Filibustering should be banned, say MPs There are a number of adverse consequences. The ability of a small group of Members to defeat a bill discourages Members from attending on a Friday to secure the passage even of a well-supported bill. Filibustering - that is, talking at length to ensure that a bill runs out of time, which can be done without formally breaching the rules of the House - skews debate and prevents proper scrutiny and discussion by discouraging supporters of a bill from contributing to debate. And the inability to bring a bill to a decision brings the House and its procedures into disrepute in the eyes of the public. Under the committee's plans, MPs would vote on whether the legislation could be timetabled to ensure that the bill was voted on. The committee Tory chairman Charles Walker said: "The initiation, scrutiny and passage of private members' bills goes to the heart of the function of the House of Commons as a legislative assembly. The ability of any MP to bring forward a legislative proposition, and to have it debated, is the clearest indication that so far as legislation is concerned the House of Commons is not a mere sausage machine, churning out endless bills introduced, timetabled, amended and whipped through by the executive. Yet over a period of many years the Commons and its members have allowed this important aspect of its procedures to be devalued and degraded. The weight of evidence which we have received demonstrates a clear desire across the House for change. If agreed by MPs, the committee's changes could be in place in time for the next session of Parliament, but would not affect bills currently before the Commons. Among backbench legislation currently being considered by MPs is a bill to enshrine in law David Cameron's promise of a referendum on the UK's membership of the European Union by the end of 2017.