Business of the House

Cheryl Gillan Excerpts

Thursday 27th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lansley]

I do so look forward to the shadow Leader of the House’s response to the business statement, but mainly—normally—for the humour. On this occasion, however, it fell short of her normal high standards, which is a pity—I look forward to future weeks.

The hon. Lady asked about NHS spending. The figures demonstrate that the coalition Government have met their commitment to real-terms increases in NHS resources year on year. In addition, the Chancellor’s statement yesterday confirmed that we will make provision for a further real-terms increase in NHS resources in 2015-16. As she must recognise, that contrasts with my predecessor as Health Secretary, the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham), who regarded real-terms increases for NHS resources as irresponsible—that was the Labour party’s view. We are delivering on our manifesto promises. The NHS could not have afforded Labour’s irresponsible policies.

The hon. Lady asked about time on Report for the Financial Services (Banking Reform) Bill. I direct her to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor’s response on Tuesday to my hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire (Andrea Leadsom). We are clear that we will welcome, and consider positively and carefully, the Parliamentary Commission’s report and that, where necessary, we will legislate to bring its recommendations into force using that Bill. She must realise that the Government have allowed two days on Report more often than did our predecessors, but that that must be an exception rather than the rule. In this instance, as always, we will consider the requirement for debate on Report and make time available accordingly.

I will tell the hon. Lady exactly what the European Union (Referendum) Bill is about: it is about my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South (James Wharton) taking the lead and giving the people of this country a choice. There are Opposition Members who do not share her unduly cynical view and recognise that it is a genuine attempt by Parliament to exercise its responsibility and give people confidence that they can decide our future in Europe. I and my hon. Friends support it, and I hope that hon. Members from all parties will do so too next Friday.

Given the Chancellor’s statement yesterday and the Chief Secretary’s excellent statement today, I am not sure why the hon. Lady tried to rerun some of the arguments from the Opposition that were demolished by the Chief Secretary. If she wants to talk about future business, she can use the half day available to the Opposition on 10 July, and I would be delighted if they chose to debate living standards in this country, given that yesterday’s statement made it clear that a five-year council tax freeze would be available. I and many others saw council tax double under Labour. Yesterday, the Chancellor announced a three-year council tax freeze and two further years available.

In addition, 24 million basic rate taxpayers will benefit by nearly £700 from the coalition Government’s commitment to increase the personal tax allowance. The consequence of not having to impose the fuel duty escalator will be a saving of £40—13p a litre—for the average motorist. If, on the other hand, the hon. Lady wants to debate the economy on 10 July, she will have the opportunity, among other things, to debate why we are in this situation: because they doubled the debt, leaving us with the highest deficit in the OECD and £157 billion of borrowing, which we have reduced by one third to £108 billion this year.

[Interruption.] It is all very well Opposition Members making gestures to suggest flatlining. The economy did not flatline at the end of the Labour Government; it fell, as new statistics tell us, by 7.2%. There was a 7.2% crash in the gross domestic product of this country. That is the basis of the crisis that we had to resolve when we came into office, and if the hon. Lady wants to have a debate on that, we will be very happy to accommodate her.

[Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)]

Will the Leader of the House consider allowing a debate on the time allocated to Departments for answering oral questions in the House and, therefore, the time that Members have to scrutinise Ministers and hold them to account? During such a debate, we could perhaps examine why the Department for Transport, which has now been given responsibility for some of the largest capital expenditure in any Department in Government, answers questions for only 45 minutes. We could consider extending that to a full hour, which would be the proper amount of time to allow for correct scrutiny.

[Mr Lansley]

The total amount of time available is fixed, so if we give more to one Department, we have to take it away from another. We look carefully at the volume of questions to the various Departments—I promise my right hon. Friend that we do this rigorously—and we try to ensure that if a Department answers questions for less than an hour, it is because it has proportionately slightly fewer questions being asked of it.