Parliament should do the Wright thing

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The Wright committee report into reform of the Commons is a perfect opportunity to put things right, argues parliamentary researcher Tom Stoate.

"An historic moment for Parliament."

Those were the words with which Professor Robert Hazell of University College London's Constitution Unit both introduced and closed the launch of the much-anticipated report of the House of Commons Reform Committee, Rebuilding the House.

No pressure, then.

Led by the senior Labour MP Dr Tony Wright, the committee was tasked with looking at ways of reforming the workings of the House of Commons in the wake of the recent political crises which have, in Dr Wright's words, made the need for change "self-evident".

The report concentrates on three major areas. The first is the select committee system.

Although, as Dr Wright acknowledged, select committees get "an almost universally good press" for their work holding the government to account, there remain serious problems with the way the committes are currently constituted.

The fact that membership – and especially the influential position of chair – are in the hands of party whips means that, in effect, the scrutineers owe their positions to those whom they are supposed to scritunise.

The Wright report proposed that select committees be elected by secret ballot of the whole House, and that committee members be elected by secret ballot from within party groups – both of which will lend the committees the legitimacy and independence they desperately need.

The report also recommends that backbenchers should be given a significant amount of power – which currently rests with the government – over what is debated and voted upon in the Commons.

Dr Meg Russell of the Constitution Unit – who acted as special adviser to the Wright's committee – aptly summarised that the present situation "infantilises backbenchers and demonises governments".

Anyone who has witnessed the spectacle of business questions to the leader of the House, where the government sets out its business and a succession of backbenchers bob up and down asking "why can't we have a debate on…?" will recognise the pressing need for reform.

The third area is the House's engagement with the world outside.

Here, the committee has made the welcome (and long overdue) suggestion that the public should also have a say in the agenda for debate in parliament – including harnessing and giving proper power to online tools like e-petitions, which would allow citizens to play a real part in the functioning of democracy.

To ardent advocates of change, these reforms seem very modest.

Veteran Labour MP Michael Meacher has already said that they "obviously don't go far enough".

Undoubtedly, Dr Wright's committee's final report was very carefully written to achieve maximum consensus amongst its eighteen members on what are still highly contested issues.

But their journey to realisation will be much harder. Almost as the report was being launched Gordon Brown was telling the House at prime minister's questions that he "looked forward to warmly welcoming the report, and some of its proposals".

Dr Wright has predicted serious opposition from the government and the whips.

For although they are modest on paper, if implemented these reforms would create new parliamenary mechanisms which, crucially, could unlock many other possibilities for far-reaching change – change which might really go to the heart of some of our frustrations with how House of Commons is run at the moment.

Parliament should do the Wright thing.