Points of Order

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

1st reading: House of Commons
Wednesday 13th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman —I would urge that we try to lower the decibel level. I understand that he feels his point keenly and he has made it with sincerity. He is a very assiduous Chamber contributor and I respect that.

I will not make any personal criticism of any Members. We have had what we have had and people will make their own assessment. The hon. Gentleman’s surmise is, of course, correct. I say this as much for people attending to our proceedings as for people sitting in the Chamber: an SO No. 24 application—an application for an emergency debate under the relevant standing order—requires notice by 10.30 am, on a Wednesday, and I fear that the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael), for example, who has expressed some interest in this matter, and I will come to him soon, made no such application. Nothing new or urgent has happened since. We have to take things on a case-by-case and day-by-day basis. I cannot be expected to work retrospectively. The fact is that there was an application. It would have been heard. The right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford) who had made the application chose to put himself in a position in which he would not be able to persist with his application. Responsibility for that choice is that, and that alone, of the right hon. Gentleman. It is not down to the hon. Member for Moray (Douglas Ross) and it is not down to me. Members must take responsibility for their own actions. As to whether there will be either an urgent question on the matters of which the hon. Gentleman has just treated, or indeed an SO 24 application on another day, that is a matter for another day.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

rose—

[Valerie Vaz (Walsall South) (Lab)]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Speaker]

I see that a former shadow Secretary of State wants to get in, but I will take the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) first, and then the shadow Leader of the House.

[Mr Carmichael]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker—this is, in fact, further to the point of order from the hon. Member for Moray (Douglas Ross). As you have said, Mr Speaker, applications should normally be made by half past 10 in the morning. Obviously, I did not make such an application, but Standing Order No. 24, subsection (4), allows you, Mr Speaker, to consider an application if

“the urgency is not so known”

at 10.30 am, and notice can be given

“as soon thereafter as is practicable.”

My suggestion to you, Mr Speaker, is that the urgency became apparent at the point at which the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford) decided that pulling a stunt was more important than allowing Scottish Members a proper debate on this subject.

[Mr Speaker]

I am very grateful to the right hon. Gentleman, and I say that with sincerity. He is an accomplished and dextrous lawyer—[Interruption.] Well, I think he is an accomplished fellow. What I say to him is “nice try”, but I am afraid that it does not work. The reason why his argument, or thesis, if I may dignify it thus, does not quite work is that the matter in question, which was arguably urgent or even constituting an emergency, was the need for a debate on the Sewel convention, adherence to, violation of or non-compliance with it. That was the urgent matter, and not the fact that there was subsequently an eruption, whether pre-arranged or otherwise, in the Chamber. I do not blame the right hon. Gentleman for having a go—he would not be the versatile lawyer he is if he did not—but I am afraid that it does not work on this occasion. I rather think that the genial smile on his face suggests to me that he knows he was being a cheeky chappie. We will have to return to these matters subsequently—I hope at not such excessive length, but I will take the remaining points of order briefly.