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Last updated: 07 May 2010
1. On 19 June 2007 the House of Commons agreed to the 2nd Report from the Commons Procedure Committee (HC541 of session 2006-07) Corrections to the Official Report. This inquiry arose from dissatisfaction by Members that the present system of correcting inadvertent errors by Ministers in Hansard was unclear and untransparent (particularly where correcting letters were placed in the Commons Library).
2. The Procedure Committee, following representations from the Leader of the House, proposed a new scheme involving a separate section of Hansard for printing corrections. Now it has been endorsed by the House, the new scheme will begin from the start of the next (2007-08) session. This note provides guidance for parliamentary branches and departments as to how the new process will work.
3. There have hitherto been five principal written ways of correcting errors (see Procedure Committee report para 4):
4. Under the new scheme, in appropriate cases corrections—in the name of the Minister—will instead be sent to Hansard, indicating the error, and these corrections will be printed in the Official Report in a separate section. This means that the old process of making a correction by placing a copy of the letter in the Commons Library1, or by supplying a ‘pursuant answer’ after checking with the Table Office—i.e. options (b) and (d) above—will no longer operate.
5. But it does not mean that other ways of correcting mistakes are no longer applicable. Where an error is not within the scope of the new system, then you will have to consider whether you need to make a Written Ministerial Statement (option (e) above)—or even conceivably an Oral Statement—as before. But many of the circumstances in the past in which a WMS was used should now be covered by the new procedure: it would thus be expected henceforth that WMSs would only rarely be used for corrections.
6. Option (c) above technically remains available, since in procedural terms it is just a fresh PQ, but it would be inadvisable to use it for the purpose of making a correction. This is because—even if tempted to use it in order to make other announcements or include other information at the same time—there will be no cross reference in the printed or electronic version of Hansard to the question and answer which is being corrected. The Department could come in for criticism and the incorrect information may continue to be used.
7. The new system does not replace the system whereby very minor corrections which do not alter the meaning of the original text would continue to be made editorially by Hansard (option (a) above and see Report para 14).
8. Overall, it is expected that the total number of corrections should not increase and the emphasise remains on officials to ensure the adequate quality control measures are in place. The number of corrections will be regularly monitored by the Office of the Leader of the House of Commons.
9. The new process (see para 13 of the Report) is available for corrections only and “should not be an occasion to provide new information, however closely related to the original proceeding. Neither should it be used to rehearse arguments which may have given rise to the original error.” Accordingly, any proposed correction under the new procedure will need to be cleared by the Table Office (as with ‘pursuant answers’ at present). It is difficult to give precise guidance in advance as to what will come within the terms set out in the Procedure Committee report, but the Table Office will be happy to advise (see para 10 below) and if in doubt it would often be good practice to check with them before engaging the new procedure. The position should become clearer as examples emerge.
10. Paragraphs 7 and 8 of the report make clear that the new procedure is available for errors by Ministers made in or during the course of:
Note that, while the procedure applies to evidence submitted to public bill committees, it does not apply to evidence to select committees.
11. If the Department wishes to clear the terms of a correction in advance with the Table Office (for adherence to the House’s requirements) the Table Office will be happy to assist. Otherwise, this clearance stage will take place after the correction is sent to Hansard. Before (or at the same time as) writing to Hansard, the Department must write to the Member concerned (if the correction involves a PQ or otherwise involves a statement directly made to a particular Member).
12. The correction should then be sent to the Hansard. They will then send it to the Table Office for checking, who will return it to Hansard for publication; the Table Office will contact the relevant Department if there is a problem. To allow time for this checking process, Hansard are proposing the following daily cut-off points for delivery by Departments to them:
4pm Monday, Tuesday
2pm Wednesday, Thursday
12pm Friday.
13. In order to allow cross-references to be inserted in the bound volume at the point of the original error (as required by the Procedure Committee), corrections need to be received before the deadlines already notified to departments for corrections for the bound volumes. Once those deadlines have passed, then while the correction can still be printed in the current Hansard, no link will appear in the bound volume or on the website. Remember that corrections should always be made at the earliest opportunity.
14. In terms of format, the correction should be free-standing—i.e. the correction letter should:
An example of how a correction might be set out below.
15. For further information on this guidance relevant contact points (as at current date) are:
Leader’s Office: Mike Winter - 020 7276 0979
Revised: Tom Healey - 020 7276 0351
Hansard: Clare Hanly - 020 7219 5258
Table Office: Table Office Clerks - 020 7219 3302/3303
1. It is possible that the requirement of depositing a copy of the letter in the Library may not have universally been followed by all Departments anyway
2. Errors in public bill committees spotted in time should be corrected during subsequent proceedings of the committee
3. In practice where Answers or WMSs are lengthy, Hansard will exercise editorial judgement (as they will have to anyway in relation to errors in speeches) as to how much of the original text should be reprinted
To: [Editor of Hansard]
Correction to the Official Report
Mr Pitcher (Minister for Baseball, DCMS)
An error has been identified in the [Written Answer given to the Hon Member for Homerun] at Official Report 19 September 2007 col 666W. The full answer given was as follows:
Mr Catcher: To ask the SofS for Culture Media and Sport what funding is given to baseball by his department. [123456]
Mr Pitcher: My department pays grants of £1.45m, broken down as follows:
The correct answer should have been:
“My department pays grants of £1.45m, broken down as follows:
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