§ Sir DONALD MACLEANMight I, with respect, ask your ruling, Mr. Speaker, on a point of Order relating to the Second Order on the Order Paper—the Rules of Procedure? I respectfully suggest it would perhaps be well if we followed the precedent of 1902, when the Rules of Procedure were then before the House. The Resolution which was then moved by the Prime Minister of that time was, "That the proposals of the Government on the Order Paper relating to the procedure of the House be now considered." I would suggest that that is a more convenient way of starting our discussion of this very important subject.
§ Mr. SPEAKERThe right hon. Gentleman the Member for Peebles has called my attention to the precedent of 1902, when the House was discussing Amendments to the Rules of Procedure; when the right hon. Member for the City of London was the Leader of the House, and there was then a formal Motion made. There was also a subsequent precedent in 1906, when Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman moved these actual Rules which it is now proposed to amend—Standing Order No. 47 and subsequent ones—and on that occasion there was no Motion made. I think on the whole that the former proposal in 1902 was a better one, and therefore I shall propose, when the Leader of the House moves at the conclusion of his speech, to put the Motion in the words the right hon. Gentleman suggested, "That these proposals be now considered." The Debate can then take place with regard to the proposals as a whole. When that Debate has been disposed of, we can then consider the Amendments separately.