Business of the House

Peter Bone Excerpts

Tuesday 18th April 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

The hon. Lady asked about the date for Dissolution. That is laid down in statute: it has to take place 25 days before the proposed date of polling day. Therefore, the date of dissolution will technically be at one minute past midnight on Wednesday 3 May, so in effect we are talking about Dissolution at midnight on the night of 2 to 3 May.

I do not recollect any previous Labour Prime Minister announcing a general election on the Floor of the House of Commons. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister went about things in the time-honoured fashion this morning. She is putting to the country the case for this Government to go forward on the basis of a clear mandate to provide the clarity and stability that the entire United Kingdom needs, as we approach the historic task of implementing the referendum decision taken by the British people and forging the new, deep and special partnership with our friends and allies in the European Union that we all want.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

May I thank the Leader of the House for making a statement at the earliest possible opportunity, and the Prime Minister for making an announcement that was not leaked to the media in advance? Will my right hon. Friend confirm that it is not in the gift of the Prime Minister to decide whether there is a general election? It will be this House that decides, and if Her Majesty’s Opposition do not want a general election, cannot face it, or are worried about annihilation, they will not vote for it tomorrow.

[Mr Lidington]

I agree completely with my hon. Friend.

Business of the House

Peter Bone Excerpts

Thursday 23rd March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

The negative procedure for statutory instruments should be used for uncontroversial matters. I am very grateful that the Government have accepted that when they are prayed against they will be debated.

Returning to normal, we are obviously going to have a lot of Bills in relation to the EU in the next Parliament, and we will also want to continue with normal business. Has the Leader of the House given any thought either to extending the sitting hours, or sitting on the Fridays that we do not sit for private Members’ Bills, and could we have a statement next week?

[Mr Lidington]

I cannot promise my hon. Friend a statement next week. How we allocate time, given the exceptional pressure that there will be on legislative time because of the legislation that is needed to exit the European Union, is something that I and other business managers are taking very seriously indeed. We are spending a lot of our time reflecting on how best that might be achieved.

Business of the House

Peter Bone Excerpts

Thursday 16th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

The straight answer is that, since the hon. Lady raised the issue with me last week, we have not yet had the detailed clarification that we are seeking from the Israeli Government. As a result, the permanent secretary at the Foreign Office is raising the matter directly with Israeli officials this week.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

I am grateful for the fact that you have called me before calling any Liberal Democrat Member, Mr Speaker. This week unemployment, at 4.7%, was at its lowest rate since the summer of 1975. It has always been a rule of thumb that Labour Governments increase unemployment and Conservative Governments reduce it, but there is another link—[Interruption.] I apologise to Labour Members, but the link is clearly different. What happened in the summer of ’75? That was when the country decided to stay in the European Economic Community, so unemployment has gone up all the time we have been in, and now we are coming out, it is going down. May we have a debate on that?

[Mr Speaker]

The hon. Gentleman has already had the debate.

Business of the House

Peter Bone Excerpts

Thursday 9th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Valerie Vaz]

I thank the Leader of the House for the forthcoming business and add my congratulations to the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart). Perhaps it will be a case of him singing to us, rather than us singing to him.

Are we any nearer to having a date for the Queen’s Speech? I am sure that the person delivering it would like to know when it is.

I gave the inaugural Emily Wilding Davison memorial lecture at Bedford College and Royal Holloway yesterday. As you know, Mr Speaker, she broke into the House of Commons a few times, most memorably on census night. It was said that she knew the House’s maze of pipes and hidey-holes far better than all the other suffragettes. She therefore had a lot in common with my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant).

May I press the Leader of the House on a date for the debate on restoration and renewal? Members need to know that and need to have their say. It might be helpful, at the time of the debate, to have a display so that Members can see what is at stake and have an informed debate, rather than one based on speculation. I know that a date has been mentioned, but perhaps that was just a gentleman’s agreement and ladies are not allowed to know.

I note that the European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill is coming back to the Commons on Monday. Once the Bill goes through, it will truly be the end of the Thatcher legacy, because the former Prime Minister signed up in 1981 to EU enlargement through the accession of Greece, in 1983 to the declaration on more European integration, in 1986 to EU enlargement through the accession of Spain and Portugal, and in 1987 to the Single European Act to create a single internal market. Yet she was also able to say no: she renegotiated the EU budget in 1984, said no to the 1985 Schengen agreement, and said no to the 1989 social charter—wrongly, in my view. Margaret Thatcher was a remainer and a reformer; the same cannot be said of this Government.

And so to the Budget. It is not so much “Spreadsheet Phil” as Punxsutawney Phil from “Groundhog Day”. He is being chased back down his hole by the self-employed and the Brexiteers. There was no mention of the most challenging events that will happen to this country in the next few years. He did not use the word “Brexit” once—not verbally, not in his speech, not in the Official Report. What he did say was that he

“will not saddle our children with ever-increasing debts.”—[Official Report, 8 March 2017; Vol. 622, c. 811.]

Will the Leader of the House clarify whether that means tuition fees will be abolished? The Chancellor talks about Germany’s productivity being better than ours. Germany abolished tuition fees. Maybe that is something we can learn from Germany.

The Chancellor said that money was available for investment in school condition. Given that the right hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove) said he regretted cancelling the Building Schools for the Future programme, will the Leader of the House make representations to the Chancellor to enable all schools allocated funds under the scheme to receive them without having to make bids that take money away from frontline services?

Will the Leader of the House confirm whether the money for research for 1,000 PhDs is a grant or a loan? I thought I heard the Chancellor say “loan”, but I cannot find it in the Official Report. [Interruption.] If hon. Members do not want to hear they should just leave the Chamber.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

Well, you’re talking rubbish.

[Valerie Vaz]

You think it’s rubbish; we don’t think it’s rubbish.

Was the Leader of the House aware of the discussions around the gentleman's agreement in Surrey? Will he launch an inquiry or make a statement to the House? An MP was involved “who has worked really hard behind the scenes”, and there is a reference to a Member whom we both know very well. May we have a statement on what exactly is on offer under this deal? Step one: councils threaten to increase council tax. Step two: they make a phone call to the Communities Secretary, who then pops over to No. 11 in his car. Then, lo and behold, there is a deal—a gentleman’s agreement that is not transparent and is just for Tory councils.

Will the Leader of the House ensure a breakdown of all business rates goes to each council when the transition is made, so hon. Members do not have to make freedom of information requests of their councils? The council tax burden will now shift totally and utterly to local taxpayers. Oxford Street in my constituency does not have any businesses. This will have a direct effect on many of our constituencies.

The Prime Minister said, when she first stood in Downing Street:

“When it comes to opportunity, we won’t entrench the advantages of the fortunate few”.

Yet the Prime Minister made it clear the Government are promoting selective schools. Can the Leader of the House confirm that children who cannot afford tutors, who will enable them to get into selective schools, will be given help? Schools are good because of the hard work of the pupils and their teachers. The Government cannot take credit for that.

The Chancellor talked about the “last Labour Government” but we are thinking about the next Labour Government. It is the next Labour Government who will have the last laugh.

Finally, it was a male-dominated International Women’s Day. Maybe next year there will be no “Spreadsheet Phil”, but “Spreadsheet Justine”. I want to bring women back to the centre. Gandhi said that if you educate the mother you educate society. How can we forget what was said about Ginger Rogers: she did everything Fred Astaire did, but backwards and in high heels? There is the Chinese proverb that women hold up half the sky. Finally, there is the new hashtag: #neverthelessshepersisted. That is what we all have to do to get true equality. A belated happy International Women’s Day to everyone.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Lidington]

I am glad the hon. Gentleman has raised the issue of the northern powerhouse, because the Government have set out a northern powerhouse strategy to boost productivity throughout the north of England. The next steps include moves on the northern powerhouse schools strategy; more than half a billion pounds of local growth fund allocation; the upgrading of transport infrastructure in the north; and further science and innovation audits. I thought the hon. Gentleman would have welcomed those steps.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

Yesterday was International Women’s Day. One of the great disappointments on both sides of the House is the fact that we have never had a woman leader of the Labour party, although the shadow Leader of the House made a clear bid for the position today. I will do anything I can to help her in that regard, but can she please resist spreading fake news? The suggestion that Mrs Thatcher would have been a remainer is absolutely outrageous. May we have a debate next week on fake news?

[Graham Jones]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Business of the House

Peter Bone Excerpts

Thursday 9th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

The programme motion was very clear that there was provision for a Report stage. Whether there would be debating time for one would, as always, depend on whether amendments had been carried and on how long the House wished to continue to debate the amendments in Committee ahead of a Report stage.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

I should like to wish the hon. Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) a happy birthday. He has been an outstanding parliamentarian. I should also like to thank him for inspiring me. I was once his constituent, and his antics drove me to run for Parliament. I thank him for that. Does the Leader of the House accept that this Parliament works because we have two Houses? Sometimes the other place does not agree with us, which annoys the Government, but that is no reason whatever to threaten it with abolition. May we have a statement from the Leader of the House to confirm that?

[Mr Lidington]

The Government’s position is that we completely respect the constitutional role of the House of Lords. As I said earlier, the House of Lords itself accepts that, as an unelected House, it needs to abide by certain conventions.

Business of the House

Peter Bone Excerpts

Thursday 19th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

On the dates for the summer recess and Prorogation, although I hope to oblige the House as soon as I am able, the hon. Lady and others will understand that there are uncertainties about how long it will take to transact the business before the House in the weeks to come, so I am not yet able to give firm dates.

The hon. Lady made a number of criticisms and asked a number of questions about the Government’s handling of the forthcoming EU negotiations. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union gave an oral statement to the House and answered Members’ questions for about two hours. In the hon. Lady’s strictures on the Prime Minister, I detect a sense of the frustration that I know is widely shared on the Labour Benches at the inability of the Leader of the Opposition to lay a glove on the Prime Minister every Wednesday on this or other matters.

The Ministers who have not resigned from the Northern Ireland Executive, in the way that Mr McGuinness stepped down as Deputy First Minister, remain as acting Ministers until the new Executive can be appointed, so the Government are able to talk to them. Of course, officials from the Northern Ireland Executive continue to attend meetings. I used to chair Joint Ministerial Committees on Europe, and I remember that after the previous Stormont elections it took a while for the Executive to be formed. During that period, Northern Ireland officials did attend the joint meetings to make sure that Northern Ireland was represented.

In line with the Prime Minister’s undertaking following the referendum, Ministers and officials are in regular contact with the Government of Gibraltar, from the Chief Minister down. More broadly, on the question of the European Union and the hon. Lady’s concluding words, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister made it very clear during her speech that the last thing she and the Government are seeking is a weakening or dismantling of the European Union. The Prime Minister said in terms that she wanted the European Union to succeed. My right hon. Friend and the entire Government are very aware of the fact that for much of Europe the mid-20th century was an utterly scarring experience, and that many Governments and many people in those countries still look to European institutions as a safeguard against anything like that happening again. We respect that outlook, which stems from their historical experience in the last century. We will go forward respecting and determined to implement the democratic verdict of the British people last June, but in a way that seeks to achieve a future relationship with our closest neighbours that is based on mutual trust, friendship, and continued alliance and co-operation on a range of policy measures.

Finally, Mr Speaker, I join the hon. Lady in wishing all the best to you and to the Speaker’s Chaplain on your birthdays today. I would be happy to accept the hon. Lady’s challenge, but I have to say that, knowing your prowess on the tennis court, I would regard the outcome of the encounter as something of a forgone conclusion.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

It is a bit rich of the shadow Leader of the House to complain about parliamentary scrutiny of the matters announced to the media. I lived through the Blair and Brown years, when they never even bothered to turn up to answer anything, whereas this Government have been absolutely splendid—better than the coalition Government. Although the Opposition claim they want to discuss and bang on about Europe, yesterday’s debate on Europe finished early, as they did not have enough speakers, so will the excellent Minister continue to schedule general debates? Could they be themed debates, with one on each of the 12 points the Prime Minister mentioned, so that the Opposition could have as much time as they like to discuss this?

Finally, with your indulgence, Mr Speaker, I would just like to put to rest a lie. The leader of the Liberal Democrats claimed that I might have written the Prime Minister’s speech, but I had nothing to do with it; it was her own words.

[Mr Lidington]

I do not know whether that last comment was a bid to join the ministerial speechwriting teams in the future. On the point about debates, there will be ample opportunities for the House to continue to debate all aspects of the forthcoming negotiation on the European Union.

Business of the House

Peter Bone Excerpts

Thursday 12th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

We have had both a statement and a lengthy exchange of questions to and answers from the Health Secretary on Monday, and then we had a full day’s debate in the Labour party’s time yesterday on this subject, when all these issues were thoroughly aired. I gently say to the right hon. Gentleman that he ought not to be too complacent about the situation in Scotland, given that the latest figures I have seen show that NHS Scotland was meeting only one of eight key targets and that one in 12 hospital bed days in Scotland were being lost because of delayed discharges.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

In wishing happy new year to the Leader of the House, may I say that I hope 2017 is as good for the United Kingdom as 2016 was? In relation to business next week or perhaps the week after—or perhaps even the week after that—will he guarantee that when the Supreme Court makes its decision a Minister will come to the House to give a statement? Will he also agree that no prior comment will be made to the media before this House is informed of what the Government are thinking?

[Mr Lidington]

We do not yet know the timing of the Supreme Court decision, which makes it slightly difficult for me to give the firm assurance that my hon. Friend wants. Let there be no doubt: the Government will want to come—and I suspect, Mr Speaker, that you will insist that the Government come—to Parliament at the earliest opportunity to explain their response to the judgment.

Business of the House

Peter Bone Excerpts

Thursday 15th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

There will be many opportunities when we return in January for every aspect of our departure from the European Union to be debated in full, and for Ministers from all relevant Departments to be questioned.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

Tomorrow is Local Charities Day. We all have very good local charities in our constituencies. One of mine is Crazy Hats, run by Glennis Hooper and her group of dedicated volunteers, who have raised more than £2 million through people wearing crazy hats. They spend that money on breast cancer care in Northamptonshire. Will the Leader of the House tell us how those charities can be further supported?

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I have indulged the hon. Gentleman for the duration of his question, but I am glad that he has now taken that hat off. I sincerely hope he will not put it on again—preferably not at any time, but certainly not in the Chamber.

Business of the House

Peter Bone Excerpts

Thursday 8th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

The report is important, as the hon. Gentleman says, and Ministers will want to study and reflect on it before announcing any possible policy initiatives. It is good that more people now are willing to come forward and report instances of domestic abuse before they get to the really critical stage he described where someone’s life is under threat. It is also true that the police are now much readier to investigate and take action in respect of such cases than might have been the case some years ago. These are always difficult judgments for the police officers and social workers who are dealing with individual families to take, but the key has to be for people who are victims to feel confident that if they come forward the allegations they make will be taken very seriously and investigated properly, and that, where there is evidence, prosecutions will follow.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

A few years ago, it emerged that if the then Prime Minister Tony Blair was indisposed or worse, John Prescott would take over as Prime Minister—the nation slept more soundly because of that. It then emerged that William Hague would take over if the coalition Prime Minister was indisposed or worse. It then emerged that my right hon. Friend the Member for Tatton (Mr Osborne) would take over from David Cameron. It emerged yesterday, with a superb performance by the Leader of the House, that it is clearly he who would take over as Prime Minister if our Prime Minister was indisposed or worse. May we have a short statement to put that on the record, so we know where everyone stands?

[Mr Lidington]

I sometimes think that my hon. Friend spends his spare hours compiling an actuarial table of senior members of the Government. What I can say to him is that whatever circumstances may arise the Queen’s Government will carry on.

Business of the House

Peter Bone Excerpts

Thursday 1st December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

Let me begin with the hon. Lady’s final question. I will certainly make inquiries of those in the relevant part of the House’s administration department about the lights in Norman Shaw South.

The hon. Lady is right to draw attention to the importance of world AIDS day. As far as the Government are concerned, this country remains committed to ending the AIDS epidemic as a public health threat by 2030. We recently pledged a further £1.1 billion to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, which will provide essential retroviral therapy for 1.3 million people who are living with HIV. That, of course, is in addition to the £2.4 million national HIV prevention and sexual health promotion programme.

The hon. Lady mentioned the recent court case on PrEP. I think it is good that we have legal clarity about where responsibility lies. Clearly, in the light of the court judgment, NHS England will now consider through its normal process of assessment whether and how PrEP should be made available to patients on the NHS.

Given that we have just had an hour of questions to the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, the House has been able to discuss the matters raised by the hon. Lady in some detail. However, the importance of ensuring the strength and vitality of the country’s science base—including, critically, its important relationships with universities and scientific institutions—in Europe and globally will of course be an important element of the Government’s approach to the forthcoming negotiation.

I join the hon. Lady in saluting the work done by our great museums, both our great national museums here in London—and, I should add, in Edinburgh, Belfast and Cardiff—and our regional and local museums, which do tremendous work. I remember, as a small child, being taken off on rainy half-term days to some of the museums in London, and I agree with the hon. Lady that they perform an important educational and cultural role.

In the spirit of these weekly occasions, I am more than happy to pay tribute to the work of the late Jennie Lee. There have been formidable champions of the arts on both sides of the House over the years, but I think that Jennie Lee was the first Arts Minister to be formally designated as such, and she has an important place in the history of public policy on the arts.

The hon. Lady referred to skills. The Government are committed to creating 3 million new apprenticeships during the current Parliament, and to continuing the work to drive up the quality of education that our children receive in schools. It should be a point of remark—not of complacency, but of some celebration—that more children than ever before attend state schools that are categorised by Ofsted as either good or outstanding.

The hon. Lady referred to magistrates courts, and all of us who have been through this process in our own constituencies know it can be a painful one, but in an age when quite a lot of routine court work can now be done more effectively, swiftly and cheaply online, doing away with the need for as many personal appearances—particularly when there is not actually a trial—there is not the need for quite so many individual courtrooms as there used to be. That is why my right hon. Friend the Lord Chancellor is looking realistically at how our justice and courts system is best equipped to deal with the challenges of the 21st century and the digital age in an effective fashion.

I was disappointed that the hon. Lady made no reference in her comments about benefits to the recent announcement by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions that he will do away with the need for reassessments of people who suffer from the most serious disabilities and chronic and degenerative medical conditions. I would have hoped the entire House welcomed that.

I think the hon. Lady is playing to the gallery a bit, frankly, when it comes to benefit sanctions. As the National Audit Office itself pointed out in its report, our current sanctions system has existed since 1996; it was in operation throughout the 13 years of the Blair and Brown Governments, because the Labour party in government recognised that a sanctions system, properly applied, was a necessary part of a fair benefits system. In any month, fewer than 1% of employment and support allowance claimants and fewer than 4% of jobseeker’s allowance claimants are now sanctioned, and we have seen a halving of sanctions in the past year alone. So I think the Department for Work and Pensions is showing it is trying to address genuine concerns, but we do not flinch—as the Labour party in opposition appears to flinch from its record in government—from accepting that a sanctions system is necessary for the fair functioning of our welfare arrangements.

The hon. Lady asked for a debate on the EU-Canada trade agreement. [Interruption.] Of course, under the provisions of the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010, that treaty will have to be laid before Parliament in the normal way, so there will be an opportunity for such a debate.

While I enjoyed the hon. Lady’s little jibe about music—[Interruption.] I was given a long list of questions by the Opposition. She asked about a serious point in respect of the private Member’s Bill on boundaries. The Member promoting the Bill published it only three days before it was down for its Second Reading debate, and it was not accompanied by any kind of statement or analysis of the costs associated with it. So the Government are now going through the normal process of trying to establish what those costs are before coming forward further to the House.

Finally, the hon. Lady talked about a discordant band. [Interruption.] I have to say that if I were looking for dissonance and atonality, I would be looking at Members on the Benches opposite, who are members of a party—

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

rose—

[Mr Lidington]

It is always good to have the support of my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone). Some 70% of Labour party Members of Parliament have expressed no confidence in their current leader; that strikes me as a party that is engaging in experimental music of the most dissonant kind.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Lidington]

The right hon. Gentleman really should not get carried away by the odd newspaper story. The Foreign Secretary, like the whole Government, is committed to getting the right deal in the negotiations on all fronts. Part of that, as the Prime Minister has set out, is accepting that, following the referendum result, freedom of movement as it exists at the moment cannot continue. There will be a need for a national immigration regime when we leave the European Union. Obviously, the exact relationship of this country to the other 27 in terms of the movement of workers, trade, investment and so on is a central part of those negotiations but, at the risk of repeating lines that the right hon. Gentleman has heard from Ministers so often, we are not going to give a running commentary on that detail.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

The hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) who speaks for the Scottish National party was slightly wrong. There is a Bill before Parliament now—the Withdrawal from the European Union (Article 50) Bill. That Bill is expected to get a Second Reading on 16 December but, as the Leader of the House knows, there is one slight problem if it progresses: Standing Order No. 84A(5) requires the Government to table a motion so that the Bill can proceed to Committee, because the Committee stage of another private Member’s Bill is taking place. Has the Leader of the House given any thought to that, and will he make a statement about when he will bring forward that motion?

[Mr Lidington]

At a time when the Supreme Court is about to consider all these matters relating to the triggering of article 50, it would be premature of me to speculate about possible future legislative needs.