Tynwald has the longest summer recess of all the parliaments in the British Isles.

A House of Keys committee is to investigate whether it needs to rethink its schedule.

It follows a call from Middle MHK Bill Shimmins to hold up to additional four sittings - in September and October - before Tynwald returns from recess at its normal scheduled time of the third Tuesday in October.

In the House of Keys, Mr Shimmins sought backing to introduce the extra Keys sittings from next September.

It followed an earlier, failed attempt to get Tynwald to support his idea that the main chamber should also have a shorter summer recess.

After he put forward his motion to the House of Keys, a plethora of amendments were tabled, before members voted to support one tabled by Ray Harmer (Glenfaba and Peel), that the House of Keys should investigate options to change sitting dates and times, ’to encourage diversity’, and that the Tynwald standing orders committee should be asked to investigate whether to continue with written questions in August and September.

After watching amendment after amendment be put forward, Mr Harmer said it would be better to have a proper investigation.

’It just sounds as though we are making a muddle of the whole thing,’ he said.

resumption

Earlier, Mr Shimmins outlined why he wanted the Keys to sit on September 11 and 25, as well as October 2 and 9, next year. All of them would have been ahead of the scheduled resumption of Tynwald.

’The Isle of Man has the longest summer recess of the parliaments in the British Isles,’ he said. ’The three-month or 88-day gap is much bigger than Westminster, Edinburgh, Dublin, Cardiff, Jersey and Guernsey.’

He said the schedule had barely changed since 1946.

’During these 71 years, other parliaments have altered their timetables to reflect the changing world around them,’ Mr Shimmins added.

’They have not been afraid to tweak the way they operate. They have also sought to ensure their assemblies reflect the makeup of their society.’

suggestions

He rejected suggestions his proposal was about ’electioneering, populism or my personal holidays’.

Mr Shimmins added: ’This motion is about working smarter, rather than harder. It also seeks to align sittings better with school holidays, following the practice of neighbouring parliaments who have made great strides in diversity.’

He said the island compared poorly with other parliaments in the British Isles.

’In Jersey, the chief minister and three deputies established a States’ Assembly diversity forum in July this year, to take action to tackle this issue. It is unfortunate that our diversity metrics are actually worse than those in Jersey and we are, of course, further behind the others.’

He said the change would spread the work more evenly, reduce delays for businesses waiting for the House of Keys to return after the summer, cut down the number of times a bill had to have multiple readings in a single day and encourage a more diverse membership by aligning more closely to the school holidays.

Members voted 15-9 in favour of Mr Harmer’s amendment to the original proposal and then voted 14-10 in favour of the motion as amended.

Martyn Perkins (Garff) voted in favour of the amendment, but against the amended motion.