Barry Gardiner
Main Page: Barry Gardiner (Labour - Brent West)Department Debates - View all Barry Gardiner's debates with the Leader of the House
(14 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Sir George Young
The hon. Lady had an opportunity on Tuesday to take this matter up with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of the State for Health. He is continuing the pilots initiated by the last Government to transfer NHS Direct to 111. NHS Direct is not being abolished: the organisation will support the new regime. On her plea for Ministers to make accurate statements to the House, no one is more strongly in support of that than I.
Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)
May I congratulate the Leader of the House on his excellent decision to table a debate on the year of international biodiversity in accordance with the suggestion that I made to him before the recess? I offer him another suggestion, which is that he takes more seriously the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham East (Chris Leslie), because the devastating impact of the cuts in housing benefit on constituencies up and down the country is something that this House needs to discuss fully in Government time as a matter of urgency.
Sir George Young
As I hope I said to the hon. Member for Nottingham East (Chris Leslie), legislation will be needed to make the changes to housing benefit, so there will be ample time for the House to debate those issues.