission's annual report. As the only hon. Member left in the Chamber who is not involved with what the hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Sir Archy Kirkwood) probably wishes he had not called "shadowy committees", I am provided with a useful opportunity to raise issues that would otherwise not be so easy to raise. Although for some unaccountable reason the press benches are empty, this is one of the most important debates this week, as it is about improving the way in which we operate as an institution, and, above all, the way in which we communicate with the public and have a dialogue with our electors. That is one of the most pressing tasks of all who are concerned about the health of our democracy, for reasons that several hon. Members have already given. I want to concentrate on the third core task of the Commission: providing information and access to the public. In doing so, I pay tribute to work that is done by the staff of the House. I also pay tribute to the work of the hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire and to the members of the Commission. I was elected to Parliament at the last general election, three and a half years ago, and I have very much appreciated the advice and support that the staff gave to me as a new Member finding my way round this institution. I shall concentrate not just on information issues and access to the public but on the kind of issues that are relevant to me and the people whom I represent. My constituency is geographically situated 400 miles from London—in a part of the UK where, as a result of devolution, the democratic parliamentary system is much more complex. In that respect, I am glad that the Modernisation Committee report "Connecting Parliament with the Public", referred to several times in the debate, points out in paragraphs 24 to 27 that only a small proportion of students or members of the public are able to visit Parliament. The report refers to ways in which it is possible, through various forms of outreach work, to reach members of the public throughout the UK. The report contains some very interesting material about the work done by the National Assembly for Wales—the fact that it has an education officer based in north Wales, for example—and reference to work done by the Scottish Parliament with a partner network of local authority libraries. I was pleased with the content of at least the first half of paragraph 27 of the Modernisation Committee's report, which states: "Outreach work is the core of the Education Unit's work, and rightly so . . . To supplement existing resources such as the website, outreach facilities such as a Parliamentary roadshow could have the potential to reach many more young people than currently are able to visit Parliament." I agree with all that, but it is a little surprising that a somewhat illogical jump appears to be made in the next sentence of the recommendation from the Modernisation Committee: "We recommend that before any further consideration is given to establishing an educational roadshow, the House should examine the scope for a Parliamentary partnering scheme with, for example, local authorities." I fully support the idea of such a scheme, but it is a bit odd that, having spoken positively about the possibility of undertaking some form of outreach work, and in particular an educational roadshow, the Committee goes on to say that that is not the right thing to do at this time. Perhaps it is simply that I am unable to understand the inherent logic in the Committee's recommendations, or perhaps some late drafting amendments have given rise to a lack of consistency in the recommendations. If any hon. Member can enlighten me on that point, I shall be happy to hear from them. Mr. Tyler : I hope that I can help. What we had particularly in mind was that there were already units, staff and mechanisms undertaking similar, or at least parallel, educational activities. As I think hon. Members are aware, we saw what the National Assembly for Wales was doing with local authorities and we thought that, instead of jumping in de novo and not benefiting from that experience, it might be useful to work with it to ensure that the whole hierarchy of governance is fully explained to Of course, that would apply in Scotland too. Mr. Lazarowicz : I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for explaining the rationale behind the Committee's thinking—although, with respect to the Committee, I have to say that "jumping in" is not the phrase that first comes to mind when considering the speed with which the House is adopting a strategy of openness towards the public. It is important to make use of resources and other organisations with which we can work to give more information about our work as a Parliament. I see nothing wrong with the suggestion that we try an educational roadshow and I urge the Modernisation Committee, and the Commission, as the body to which it directs its recommendations, to consider that point again. In the face of a generally good report from the Commission, I shall refer briefly to the Commission's response to the Modernisation Committee's recommendations in the report to which I referred. I am disappointed that the Commission has only agreed to go as far as funding an additional staff post in the education unit. The Commission says that it will consider the views of the House before any further consideration of an educational roadshow is undertaken. Clearly, my view is that we should consider that type of work sooner rather than later. As I have suggested, these issues are important for the UK and UK hon. Members generally, but they are particularly important for those of us who come from parts of the UK that have devolved systems of government. It is important that electors and young people in my part of the UK, in Wales and in Northern Ireland understand the role of the Westminster Parliament—the UK Parliament—in the context of the new devolved arrangements. I referred earlier to the Scottish Parliament's website. I may be seen as someone who is prepared to defend the Scottish Parliament in all respects, but in fact I am not one to defend everything that the Scottish Parliament has done in the past few years. Certainly, the experience with the building was not one of its high points. I understand that the Palace of Westminster took some 40 years to build in the 19th century and went over budget many times, so I am not sure that we are in any better a position. I am not going to defend everything that the Scottish Parliament has done, but one of its success stories has been its outreach work, including its dialogue with the public, with the community and with schools and other education outlets throughout Scotland, which I note the Modernisation Committee examined with some interest. Without going into its recommendations and report in detail, the Committee provided some very interesting material describing some of the work done by the Scottish Parliament and the National Assembly for Wales, and I hope that the Commission will consider the experience of Scotland and Wales in more detail, because there is much that can be learnt from it. We read that the National Assembly for Wales organises stands at public events. Why can we not do that sort of thing from the House of Commons? I was interested to see that the Scottish Parliament sent one of its Committees to a meeting outside Edinburgh in a more remote part of Scotland as a way of extending its activity outside the Scottish capital. Its education unit also organised a whole series of activities before the Committee went out to that particular locality, including meetings with schools and other organisations, to explain what the Committee would do to allow the local communities a wider context to understand the Committee's work. Committees at Westminster visit different parts of the United Kingdom from time to time, partly as a way of showing our wish not to be too London-centred. I would not quite call these visits royal visits, but in my experience they are often visitations from the centre, whose context and connection with the local community is at that point often very tenuous and depends very much on the work of the local MP, who may or may not choose to publicise that Committee's involvement and arrival in his or her constituency. So let us learn from the successes of parliamentary institutions and Assemblies in other parts of the UK. Of course issues of cost are involved. We cannot spend unlimited amounts of money trying to improve our engagement with the public—although engaging properly with the public is so important that we could usefully spend money on it—but we could work with local authorities. Some local authorities are good at publicising what they do; others need to do more to publicise what they do. The Electoral Commission also needs to do more to publicise voter registration. Why do we not talk about a roadshow, perhaps as a trial, at a major railway station in London or another major city, giving information about voter registration from government at different levels, and see how that more direct engagement with the public works? We might then overcome what many Members have described as the alienation and distancing of the public from government. Again, let us consider the work done by the National Assembly for Wales and the Scottish Parliament at their own information centres. Could we not work with those organisations, if they were happy to, to ensure that information about Westminster is available in the information centres of the National Assembly for Wales and the Scottish Parliament? There was not much information at the last information centre I visited, which was in Edinburgh. Equally, there is not much information in Westminster about the devolved institutions. We should perhaps be talking about ways of trying to use these outlets to explain more widely the workings of our parliamentary system, particularly the parliamentary system as changed by devolution, which is relevant to Members from those parts of the UK with devolved institutions. That leads me on to a point on which I would appreciate a response from the hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire, either today or in due course if he cannot reply in the debate. I am concerned that when we are talking about work with schools, it should not be work with schools just in England and should not be directed to fit in only with the English national curriculum. That is clearly where most of its work will be directed, but the national curriculum does not apply in Scotland. I am pleased to see that the Commission accepts in its response to the Modernisation Committee's report that there should be an additional staff post in the education unit whose principal focus is to build links with local education authorities. I hope that I can get an assurance that that will include authorities in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and not just those in England. The Modernisation Committee recommended that Ministers in the Department for Education and Skills re-examine the balance of the citizenship curriculum. My hon. Friend the Member for Reading, West (Mr. Salter) referred to that earlier. Of course, the curriculum is a devolved matter in Scotland, and one would not be surprised if in Scotland the major focus in that subject was the Scottish Parliament rather than Westminster. However, we should seek to ensure that an element of that curriculum covers the work of the UK Parliament. I hope that the Commission and the Leader of the House will make an approach to the devolved Administration to ensure that as the curriculum develops to take on citizenship issues in Scotland, it takes account of the role of Westminster and UK MPs. It is unacceptable that we make no attempt to explain to school students and young people in my constituency how the UK Parliament relates to them. As a Member, I clearly do that, but we should also do that from Parliament. I have one word of slight reproach to the Deputy Leader of the House, who has otherwise played an excellent role in supporting the wider access that I want to see. I am a little concerned that when I asked for representations to be made to Education Ministers to the effect that more emphasis should be placed on Parliament in the school citizenship syllabus, the written answer that I received referred only to the Secretary of State for Education and Skills. My question had been specifically directed at "Education Ministers" to make the point that I was not asking just about Ministers in the UK Parliament. I hope that the Deputy Leader and Leader of the House look at how such an approach can be made to Ministers in devolved Administrations as well. My final point as a Scottish Member is to suggest that we consider some way of making it easier for groups of electors and potential electors—including school and other students, and young people—to visit Parliament and see it in operation. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Reading, West that although it is true that many more millions of people can see what we do through the information that is available online and that we should be trying to improve that kind of accessibility, it is equally true that a visit to the House of Commons by individuals and groups of electors is something for which there is no real online substitute. It is obviously easier for my hon. Friend's constituents to take the 25-minute journey from Reading to Paddington and then come here than it is for my constituents and others who are further afield. Is there not a way of providing some form of financial assistance to make it a little easier for groups from further away to have educational visits to the House to see how we operate and have the direct experience that is so important. All sorts of difficulties would be involved in such a scheme, and we would have to ensure that people did not misuse it, but we should certainly examine ways of doing it. I understand that the European Parliament has a scheme in which some support can be given for such a visit. I shall give an example of why that is worth examining. In my constituency, there is an excellent group called the Pilton Elderly Project that works with the elderly. Over the past few months, it has run a pensioners political education group, with about 20 pensioners studying local government as well as the Scottish and Westminster Parliaments. Councillors, the MSP and I have been to talk to them, and they have carried out various other educational activities. They intend to visit the council and the Scottish Parliament, and they want to visit Westminster. Various forms of sponsorship may be available to them, and I am helping them in their attempts, but it is not that easy for a group of about 20 pensioners to visit London to see Parliament operate. We should consider ways of making that possible, perhaps even through the establishment of an independent trust to support organisations wanting to see Parliament in operation. Those issues are of particular concern to me as a Scottish Member, but I shall finish with general comments about the trend of the recommendations of the Modernisation Committee, the proposals in the Commission's report and the subjects that we have been discussing today. My general message to the Commission and the Modernisation Committee would be "full steam ahead". The Modernisation Committee has made many good recommendations. Some have been diluted a little once they have been filtered through the House of Commons Commission, and by the time they get to the House they could be diluted further. We must try to take account of the wide range of Members' views on how to modernise, change our practices and open up to the public. However, we must avoid allowing those Members who are the least open to change to determine the speed at which we move forward. Many Members want us to open up in the way that we relate to the public, and they want change to happen more quickly. I have only been here for three and a half years and was under no illusion that this was the kind of place in which operational change occurs over-rapidly. Nevertheless, the speed of change should not be determined by the slowest animals in the pack, particularly when some of those animals, with deepest respect, are dinosaurs.
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	16th December 2004, Column 357-62 Westminster Hall