Labour has said plans to move the annual Queen's speech from the autumn to the spring are an "abuse of power".
The proposed shift was announced by Commons Leader Sir George Young, who said the change would suit the change to fixed-term five year parliaments.
If backed by MPs it would mean the next Queen's Speech will not take place until the spring of 2012.
Labour's Rosie Winterton said it was an "affront to Parliament" and ministers wanted extra time to get plans through.
Sir George is making a statement to the Commons after Speaker John Bercow granted a request from Labour's Denis MacShane for an urgent question on the issue.
Pomp and ceremony
MPs will later debate the proposed introduction of fixed-term term parliaments - which would see the next election date held on 7 May, 2015.
In recent years the Queen's Speech, and the pomp and ceremony of the State Opening of Parliament, has been held in November or December in non-election years.
However this means that, as in 2009, the government programme covers just six months or so when there is a May general election.
The proposed changes - announced in a written ministerial statement - would mean that with fixed elections there would be five Queen's Speeches, each covering the programme for a year.
There was a Queen's Speech in May after the change of government in the general election - the programme outlined was expected to cover the period to November 2011.
The timetabling change means that there will now be an extra six months or so for the coalition to get its programme through Parliament.
Labour said the coalition simply wanted extra time to get "difficult" legislation through Parliament over the next 18 months and should end this year's Parliament in May instead.
"What the government has done is to unilaterally decide to abolish next year's Queen's Speech," Rosie Winterton, the shadow Leader of the House of Commons, told BBC Radio 4's World At One.
"It is an affront to Parliament and an abuse of power."
Citing the government's proposal to reduce the number of MPs from 650 to 600 and to make constituency sizes more uniform - which Labour opposes - she said ministers were pursuing a "whole series" of policies tantamount to "gerrymandering or abuse of power".
BBC deputy political editor James Landale said the last year when the monarch did not come to Parliament was 1949.
He said that for the Government, the extra length of the current session means they lose the advantage of having a deadline next year by which they have to force through legislation.
But on the plus side they also lose the chaos of the so-called "wash-up" period before the end of a parliament when a lot of unexamined legislation is rushed onto the statute book - and a lot of other legislation is dropped to get the more important measures through.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11283941Thoughts?
