Oral Answers to Questions

Alex Salmond Excerpts

Wednesday 29th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

As my hon. Friend is saying, we are aiming to end the postcode lottery of schools funding, and as I said, schools funding is now at a record high. On the minimum funding level, as I have said before, the Department for Education has heard representations on the issue on this national funding formula and will, of course, be considering those. This was a consultation, and there have been a lot of responses to it, but it is an historic and complex reform. There has been general agreement for many years that reform is needed. We want to get this right, which is why we are carefully considering the representations.

[Alex Salmond (Gordon) (SNP)]

Q5. After nine months of this Prime Minister’s approach to Brexit, Northern Ireland is deadlocked, the Welsh are alienated, Scotland is going for a referendum, the English are split down the middle, and Brexit MPs are walking out of Commons Committees because they do not like home truths. Has the Prime Minister considered, in terms of invoking article 50, that “now is not the time”?

[The Prime Minister]

What the UK Government are doing in invoking article 50 is putting into practice the democratic vote of the British people on 23 June last year in a referendum. There was a referendum in 2014 in Scotland, when the Scottish people voted to remain part of the United Kingdom. I suggest the right hon. Gentleman and his colleagues put that into practice.