Nigel Beard's ten minute rule Lighter Evenings Bill came up for its second reading on Friday. The Hansard report is at 15 Oct 2004 Column 594: <http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200304/cmhansrd/cm041015/ debtext/41015-19.htm#41015-19_head0>. The bit covering the Lighter Evening Bill is short enough to quote in full: LIGHTER EVENINGS BILL Order for Second Reading read. Hon. Members: Object. To be read a Second time on Friday 5 November. Parliamentary procedure for bills like this is that a single member shouting Object is sufficient to kill it off. Rational debate it ain't. The bit about reading it again on 5 Nov is fairly meaningless. The house won't actually be sitting on that day. Nigel chose a date in the near future rather than giving up just in case some emergency arises that means the house would sit on that day. It's vanishingly unlikely that it will, and even if it does no doubt the Hon. Members would Object again. There was some reporting of this proposal in the Scottish papers early last week. Nigel wrote a letter to the Sunday Herald setting out his case. This appeared in the news section and is available at: <http://www.sundayherald.com/45353>. By the time this appeared the Bill had already been lost. I'm surprised the Herald didn't note this. So that's it for this latest attempt to fiddle with the clocks here in the UK. Peter Ilieve peter@aldie.co.uk