Business of the House

Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts

Thursday 11th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

The hon. Gentleman has raised this issue many times, and he is very rigorous in pursuing such matters. We are all anxious for the inquiry to get under way, as he says. Fiona Woolf has had a long and distinguished career. She has held high-profile and challenging positions, including as president of the Law Society and chairman of the Association of Women Solicitors, and she is only the second woman since the year 1189 to hold the position of lord mayor of London. She is a very distinguished person, who is well able to conduct the inquiry to the very highest standards of integrity. The Government are therefore confident that she has the skills and experience needed to set the direction of the inquiry, lead the work of the panel, challenge individuals and institutions without fear or favour, really get into this issue and stop these terrible things happening again. I think that we should support her in doing this work.

[Miss Anne McIntosh (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)]

Scots and Yorkshire folk have a great deal in common. They say, “You can tell a Yorkshireman, but you can’t tell him much.” We hope fervently that the Scots will vote to stay with us.

Rural businesses in North Yorkshire look with some envy at rural businesses in Scotland that have pretty much total 100% rural broadband coverage. Will my right hon. Friend agree to an early debate on why his constituency and mine will have less than 80% fast-speed broadband coverage by 2015-16, whereas the Scots will have a much better deal?

[Mr Hague]

Yorkshire and Scotland do have much in common, including a lot of sound common sense, and we hope that it will be displayed next week.

Superfast rural broadband is very important to my hon. Friend’s constituents and to mine. Public expenditure is higher in Scotland than in North Yorkshire in particular, and indeed than in much of the rest of the UK. In fact, Scots benefit from spending that is about £1,200 per head higher than we have in England, which affects such things. However, we are investing £790 million in superfast broadband access—North Yorkshire is at the forefront of the rural counties that will benefit from that—and 1 million UK premises are already connected, so this work is well under way, including in England.