Earlier this month, the public bill committee issued a call for evidence on the Courts and Tribunals Bill ahead of meeting this week to scrutnise the legislation 'line by line'.
Expecting MPs to be sitting round a table slowly going through every page of the 100-page bill, I was taken aback when I tuned into Parliament TV mid-morning to find that the day had begun with Sir Brian Leveson, whose report inspired the government’s reform package, giving evidence. And was that courts minister Sarah Sackman on the committee? Is it usual practice for a minister who has been promoting her department’s bill to be on a committee scrutinising that bill?
I had tuned in partway through the second evidence session, with victims commissioners, Claire Waxman and Vera Baird, who both had some tense exchanges with shadow minister Kieran Mullan.
Wednesday wasn't 'line by line scrutiny' as I had first thought but a packed day of evidence sessions with an extraordinary lineup of guests that included bar chiefs, circuit leaders, a chief constable, a former lord chief justice, the attorney general of Ontario, senior judges and campaigners and victims.
With so many witnesses lined up, you’d expect some evidence sessions to overrun. Not on the chair's watch. Committee members were cut off mid-questioning when time was up. No exceptions, even for judges. ‘Thank you. Order, order. That brings us to the end of the time allotted for the committee to ask questions’, declared chair Dawn Butler while former High Court judge Sir Richard Henriques was mid-response. ‘That’s exactly what you’d be able to do if there was no jury,’ joked His Honour Clement Goldstone KC.
‘As this is stated government policy, would I be correct in saying it wouldn’t be in your remit to criticise or say that the stated government policy is wrong?’, Mullan asked HM Courts & Tribunals’ Daniel Flury, senior responsible officer for implementation of the outcomes of the Leveson reviews. ‘It’s not within my remit no,' replied Flury.
What’s more surreal than watching Sackman, a government minister, cross-examine witnesses on her boss’s bill? Sackman moving to the other side of the table to be cross-examined as a witness.
Is this what a typical day with a public bill committee is like? If not, we should have more days like this, not just for the Courts and Tribunals Bill, which has divided opinion, but all government legislation.
Yes, at times, it felt like a soap opera, but it also felt like parliamentary scrutiny at its best. MPs questioned a diverse group of witnesses, whose opinions differed, and witnesses had to the opportunity to share their views and experiences directly with the lawmakers.
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