2.1 Debating Bills

There is opportunity for parliamentary debate and discussion at all stages except the initial stage. This process enables politicians from all parties to participate in parliamentary debates. The debate and discussion also allows the UK Government the opportunity to reflect on its proposed laws and modify them if necessary. An intricate web of politics therefore is woven into what otherwise might appear a rather mechanical procedure for making law.

Maximise

Figure 8 Stages of a Bill

Show description|Hide description

Figure 8 is a diagram which represents the stages a Bill of the UK Parliament goes through to reach Royal Assent. It provides a visual representation of what was discussed in Section 2.

Figure 8 Stages of a Bill

Watch the following video which explores how the House of Lords works with the House of Commons to make a Bill law.

Show transcript|Hide transcript

Transcript: How the Lords works with the Commons to make a Bill law

SIMON BLACKBURN:

So most bills start in the House of Commons and when they’ve finished with it and it’s been through all its stages there, literally a hard copy is still walked up to the House of Lords, wrapped up in ribbon. It gets brought into the chamber, and a government minister will stand up and read the long title and this is known as the first reading, and the long title is a paragraph on the bill which just sums up what that bill is doing. And then that hard copy of the bill gets taken out of the chamber and up to our office where we keep it safe.

So second reading is a debate and members take it in turns to stand up and talk about the subject, and it’s quite useful because they can also take the opportunity to tell the government, well, this is what I think of your bill, these are the bits I’m going to try and change later on.

Once we’ve received the bill and once it’s had its second reading, then a bill is open for amendmentsa and members come into the legislation office and discuss with us the changes they’d like to make to the bill and then we put everything in the right order and print it out all ready for everybody to look at when it’s in the chamber.

If, at a second reading, lots of people disagree with the subject, then at the end they can have a vote and they can decide to throw out the whole bill there and then, but that doesn’t tend to happen very often.

MP:

My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into a committee upon the bill.

SIMON BLACKBURN:

At committee stage, everybody turns up and they go through the bill, line by line, and most of the amendments are a chance to try and work out what the government is thinking, what its policy is in an area, so people suggest changes just to see what the government says about them and whether they’ll accept them or not.

MP:

Questions. One is what is the urgency to consider the report stage?

SIMON BLACKBURN:

So the next stage is called report stage, and this time they go through the bill line by line again, but the amendments are, they’re right down to the nitty gritty, these are changes that people really want to make and so, quite often we get more votes at report stage because people really want to push the government and find out how many people agree with them.

OFFICER:

Not contents, 218, therefore the not contents have it.

SIMON BLACKBURN:

The very last stage is called third reading, and this is pretty much just a tidying up, so if there’s been a big change earlier on, which has lots of consequential little changes. So after third reading, all of the changes that have been made will be stuck in, or crossed out, as the case may be, and then it’s wrapped up in red ribbon with a message saying, dear House of Commons, here’s a bill that the House of Lords passed, please, will you consider it.

OFFICER:

Message from the Lords.

SIMON BLACKBURN:

So Ping-Pong is the point where a bill is going backwards and forwards between the two houses, and all they’re looking at the areas where they can’t agree. So everything else that’s agreed is put to one side, and on the areas where they can’t agree they try and find a compromise. So the House of Lords might say, we don’t like this, what do you think of this instead? And the Commons will either say yes or they might say no, we don’t agree with that policy, but how about this compromise? And they’ll whittle it down until everybody is agreed on a way forwards.

So when both houses have finished the bill, then the last stage is that the Queen is asked to signify that she’s happy with it and when that happens, in both houses, the Speaker and the Lord Speaker stand up and announce that the bill has been given its royal assent.

OFFICER:

My Lords, I have to notify the house, in accordance with the royal ascent act 1967, that the Queen has signified her royal assent to the following acts.

SIMON BLACKBURN:

Then the bill goes off and the final copy is printed, and it’s that copy that is taken up to the parliamentary archives and is the official record.

End transcript: How the Lords works with the Commons to make a Bill law

How the Lords works with the Commons to make a Bill law