§ 3.8 p.m.
§ Lord GrocottMy Lords, two brief pieces of information: as has already been trailed, there will be a Statement later this afternoon on Iraq and the Middle East peace process. The Statement will take place after the three Front-Bench speeches in the Second Reading debate; that is, after the speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp of Guildford. On that debate, the fact that we have a Statement means that the timings for the day 12 are not quite as they were when we planned them originally. I can say to the House that should noble Lords exercise that splendid discipline, oratorical brevity, and were able to restrict their speeches to eight minutes, then even with the Statement we would finish by 11.30.
I have one final comment. I hope this does not sound too school masterish, but I simply remind the House of the Companion. If anyone on the list finds that for any reason he or she will be unable to be here for the windup speeches, then as we all know the advice is that they should remove their names from the list.