Carry-over of public bills

In the 1997 Parliament, the Modernisation Committee suggested carrying over public bills from one parliamentary session to the next. The committee said this could reduce the fluctuations in legislative activity caused by parliamentary sessions.

This briefing summarises the 1997 Modernisation Committee’s views and describes the different approaches to allowing bills to be carried forward in the House of Commons and the House of Lords. It also provides examples of the form of words used in carry-over motions.

House of Commons

On 29 October 2002, the House of Commons introduced carry-over on an experimental basis until the end of the Parliament that ran from 2001–2005.

Standing Order No 80A

On 26 October 2004, the House of Commons agreed to slightly amended arrangements to make carry-over permanent (Standing Order No 80A). The permanent standing order was effective from the beginning of the 2004–05 session of Parliament.

Under the standing order, bills can be carried over from one session to the next, but they must complete their progress through Parliament within 12 months of being introduced. However, the standing order does allow the 12-month period to be extended: at the time of writing, 14 bills have been granted extensions.

In December 2011, the standing order was amended and a new standing order was made to allow bills introduced under Ways and Means resolutions to be carried over. This followed the passage of the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011, which marked a move to spring-to-spring parliamentary sessions. This meant that the Finance Bill that followed a spring Budget, late in one session, could be carried over to the following session. The Finance (No 4) Bill 2010–12 was the first bill introduced under a Ways and Means resolution to be the subject of a carry-over motion under the new standing order.

How many bills have been carried over?

Six bills were carried over before the standing order became permanent in 2004.

Since the standing order became permanent:

• nine bills were carried over during the Parliament that ran from 2005–2010
• 11 bills were carried over during the Parliament that ran from 2010–2015
• two bills were carried over during the Parliament that ran from 2015–2017
  • These were both bills that were carried over from the 2015–16 session to the 2016–17 session.
  • The House agreed to three motions to carry over bills from the 2016–17 session to the 2017–18 session. The motions were agreed before the 2017 general election was announced. As it is not possible for public bills to be carried over from one Parliament to another, these decisions did not have effect in the 2017 Parliament.
• one bill was carried over during the Parliament that ran from 2017–2019
  • this bill was carried over at the end of the 2017–19 session
• 14 bills were carried over during the Parliament that ran from 2019–2024
  • this included three bills (one in the 2019–21 session and two in the 2021–22 session) that were allowed two years to complete their passage (rather than the one year specified in Standing Order No 80A)
• seven bills have been carried over during the 2024 Parliament to date
  • these are being carried over from the 2024–26 session to the 2026–27 session

These figures exclude bills introduced under Ways and Means resolutions (see below); they also exclude hybrid bills.

House of Lords

In the House of Lords, a procedure for carry-over was agreed on 24 July 2002, following recommendations from the House of Lords Procedure Committee. 

Since the 2003–04 session, four public bills have been carried over in the House of Lords.