On Wednesday evening the parliamentary timetable and my own dovetailed for once. Those of us opposed to the Personal Care at Home Bill trounced the Government on 4 votes at report stage. Carefully choreographed by 5 of us, Lords Lipsey and Warner in the lead, with Earl Howe for the Tories, Baroness Barker for the Lib Dems and Lord Best and myself from the Crossbenchers we devised a series of holding amendments (and a sunset clause) to allow the Government to reassess the costs, work out how they might do it better and turn it into a pilot project. We agreed that it was essential to get the votes fast before people went home. This meant that those of us who were not leading on each debate must stay silent so as not to prolong the debates. I said nothing therefore but encouraged fellow crossbenchers to vote with us. The strategy worked; we were all finished by 6.35pm. We now have to see what the Government will do with the time left; cynically I suppose it will depend on how much they want to use this piece of electioneering in their campaign.

So I was able to get to the 10th Anniversary Concert of the Parliament Choir singing for the first time in Westminster Hall. Acoustically marvellous, the Hall is a wonderfully atmospheric building for such a splendid occasion. Singing with the help of professional soloists and an exceptionally talented young scholarship orchestra of professional players, the Southbank Sinfonia, conducted by Simon Over, the choir sang Mozart’s Requiem, preceded by a new setting to music by Nicholas O’Neill, the choirmaster, of two of the parliamentary prayers I mentioned in my last blog.  He called the piece ‘Of All Persons and Estates’, which more or less describes the extraordinary cross section of people working in parliament who make up the Choir.

They were in wonderful voice and the 600 strong audience were in celebratory mood. The Choir was the brainchild of Lord Filkin, who also sings bass in the choir and Simon Over, who was then Director of Music at St Margaret’s Westminster. I rarely go home after a late night in parliament humming Mozart’s Kyrie Eleison as I did wednesday. To learn more go to http://www.parliamentchoir.org.uk/