- Parliamentary ping-pong—Lords’ amendments and government changes.
The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill received Royal Assent on 28 April, 13 months after it was first introduced. The Lords spent 11 days on the committee stage and six days on the report stage. That resulted in no less than 161 amendments. Many were changes made by the government to its own Bill—though a considerable number had been stimulated by the opposition. There were also changes made by the Lords that were government defeats, but almost all of these were reversed by the Commons.
The provisions triggered by extreme Extinction Rebellion protests were first introduced just before midnight on 24 November 2021, at the very end of the committee stage in the Lords. But because of the late hour, their controversial content, the fact that they had not been considered by the Commons and the short notice, the government did not put them to the vote that night. They were re-introduced on 17 January, the last day of the report stage.
