Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

My Lords, surely the point is that this Government could have determined and announced that they were going to last for five years. They could then have produced legislation for the future, were that their wish, on which there could have been pre-legislative scrutiny—which the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, believes, and I share his view, we would all have been the beneficiaries of. So why on earth are we doing this Bill now, dealing with the future?