Foreign Affairs Committee

Baroness Winterton of Doncaster Excerpts

Tuesday 19th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Ian Austin]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Is it in order for the shadow Deputy Leader of the House, the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Alex Norris), to sit there muttering away, shaking his head every time a contribution is made yet not say a word from the Dispatch Box about why the Opposition have imposed a three-line Whip on their MPs to vote in a particular way in this debate? Stand at the Dispatch Box and explain yourself.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I think we should lower the temperature here a bit—that is not a matter for the Chair. What I would say is that this is about the replacements on the Select Committees and there is quite a lot of muttering going on, and it would be much more polite if we could listen to what the right hon. Member for Enfield North (Joan Ryan) is saying. But I remind this House that this debate is focused on the issue of the Select Committees.

[Joan Ryan]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

To finish addressing the point made by the Chair of the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs, the hon. Member for Tonbridge and Malling, as to whether all Members are equal before this House, some are clearly more equal than others. When I resigned on the basis of the Labour party becoming institutionally antisemitic and the fact that I could only say that I considered the Leader of the Opposition not fit to be Prime Minister, I made the point that Labour’s founding principle is equality, so I can only agree that that founding principle has been desperately undermined by the current Leader of the Opposition.

The Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee also mentioned my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger) and it remains seriously concerning that Labour has sought names to replace her on the Health and Social Care Committee; that is on its list of vacancies where it seeks a replacement. Although the party has briefed that there are no plans to replace her, it has begun the process by seeking nominations, and presumably it remains the case that if someone from the parliamentary Labour party puts themselves forward Labour will submit their name to the Selection Committee. It is not right that my hon. Friend faces this situation; she is on maternity leave. What would we say to other employers who took punitive action against an employee on maternity leave? I think we would take a very dim view of that indeed.

I have said a lot about my right hon. Friend the Member for Islington—or rather my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford South. [Interruption.] I think I have said a lot about both, frankly, and I wanted to say a few more words about my hon. Friend—my very, very good friend—the Member for Dudley North, who I very much wish was part of our group because I very much enjoy working with him, but I understand his reasons why he is not.

Leaving aside members of the Independent Group, it is concerning that Labour is moving against the hon. Member for Dudley North, whose resignation from Labour over antisemitism was brave and principled. The fact that Labour is responding by seeking to remove him from the Committee shows how the party’s leadership still does not understand the seriousness of the issue it faces. I really think it needs to listen today to what is being said and to the views of this House.

There cannot be independence as long as there is this system of patronage; the House itself needs to take this issue on. However, nobody in this place should endorse these mean-minded, petty actions by the Leader of the Opposition. Beyond that, if they do, they will appear to be endorsing the most despicable views that have infected this Labour party around racism against Jewish people—antisemitism—and not just the inability but the refusal of the Labour party to deal with that. The House needs to express its view on what I consider to be institutional antisemitism. This motion should be resisted at all costs. It has far, far greater implications and consequences than perhaps everyone is seeing at first glance.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Julian Lewis]

Is this not the heart of the matter? Is it not absurd to be talking about changing the balance between Opposition and Government membership on these Committees? These Committees, with very few exceptions, never divide along party lines. When the Defence Committee meets, I never ever have to consider the fact that it might be me—one Conservative—and five Opposition Members who happen to be in that meeting at the time.

I crave your indulgence for a second, Madam Deputy Speaker, to say that I am very sorry I cannot make a full speech in this debate because I was chairing a Defence Committee meeting that overlapped with a large part of it. However, I have known of the hon. Member for Ilford South (Mike Gapes) since the 1970s, when we were both fighting Trotskyists inside the Labour party. In the 1990s, I remember going with Conservative delegations to eastern Europe, only to find that the hon. Gentleman, as international secretary of the Labour party, had got there before us. The idea that the hon. Gentleman has had to leave the Labour party, when every drop of his blood is infused with the ethos of the Labour party, is absolutely tragic—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

Order.