Business

Lord Kennedy of Southwark Excerpts

Tuesday 29th May 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Grocott]

On behalf of this House, will the Leader of the House undertake to explain to his colleagues in the House of Commons that the fact that they are not sitting does not mean that Parliament is not sitting? In passing, will he also let us know why this Government seem persistently to revert to a situation where one House is sitting and the other is not? The previous Administration, if I may say so, made determined efforts to work as a bicameral parliament, with both Houses sitting at the same time. The Leader of the House can find the records for this.

Even if the noble Lord is trying to tell us that somehow this business of pasty taxes and caravan taxes is trivial; and even if, being generous to the Chancellor, it was an oversight on his part that the House of Lords is sitting but that the House of Commons is not; and even if the Chancellor had a Eureka moment between the House of Commons rising last Thursday and midday yesterday, at the very least the Government could have righted the wrong by making a proper Statement to this House. Perhaps the Treasury Minister, who is in his place, could do it for us. Above all, the Government need to understand that when this House is sitting, part of Parliament is sitting and they are answerable to us.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords—

[Lord Strathclyde]

I am very happy to answer, but if any more want to join in this debate—

[Lord Peston]

I have a simple question. I have never eaten a Cornish pasty in my life and I do not propose to start now. I gather that the comparison is with boeuf en croute, which is another matter. Where I am a bit lost is that from the answer the noble Lord the Leader of the House gave to my noble friend the Leader of the Opposition I could not work out whether his argument is that this is a trivial matter and therefore we should not be fussing. Can we assume that no one from the Treasury will in due course say, “What a great thing we have done because it was a totally trivial matter”?

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that yesterday HMRC increased the tax on skips depositing in landfill sites from £2.50 per tonne to £64 per tonne, with no notice? That is an increase of nearly 2,500%. I thought that those sorts of figures were from wonga.com, not HMRC. Is he not aware of the great risk to business that causes and that it should therefore have been brought to Parliament and announced here?

[Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean]

My Lords, whatever the view of the noble Lord the Leader of the House about caravans and Cornish pasties, he must see that the changes that have been made to the courts and coroners proposals are highly significant. When my noble friend the Leader of the Opposition put her original question, she stressed that point to the noble Lord the Leader of the House. Unless I am mistaken, he did not address that very important point in his initial answer to her. I wonder whether he would be kind enough to take that point into account now in his reply to the House.