G20

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Monday 7th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. As I said, it is difficult to say more about it in the House, but I will discuss with Treasury Ministers whether we can say a little bit more. If Members have contributions that they want to make or concerns about elements of any contingency plan, which would have to be very wide ranging and cover all sorts of different eventualities, they should talk to Treasury Ministers.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

Does the Prime Minister have an estimate of the liability that the UK would have incurred had we not excluded ourselves from the European financial stability mechanism bail-out fund that the Labour Government supported?

[The Prime Minister]

One thing that we have managed to keep out of is the European element of the Greek bail-out. That has had two iterations, and we were not involved in the first or the second. The specific idea of using the EFSM to support Greece was batted away by Britain.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Wednesday 7th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Brandon Lewis (Great Yarmouth) (Con)]

2. What steps his Department is taking to ensure that small and medium-sized enterprises are aware of opportunities to gain Government contracts.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

5. What steps his Department is taking to ensure that small and medium-sized enterprises are aware of opportunities to gain Government contracts.

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Mr Oliver Letwin)]

We have established Contracts Finder as a one-stop shop, which enables suppliers to find procurement opportunities, tender documents and contracts online and free of charge. We are also piloting a simple method, which I think is called a dynamic market, for suppliers to register online for public sector contracts below £100,000. That will enable small and medium-sized enterprises to compete at minimal cost alongside large suppliers.

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[Andrew Bridgen]

SME information technology companies are reporting back from the Government tendering process that project aims and budgets remain unspecified and that forms are still the size of telephone directories. Can my right hon. Friend assure the House that those concerns will be taken on board, so that this Government can deliver real value from IT projects—something that the previous Government failed to do?

[Mr Letwin]

My hon. Friend has actively and aggressively pursued several Government Departments about these issues and I hope that he will continue to do so. He is absolutely right that too much of this still goes on. My right hon. Friend the Minister for the Cabinet Office, who has taken the lead on the issue and deserves great credit for that, has not tried to keep the issue secret—on the contrary, he has tried to open it up.

We have introduced a “mystery shopper” scheme, which allows suppliers to challenge Government procurers when they see overly bureaucratic processes. I am delighted to be able to tell the House that during the first three months of the scheme, 23 cases of things such as huge telephone-book-sized contracts were investigated and 11 have led to immediate reductions in tedious bureaucracy. All the information about the scheme has been published on the Cabinet Office website.

Libya

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Monday 5th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Gentleman raises an important point. We are trying to change the entire European neighbourhood policy to make it much more about market access and trade, and in some ways we have been successful. If those north African countries traded as much with each other and with the EU as European countries do, they would have far higher levels of GDP and much more balanced economies. The exciting thing about Libya is that, because of its oil wealth and its relative size, it can be an economic success story. For too many countries, oil has been a curse rather than a blessing, but Libya has this opportunity to make a new start and to put those oil revenues to good use.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

The Prime Minister has indicated that the British Government is planning to play a role in the vital training of the new military forces of the new Libyan Government. Will the resources allocated to this task be greater or less than those allocated by the previous Labour Government in the training of Colonel Gaddafi’s forces, which enabled him better to repress his own people?

[The Prime Minister]

That is an ingenious question. The point is that we should wait and see what it is the Libyans want us to do. We clearly have strong capabilities in the training of armed forces and police forces, in advising on having an independent judiciary and the like, and I believe we should make these available and see what the Libyans want. Training the police forces of other countries is a difficult issue. In getting into it, one is often accused of helping a regime that might not be perfect in every sense, but if we do not do it, we lose the opportunity to explain some of the finer points of independent policing and respect for human rights. This is a very difficult issue that we have not yet got right.

Public Disorder

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Thursday 11th August 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

That is exactly what I have said. There is the Riot (Damages) Act, so businesses, even if they are uninsured, can apply to the relevant police force, and the Home Office will stand behind that force. That is obviously a scheme that has been in place for decades. In addition to that, there are, of course, the two schemes that I have announced today, one of which will directly impact on the hon. Lady’s constituency, because it was affected by the riots.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

Does the Prime Minister agree that what we have witnessed on the streets of our major towns and cities is nothing more or less than pure criminality and thuggery? Those who seek to excuse that behaviour, putting it down to deprivation, poverty, or current Government policies, are themselves symptomatic of the no-blame, no-responsibility culture that has undermined our society and led us to this sorry state.

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. I have been struck, when meeting local people, community leaders and police officers, by the fact that everyone has been making the point that this is about criminality, and not about political protest.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Wednesday 15th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Maude]

That is why we are engaging in discussions with the TUC at its behest. The discussions continue, and there is much still to be sorted out. I remind the hon. Gentleman that Lord Hutton, Labour’s Work and Pensions Secretary, recommended the reforms to make public sector pension schemes sustainable and affordable for the future. That is what we are determined to achieve. Any union or public servant contemplating strike action is jumping the gun. There is a long way to go yet.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

3. What steps he is taking to encourage increased levels of giving.

[The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Mr Nick Hurd)]

The Government are anxious to encourage more giving. On 23 May, we published a White Paper that set out a range of ways in which we can help to make giving easier and more compelling, and offered better support for charities, community groups and social enterprises.

[Andrew Bridgen]

Although people in the UK are very generous compared with Europeans, the rate of UK charitable giving remains only half that of the rate in America. What further steps will the Minister take to encourage us to give up to the level of our American cousins?

[Mr Hurd]

My hon. Friend is right—we are a generous country—but giving has flatlined, despite substantial interventions from previous Governments. We do not accept that as being inevitable, and we want to help people to give more. He will know that the Chancellor announced generous incentives in the last Budget. The White Paper contains many ideas, including a social action fund to support creative, new models that incentivise people to give.

Japan and the Middle East

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Monday 14th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Obviously, we want to have the widest possible international support. Also, we should not proceed without a proper legal basis. The hon. Gentleman mentions the Libyan opposition. They have made it absolutely clear in what they said that they want a no-fly zone and to have this sort of international support.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

Does not the welcome support of the Arab League for a no-fly zone show that the Prime Minister was both forward thinking and right when he proposed it two weeks ago? Does not his stance on this issue contrast enormously with the Leader of the Opposition, who appears to have flip-flopped in a way reminiscent of his predecessor?

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend for what he says. The point I made two weeks ago was not that we should introduce a no-fly zone immediately, but that with such a situation we have to plan in advance for contingencies that may become necessary. I believe that the time is coming when it will be necessary for the international community to step forward and make this decision. However, I do not pretend for a minute that it is a one-shot wonder that will deal with the situation—it is not—but it could help.

Libya and the Middle East

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Monday 28th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes a good point, and there are lessons to learn about how information is shared. It is a difficult and ever-changing picture. Let us just look at the numbers of people who we think are in Libya and who want to come out. Even in the age of the internet, the mobile phone, computer databases and the rest of it, getting a real grip of those numbers, as I believe we now have—we will go on publishing more granular information about that—is difficult, but companies working with the Government is clearly an essential part of that process.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

Does the Prime Minister agree that much of what we have heard from the Opposition over the past week, at the height of the Libyan crisis, has been nothing short of naked political opportunism, and that the deputy leader of the Labour party should apologise for comments that she posted on Twitter, when she said:

“Rapid deployment force not rapid”—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am always interested to hear the hon. Gentleman, who is an extremely keen and assiduous new parliamentarian, but I am afraid he is asking the Prime Minister about something for which even the Prime Minister does not actually have responsibility, so we will leave it there.

[Andrew Bridgen]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. We will leave it there.

Legislation (Territorial Extent) Bill

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Friday 11th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Harriett Baldwin]

That approach is one of those things that looks fair at first sight, but the more one looks at it, the more problems with it one perceives. For example, what if the Government of the day could not carry the Budget? The Finance Bill is something that the Government have to be able to carry, but if the make-up or majority in the English Parliament was different from that in the overall, national Parliament, how would we solve such conundrums? That is why I have not taken that approach in my Bill.

The recommendation that I thought made the most sense was the one in the democracy taskforce publication, which proposed a lower-strength version of English votes for English laws. This proposal was that Bills be certified by the Speaker as English. They would pass through normal Commons processes as far as and including Second Reading, on which the whole House would vote. The Committee stage would be undertaken by English MPs in proportion to English party strengths. Report stage would be similarly voted on by English Members only, and Third Reading, when no amendments are possible, would again be voted on by the whole House. However, there are also problems with that approach, but it is those problems that my Bill seeks to solve.

The problem was best expressed by lain MacLean of Nuffield college in his 2005 paper, in which he said:

“It will be hard for the Speaker to define what is an English bill, at least to do so without controversy—the Speaker could be politicised”.

I would not want to put you in such an awkward position, Mr Speaker. Therefore, by requiring the Secretary of State to specify in draft legislation the territorial extent of a Bill, my expectation is that it would be much clearer in the drafting of Bills to which parts of the UK they applied. Indeed, the Clerk advises me that the Health and Social Care Bill, which was mentioned earlier and which, really, applies only to England, would be hard to certify as being an England-only Bill, because of the way in which it is drafted. What I hope my Bill would achieve, once it received Royal Assent, is gently to guide those drafting Her Majesty’s legislation to be clear enough in that drafting so that you, Mr Speaker, would have no problem certifying Bills. Indeed, you already have the power, under Standing Order No. 97, to certify Bills as having regard to Scotland only. In the past, before devolution, that Standing Order was used quite often, which shows that there is a precedent for such certification and that it would not be beyond the wit of those much wiser than me to come up with some improvements on that Standing Order.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend for indulging me. I wonder whether she would be willing to listen to my perhaps more simple solution to the West Lothian question, which is indeed a boil that needs lancing. If we got rid of Members of the Scottish Parliament and Members of the Welsh Assembly, and instead merely had elected MPs, then all MPs from across Great Britain could meet in this place on Mondays and Tuesdays to attend to British affairs, and then on Wednesdays, and perhaps Thursdays, they could return to the Scottish Parliament or the Welsh Assembly, or to Northern Ireland, leaving English MPs to attend to English matters in this place. Surely that would save the taxpayer a great deal of money and, by getting rid of so many politicians, be very popular in the country.

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[Sir Malcolm Rifkind]

I suspect that my hon. Friend’s intervention has guaranteed that that will not happen. In any event, I would rather give evidence to the committee than serve on it. We will have to wait and see.

Finally, it is the essence of a parliamentary system of government that Governments must not assume that they can always get their business through. They will occasionally be defeated and, if they believe that the issue is fundamental, they can ask for a motion of confidence to enable them to survive. It is not a barrier to the kind of change that I and others have recommended to say that a Government might from time to time have to amend or withdraw their proposals because they lacked parliamentary consent. The parliamentary consent is what matters, not the Government’s wishes.

[Andrew Bridgen]

May I drag my right hon. and learned Friend back to a point he made earlier in his eloquent speech? He said that he did not wish to create two classes of MP. Indeed, there is only one class of MP in this place. However, do we not already have two classes of MPs in our constituencies, because the work load of English MPs is far higher than that of Members in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) makes a sedentary comment, but if the work load of MPs in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland is not less than that of English MPs, what are the devolved Governments doing and what is their purpose?

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[Andrew Bridgen]

The previous Government may well have had the majority of seats in England, but they did not have the majority of the votes.

[Chris Bryant]

Yes, they did.

[Andrew Bridgen]

Once again, the hon. Gentleman comments from a sedentary position. The previous Government did not have the majority of the votes in England. I am a Unionist, and I wholeheartedly support the Union. The biggest risk posed by not addressing the West Lothian question is that the dissatisfaction of English voters, rather than the dissatisfaction of Scottish or Welsh electors, will force the Union apart.

[Iain Stewart]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. Sadly, I do not have the statistics, but I believe that my hon. Friend the Member for North West Leicestershire (Andrew Bridgen), rather than the hon. Member for Rhondda, is correct about the outcome of the 2005 election in England. Hon. Members with BlackBerrys may be able to provide us with that information. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman and my hon. Friend will debate that one in the bar afterwards.

Doing nothing is more dangerous than doing something. I am yet to hear a convincing view that the double-majority option is worse than the current situation. The approach should, of course, be gradual. We should evolve our constitution, rather than smashing it up and piecing it together again, which is why I am happy to support the Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for West Worcestershire. I hope that the Bill is read a Second time today and that it gets a fair wind in its later stages.

EU Council and North Africa

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Monday 7th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The right hon. Gentleman makes an important point, which is that Yemen is vital to the security not just of that region, but frankly of our world, because there has been such a lot of al-Qaeda activity in that part of the Arabian peninsula. Yemen was mentioned at the European Council. In terms of the action that President Saleh has taken, clearly we want to see it in detail and see it put in place. There is something of wake-up call in Yemen because of the incredible stresses and problems that that country faces, and we need to work with it. I have met President Saleh and spoken to him on the telephone, and the Foreign Secretary has had meetings, as the right hon. Gentleman says. We need to help Yemen with its reform programme, not just so that it becomes more stable, but so that it is able to deal with the cancer of al-Qaeda which is in its own country.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister believe it to be a coincidence that, despite numerous assurances from the then Labour Government that Mr Ronnie Biggs would remain in prison until he died, the then Justice Secretary, the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw), conducted a U-turn and released Mr Biggs on compassionate grounds—mysteriously just weeks before Mr Megrahi was released on the same grounds?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is pulling me into territory where I should not go, but it does seem to be a pretty good medical record that people released from prison, normally on the brink of keeling over, then last for a very, very long time.

Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Thursday 2nd December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

As a Member of the 2010 intake, I have no personal knowledge of the system that ran before, but I came here from the private sector, and the IPSA system epitomises everything I had always believed to be wrong with government—it is bureaucratic, inefficient and very expensive. The system fails in two respects. First, unless hon. Members are of considerable personal wealth, they are prevented from conducting their duties as their constituents would like; and secondly, that this system was adopted in response to such serious allegations against conduct in the previous Parliament is a stain on this place. The system is failing and it needs reform.

[Adam Afriyie]

I thank my hon. Friend very much for that intervention; everyone will have heard what he said.

We know that the current system costs the taxpayer far too much, that it takes the time of MPs away from their constituents, and that it will continue to undermine Members, particular those with families and those who are less well off. We have a duty to act in the taxpayer’s interest if IPSA does not propose a new scheme. One former Prime Minister said:

“The first duty of a member of Parliament is to do what he thinks in his faithful and disinterested judgement is right and necessary for the honour and safety of Great Britain. His second duty is to his constituents of whom he is the representative but not the delegate.”

We must stand up, in a disinterested fashion—not for our own purposes—and insist that IPSA propose another system. If it does not, we must resolve to act. That is what the motion proposes.

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[John Mann]

I do not think that that would be an accurate constitutional point if there were a constitution. Parliament has powers to meddle with the courts. Parliament has the power, for example, to meddle with any piece of legislation. The question is whether Parliament should cede authority over the administering of, and the meddling with, such implements.

Parliament could, at some stage, decide to abolish, but my amendment seeks to influence by threatening to abolish, which in some respects is even more invidious than simply moving to abolish. For the House to suggest, six months into a new system, that that system is too onerous to allow Members to do their job properly is absurd. Legitimate criticisms can be made on grounds of both bureaucracy and expense, but we should not reverse the principles of a decision made so recently. I warn the House that if we do, the wrath of our constituents will rightfully fall on us, because we will be saying, “The bad old days were not that bad. We will create the system that we want to fit us.” [Hon. Members: “People are not saying that.”] Actually, people are saying many different things about the expenses system that would suit them and their position best. That is the problem with creating expenses systems: we have different constituencies, and experience different circumstances in different parts of the country.

[Andrew Bridgen]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[John Mann]

I shall conclude on this: the principles on which we changed—because we were forced to change, because in 2008 and January 2009 we refused to change the system or even to countenance changes to the system—are the same principles today. In pointing that out some of us may have to become a little less popular, but in this case it is not us who are the extremists in the debate. In this case we are the moderates in the debate, suggesting a moderate way forward. I advise the House that in this case moderation would do well.

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[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

The country is suffering sub-zero temperatures, towns and villages are being cut off, some people are isolated, airports are being closed, and I was wondering what piece of news could depress me more. I was wondering also which Member could bring that news to me, and I am not surprised that it is Mr Pound.

I am sure the whole House wishes Russia well in holding the World cup and to send its thanks and gratitude to the presentation team of the United Kingdom, with His Royal Highness Prince William, the Prime Minister, David Beckham and others. They did as best as they possibly could, and we are all somewhat depressed that football is not yet coming home, but we look forward to the day when it does. This is clearly not a point of order for the House, though.

[Andrew Bridgen]

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. I point out to the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) that if he were slightly more generous with taking interventions, there would not be the number of comments from a sedentary position to which he objects so vehemently.

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

That sounds to me like a continuation of the debate.