Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Rules, Procedures and the Rights of Parliament
Issue 8 - Evidence, May 2, 2007
OTTAWA, Wednesday, May 2, 2007
The Standing Committee on Rules, Procedures and the Rights of Parliament met this day at 12:08 p.m., pursuant to rule 48(1) of the Rules of the Senate, to consider the question that whenever the Senate is sitting, the proceedings of the upper chamber, like those of the lower one, be televised, or otherwise audio-visually recorded, so that those proceedings can be carried live or replayed on CPAC, or any other television station, at times that are convenient for Canadians.
Senator Consiglio Di Nino (Chairman) in the chair.
[English]
The Chairman: Good morning. For the information of witnesses joining us by videoconference from the U.K, the committee has been considering the motion of Senator Segal to televise the proceedings of the Senate chamber. In the course of deliberations, it was suggested that the committee explore the experiences of other second chambers in the Westminster system. Thus, who better to speak to than members of the House of Lords at Westminster, thanks to the kind cooperation of Mr. David Beamish, Reading Clerk of the Overseas Office? The committee will hear from Lord Elton, Lord Graham and Baroness Bonham-Carter. In addition, Ms. Barbara Long, Director of Parliamentary Broadcasting, will answer questions that are technical in nature. I thank all of you for taking time out of your busy schedules to meet with committee members today.
I am Senator Consiglio Di Nino, Chairman of the Rules Committee. To begin the dialogue, I would ask each of you to share with us your individual expectations of how television might affect the overall environment of your chamber and whether your fears or hopes, as they might have been, were founded.
Lord Graham, please proceed.
Lord Graham of Edmonton, House of Lords: I am Lord Graham of Edmonton. I did visit the lovely city of Edmonton in Canada many years ago. I was a member of the Commons for 10 years, from 1974-83, after which I came up to the House of Lords in 1983. I have experience in both chambers. Of course, in this country, the House of Lords began televising its proceedings first, and then the House of Commons took it on after us.
In general, I want to make the point that there was some apprehension as to whether the introduction of television would interfere with the proper conduct of business. However, I must tell senators that that did not happen at all. It has been our experience in the House of Lords for more than 20 years that televising the proceedings has been well received and appreciated by the members. It is unobtrusive and there is no interference. Certainly, everyone knows the cameras are there, but they do not interfere in any way with procedure. My memory over the last 20 years is that televising the proceedings has been much welcomed by the general public. The public now understand how we work. They appreciate, of course, by comparison between ourselves and the Commons, the difference between the two chambers — that they have the same function but they operate differently. People sometimes say that we have a higher standard of debate, but I would not enter into that argument. However, as far as televising in general is concerned, it is something that I strongly recommend as increasing the stature and the significance of the second or upper chamber in our parliamentary affairs.
Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury, House of Lords: I am Baroness Jane Bonham-Carter. I have only been in the House of Lords since it has been broadcast. I come from a broadcasting background myself, so I have a different perspective, as well. I am 100 per cent in favour of broadcasting the proceedings, because I believe that, if you live in a democracy, people should see how the democracy works and see how it works within the chambers. I would argue today that the cameras should have greater access than they do at the moment.
As my colleague has been saying, the cameras are completely unobtrusive. There are a couple of things that could make the way we look better. For instance, in the House of Lords we have hearing speakers in the back of the seats we sit on. I think it sometimes appears to the public as if we are sleeping, whereas what we are in fact doing is listening. That might be a tip for you, if you are going to introduce cameras into your chamber, which I hope you will.
Barbara Long, Director of Parliamentary Broadcasting, Houses of Parliament: As the person who administers the system here, the House of Lords has always been much more forthcoming and open to the idea of coverage of their debates. It is interesting that recently the rules of coverage on how the debates were filmed have been relaxed. It was the House of Lords that really pushed for that and allowed an experiment with the relaxing of coverage, which was then taken up and agreed to by the House of Commons. This second chamber, when it comes to broadcasting, is really the first chamber.
David Beamish, Reading Clerk of the Overseas Office, House of Lords: Lord Elton has not been able to get here yet. I have been a member of the staff since before televising began. It was very interesting observing the effect back in 1985.
As Lord Graham has said, the House of Lords was ahead of the House of Commons, and the broadcasters were very keen to prove they could do it successfully because they wanted the House of Commons to let them in, which they duly did.
I detected that the effect was to raise the profile of the House of Lords and make it better known to the public. It really helped to generate a surprisingly good public image for the house that people could see the proceedings. One amusing aspect was that the contrast between the sometimes noisy scenes at Prime Minister's question time and the atmosphere in the House of Lords seemed to be regarded by the public in a way that meant that the House of Lords was more highly regarded than the House of Commons, whether or not that was justified.
The Chairman: That is a very encouraging comment and thank you for that.
Senator Cordy: Thank you to each of you for taking the time; I know it is later in your day than it is here.
You said that your sense is that the House of Lords has more respect than the House of Commons. For those of you who have been around since the broadcasting started, has the behaviour of the members of the House of Lords been affected by having cameras?
It is sometimes said here that with respect to the House of Commons — which has cameras — everyone is looking for the 30-second news clip on the evening news. Has the behaviour and the level of debate within the House of Lords changed since cameras have been placed in the chamber?
Lord Graham: At the beginning, there might have been some apprehension that members would take advantage of the fact that they were being televised. In effect, the suspicion was that they might be acting to the camera. However, that did not happen at all, and it certainly does not happen now.
There is no semblance of any part of the house reacting in such a way that it hopes to get on television merely by doing so. Of course, people sometimes make inflammatory statements that are picked up by the television. What has happened is that the personalities of the members of the House of Lords are now generally well known to those people who follow the proceedings at Westminster. I hesitate to say they are stars, but certain people are well known personalities.
The house, in my view, is completely comfortable with the fact that the proceedings are being televised. It does not cause people to pull their punches or use dramatic gestures in order to catch the camera, because the people who operate the cameras fully understand and are very clever at detecting when people are acting somewhat out of the ordinary. I would say that other than getting over the beginning, when there is an apprehension as to what might happen, in general, members react calmly and in a matter-of-fact manner to what is going on.
Baroness Bonham-Carter: I have never been aware of people posturing or performing. At the beginning, the important thing is that it allows the public to have access to their politicians, which seems to me to be the really important point about it.
Lord Graham: I am certain that a wide section of the public may not have been aware that there was such a thing as a second chamber or a House of Lords — because we are not elected. In a way, the public know their constituency members of Parliament, and they have access to him or her. Of course, a member of Parliament has a surgery where they meet their constituents.
However, I am bound to say that my post bag, far from being diminished, has increased largely as a result of the fact that the House of Lords is televised. The public recognize the arguments being made in the House of Lords, and they then use us as a surrogate voice, or an additional voice, as well as the one they have directly in the House of Commons.
Senator Cordy: Those are very positive comments for us to hear because Canadians also are often unaware of the work that the members of the Senate do in Canada.
Do you have numbers as to how many people view the proceedings? Do you have any way of allowing the public to provide feedback to you, other than just phoning your office directly? Can the public give you feedback through the Internet? Are the proceedings online, in addition to being televised?
Ms. Long: The answer to your first question is that we do not collect statistics on viewership. What the Parliament does, in partnership with the major domestic broadcasters, is to send what is called a ``clean feed'' of coverage to the outside world. It is then left up to the individual broadcasters to decide how they are going to use it and where. Obviously, the individual broadcasters keep their own statistics.
There is a public service broadcaster, BBC Parliament, which carries coverage of all debates of the House of Lords in full. BBC Parliament obviously collects statistics — I am sure that Baroness Bonham-Carter has them with her; I do not have a copy with me. However, BBC Parliament has a growing audience.
What we do as a Parliament is put that clean feed on to the Internet, where it is available both live and on demand for the next 28 days so that people can catch the debates. The response we are getting for the two Houses shows that the House of Lords holds up very well in comparison with the House of Commons through the level of interest that people show, particularly on contentious issues.
There was a major debate here on the assisted dying bill, which crossed political boundaries and was an issue that attracted a lot of attention. We were getting very significant viewerships online for that. We are now currently getting about 150,000 to 200,000 viewers online for both Houses. That figure is encouraging, as we move forward.
Mr. Beamish: If you would like to check this out, the URL of the website is www.parliamentlive.tv.
Senator Hays: Congratulations for the decision to televise your proceedings — which is a good idea. Thank you also for your words of encouragement to us. They are appreciated by me and a number of my colleagues.
My first question is to follow up on how you use the Internet, how you webcast, and how you decide what material you will make available on the Internet to your 150,000 to 200,000 visitors, who are interested in more detail on debate as it occurs either, I assume, in the chamber or perhaps in committees. I may be assuming things incorrectly here, but let that be my first question, and I shall follow up with one more.
Ms. Long: We carry on the Internet full coverage live of all debates in the chambers, and we carry coverage of all public committee meetings. We do not have cameras in every committee room, so some of that coverage is, like your own, in audio only. However, if there is a public meeting taking place in either House, then it is available on the Internet both live or from an on-demand archive.
Committees are filmed at the request of broadcasters. This is a legacy or part of the cost-sharing arrangements agreed with the broadcasters many years ago, when cameras were first allowed in. If they are being filmed for broadcasters, they obviously appear on our own Internet service in full broadcast quality, audio-visual coverage.
Senator Hays: It has been suggested in this committee that some of our proceedings may not be of much public interest. Have you had at any time considered or in fact at any time done less than gavel-to-gavel coverage?
Ms. Long: The philosophy here is that it is not up to us to decide what is of interest. If we are to make the debates available to the public then we make them available to the public and it is for the public to decide whether they find them of interest or not.
Mr. Beamish: In the very early years after 1985, we did not have automated cameras but camera operators coming in, and basically it was the broadcasters who chose what to cover. For three or four years, it was not gavel-to-gavel coverage; it was the more interesting material. However, once both Houses were broadcasting, an agreement was reached with the broadcasters that they would do all the proceedings in both Houses. Obviously, there are cost implications there. We have only been able to do it because the broadcasters were willing to make the financial commitment to do it. In Canada, if you do not have broadcasters willing to pay for the privilege, you will find it more expensive than we have to operate the gavel-to-gavel coverage.
Baroness Bonham-Carter: I am speaking here as a politician. I think something that Ms. Long has accepted and is very important is that the way the televising is done is not in a boring manner. Recently, there has been somewhat of a victory, in my opinion, in that you are allowed to have a reaction shot — in other words, the camera is not purely, which it was for many years, on the person speaking, which makes for pretty dull viewing.
My suggestion is that you should communicate with your House of Commons about their experiences as well as retain an adviser with broadcasting experience, in an effort to determine the best way to televise what is going on. I agree that the proceedings should not be perceived to be dull and unwatchable.
Senator Hays: This will come up again, but let me raise it for the first time. Can you comment on the costs to the House of Lords? I note that you have a management group with the interesting acronym PARBUL — the Parliamentary Broadcasting Unit Ltd. Is there a lead role? For instance, you now have a Lord Speaker. Is there a lead role from the Lords in terms of management? Please comment on that as well as costs.
Ms. Long: I am officer of both Houses, and the broadcasting of proceedings is carried out as a joint enterprise with House of Commons meeting 60 per cent of the costs and the House of Lords meeting 40 per cent of the costs.
The budget for the two Houses is approximately £500,000 a year, but that is only for the administration and the creation of the archive and the online service. Every 10 years or so, major capital expenditures on camera systems and so on are needed. All manpower costs — operating cameras and maintaining them — are met by the broadcaster through this organization called PARBUL, a mechanism for the major domestic broadcasters to channel their funds into meeting their share of the costs. The overall figure is considerably higher than the cost the Houses alone carry. It may be of interest to see whether that sort of relationship with your broadcasters would be possible. Otherwise, you are looking at far greater costs than we actually carry.
Mr. Beamish: I think, Senator Hays, you are coming here on May 21, at which time you will have the opportunity to talk to the Lord Speaker, Baroness Hayman, about that. She is very much taking an interest in the outward face of the House, but she has not directly been involved in the governance arrangements for televising, though it would not surprise me if in due course she did not get more involved in that side of things.
The Chairman: The keen interest that Senator Hays has on this issue, I am sure, will lead him to have a serious discussion with our colleagues in the U.K. We will look forward to your report when you come back.
Senator Hays: I will faithfully report back, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Joyal: We are grateful for your availability for this discussion with us today.
I want to ensure that I understand this system. If I understand your explanation, there are two systems of broadcasting. Online is wall-to-wall coverage, whereby any person who has access to the Internet can watch. The other system is through PARBUL. According to your Companion to the Standing Orders and Guide to Proceedings of the Lords, PARBUL is a group of broadcasters who pick up from wall-to-wall coverage what they consider would be of interest for the viewers. In other words, they package their programming. If I understand, there is no wall-to-wall coverage on TV. There are only the programs that have been put together by the broadcasting companies that are shareholders of PARBUL. In other words, it may be, as our colleague Senator Hays has mentioned, dead time in the proceedings whereby the interest of a viewer would fall low.
Let us take an example. In the daily routine of business, under Orders of the Day there are all kinds of reports and/ or motions for which there is no debate taking place that day, and of course the matters are stood. If there is a list of stood matters in our house — or your house, for that matter — a perception can be created that no debate has taken place, that everything is passed and no exchange of views has taken place. It creates the perception that there is no debate, in fact. To avoid that perception, a broadcasting company's member of PARBUL would pick and choose among all the materials what it considers to be of interest and then rebroadcast it on his channel. Am I right on those two approaches?
Ms. Long: There is television coverage of the House of Lords gavel to gavel, as well as on the Internet. It is carried by BBC Parliament, the public service broadcaster here, which is a digital channel. It is not carried live. It is carried time shifted, because they only have one channel and they are obliged by their arrangements with the House of Commons to take the House of Commons live. Obviously, there is an overlap of timing. Today's debates in the House of Lords will be carried on public television on that channel every morning. Hence, you do see it in full, although not live.
There have been changes recently. The House of Commons said that it will occasionally allow BBC Parliament to take House of Lords debates live instead of House of Commons, if the House of Lords debates are of particular public interest. However, at the moment, given that there is only one public service channel, they can only actually carry one proceeding live at a time.
Nevertheless, the debates are carried on a public television service as well as on the Internet.
Senator Joyal: How is it packaged by the broadcasting companies that are members of PARBUL, which is the association of the interested broadcasting companies? How do they manage to do the editing?
Second, if someone has a complaint to express, is there a mechanism through which there is a reconciliation of the end result with what the person expected the coverage would be?
Ms. Long: The broadcasters are given a clean feed. They are given coverage of the debate, with no captioning or editing. It is a five-camera system. It looks like any other meeting being carried live on television. The broadcasters are then, within certain limitations, able to do what they will with it. In terms of any argument an individual might have with the way in which the material is being used, if it is a question of interpretation, that is something for the broadcasters.
There are, however, some basic regulations in both Houses, such that, for example, the material should not be used in light entertainment or satirical programming, and that sort of thing, to try to protect the way in which it is used. Part of my role is to police that, if necessary.
Senator Joyal: If there is a complaint, what is the mechanism to resolve it?
Ms. Long: You start by talking and then you take it from there. We have had very few problems.
Lord Graham, you are not aware of major problems?
Lord Graham: No.
Ms. Long: The way in which material is used, by and large, is fairly responsible.
Baroness Bonham-Carter: I used to do a program entitled A Week in Politics, where we did a televised sketch. You probably have sketches of parliamentary debates in Canada. We used to use bits of text from the House of Commons and the House of Lords, and rarely was there a problem.
Senator Joyal: In other words, your past 25 years of experience or so has led you to conclude that the fact that you leave to the broadcasters the capacity to choose and package the product has never been a subject of contention or created a lot of tension among the various parties or personalities involved. In other words, the way various personalities were treated, when a debate has been packaged — the broadcaster having picked and chosen among interventions, to give an idea of the tone of a debate and the end result of a debate — has not been a contentious matter; is that correct?
Ms. Long: I do not think there have been major problems. We have had the odd problem in the other chamber — for example, the invasion of the chamber by the anti-fox hunting ban protestors. However, in the House of Lords, where the style of debate is perhaps less confrontational, the material does not lend itself to being cut in a particularly contentious way.
Baroness Bonham-Carter: There are quite strong rules and regulations. It is quite policed, as Ms. Long was saying.
Lord Graham: In my experience, although the house is fairly regularly debating broadcasting in general, I cannot recall an issue of complaint about the manner of presentation of the proceedings. In other words, the manner in which the proceedings are now put together has never been raised as a significant issue on the floor of the house.
I was the chief whip for seven years in opposition. We have a procedure called ``the usual channels,'' whereby the chief whips of the various parties meet regularly to iron out matters that irritate the other benches. I never recalled — nor do I now, after 25 years in this place — finding that the treatment of the broadcasts, either audio or televised, has ever caused a problem to the members of the house.
Senator Joyal: Can you tell us more about the way that the camera is directed? Is it directed only on the member, the lord or the baroness who is speaking, or is there movement of the camera to cover the reaction in the rest of the chamber?
Baroness Bonham-Carter: There is movement to cover the reaction — what I referred to this earlier. This has been a recent innovation and it makes the procedure much more watchable. If the camera is focused on the speaker only, it makes for a very static experience. Obviously, part of the experience is the reaction to what people are saying — something we all have in the chamber in which we sit. I would say that this has been a big step forward in our coverage.
Lord Graham: The most watchable period to the public is Question Time. The general public seem to enjoy, as opposed to simply being interested in, the swiftness of the repartee during Question Time. In 30 minutes, there are at least 14-16 questions and answers given, which means 7.5 minutes to each of four questions, and the personalities are apparent. Lords have to train themselves to ask a sensible question or two in about one minute, so that they can make an impression. The House of Lords has benefited from the contrast between Question Time in the Commons, where, by virtue of the style, there is much more boisterousness and animosity between the parties. Political points are made much more openly in the House of Commons than they are in the House of Lords, but do not run away with the idea that the House of Lords is not a political house.
Senator Joyal: My other preoccupation presents itself in the same context in the House of Lords, where there are more than 700 members. When there is debate on an issue that might interest only a minority of Lords, because they want to intervene specifically, does that create a negative perception that very few Lords work or are in attendance?
Baroness Bonham-Carter: Another reason for being imaginative with the camera is to avoid the great empty wide shots. However, I do not think that is true of us, and I am sure that it is not true of you. If there is gavel-to-gavel coverage, viewers will come to know that certain debates are less interesting while other debates are such that the chamber is quite full. The interesting debates will draw the greatest number of viewers. That question is a bit unconfident, if I may say. You have to believe in yourself.
Lord Graham: The situation here is such that over the last 10 years we have used a room adjacent to the chamber called the Moses Room. I am sitting on the committee to study the Greater London Authority Bill and the powers of the Mayor of London. It is a very important bill but only a handful of members want to participate on that committee. If those half dozen members sat in the chamber where they would be televised, it would not be a good impression of the importance of the debate. Therefore, the debate was taken off the floor of the House of Lords and put in the Moses Room, where we six or seven Lords are quite happy to make our points.
The reputation of the House of Lords is secure. The House of Lords, in my view, is well served by the coverage we receive on the ``sexy subjects'' — the kinds of subjects that we know the general public is very interested in and that will fill the House to a moderate level. The full complement of the House of Lords is about 700; on a busy day, we will get 350-400 members in attendance.
Baroness Bonham-Carter: Yes, except when we are debating House of Lords reform.
Lord Graham: Sometimes the House will be packed, but that might be only 200 members. There are many other things that members do around the House, in committees, for instance, and as we are doing now in conference with your Senate committee. At one time, the public would take offence at an empty house of 4 or 5 members, but they have been educated over the 20 years that the Lords have been televised to appreciate that that is not how it always is. Providing the topic is interesting and the speeches are entertaining or educative, the public understand the nature of the place.
Senator Keon: I, too, want to thank you for your generosity of time and effort to be with us to help us in this area. We have television coverage of most committee meetings. We are not as far along as you, but we have some coverage. It comes down to available resources for a given committee when it is scheduled to meet. There is no doubt that, when a committee is televised, it adds a tremendous amount of interest on behalf of the witnesses. If the witnesses know that the proceedings will be televised, they are quite interested in appearing.
Assuming that your resources are also limited, have you found a way to ensure equitable distribution of television coverage for your many committees?
Ms. Long: The arrangements for televising committees are such that committees are televised only at broadcast quality at the request of broadcasters who make their decisions on news value for what they perceive to be the public interest. We have four rooms in the House of Lords equipped for broadcast-quality televising. We have two sets of cameras that we can move from room to room. We can televise two committees simultaneously, in addition to the chamber.
We now have on trial in the Moses room, which Lord Graham referred to earlier, unattended automated camera systems — not unlike the systems that are allowing us to speak to each other now — that are operated by the microphone system. We are trying to see whether some sort of web camera, not quite a broadcast-quality camera system, will allow us to make sure that all committees meeting in public are televised. It would not be to broadcast- quality standards — as you say, the cost of that is prohibitive — but it would at least give people a visual image of a meeting, which will be much more engaging for people watching on the Internet than simply an audio feed, as you said yourself.
Mr. Beamish: Some committees are probably disappointed that they do not get more television coverage of their proceedings. That reflects the fact that House of Commons committees tend to be less polite to their witnesses; they ask them tougher questions in a more adversarial style and therefore make better television. The number of opportunities to hear interesting dialogue with well-known witnesses is probably less with House of Lords committees.
However, on the whole, all committees are grateful to get coverage, and I am not aware of any resentment that some get more than others.
Senator Keon: I take it from your comment that the selection of the committee is fundamentally on the basis of the newsworthiness of the proceeding. Is that correct?
Mr. Beamish: The selection is made by the broadcasters and not by us.
Senator Keon: Are you satisfied with that?
Ms. Long: One of the reasons we are looking at web-camera coverage is to fill the gaps. It will then mean that everything will be televised to a reasonable standard. However, as you say, the cost of cameras, in addition to all the necessary backend equipment — and in particular, the operating costs — do make it prohibitively expensive to have that quality of coverage of every committee that meets in the two houses.
Lord Graham: There are individuals who are very interested in a topic, and they would want us to read every word in a book. They would want to watch every minute, dull as it might be to some people — but they are very few.
The general public, in my view, feel that they are well served if they are able to watch their legislators going about their business in the two chambers.
Senator Stratton: I am the government whip in the Senate, and my questions are with respect to that. Someone raised the issue that, if there is something that comes up, there are regular meetings between the two chief whips. My question is this: What are those issues that come up? Are they contentious generally or procedural, and how often do they meet? Do they meet on a regular basis or as required?
Lord Graham: For the chief whips of the four benches — that is the government, the official opposition, the Liberal Democrats and the cross-benchers — there are regular agreed times when they meet. Primarily, they meet every week to review the business of the next week. In between, each whip's office has got officials who go backwards and forwards in shaping the business for the next week. There is always a contention as to the night of the week or the day of the week, the number of days that are allocated for committees, and things of that kind. That is on the business side.
However, there is a range of other issues — aside from the business issues — that the chief whips have to look at. There is the whole question of how the house is run, the refreshment department and various other things of that kind.
In terms of contention, we use the term ``usual channels.'' Whenever there is a matter of real contention on the floor of the house that looks as if it will cause bad blood, someone will suggest that it be left to the usual channels — that is, the four very senior members who can sit in a room — they are all friends, in that sense. They will hammer out an agreement, which is reported to the house and almost universally accepted without argument.
Senator Stratton: I guess we would only be concerned about the two whips in Canada. There is a procedural difference here: In our system, it is the deputy leaders who determine the course of business in the chamber itself — but that is just a side issue.
What you rely on, it would appear, is the congeniality, the consensus reached or achieved between the whips. The situation very rarely involves a very divisive and hard issue, and for the most part issues are resolved congenially or by consensus — is that the case?
Lord Graham: You have stated it very well. If an issue is not resolved by the whips and has to come on the floor to be determined, that is a failure of the whips, because they are experienced, they know what is possible and what is not. They understand the reaction of their own benches.
In my time in this house, which is now 25 years, I can count on the fingers of one hand and have some left over the number of times when it has had to be reported by the government chief whip that they have been unable to resolve a matter, in which case it then is given to a vote. We avoid a vote if we possibly can.
Senator Andreychuk: My questions are several. In terms of the issues that the whips have to resolve vis-à-vis transcribing proceedings either to a webcast or to Internet or to the broadcasters, are the complaints you receive from varying members related to the fact they feel they did not get their fair time or are the complaints related to an issue of subject matter, or are they technical complaints? What is it you deal with that is of ongoing concern?
Lord Graham: I have to tell you that the issue of broadcasting, its treatment of the officials, has very rarely been raised as an issue between the chief whips because there is general satisfaction with the work of the broadcasters.
Inevitably, if someone is eager to speak and does not get his or her turn, the individual feels that there is some monkey business going on and that he or she has been kept out of the debate. By and large, however, I can assure you that in general people recognize that the system is fair.
Senator Andreychuk: The House of Lords has changed. Certain aspects of your procedure of coming into the House of Lords have changed. Did that change the public's perception of the House of Lords? Did that change how you attacked this issue of broadcasting or was it totally inconsequential?
Baroness Bonham-Carter: I think it was inconsequential because broadcasting occurred before the changes.
Lord Graham: When the House of Lords Bill was enacted in 1998, there was a great interest because the basis of the Lords before 1959 was wholly hereditary. The system of life peerages came in in 1959. With one or two exceptions, all new peers after 1959 were life peers.
Basically, the hereditary peerage was pound to such an extent that it only left in total 92 hereditary peers. They remain here as part of a deal, which meant that the complete abolition of hereditaries would not be completed until there was a satisfactory power-sharing in place.
The debates on the future of the House of Lords, in my view, are one of the finest pieces of broadcasting that there is.
I can only say that the majority of letters I receive have to do with the House of Lords, the European Community, sexual matters and religious matters. The House of Lords certainly is an attractive and in my view sexy subject.
Baroness Bonham-Carter: In other words, House of Lords reform makes good television but television did not make the House of Lords reform.
Senator Andreychuk: How are the costs borne?
Ms. Long: The cost is shared between a group of major domestic broadcasters who meet all the costs of the staff required to operate the cameras, the organization of those arrangements and the maintenance of the equipment.
The actual figures are commercially confidential, because they involve contract negotiations, but in broad terms you are looking at something like, across the two Houses, over £750,000 a year. However, that is just for the core coverage. It does not take into account the cost that broadcasters have to meet for committee coverage.
Of course, the two Houses invested a great deal of money in their camera systems. Roughly guessing, each camera channel, for want of a better word, and everything associated with it works out to about £100,000. We have five cameras in place in the House of Lords chamber; hence, the system in place there is about £500,000 worth.
Senator Smith: New senators, never mind a viewer, do not automatically understand our rules of procedures — say, in terms of various reports and items being ``stood.'' Given that the number of people watching you has multiplied many times by TV coverage, has that motivated a review of certain procedures that would help make them more understandable and comprehensible to the average person, or have you continued in the same way?
Baroness Bonham-Carter: Things have changed, exactly as you have suggested. We have a strange custom, when the House is in recess — which is, Lords at their pleasure — this is regarded as something that the general public may find a little peculiar.
It is the case that television has affected things in a rather small way.
Mr. Beamish: It did, however, take 20 years for that happen. It was only last year that we got rid of some of that quaint terminology. It was more to do with the pressure generally for what some in the Commons have branded as modernization — connecting better with the public. A lot of the things that are said on the floor of the house are still in rather quite old-fashioned language. For example, if I were a member, I would be expected to refer to my neighbour as the Noble Lord, Lord Graham of Edmonton, et cetera. In a way, the character has not changed too much, but as Lady Bonham-Carter said, there are moves afoot, some of which have happened, to make the language more comprehensible. It was not, however, an immediate consequence of television.
Senator Smith: Let me give you a specific example of a challenge we might have. Our Order Paper contains, among other things, reports of various committees. Those reports will stay on the Order Paper as long as someone wishes to debate them. When a particular report, say, is called, the senator whose name the report stands in will say ``stand,'' if he or she does not intend to debate the report on that day. There are also a lot of motions on the Order Paper. The same can be said of motions. The process is not difficult to follow if you have a copy of the Order Paper in front of you; however, for someone who does not have a copy of the Order Paper, the process can appear difficult. I am wondering whether our chamber might consider changing the process, such that we would go to a particular category and then ask which members wish to raise which items, rather than going through every single item on the Order Paper.
In any event, have you had similar instances?
Mr. Beamish: We have not changed things very much; we rely on the broadcasters to put up helpful captions. For example, at Question Time, the first thing a peer will say is, ``I beg leave to ask the question standing in my name on the Order Paper.'' Everyone in the chamber has the Order Paper, so they can see what the question is, and we rely on the broadcasters to put it on screen. Later on during our proceedings, a peer may say, ``I beg to move the motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.'' It would be difficult to follow the proceedings without an Order Paper; however, in practice, broadcasters caption what is broadcast.
Lord Graham: Believe me, there are many members of the house to whom the business is incomprehensible, never mind the public. There are some members who are very diligent. We have something called the little Red Book, which is our Standing Orders, and there are some members, but not many, who have mastered the intricacies of what it is we can and cannot do. In general, our members rely upon the leader of the house, the chief whip, three or four people who have made themselves expert at procedure, and they follow it. I do not think the general public is too confused by parliamentary mumbo-jumbo. The general public is interested in the cut and thrust of a debate.
Senator Cordy: Lord Graham, you talked about what you do when you have a specific issue that may be of interest just to a few people — you move it to what you referred to as the Moses Room. We do not have such a room. We would be dealing with issues to, perhaps, not a full house in the Senate.
What other changes have you made to your proceedings so that they lend themselves to being more viewer-friendly than perhaps what we have now? For example, in the House of Commons, there are time restrictions on the amount of time a speaker can take to ask as well as answer questions. In the Senate, we do not have those restrictions. Hence, sometimes questions ands answers turn into speeches, which may not be of interest.
I think you said earlier that the public tends to like the quick bantering back and forth in Question Time. When television was first introduced to the House of Lords, did you make any changes, to make the proceedings more viewer-friendly?
Lord Graham: When I first came to the House in 1983, Question Time was 20 minutes in length; it has been increased to 30 minutes. Frankly, there are days when we need 40 minutes.
We are very strict. The first question may well merit more than 7.5 minutes. The maximum time that is allowed to go beyond that is to eight minutes. The Leader of the House has the power to intervene and stop asking of the same question. They must move on. In other words, the person who has managed to get slot number 2, 3 and 4 is entitled to his or her time. The more time you take on question 1, the less time there is. We are strict on ensuring that 30 minutes is the maximum time for questions.
Senator Hays: My question follows up on the Internet aspect of your outreach, interactivity, in particular. I assume some individual senators have web pages or websites that are interactive, and of course the committee's website is interactive.
How do you manage that? Not all of us in this chamber — and I suspect not all of you in your chamber — are good at the technology of using this important communications vehicle. How do you support the lords and the committees of the lords in that part of their role?
Mr. Beamish: We have many more members than you do, and of course they are not salaried; they get modest allowances, not enough to enable to them to employ full-time staff. The short answer as regards members' personal websites is that on the whole we do not support them. Not many members have personal websites. The parliamentary website, www.parliament.uk, we share with the House of Commons. Each committee, in particular, has its own home page showing its current inquiries, past reports and so forth.
All our support is focused on the parliamentary website. As far as individual members are concerned, lists are available; people can refer to those lists to find out who the members are and what party they belong to. There are links for members, which we provide to a commercial organization, Dod's, that puts up information about members of both Houses, which is widely respected and achieves the same result without our needing to put our resources in.
[Translation]
Senator Robichaud: You mentioned that you had a limited number of committee's rooms equipped with cameras and that you had to elbow your way through to have access to these rooms.
Do you plan to add more equipment in other committee's rooms in order to increase the TV coverage of your proceedings?
[English]
Ms. Long: What I was saying is that we have a number of committee rooms, which are limited in number, that have television broadcast-quality camera systems. We are trying to install in other committee rooms the type of cameras that we are using today for this meeting, which allow for full audiovisual coverage to be available from every committee room. It will not happen overnight, but we are moving towards a rolling program of installing cameras in as many committee rooms as we can. Even that, though not as expensive as the broadcast-quality cameras, does have substantial cost implications.
Mr. Beamish: The number we have equipped for live, full, high-quality broadcasting is quite enough for the number of meetings that do get broadcast, so the only practical problem for us is that occasionally a committee might have to meet in a different room from its usual one in order that they can benefit from the broadcasting. There are no plans to make all the rooms suitable for broadcast; we are focusing instead on ensuring that webcasting can go out from everywhere.
Lord Graham: I can assure you that there is no pressure at any level for an increase in the quantity of televising parliamentary activity. We have moved along at a fairly brisk pace, within our limits. There are limits on finance and resources, but in general, I do not know of any complaint by the general public or the parliamentary estate that leads me to believe there is dissatisfaction. There is general acceptance that what we have is as good as we can get at the present time.
The Chairman: Lord Graham, you gave me an opening to suggest that Senator Joyal pose a brief question, hopefully with a brief answer.
Senator Joyal: On the basis of your experience and what you have learned during the past 25 years or so of broadcasting, what would you suggest to us as an approach? Would you suggest meeting the same kind of coverage that you have achieved now, or would you suggest to us a step-by-step approach? Which step would you suggest that we take first?
Lord Graham: You now have our experience to guide you. We did not have much experience to guide us. We just took the view that it was right at the time to allow the public into Parliament in order to see how we react.
The first step surely would be to televise proceedings in your chamber on selected aspects of procedures, ones that are generally seen to be of great interest. I understand the regional nature of Canada, and all of citizens' interests are affected by what happens in Ottawa. On the other hand, you should try to produce something that is relevant and important. It would be easy, I think, to trivialize your proceedings by going for something that looked as if it was in demand. You have to maintain standards. I honestly believe that in Britain we have managed to maintain good standards both of televising and for Parliament.
Baroness Bonham-Carter: I think the most important factor is that you should be confident that the people will appreciate what they see and that it is a politic thing for democracy for them to be able to see what you do. Also, unlike the House of Lords, your House of Commons is already televised. My strong recommendation, as I said earlier, would be that you coordinate with the House of Commons and learn through what they have experienced. I would also suggest you seek the help and advice of people who actually understand broadcasting, so that it is not just politicians talking together. I would advise you to get advice from someone from the other side of the business to help you in this endeavour.
It seems to me there is unnecessary trepidation I am hearing, because I am sure what you have to offer will be incredibly well received by the Canadian public.
The Chairman: I should like to express our thanks to you, Baroness Bonham-Carter, and to you, Lord Graham, as well as to Ms. Long and Mr. Beamish. I extend our warmest thanks for sharing your experiences and opinions. It has been most informative, and I can assure you that it will be very helpful in our deliberations.
Lord Graham: Thank you very much.
Baroness Bonham-Carter: Merci.
The Chairman: Before we adjourn, there is some business I must look after. It will be of no surprise, I trust, to anyone here to learn that I am immediately submitting my resignation as chair of this committee. As senators know, there are changes taking place. I should like your indulgence to give us another moment so that we can elect our next chair.
I am resigning; hence, I turn this meeting over to the clerk, who will conduct the rest of the business.
Senator Robichaud: If we were to refuse your resignation, what would happen?
Senator Di Nino: Thank you for your confidence.
My position is firm.
Senator Joyal: Certainly on behalf of our side, we want to thank you, Senator Di Nino, for your chairmanship. It was pleasant to work with you and we have achieved progress on the issues we have been tackling. I want to wholeheartedly express our sincere thanks and gratitude for your chairmanship.
Blair Armitage, Principal Clerk, Legislative Support Office, Senate of Canada: My only power here, according to the rules and practices of the Senate, is to preside over the election of a new chair. I open the floor to a nomination.
Senator Smith: I would echo Senator Joyal's remarks about Senator Di Nino, who when dealing with rules — most things really, but rules in particular — took a non-partisan approach. This is very desirable.
It is my pleasure to nominate Senator Keon for the position.
Senator Joyal: I second the nomination.
The Clerk: Any other nominations from the floor?
There being none, is it agreed that Senator Keon take the chair as chairman of this committee?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
Senator Wilbert J. Keon (Chairman) in the chair.
The Chairman: I wish to thank you for the confidence you have shown in me. I am very proud to be a senator. I was a fish out of water when I came here from the medical and scientific world, and in some areas I remain a bit of a fish out of water, but I enjoy every one of you. I enjoy the debates and what you have to say. I think I will enjoy chairing this committee with a lot of help from the clerk and from those around the table, because there are some truly outstanding people here.
The committee adjourned.