Taking democracy outside the asylum

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Jon Bright (London, OK): Graham Allen MP questions the Deputy Leader of the House:

Mr. Graham Allen (Nottingham, North) (Lab): What steps she is taking to encourage public debate on those elements of the Governance of Britain White Paper which fall within her remit; and if she will make a statement. [185150]

The Deputy Leader of the House of Commons (Helen Goodman): The Leader of the House has an interest in a range of issues under the governance of Britainprogramme, with a particular responsibility in the proposals relating to the draft legislative programme, the dissolution and recall of Parliament, departmental debate days and regional accountability in the House. Those are all being considered in inquiries by the Modernisation Committee, chaired by my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the House, to which public contributions have been invited.

Mr. Allen: The effort to revive our democracy was given a starburst opening when the Prime Minister chose to make his first speech to Parliament as Prime Minister on the governance of Britain and to produce a Green Paper within days of taking over as Prime Minister. Does my hon. Friend agree that a little bit of the excitement, passion and drive may have gone out of the agenda? Can we not involve millions of people in debate on the issues, rather than just those of us in the asylum, so that we can take them further and get more and more people involved in moving our democracy forward?

Helen Goodman: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his attempts to bring more excitement to the issue. The Leader of the House published the draft legislative programme and put it on the Cabinet Office website. Regional Ministers held meetings to discuss it and a national deliberative forum was held. The programme is being taken forward across the board.

As I allude to below, and leading up to a roundup of our year ahead series which I'll be posting on later, in 2008 Brown's governance agenda will be moving forward across the board. Whether the board is made aware of this fact or not is another matter entirely - and could be crucial to how everything turns out.

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