Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Adam Afriyie and Edward Leigh

Thursday 6th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh]

Clearly, there are enormous risks in our overseas aid budget. I will not comment on policy aspects, but if we are linking expenditure with a proportion of gross national product, which can rise every year, there are enormous possibilities in the Department for International Development for waste, incompetence and employing too many staff. I know that the NAO is particularly concerned with ensuring that in our international aid work, which is so important, we concentrate on work on the ground and try to root out waste and incompetence.

[Adam Afriyie]

We have some excellent institutions, in addition to the NAO, that work towards underpinning our overseas trade and investment, such as CDC and UK Export Finance, but if we are to boost international trade we need to increase our appetite for risk. We need to accept that a higher number of failed projects will be a sign of success. Does my right hon. Friend agree that if the NAO’s attitude to risk is too risk-averse or too judgmental of individual project failures, there is a danger it may undermine our international trade objectives?

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I assure my hon. Friend that that is simply not the case. The NAO recognises that the civil service, and indeed Ministers, occasionally have to take risks, because that is the only way to learn—you learn from failure. We are not risk-averse, but we expect Departments to evaluate risk. On projects such as the Olympic Games, IT projects, the Child Support Agency and all the things we have investigated over the past 18 years, we expect Departments to evaluate risk and take risks, but get things right in the end.

Education Regulations and Faith Schools

Debate between Adam Afriyie and Edward Leigh

Thursday 12th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh]

Absolutely. The cornerstone—may I dare use that word?—of faith schools is that they start from their own religion, and what do all of the great world religions teach? They teach understanding, tolerance and love of God and neighbour, so nobody should be teaching intolerance.

[Adam Afriyie (Windsor) (Con)]

In Windsor we have some really excellent faith schools as well as secular schools—a good mix. I have observed that the pupils who go through the faith schools are equally open minded and tolerant as those in the secular schools.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

The evidence for that is absolutely overwhelming.

I now want to turn to Ofsted and the terms of this motion. It may be that the time has come for Ofsted to put itself in special measures, in certain respects. It appears to be guilty of trying to enforce a kind of state-imposed orthodoxy on certain moral and religious questions. This has provoked huge controversy and has rarely been out of the news. We have to ask whether we can any longer have confidence in Ofsted’s reports. Ofsted’s own director of schools, Sean Harford, has admitted that the reliability of inspections is a problem. Sadly, Ministers deflect every question by saying, “It’s a matter for Ofsted.” Perhaps Ofsted is out of control because it is not being held accountable by the Department. That is why we are having this debate.

In September, the National Association of Jewish Orthodox Schools wrote to the Secretary of State complaining that Ofsted inspectors asked hugely inappropriate questions and bullied their pupils into answering insensitive and anti-religious questions.

Parliamentary Standards Act 2009

Debate between Adam Afriyie and Edward Leigh

Thursday 15th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Adam Afriyie]

That is an interesting point.

[Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

I chair the liaison committee with IPSA, which includes Members from all parties, and know that it can be a deeply frustrating experience. We do our best, but one of the problems we have had is trying to convince IPSA that its primary motivation must be to allow MPs to do their job and have a system that is not bureaucratic, does not allow fraud or error and, above all, saves taxpayers’ money. That is why a central recommendation of the report is that there should be an independent cost-benefit analysis of whether a flat-rate, taxable allowance, so that there could be no fraud, error or detailed administrative costs, would save taxpayers’ money.

[Adam Afriyie]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention and for his work on the Committee. I think that together we came to a very moderate view that we hope will, if the recommendations are accepted, move the whole thing forward.

--- Later in debate ---

[Adam Afriyie]

We can quibble about one word in a report that is 100 pages long. I am telling hon. Members on behalf of the Committee that that was not the intention. The intention was simply to express a view about whether that was something that we would like to see. Basically, it would be like another recommendation to IPSA.

I hope that there is not going to be some massive argument about the issue; I have just made it absolutely clear to the House what was intended. By the way, I have also put the matter in writing to Front Benchers. Furthermore, I have now stated that I imagine that there would be a statement or early-day motion that said, “The House’s opinion is that we like it or do not like it.” The issue is for IPSA, not the House, to decide. We are looking for demons where they do not necessarily exist.

[Mr Leigh]

The right hon. Member for Oxford East (Mr Smith) can be reassured because the House cannot order IPSA to do anything, except by an Act of Parliament. We could pass any motion we liked to express an opinion, but that could not force IPSA to do anything. The right hon. Gentleman talks about the House making a decision, but it is making a decision to express a point of view, and IPSA is independent.

[Adam Afriyie]

I draw hon. Members’ eyes back to the first recommendation—the first thing that we are insisting on is that that independence should remain. That is what this whole thing was about. We were not tackling that in any way, other than to say that in some ways that independence should possibly even be enhanced through a separation of the administration and regulatory functions, so that IPSA would be in an even more powerful position to do the regulation, audit and checking, rather than doing the administration.

Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority

Debate between Adam Afriyie and Edward Leigh

Thursday 2nd December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Adam Afriyie]

Exactly that debate was had in 1911. After the Osborne judgment, Labour Members could no longer be funded by the unions, which meant, in effect, that they were destitute. Then, in 1911, a flat rate—a beautifully simple Members’ allowance— was introduced at £400 a year. Members were told: “There you go. This is not a salary, a remuneration, a reimbursement of expenses or a payment in kind for services; it is merely an allowance that recognises that there are costs associated with being here, and Members are trusted to organise their lives in the way that is necessary.”

One cannot second-guess and legislate for the topography of every seat or the lifestyles—the changing lifestyles—of every MP, or for the reproduction rates of MPs: we are now on our fifth. One cannot create a system that takes into account whether the trains are working or whether it is going to snow and being told only at 5 o’clock in the evening. There is no way that the route that IPSA is currently pursuing will satisfy the needs of the public to have a Parliament that functions effectively.

[Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

So why not go back to a simple flat-rate allowance for everybody?

[Adam Afriyie]

The Parliamentary Standards (Amendment) Bill, which will appear on tomorrow’s Order Paper—of course, I do not know what is going to happen to it—says that that is exactly what we ought to do, because it would save the taxpayer money and give MPs time to serve their constituents. That proposal is not directly related to the motion, but I just point it out. It would take courage to enact such a simple, straightforward scheme, and I urge IPSA to have the courage to do so. There is nothing more transparent than a flat-rate Members’ allowance: everyone can see what it is and everyone can see that every MP gets the same thing.

The current system causes inconvenience and makes things very difficult for Members with families and Members who are less well-off. It also causes problems, because Members are not making claims. Looking back at this year, and certainly over the past six months, I know that virtually every one of my colleagues—I have spoken to 350 MPs one-to-one—has not made the claims that they are entitled to make. That may be seen externally as a great success—“Look, IPSA has crushed the MPs, and they cost far less!”—but we all know that that is not the situation. We know that Members are borrowing from their parents, having to borrow cars from friends, and still sleeping on floors of offices, which they are not supposed to do, because they are not claiming what they rightfully should be able to claim. It is not a good situation.

However, I am not moaning on behalf of existing MPs. I love all the MPs here, but I am not whingeing on their behalf. What I am concerned about is the functioning of Parliament for the next 100 years. Where will we be in 30 years’ time if we continue down this route where only the wealthy can serve? That is where we were before; I thought we had moved on. IPSA, I hope you are listening.