Points of Order

Baroness Chapman of Darlington Excerpts

Thursday 25th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Yes, indeed. I will come to the hon. Gentleman, but I want to save him up; I do not want to squander him at too early a stage in our proceedings, so we will keep him on ice and come first to the point of order from Jenny Chapman.

[Jenny Chapman (Darlington) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I would be grateful for your advice. If we exit the EU without a deal, we can no longer export millions of lambs slaughtered in the UK for consumption in the EU. This represents a third of the industry, and in this event if a wasteful cull of millions of lambs and breeding flock is to be avoided, arrangements need to be made now to store the meat safely. We do not have anything like the cold storage capacity needed to do this at the moment. Knowing this, on 17 July, I tabled a number of written parliamentary questions to the Government to establish what the plan is. Although distinct and tabled with advice from the Table Office, they were inexplicably grouped by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, and its answers tell me nothing other than that there are contingencies, but it will not answer my questions, which is what those contingencies might be. I would be grateful for your assistance, Mr Speaker, on how I can get the truth from the Government.

[Mr Speaker]

I am advised, although I do not know whether the hon. Lady is yet aware—a simple nod of the head would suffice—that she has secured an Adjournment debate on Tuesday 3 September on this matter.

[Jenny Chapman]

indicated assent.

[Mr Speaker]

The nod suggests that she has seen her emails and is aware of that, although it does not satisfy her now. Well, that debate will take place and she will have the opportunity to explore these matters. In the meantime, what can she do? First, she can before the rise of the House table further questions, and it may be possible for there to be named day questions; I cannot say for certain off the top of my head, but that is possible. Secondly, although it may be suboptimal so far as the hon. Lady is concerned in the absence of an appropriate departmental Minister, she can either raise these matters herself among the matters to be raised before the forthcoming Adjournment—that is to say, for the benefit of those observing our proceedings, this afternoon in the debate almost immediately to start—or she can cajole, exhort or entice a right hon. or hon. Friend of hers to do so. That may be unsatisfactory, but it is better than nothing. She can also, of course, correspond with Ministers.