Consideration of bills on report

28.130The consideration of a bill, commonly called the report stage, is an opportunity for the House to consider afresh the text of the bill. The rules of debate and procedure differ somewhat from those for the committee stage: in particular, no question is put for the successive clauses and schedules to stand part of the bill (cf para 28.114 ) and amendments which have the effect of leaving out clauses or schedules are therefore in order at this stage. Also, a Member may speak only once to the same question, though, in the case of a bill reported from a public bill committee, this rule, under the provisions of Standing Order No 76, is relaxed in favour of the Member in charge of the bill or of the mover of any amendment or new clause or schedule in respect of that amendment (or clause or schedule).1 The same arrangements for the giving of notice of amendments, new clauses, etc, apply as for the Committee of the whole House and public bill committees (see para 28.98 ). The provisions of Standing Order No 64 with regard to notices handed in during an adjournment apply to amendments, new clauses or new schedules to be moved on consideration (see para 28.98 ).

Amendments which were rejected or withdrawn in committee may be moved again, and attempts may be made by amendments to restore the original text of the bill. The Speaker's power of selection of amendments, conferred by Standing Order No 32 (see para 20.33 ), may be exercised more rigorously by the Speaker on consideration than in committee by the Chair,2 having regard to the importance of the matters to be raised. The normal practice is for the Speaker's provisional selection and proposed grouping of amendments to be made known in advance.

New clauses, amendments and new schedules may be grouped for debate at the report stage in the same way as in committee (see para 28.102 ), and report stage groups are often broad in character.3 If an amendment (or new clause or new schedule) has been selected for separate decision, the Speaker may put the question on it when bringing proceedings on consideration to a conclusion in accordance with a programme order (Standing Order No 83E(2)(c), and see para 28.139 ).4 Normally, an amendment is selected under this Standing Order only if the first amendment in the group had been reached for debate before the close of the proceedings.5