Business of the House

Angela Eagle Excerpts

Thursday 5th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)]

Will the Leader of the House give us the business for next week?

[The Leader of the House of Commons (Mr Andrew Lansley)]

The business for the next week is as follows:

Monday 9 December—Second Reading of the Intellectual Property Bill [Lords], followed by a motion to approve a statutory instrument relating to terrorism, followed by a general debate on rural communities. The subject for this debate was determined by the Backbench Business Committee.

Tuesday 10 December—Remaining stages of the National Insurance Contributions Bill, followed by: the Chairman of Ways and Means has named opposed private business for consideration.

Wednesday 11 December—Motion to approve a Ways and Means resolution relating to the Financial Services (Banking Reform) Bill, followed by a motion to approve a money resolution relating to the Financial Services (Banking Reform) Bill, followed by consideration of Lords amendments to the Financial Services (Banking Reform) Bill.

Thursday 12 December—Select Committee statement on the publication of the first report from the Liaison Committee entitled “Civil Service: Lacking Capacity”, followed by a general debate on the fishing industry, followed by a debate on a motion relating to Ford and Visteon UK Ltd pensioners. The subjects for both debates were determined by the Backbench Business Committee.

Friday 13 December—The House will not be sitting.

The provisional business for the week commencing 16 December will include:

Monday 16 December—Second Reading of the Care Bill [Lords].

Tuesday 17 December—Remaining stages of the Local Audit and Accountability Bill [Lords].

Wednesday 18 December—Opposition day (15th allotted day). There will be a debate on accident and emergency services, followed by a debate on food banks. Both debates will arise on an official Opposition motion.

Thursday 19 December—Business to be nominated by the Backbench Business Committee.

Friday 20 December—The House will not be sitting.

I should also like to inform the House that the business in Westminster Hall for 16 January will be:

Thursday 16 January—A combined debate on the second report from the Justice Committee on “Women Offenders: After the Corston Report” and the fifth report on older prisoners.

[Ms Eagle]

I thank the Leader of the House for announcing next week’s business.

The right hon. Member for North West Hampshire (Sir George Young) announced this week that after a good innings in Parliament he will declare on 41 not out. I am sure that everyone will join me in paying tribute to one of the longest serving Members of the House, and I wish him all the best in his next choice of career. I will not predict a swift return this time, but may I suggest that his local party needs to incorporate an IQ test as part of the selection process for his successor to stop the Mayor of London sniffing around?

I note that on the Order Paper today there is a written ministerial statement on the progress of universal credit—a major announcement about a flagship Government policy that as recently as last month the Work and Pensions Secretary guaranteed would be delivered on time. The statement was slipped out just two hours before the autumn statement, and made available to the media before it was made available to the House. It announces major delays and the complete upheaval of the universal credit scheme, which affects millions of people. Despite the importance of the announcement, there is very little detail about what is actually going on. This is a contemptible way to treat Parliament.

When the Work and Pensions Secretary’s delusions about the practicality of his grand reforms collide with reality, he should be forced to come to this House in person to account for himself. Will the Leader of the House now guarantee that the Secretary of State will explain himself to the House at the earliest opportunity?

The Prime Minister’s unlikely infatuation with the Chinese Communist party continued apace this week, as he skipped Prime Minister’s questions again, postponed the autumn statement until today and flew to Beijing to deliver a framed photograph of himself and a biography of Margaret Thatcher. After being in the diplomatic deep freeze for three years, the Prime Minister took his re-initiation like a man and ended up feasting on bamboo fungus in the spectacular surroundings of the great hall of the people—and to think he was the one who accused my right hon. Friend the Member for Oldham West and Royton (Mr Meacher) of taking mind-altering substances. It is clear that the Prime Minister has been getting into bad habits, too; his press conference with the Chinese Premier consisted of two long statements, no questions, and concluded to rapturous applause from the journalists who had the honour to be present. I think the Lobby had better watch out.

The Prime Minister has been on more foreign junkets in three short years than there are Lib Dem betrayals, but the trade deficit has got worse this year, so may we have a statement on the value for money that these spectacularly expensive, taxpayer-funded PR opportunities represent?

There is less than an hour to go before the Chancellor gets to his feet to deliver the delayed autumn statement. We have had the usual raft of selected leaks to the press and Government pre-statement announcements. The Chancellor was even tweeting bits of it last night. He’s got form. In the 2012 Budget, we had tax U-turns on pasties, charities and caravans, and the word “omnishambles” entered the Oxford English Dictionary. In last year’s autumn statement, the Chancellor’s flagship Swiss tax deal and the 4G auction both raised less than a third of what he had scored in the Red Book, and large chunks of the last Budget were published before he even got to the House.

This year, the Chancellor has been busy getting his U-turns in first. He has been getting more incoherent by the day. He thinks it is Marxist to cap energy prices but positively Thatcherite to cap payday loans. He has been so panicked by the popularity of our energy price freeze that he has persuaded the Energy Secretary to claim that a £70 increase in bills is actually a cut. When will he realise that, on energy, only a price freeze will do? And while he is at it, will he realise that after the record £1.4 billion Euro-fine of banks involved in the Euribor and LIBOR fixing yesterday, he should accept the Lords amendments to the banking reform Bill that create a licensing regime for senior bankers? Will the Leader of the House confirm that he is planning to do that?

Despite the welcome news that our economy is growing again, growth is only a third of what the Chancellor predicted it would be in 2010 and we have the slowest recovery for 100 years. All the Chancellor has delivered is a recovery that helps a few at the top and leaves ordinary people hurting. That is this Chancellor all over—tax cuts for millionaires and a living standards crisis for everybody else.

[Mr Lansley]

I am grateful to the shadow Leader of the House for her response to the future business and especially for her very kind words about the Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury, my right hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Sir George Young). The House will have an opportunity, which I look forward to, to express its full appreciation of my right hon. Friend—[Interruption.] There is plenty of time yet. You never know with my right hon. Friend quite what is going to happen, because he has a habit of re-emerging in different guises. He has had more regenerations than Dr Who.

The hon. Lady asked about the written statement by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, in which he set out the further steps we have been taking to trial, learn, implement and put in place an effective online digital system. [Interruption.] It is perfectly reasonable to tell the House about steps that are being taken in line with the policy to deliver universal credit on time and on budget, and my right hon. Friend has done it by way of a written statement to the House.

The hon. Lady asked about the Prime Minister not being here for Prime Minister’s questions yesterday. As it happens, and as she knows, the Prime Minister has been here to answer questions at least as often as his predecessors. In particular, he has made more statements to the House than any of his predecessors. What the hon. Lady said was wrong in relation to where the Prime Minister’s priorities should lie. He has, among many other things, been a leader in going around the world winning business for this country, and for him to be in China winning £1 billion of business will enable us, having almost doubled exports to China under this Government, to do more in the future. It is extremely important that we do so.

The hon. Lady asked the Financial Services (Banking Reform) Bill. I announced that the House would consider amendments from the Lords during our debates next Wednesday. If I may, I will leave that debate until next Wednesday, rather than pre-empt it now. The Bill will enable us to put in place effective banking regulation for the future, after the failure of the tripartite system that was put in place by the shadow Chancellor when he was the financial services Minister.

Speaking of the shadow Chancellor, we are all looking for him. We could not find him when the national infrastructure plan was being reported to the House yesterday, so we look forward to having him here today. I am sort of sorry that, in the business announced, the Opposition did not use their opportunity of an Opposition day before Christmas to debate the economy, as we could have discussed the long-term plan of this Government, which is clearly demonstrating that we are turning the corner and building a strong and sustainable recovery. After the small hors d’oeuvre of business questions, I look forward to a satisfying main course when the Chancellor makes his statement.

An Opposition day debate before Christmas would enable us to contrast what we are doing and what the Chancellor will say in his statement with the absence of any plan now from the Opposition. They had plan B. That seems to have disappeared, along with the prospects of the shadow Chancellor. Such a debate would enable us to recall, in a compare and contrast way, what the Leader of the Opposition had to say when President Hollande was elected, which I always rather relish. He said that what President Hollande was going to do for France, Labour was going to do for Britain. In truth, that is a contrast that, like their plan B, the Opposition now do not want to talk about.