Politics Explained: Parliament returns tomorrow – what is on the agenda?

John Rentoul on what we can expect as MPs resume their activity in Westminster after six weeks working hard in their constituencies

The House of Commons has been in recess since 22 July (Getty)

Boris Johnson is not always keen to have the House of Commons in session. At the end of August last year, he suspended parliament for five weeks in a futile attempt to stop it blocking a no-deal Brexit – only for the Supreme Court to rule the prorogation unlawful.

Even though he now has an election mandate of his own and a majority of 78, it seems he is wary of giving his own MPs the chance to meet and plot – and he is certainly unenthusiastic about giving Keir Starmer the limelight of Prime Minister’s Questions every Wednesday.

Labour, on the other hand, will welcome the chance to get back into the headlines against a prime minister whose opinion-poll ratings are in retreat.

However, it is Johnson’s own MPs that Mark Spencer, the Conservative chief whip, is worried about. Many of them have been fuming in their constituencies during the parliamentary recess, complaining mostly anonymously about government policy on exam grades, face coverings, getting pupils back to school and getting office workers back to their desks.

Once they start to assemble in Westminster in socially distanced huddles – or in many cases just huddles, as the rebellious ones tend to think the rules on Covid safety are a hysterical overreaction – the scope for trouble only increases. And there will be parliamentary votes, each one a chance to exert some leverage on a government that they think fails to listen to its backbenchers enough.

This may be why there is little actual legislation listed in the parliamentary calendar. The Non-Domestic Rating (Public Lavatories) Bill on Thursday is about as exciting as it gets. “No one knows what it will be, but there is bound to be a backbench revolt over something,” according to one seasoned observer of Tory troublemaking.

The resumption of parliament also means the resumption of select committee hearings, mostly still held via Zoom, which are likely to generate a stream of unhelpful headlines for the government. Tomorrow, for example, the Treasury Committee takes evidence from think tanks about possible future tax rises; the Foreign Affairs Committee hears from Tony Abbott, the Australian former prime minister expected to be appointed a UK trade envoy; and the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee takes evidence about planning for floods.

Boris Johnson must privately sympathise with James I and VI, who complained about the House of Commons: “I am obliged to put up with what I cannot get rid of.”