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Counsel - Parliamentary Question and Answer

From House of Commons Hansard, 9 March 2000, cols. 784W to 786W

Parliamentary Counsel

Mr. Kidney:
To ask the President of the Council how many hours have been spent by Parliamentary Counsel in preparing (a) Government legislation announced in the Queen's speeches, (b) private members' Bills, (c) Law Commission work and (d) private legislation, and what proportion of Parliamentary Counsel's time was spent on each, in each of the parliamentary sessions (i) 1997-98, (ii) 1998-99 and (iii) 1999-2000 to date. [113349]

Mrs. Beckett: 
The Parliamentary Counsel Office answers to the Prime Minister, but I am replying to this question since it relates to the Government's legislative programme.

Information is not available on the number of hours spent by Parliamentary Counsel on different types of legislation. However, a reasonable indication of how the Counsel are deployed is given by their location. Counsel at 36 Whitehall work on Government Bills and on Private Members' Bills supported by the Government. Other Counsel are on loan to the Law Commission, to the Inland Revenue's Tax Law Rewrite Project and to the Department of Trade and Industry's Company Law Review.

The following table shows the total number of Counsel in these locations in the 1997-98 and 1998-99 Sessions (as at 1 January) and at present. The figures exclude Scottish and Northern Ireland Parliamentary Counsel.

In the table, part-time Counsel are counted as equivalent to half a full-time Counsel. The split between Government legislation and Private Members' Bills supported by the Government is pro rata the number of pages of each enacted in the Session or, in the case of the 1999-2000 Session, the number of pages enacted to date plus the number of pages, on introduction, of Bills introduced but not yet enacted. A split of work on Government Bills between those in the Queen's Speech and others is not available. Parliamentary Counsel are not involved in drafting Private Bills.

Deployment of Parliamentary Counsel by type of work (numbers of Counsel, full-time equivalents, as at 1 January 1998, 1 January 1999 and at present)

	Session 1997-98		1998-99		1999-2000*
Type of legislation	Counsel	%	Counsel	%	Counsel	%
Government Bills (est.)	27½**	77	24½**	73	30**	80
Private Members' Bills supported by the Government (est.)	1**	3	1½**	5	½**	1
Sub-total 36 Whitehall	28½	80	26	78	30½	81
Law Commission	4½	13	5	15	4	11
Inland Revenue	2½	7	2½	7	2½	7
DTI	--	--	--	--	½	1
Total	35½	100	33½	100	37½	100

* To date
** Rounded to the nearest 1/2

Although there are minor fluctuations from year to year, the figures show that, since the start of the 1997-98 Session, about one-fifth of the Parliamentary Counsel have been engaged on work for the Law Commission, for the Inland Revenue Tax Law Rewrite Project or (since the beginning of this month) for the DTI's Company Law Review. Some four-fifths of Counsel work on the Government's Bills and Private Members' Bills, with on average about 97 per cent. of that work concentrated on the Government's Bills.