Business of the House

Lord Kennedy of Southwark Excerpts

Tuesday 21st July 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, I will take this opportunity also to welcome the continuation in their role of the Leader and the Chief Whip.

[Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms and Chief Whip (Lord Kennedy of Southwark) (Lab Co-op)]

Not yet.

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

I apologise to the Chief Whip if I have just doomed his chances in the reshuffle. Now all of his Back-Benchers are keeping a beady eye on their phones to learn his fate. I also thank on behalf of these Benches the outgoing Ministers for their service. They were open, accessible and often responsive. We thank them for their service and we wish them well. For those Ministers who will be either reappointed or newly appointed, we wish them luck in their role.

On more occasions than I can remember, the noble Lord, Lord True, has said that the House functions on the basis of a degree of respect among the usual channels. He has said it is a fundamental of how this House functions. We are a House of minorities, after all. He has reminded us on many occasions that, if the usual channels break down, the House does not function as it should.

The Chief Whip is leaving the Chamber. I think this brings a new meaning to “The Whip is off”.

Today’s Motion was not highlighted in the usual channels at all. The Government were not informed or consulted. My Benches were not. The Cross Benches were not. The usual channels were ignored. If the noble Lord considers the usual channels to be the fundamental principle of how this self-regulating House operates, why is it just today that he believes that they should be summarily ignored—not consulted, informed or written to?

On the subject of being written to, Peers across the House were this morning written to in a letter from the noble Lord condemning the Government for making announcements outside Parliament first. With a superpower level of irony, the letter was released to the press last night at 9.38 pm. When these Benches were asked by Sky News last night for a comment on the letter, my immediate reflection was to say that this could not have happened: colleagues were not written to, and I did not receive a letter, so obviously this was not the case. Sky News then pinged on X—I will happily give way if the noble Baroness wishes to correct the record.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Smith of Basildon (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for that, because I was told by his office that he was unavailable to see me at that point. I did say that he then came down to see me, but I am grateful for the clarification that he was not involved in that decision by his office.

The Motion was tabled at around 5 pm and, as the Chief Whips have agreed, there were no discussions with the usual channels until around 9.30 pm.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

Around 9 pm.

[Baroness Smith of Basildon (Lab)]

Okay, 9 pm. I have to say, given what was said—we all agreed on how we would say this when we had the King’s Speech—I was a bit surprised and, as I say, disappointed that there was no consultation, discussion, engagement or even notice from the noble Lord. There was no request for a Statement. There was no discussion to say, “Have we got any plans this week for a debate? Would we like to do that?” The first we knew about it was a Motion being tabled. There was no attempt at all to seek to address the concerns raised by the noble Lord in any of the ways to which we committed when we had the debate on the King’s Speech. I must say to the noble Lord that I really thought that we had made some progress then.

As the noble Lord said, business Motions moved by the Opposition are not unprecedented, but they are extremely rare. Only twice in recent history have the Opposition attempted to take control of the Order Paper in this way, and doing so was very much opposed then by the noble Lord opposite. Lord Richard did it in 1996, about 30 years ago, in response to the Scott report. I did something similar in 2019, reflecting a Motion that had been tabled in the House of Commons in relation to Brexit; I hope that none of us would want to return to those bad-tempered days of debate. Fortunately—particularly for the party opposite, including the noble Lord and his predecessors—this has never happened before with a change of Prime Minister.

I completely agree with, and have always committed to, the idea that the House should be given ample opportunity to scrutinise the Government. However, in politics, as in life, patience is a virtue. This is day 2 of a new Prime Minister. The Government are still being formed; we saw an appointment just now. Of course, we will welcome scrutiny—Ministers will come to this House and Parliament will do its job in scrutinising the work of the new Government—but this Motion is unnecessary. It is not the way this House does business. There have not been any extensive policy changes at this point, and the Prime Minister has committed to move forward on the basis of the manifesto on which this party was elected at the 2024 election.

On an issue raised by the Leader of the Opposition, this morning, the Prime Minister announced a targeted intervention on VAT to help with the cost of living. Today, a Written Ministerial Statement was laid to update the House on these matters, and a topical Oral Question on Thursday relates to these matters. Further, in the autumn, noble Lords will have to scrutinise the regulations that give effect to the policy. That is hardly dodging scrutiny.

I have also laid a Written Ministerial Statement today to inform Parliament of the machinery of government changes that have taken place, and my noble friend Lady Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent has answered a PNQ on the topic. My point is that the scrutiny of government is continuing. We have a number of Bills before us which also deserve scrutiny, Oral Questions to be asked, Statements to be repeated and replied to, and yesterday 10 Private Notice Questions were tabled—an exceptional number. General debates will take place on Thursday, and we will continue to lay Written Ministerial Statements as required. If this Motion were carried, it would be put at risk a full day of business tomorrow and continued scrutiny of legislation that this House presumably considers important.

The Prime Minister has been very clear: he takes Parliament seriously. I can tell the noble Lord—[Interruption.] It is no good the party opposite making those comments. It is day two of a new Prime Minister, and I would like to have a considered response from him and for the House fully and properly to debate proposals when he brings them forward. As a parliamentarian of nearly 30 years who has been on the Front Bench—in government and in opposition—for over 25 years, I hope that noble Lords recognise my commitment to the work of this House and to scrutiny of government. Rest assured, we will not seek to evade or avoid scrutiny of our Government’s policies, because we will be proud of those policies as they are drafted and brought forward for further discussion.

This Prime Minister did not set the timing for the change of leadership. The Prime Minister did not set the timing for the recess dates. The noble Lord tabled his Motion yesterday. He has known for some time now—it has not exactly been a state secret—when the new Prime Minister was taking office. Procedures such as this should be used only in rare and unprecedented times. The party opposite has ensured that a change of party leader between elections is certainly not unprecedented. I urge noble Lords not to accept this Motion. But, whatever the outcome, can we rise above some of the rancour today, which was unnecessary? I wish all noble Lords a restful Summer Recess, and I look forward to further scrutiny in September.