• The Budget: how is it debated?

• Government tax and spending plans: how much influence do backbench MPs have?

• House of Commons chamber: what are new MPs getting wrong and and what are the "do's and don'ts" of etiquette in the Chamber?

• Health and Social Care: how will the new Select Committee tackle the issue of social care?

• Will the Health Committee conduct an inquiry into the 'Assisted Dying' Bill?

Hansard Society

• A procedural guide to the Budget process

  • What is the Budget?

  • How do MPs scrutinise the Budget?

  • How do MPs approve the Budget?

  • Can MPs amend the Budget?

  • What is the Finance Bill?

  • What principles and rules govern the Budget process?

House of Commons

• Rules of behaviour and courtesies in the House of Commons

Health and Social Care Committee

• Assisted Dying/Assisted Suicide, Second Report of Session 2023-24

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You are listening to Parliament Matters, a Hansard Society production supported by the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust.

Ruth Fox: Learn more at hansardsociety.org.uk/pm. Finally, it's really here. 118 days after the general election, the first budget of this Labour government will be delivered next week. So we'll take you through what happens in one of Parliament's more complicated events.

Mark D'Arcy: Are you embarrassing yourself with these basic mistakes in parliamentary etiquette? Our guide for new MPs on what they're getting wrong in the Commons Chamber.

Ruth Fox: And the new chair of the Health and Social Care Committee, Layla Moran, stops by to talk NHS reform, assisted dying, and getting new MPs up to speed for life on the committee corridor.[00:01:00]

Mark D'Arcy: But first, Ruth, let's talk about the budget. It's finally here. You can argue that there's been a huge political vacuum left in the absence of Labour having an immediate Budget as soon as they took office, but finally next week, it's going to arrive. An all singing, all dancing financial statement with details of tax and spending plans for the coming year and probably for time beyond that as well.

And all sorts of incredible intricate. technical complexities about how the budget is debated, what the parameters of the debate are, how the documents around the budget are extracted from Exchequer, and much, much more. And it can look quite opaque to people watching from outside, as all sorts of slightly strange rituals are enacted.

Ruth Fox: Yeah, so should we take listeners through it step by step, Mark, so that when they're watching next week, they can follow. And some of this actually happens at quite a bit of speed. So it's quite tricky.

Mark D'Arcy: It's, it's all very rapid. [00:02:00] But the first thing that happens is that the Speaker leaves the chair to be replaced by the senior deputy speaker, the Chairman of Ways and Means.

And this is a historical oddity that goes back to, I think, the Restoration Era, where at one point the Speaker was seen as a tool of the monarchy. And so when the Commons wanted to discuss money matters, it resolved itself into a committee of ways and means that was not chaired by Mr Speaker. And that has persisted pretty much ever since through the ensuing centuries.

It's the one big parliamentary event that the Speaker doesn't chair as of right....