If Sir Lindsay’s view is ignored and the government stick to their petty attitude (and as pettiness goes it’s pretty much right up there) then that will be seen as just as biased a position as any perceived bias on the part of the Speaker. The argument, effectively, that the Speaker is supposed to be unbiased, but no one else, apart from being slightly ridiculous, misses the point already made that in that situation it would have been impossible not to have been biased one way or another. I liken it a bit to the Drumcree dispute in Co Armagh, where no matter what the government of the day ruled, there was no right or neutral approach that would have pleased everyone.