Business of the House

Angela Eagle Excerpts

Thursday 10th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)]

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

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

The business for next week is as follows:

Monday 14 July—Second Reading of the Childcare Payments Bill, followed by a motion to approve the first report from the Committee on Standards on respect policy.

Tuesday 15 July—Proceedings on a Business of the House motion, followed by all stages of the Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Bill.

Wednesday 16 July—Motion on the retirement of the Clerk of the House, followed by Second Reading of the Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Bill.

Thursday 17 July—Statement on the publication of the second report from the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee, “A New Magna Carta?”, followed by statement on the publication of the second report from the Education Committee, “Safe and Suitable: 16-plus Care Options”, followed by debate on a motion relating to the universal postal service obligation, followed by general debate on provision of education for children with autism, followed by general debate on the position of Hazaras in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The Select Committee statements and the subjects for debate were determined by the Backbench Business Committee, to be followed, if necessary, by consideration of Lords amendments.

Friday 18 July—The House will not be sitting.

The provisional business for the week commencing 21 July will include:

Monday 21 July—Second Reading of the Social Action, Responsibility and Heroism Bill.

Tuesday 22 July—Matters to be raised before the forthcoming Adjournment, as selected by the Backbench Business Committee.

I should also like to inform the House that the business in Westminster Hall for 17 and 21 July will be:

Thursday 17 July—Debate on the middle east and north Africa.

Monday 21 July—Debate on an e-petition relating to making Eid and Diwali public holidays.

Hon. Members will wish to know that Westminster Hall sittings will be temporarily relocated to Committee Room 10 for the two weeks of the September sitting. Repair and modernisation work will be undertaken to the lift that provides access to the Grand Committee Room and the Jubilee CPA and IPU Rooms. This work will not affect the Grand Committee Room itself, but will rule out disabled access, and the relocation to Committee Room 10 will therefore ensure that Members of Parliament, staff and members of the public who require lift access will still be able to attend sittings in Westminster Hall.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ms Eagle]

I thank the Leader of the House for announcing next week’s business, and for ensuring that access to our debates for those with disabilities remains possible, despite the works that inevitably have to go on during the recess.

I realise that we will hear a statement shortly, but will the Leader of the House confirm the arrangements for next Tuesday’s sitting, and whether he will extend it to ensure that the House can properly scrutinise emergency legislation to restore the status quo prior to the European Court ruling on data protection?

We now have the business until the summer recess. After six weeks of legislative lethargy, just like buses, all the Government’s Queen’s Speech legislation has come along at once, with 25% of it in just five days. On Monday we will debate the Childcare Payments Bill. Nursery costs have risen five times faster than wages since the election, but the Government have done nothing, and this Bill will not come into force until after the next election. Will the Leader of the House tell us why the Government will not support our plans to extend free child care from 15 hours to 25 hours? And will he tell us why with this Government it is always too little too late?

On Wednesday, we will debate the Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Bill, which bears an eerie resemblance to the Deregulation Bill as it features such a random assortment of issues that virtually any new clause the Government care to produce is within its scope. Will the Leader of the House now give me a cast-iron assurance that the Government have no intention of tabling 45 new clauses and leaving just 43 minutes to debate them, as they did during the passage of the Deregulation Bill in the Commons? Will he tell us why the Governments do not back our plans to provide certainty for people working regular hours on a zero-hours contract?

A week on Monday, we will debate the Social Action, Responsibility and Heroism Bill, which has a title that is longer than its contents. The Government really are living in a parallel universe. The Passport Office has tried to claim that everything is okay, but it is still struggling with a backlog of half a million applications. The Prime Minister tried to claim that the NHS is getting better when it is actually getting worse and then we had the spectacle of the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions being dragged to the House surreptitiously to confirm while appearing to deny that the business case for the implementation of universal credit is yet to be signed off by the Treasury. The Secretary of State denied on the Floor of the House yesterday that the Treasury had ever questioned the financial viability of the business case for his pet project, but on Monday the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Jeremy Heywood, said that the Treasury played a role

“in bringing to the Secretary of State’s attention that the project was way off track.”

That directly contradicts what the Secretary of State said yesterday and both cannot be true, so which is true?

As the population ages, more people are in need of care, but this week figures show that the number of people receiving care has fallen by 5% in the past year alone. A report from the Public Accounts Committee warns today that despite the squeeze in adult social care, the Government do not appreciate the scale of the challenge. I was therefore surprised to read an e-mail from the Liberal Democrat Education Minister to party members that laments that

“almost half of all carers are cutting back on essentials like food and heating.”

He fails to mention that that is because his Government have cut £3.5 billion from care services. The Deputy Prime Minister told the Radio Times this week that it takes a “steely side” and thick skin to get on in politics, but he failed to admit that Liberal Democrats also need two faces. I understand that Liberal Democrat MPs have been sent to Bedfordshire for survival training. At least they are finally admitting that they are an endangered species teetering on the verge of extinction.

This week, the Financial Times has revealed that the majority of candidates selected to replace retiring Tory MPs are white male Eurosceptics. In South Suffolk, the long list contained seven women but the shortlist was made up of three men. A former leader of the UK Independence party will contest South Thanet for the Tories. It has gone from the A-list to the Tea party. This week, the hon. Member for Hexham (Guy Opperman)—a Conservative Member—admitted that he keeps the Prime Minister off his leaflets, that no one wants to keep hearing about Europe and that it is so lonely being a northern Tory that their regional group could meet in a lift. Where does that leave the Liberal Democrats?

[Mr Lansley]

I am grateful to the shadow Leader of the House for her remarks. May I take this opportunity, Mr Speaker, to say how much I and other Members of the House enjoyed hearing the parliamentary choir singing with their colleagues from the Bundestag last night? I know that you, Mr Speaker, and Professor Dr Norbert Lammert, President of the Bundestag, had the opportunity to address a packed Westminster Hall. It was the most inspiring and entertaining concert.

The shadow Leader of the House asked about the business for next Tuesday. She is quite right: as we will complete all stages of the Bill on Tuesday it is important that we have a full opportunity for debate, so, subject to discussion and a motion being put before the House, I hope that the debate will extend to 10 pm.

The shadow Leader of the House seemed to castigate us for not having enough legislation, but in order to do so she ignored the fact that after the Queen’s Speech debate we entered into the consideration of a number of carry-over Bills and the Finance Bill, and we are now moving on to the Second Readings of the Bills that have been introduced in this Session. That is entirely normal. Strangely enough, she said that there is too little legislation and then complained that the small business Bill had too much in it and that we might introduce amendments to it. It is a wide-ranging Bill. Its character is different from that of the Deregulation Bill. That Bill is principally about removing regulations that cause a burden, but the small business Bill is about making the policy changes in legislation that are necessary to promote enterprise and reduce burdens. This is not just about reducing burdens but about promoting enterprise, and rightly so.

Curiously, the hon. Lady said that the small business Bill was too long and then complained that the heroism Bill was too short. I quite like a short Bill, as it happens—I think that is rather a good thing. I look forward to the Second Reading debate on the Bill, which will introduce the important aspect of giving people in law, in civil cases, the opportunity to be sure that when they undertake something that is in the broad public interest or demonstrates heroism, they will not be penalised. I think that is very helpful.

The hon. Lady seems to have taken to a habit of starting to re-run Opposition debates—in this instance, on universal credit. The House had an opportunity to debate universal credit on an Opposition motion, an opportunity to listen to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions answer the urgent question very thoroughly and successfully, and an opportunity, through the Liaison Committee, on estimates, to debate the implementation of universal credit. In every instance, my right hon. Friend and Ministers made it admirably clear how we are proceeding with a policy that, frankly, the Opposition supported. It is typical political opportunism to try to cavil as we implement this safely and securely, as distinct from their implementation of the tax credit system, which was, in truth, chaotic.

The hon. Lady talked about the cost of living. Let me remind her of what this coalition is doing together to assist people with the inevitable difficulties of coping in the wake of the destruction of economic value by Labour, which took £3,000 per household out of the value of the economy. We are cutting tax for over 26 million people, taking 3 million people out of income tax altogether, freezing fuel duty for the rest of this Parliament, helping local authorities to freeze council tax, delivering an average £50 reduction in energy bills, cutting £50 from some of the highest water bills down in the south-west, capping rail fare increases, capping charges on pensions, stopping excessive charges when paying with credit and debit cards, and capping the cost of payday loans. On child care, which she mentioned, we are funding 15 hours a week of free child care for all three and four-year-olds and for disadvantaged two-year-olds. I look forward to the support that I hope the House will give to the Childcare Payments Bill, which introduces tax-free child care for working families. That is how we are helping working families in this coalition Government, and I look forward to the debates that push that agenda forward.