Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Thursday 19th January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising the issue. It is not the Government’s usual policy to comment on individual cases, but the Home Office confirms that it has received from Turkey a formal request for mutual legal assistance concerning Sarah, Duchess of York. It would be inappropriate for me to comment further.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

The Public Accounts Committee learned yesterday that the NHS strategy for people with long-term conditions was ineffective for those with neurological conditions and not good value for money. Will the right hon. Gentleman ensure that before the Health and Social Care Bill, which will make that pattern the usual one for particular conditions, returns to the House we learn whether that issue is one of the things on the risk register that the Government are seeking to block?

[Sir George Young]

I will raise the hon. Lady’s concerns with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health. She will know that we plan to publish a White Paper on long-term care in the spring, which I hope will drive up the quality of care. I will pass her request for data on to my right hon. Friend.

Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Thursday 3rd November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I detect the serious mobilisation of the armed forces on the Benches behind me, pressing for a further defence debate. As my hon. Friend knows, we have provided one day and, as I said in response to my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin), between now and the end of the Session, now that most of the major Bills have gone through the House, there may be headroom to provide some of the debates that were provided in Government time in the previous Parliament but which, for whatever reason, have not been forthcoming so far in this one.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

The right hon. Gentleman will be aware that I apologised to the Economic Secretary to the Treasury for my patronising tone in my question to her on Monday, but will he ask her to come back and apologise to the House for misleading it when she claimed that unemployment under the previous Government reached 30%?

[Fiona Mactaggart]

I am sure that it was inadvertent. Perhaps the Economic Secretary would come to the House and explain how she arrived at that figure.

[Sir George Young]

In fairness to the hon. Lady, I welcomed what she said at the outset of her remarks about apologising for any offence that she may have caused my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary. I will draw my hon. Friend’s attention to this exchange, and ask her to write to the hon. Lady clarifying the use of the figures and, I am sure, justifying any figure that she used in the Chamber.

Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Thursday 27th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I commend my hon. Friend on his work as a church warden for the Church of England. As I understand it, there has been a resignation at St Paul’s. So far as I know, the protestors have not closed a bank or caused a single banker to resign, but they have closed St Paul’s and caused the resignation of a cleric who was committed to their cause. The legal situation is complex, as there is a variety of land ownership surrounding St Paul’s. My understanding is that the City of London Corporation is in touch with the Church authorities to see if they can reach agreement on the way forward. In the meantime, I hope that the protestors will heed the advice from a number of sources, not least the Bishop of London, that they should stop their protest and allow free access to St Paul’s.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Domestic violence costs the economy more than £6 billion, and research shows that it is three times more likely to occur when couples are under financial strain. On Monday, the Prime Minister was unable to tell me three ways in which his Government have helped women’s contribution to the economy. In view of that and the fact that the Bill we will start discussing next Monday will reduce access to legal aid for women victims of domestic violence, may we have a statement from the Government on what they have done to protect women from domestic violence?

[Sir George Young]

Only a few days ago, we had a debate in which we assisted women by changing the pension age arrangements, and there will be opportunities to discuss domestic violence in the three days next week that we debate the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill. The hon. Lady will also know that on Tuesday of this week the Home Secretary started a consultation on Clare’s law, which will bring real help to those suffering from domestic violence by giving people the right to know, or a right to ask, whether they are with a partner who has a history of violence. We have, therefore, taken a number of steps to protect women liable to domestic violence, and next week there will be an opportunity to pursue the agenda further.

Cabinet Secretary Report (Government Response)

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Wednesday 19th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

The Leader of the House said in his statement that Mr Werritty was not a lobbyist. How then will the register and the reforms that he proposes affect the behaviour of someone like Mr Werritty?

[Sir George Young]

I did not say that I did not think that he was a lobbyist but that the Cabinet Secretary did not think that he was a lobbyist. When we publish the consultation paper next month, we will be open to consultation on what a lobbyist is. In the view of many people, the definition should include Mr Werritty.

Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Thursday 23rd June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

We all enjoyed yesterday’s debate in which my right hon. Friend the Chancellor trounced the shadow Chancellor on his economic strategy. The Opposition have left their tax cut open-ended and unfunded. They have not given any definition of what constitutes “growing strongly again” and would simply be adding £51 billion to the deficit at the end of this Parliament.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

May we have a statement on the accountability of the Government on women and equalities? Today, an oral question on the impact on women of the increases in fees for courses in English as a second language was transferred to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. The Department has form on this: on 3 March, I raised in questions to the Leader of the House the fact that questions on women and pensions had been transferred. How can we hold the Government to account given that we have only quarter of an hour for questions and no topical questions and given that questions specifically about the impact of Government policies on women are ducked by the Ministers responsible for women’s policies?

[Sir George Young]

I say to the hon. Lady that we have adopted precisely the same arrangements for questions about women as we inherited from the outgoing Government.

Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Thursday 9th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I extend my condolences to Marie Heath on the recent tragic death of her son Lee. The consular service of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office should of course continue to provide all assistance necessary to Mrs Heath and her family and maintain contact with her, as it did when she went to Germany following the attack. I understand that it has also arranged for the family to receive assistance from Victim Support’s national homicide service. I will also ensure that the FCO is aware of my hon. Friend’s interest in the case.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

In Business, Innovation and Skills questions earlier today the House heard that the Minister for Further Education, Skills and Lifelong Learning plans to produce an equality impact assessment of the proposed increases in charges for English for speakers of other languages courses before the House rises for the summer recess. If that shows, as my experience in my constituency does, that the changes in ESOL fees will bear unfairly on women—seven in every 10 students affected in Slough are women—will the Leader of the House ensure that we have time before the House rises to change the policy on behalf of those women?

[Sir George Young]

The hon. Lady is making an assumption that the document to which she refers will indeed confirm her suspicions. I think it makes sense to await the outcome of the impact review, but I will share her concern with the Minister and ensure that there is an opportunity to take what she says on board if it turns out that there is an adverse impact.

Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Thursday 3rd March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

What has happened since last Thursday to cause the order of next Thursday’s two debates to be reversed, so that the traditional debate on international women’s day will be the last item of business rather than the first?

[Sir George Young]

The Chair of the Backbench Business Committee, who is responsible for arranging the sequence of debates, will have heard the hon. Lady’s question. I think that it is still open to the Committee, if it so wishes, to reverse the order again between now and next Thursday so that it is as originally proposed.

Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Thursday 16th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

As a former local government Minister, I know that there is no way of coming up with a draft settlement that satisfies every single local authority. As my hon. Friend will know, we are consulting on the proposals announced on Monday, and if he or members of his local authority have comments to make about the settlement, they should make them. There will be an opportunity to debate the final settlement when it is laid before the House next year.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Will the Leader of the House invite the Home Secretary to come to the House again to correct comments that she made about public order policing in her statement last Monday? She informed the House then that protesters

“who remained peaceful and wished to leave via Whitehall were able to do so.”—[Official Report, 13 December 2010; Vol. 643, c. 665.]

When I pressed her on that, she confirmed it. Since then an e-mail has been passed to me by, among others, my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford East (Mr Smith), which reports that peaceful protesters spent hours trying to leave and being prevented from doing so by police. Although the police told them that they could leave, they actually prevented that from happening. Will the Home Secretary come and tell us the truth about the policing of the demonstration?

Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Thursday 21st October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, and my sympathies go first and foremost to the victim’s family. As in all criminal cases, it is for the court to decide what sentence is appropriate—but the sentencing assessment currently being conducted by the Lord Chancellor is now considering the sentencing framework as a whole. In response to my hon. Friend’s specific point, we intend to publish proposals for the reform of sentencing and criminal justice in the autumn, and I am sure that there will be an opportunity thereafter to debate them.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

I am holding in my hand the most recent paper from the Library about the hours of the House. It claims that the House adjourns at 10 pm on Monday and Tuesday, at 7 pm on Wednesday and at 6 pm on Thursday. The right hon. Gentleman will have noticed that last night we did not move to the Adjournment debate until 3 minutes past 10. What is he going to do to make the hours of the House more predictable and family-friendly?

[Sir George Young]

One has to put the hon. Lady’s request in the context of the earlier request for more time to debate the constitutional measure currently going through the House. The events of this week and last week are unusual, in that we are debating a constitutional Bill on the Floor of the House and we have allowed injury time for statements that we knew were going to take place. That will not be the normal pattern of sittings, and I hope that normal service will be resumed quite soon.

Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Thursday 22nd July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

May we have an urgent debate on the right of Back-Bench Members to hold the Government to account? On 15 July, a Communities and Local Government Minister said that no local authority had faced cuts larger than 2%. That statement has not since been corrected, although it is not true. Yesterday, the Deputy Prime Minister said that the war in Iraq was illegal—apparently in a personal capacity, although without informing the House of that fact. What can Back Benchers do, faced with this uncertainty about how Ministers take responsibility?

[Sir George Young]

The hon. Lady has raised that issue in a week when we have had the first debate in Back-Bench time in 400 years on one reckoning and in 12 years on another. We are anxious to give Back Benchers more powers. She is perfectly entitled to ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government the question that she has posed about funding for Slough. She will get an answer.

Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Thursday 17th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

In the Queen’s Speech, we outlined 22 Bills for an 18-month Session. We have already introduced three of them—one in the House and two in the other place—and I anticipate a finance Bill before too long. I also anticipate two more Second Readings before the summer recess.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Will the Government arrange, in Government time, a debate on the effects on employment of Government policies? I estimate that the recently announced cuts will cost at least 30 jobs in Slough—a town where unemployment has fallen month on month since the start of the year. Will the Government give us a chance to discuss the effects of what they are doing?

[Sir George Young]

May I return the compliment and suggest that the Opposition use one of their Opposition days to explain where they would have found the £50 billion cuts that were factored into their pre-election statements? They never told us where those cuts would come from, and they would have included some £18 billion of cuts to the capital programme. They said that they would tell us after the election where they would find those cuts, and the time is now ripe.

Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Thursday 3rd June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I understand that the Mayor of London is going to the High Court today to get an injunction in order to make progress on clearing Parliament square.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Will the Leader of the House assist me in getting a response from the Department of Health on a matter that I first raised in February, prompted by consultants at Wexham Park hospital in my constituency? They feared that the hospital had fiddled the books to acquire foundation status. I got replies from the former Secretary of State for Health every month, telling me that the Department was still looking at the question. I have been in direct touch with the current Secretary of State’s office but have still heard nothing. Will the Leader of the House ask the Secretary of State to reply to me on this important issue?

[Sir George Young]

Yes.

Business of the House

Debate between Lord Young of Cookham and Fiona Mactaggart

Thursday 27th May 2010 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I understand the concern, and during the campaign we proposed a moratorium on centrally driven closures of accident and emergency departments. May I suggest that the hon. Gentleman seek the opportunity of an Adjournment debate to raise that important local issue?

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

May I welcome the rowing back by the Leader of the House from the explicit commitment to extend anonymity in rape cases to defendants? It contrasted with “we will consider” finding ways to invest in new rape crisis centres. I also hear that we are now “considering” anonymity. May we have an early debate on the Stern review, which said that there was no compelling evidence that anonymity protects men, but that there is a case for more research on that?

[Sir George Young]

If the hon. Lady recalls what Stern said, she will know that the report also said that nor was there a case for the opposite. I have some sympathy with the case she makes for a debate on this important subject. Without making any firm commitments, and in light of the fact that I hope that we will have a Back-Bench business committee, I would like to find time for that important issue to be explored. However, I am not sure that what I said warranted the description “rowing back”.