Information for Backbenchers on Statements

Barry Gardiner Excerpts

Tuesday 20th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hollobone]

I appreciate the hon. Gentleman’s point. I would say in answer to his question that it is a sensible way forward for the Procedure Committee to take evidence from hon. Members, and I suspect that he will be the first in the queue. The Chair of the Procedure Committee is here tonight to hear contributions from hon. Members. We can develop a sensible protocol that everyone can understand, including Ministers of Crown, and we can find a better way forward. I also say to the hon. Gentleman that the motion has been sitting on the Order Paper for some time, and if he had wanted to table an amendment, he would have been quite within his rights to do so.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman is making an excellent case, and I welcome how he is standing above party politics in order to do it. He mentioned the advent of 24-hour news. Does he similarly deprecate the fact that for once the news Galleries in this place are empty? There seems to be no appetite in the media for what the Chamber is trying to do in asserting the power of Parliament back over an overweening Executive.

[Mr Hollobone]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that helpful intervention, although actually it was my right hon. Friend the Member for East Yorkshire (Mr. Knight), the Chair of the Procedure Committee, who made the point about 24-hour news media. However, the point made by the hon. Gentleman was spot on. The thrust of this motion, and the reason the Backbench Business Committee put it forward tonight, is that all too often the Press Gallery is empty. Why is it empty? It is because the media have generally heard about it all before we get to hear about it on the Floor of the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Hollobone]

There’s food for thought. My hon. Friend makes an excellent point.

[Barry Gardiner]

I rise simply to correct the assertion I made earlier that the Press Gallery was bereft. I have since noticed the not inconsiderable frame of one of the members of the press—I believe from the Jewish Chronicle—who—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The hon. Gentleman entered the House with me in 1997, and he is aware of the normal custom that one does not refer to people outside the Chamber. I allowed a modest latitude for the hon. Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone), because what he was saying was central to the thrust of the argument that he wished to develop, but to get into the business of identifying individual journalists is not good for the House, and it is probably not good for the egos of the journalists concerned either.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alison Seabeck]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. To be fair to special advisers and to Ministers who employ them, they are not all of that ilk; there are within government, as there certainly were within our Government, very specialist people in the particular spheres in which they work.

Unfortunately, despite the risk of being chastised by you, Mr Speaker, and your predecessors, it has been difficult to bring both the current Government and the previous one to heel on some of these issues. Although apologies have been made, sanctions should be considered. I hope that the Chairman of the Procedure Committee is listening to these comments, which I am sure will be reinforced later in the debate. What is an appropriate punishment for Ministers? Perhaps we should make them deliver the apology on their knees at the Bar of the House.

I shall stop being frivolous, because this is a serious issue and one on which the Government were elected. All parties stood for cleaning up Parliament, modernising this House and listening to Back-Bench MPs, and the Government were elected on that. It might therefore be appropriate for the Procedure Committee to consider insisting that the Prime Minister come to the House to apologise in person every time one of his Ministers pre-announces something. The thought of a Prime Minister having to come to the Dispatch Box on a regular basis to apologise for the actions of members of his team would help to focus minds. Such an approach would make him force his Front Benchers to behave, because that would not be good for his business or for his image.

[Barry Gardiner]

Does my hon. Friend agree that, given the extent of leaks from both parties when they have been in government, the fact that the leaks have continued signals either that the Prime Minister does not have authority over his Cabinet or that he refuses to implement that authority?

[Alison Seabeck]

I agree with my hon. Friend.

The motion states that we need a “protocol” that Ministers will abide by and, as Back Benchers, we should expect that to happen. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) says, it has to have teeth. There will be an expectation that the Procedure Committee will take this forward and we will expect serious proposals to be made. If they are not, we should revisit this issue because it is incredibly serious. We have heard all the talk about new politics, but I think we should have some action. Let us see Ministers acknowledge the respect with which this House ought to be treated and see an end to policy announcements in the breakfast media.