Committee publication · Report · 3 February 2026 · HC 536

4th Report – Call lists

Government response deadline: 3 April 2026

Summary

The Procedure Committee examined whether published call lists (speakers lists) for House of Commons debates would improve certainty, accessibility, and representation. After hearing from MPs, experts, and examining practice in other legislatures and devolved assemblies, the Committee concluded that published call lists should not be introduced, as they would require major procedural changes and risk undermining the Speaker's discretion and debate quality.

Key findings

Members requested call lists to improve work-life balance, planning around caring responsibilities, and managing health conditions, particularly disabled MPs; smaller parties cited difficulties committing time to debates with uncertain speaking slots.
The informal system whereby Members approach the Chair to seek guidance on if/when they will be called currently strikes the right balance and should continue; published lists would unduly restrict the Speaker's discretionary powers.
Call lists in the House of Lords require earlier registration deadlines (two working days) and administrative resource; the House of Lords system operates under fundamentally different conditions with no fixed debate end times.
International legislatures using call lists (European Parliament, PACE, devolved assemblies) employ proportional allocation of speaking time by party size and fixed time limits; the EU Parliament is now trialling unpublished lists due to concerns about debate quality.
The House of Commons' flexibility to accommodate Government statements and Urgent Questions at short notice makes predicting parliamentary business timing impossible; call lists in isolation will not solve the identified problems without broader procedural reform.

Recommendations

Call lists should not be published.
The Modernisation Committee should investigate whether introducing more certainty into the sitting day is desirable, given the lack of universal support in evidence received.
The Modernisation Committee should clarify whether it intends to consider the use of time in the Chamber as announced in its 2024 memorandum, and if so, what it will cover.

Tone

Procedural

Topics

parliamentary-procedurework-life-balanceaccessibilityrepresentationdebate-organisation

Key actors

Cat Smith, Rt Hon. Nigel Evans, Claire Hanna MP, Dr Ruth Fox, Dr Sarabajaya Kumar, Kirsty Blackman MP, Lord Gardiner of Kimble, Dr Ekaterina Kolpinskaya

Notable line

“Published call lists would not work unless implemented alongside a broad package of major procedural changes, and would risk causing more problems than they have the potential to solve.”

Key Quotes

“… having call lists is a good idea. I want to be required to listen to my parliamentary colleagues, but I want to do so for a reasonable amount of time so that I can go in and out, and with some predictability, so that it is not stressful.”
— Dr Marie Tidball MP · testimony to the Modernisation Committee on accessibility for members with health conditions

“If you go in to speak on a standard debate of maybe three or four hours, as a smaller party coming down the pecking order, you really need to commit those four hours. It is a disincentive to speak.”
— Claire Hanna MP · explaining challenges faced by smaller parties in committing time to debates without certainty of being called

“I would be opposed to introducing a call list because it would manufacture an expectation of when people will speak, and it would move the Chamber away from being a debating chamber and towards being a public speaking chamber.”
— Robin Swann MP · expressing concerns that call lists would undermine the nature of debate in the Chamber

“It is not clear to me at this stage exactly what problem this is trying to solve. It seems to me that there is not a consensus.”
— Dr Ruth Fox · noting that call lists are presented as a solution to multiple distinct problems without clear agreement

“Especially because of the size of [the SNP] right now and the fact that we don't always get called in all of the debates, I think it is the case that people think, "I've got the choice. Will I be home for my constituents and my kids, and to care for my mother on that Thursday, or will I put in for that debate?”
— Kirsty Blackman MP · describing the difficult trade-off between parliamentary participation and personal/constituency responsibilities

“We believe that the informal system currently in play, where Members can seek guidance from the Chair on if and when they might be called strikes the right balance, ensuring that the power of the Speaker and Deputy Speaker to exercise discretion during a debate is not eroded.”
— Procedure Committee · Committee's central conclusion on current practice

“Generally it works well, and is in keeping with the overall procedures of self-regulation in the House of Lords. We have well established conventions and precedents for how lists are ordered.”
— Lord Kennedy of Southwark · reflection on how speakers lists operate effectively in the House of Lords context

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Source · parliament.uk record ↗