Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Bridget Phillipson and Nick Clegg

Tuesday 8th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

“Finally” is the operative word for something that has bedevilled debate in Westminster for more than 100 years. As the hon. Gentleman knows, in January 2012 we set up the McKay commission to consider how the House of Commons should deal with legislation that affects only part of the United Kingdom. The commission’s report—an excellent one—was published in March, and the Government are now considering it in detail. I must point out to the hon. Gentleman that if this question were so straightforward to sort out, I suspect someone would have done it a long time ago.

[Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab)]

T13. Under the Deputy Prime Minister’s flagship school meals programme, he pledged that every infant child would receive a hot, healthy school meal. How many children will be eating cold sandwiches in September because, once again, he cannot keep his word?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

Even by the hon. Lady’s standards, it is a bit sour to try to undermine a policy that has not yet been implemented. It will be implemented in September and is a really progressive policy. All the evidence shows—as did the pilots conducted under the previous Government in Durham and parts of east London—that this will not only save families on low income a lot of money, but help to raise the educational performance of children from lower-income backgrounds and provide a powerful way of creating cohesion among young children as they share a meal together. We are working intensively with thousands of schools across the country at the moment, so I cannot give the hon. Lady a precise answer, but the overwhelming majority of those schools are already ready to provide this service. We are working with them over the summer to make sure that if there are any exceptions in the provision of those healthy school meals at lunch time in September, there will be only a very small number of them.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Bridget Phillipson and Nick Clegg

Tuesday 13th May 2014 Commons Chamber

[Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Nick Clegg)]

As Deputy Prime Minister, I support the Prime Minister on a full range of Government policy and initiatives. Within Government, I take special responsibility for the Government’s programme of political and constitutional reform.

[Bridget Phillipson]

Real wages are down, 1.4 million people are stuck on zero-hours contracts and thousands more families have been forced to turn to food banks. Is that the right hon. Gentleman’s party making a difference in government?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

The hon. Lady might have forgotten that when we came to power her party had left an absolute economic catastrophe behind. The great Labour recession in 2008 cost every household in this country more than £3,000. Her party predicted that more than 1 million more people would be unemployed when in fact 1.7 million new jobs have been created, of which we are very proud.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Bridget Phillipson and Nick Clegg

Tuesday 25th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

The hon. Gentleman wants some examples: I said no to proposals from his party that anyone could basically be fired at will with no reason at all; I said no to his party’s proposals for a snoopers charter; and I have said no to profit making in state schools and to prioritising tax cuts for millionaires when our priority should be tax cuts for many people on middle and low incomes. If he wants me to go on about how the Liberal Democrats are anchoring the Government in the centre ground to ensure that we build a stronger economy and a fairer society, be my guest.

[Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab)]

T11. A recent answer to a parliamentary question reveals that by 2015 construction will have started on only 10% of schools in the Deputy Prime Minister’s priority school building programme. Is he happy with that record?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

There has been a long record of ineffective use of the public funds provided to schools for their redevelopment. The Building Schools for the Future programme, for instance, was widely recognised to be inefficient in the deployment of funds. We are providing billions and billions of pounds of capital so that schools can be rebuilt across the country, and of course all of us, on behalf of our constituents, want that rebuilding programme to take place as soon as possible.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Bridget Phillipson and Nick Clegg

Tuesday 22nd May 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

Yes.

[Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab)]

T8. Last week, the Deputy Prime Minister said:“There is going to be no regional pay system. That is not going to happen.”Are not his Government drawing up plans for precisely such a system?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

No.