Business of the House
Chris Bryant Excerpts(5 years, 8 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Speaker
I appreciate that that is not the answer the hon. Lady wants, but it is the answer she is getting tonight. I understand entirely where she is coming from, but these matters can all be explored in the days ahead, and I am absolutely certain that they will be.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
I guess that if the Government have tabled the main motion, they have also tabled the Business of the House motion governing tomorrow, so I do not understand why the Leader of the House cannot just tell us what time the votes will be tomorrow. It would be for the convenience of Members who have families and so on to know, because we are substantially changing the business for one of the most important matters affecting the House. Will it be at 7 o’clock tomorrow evening? Will it be 5 o’clock or 7 o’clock on Thursday?
Business of the House
Chris Bryant Excerpts(5 years, 8 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Andrea Leadsom
My hon. Friend raises a very important matter, and I know she is very knowledgeable in this area. The voisinage arrangement has been in place since 1965 but was suspended by Ireland following a decision by the Irish Supreme Court in October 2016, as she knows. On 26 February, two Northern Ireland fishing vessels were detained, but on 1 March the skippers were not convicted under the Probation Act and the vessels were released. Since the suspension of the arrangement, the UK Government have raised this issue several times and have been clear that we cannot accept continued unequal application indefinitely. We continue to explore solutions to reinstate a level playing field as quickly as possible for the benefit of all our fishermen.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
Unfortunately, skin cancer is very much on the rise in the UK, partly because lots of us have skin like mine with freckles and fair hair and are not really built for the sun, but still go on holiday to Spain and other places and do not cover up properly when the sun is out.
May we have a debate on skin cancer, so that more people can be made aware that if they have a dodgy mole, going to the doctor can save their life if it is caught very early; so that everyone covers up their kids, particularly when the sun comes up; and so that no one uses a tanning machine, because, frankly, those things are death machines?
While I am here, let me say this. I am nobody special—I am just one of the many, many hundreds of people who have received diagnoses of skin cancer in the last few weeks, including other Members—but I am enormously grateful for the love that many people have shown in the House, some of them people to whom I have been phenomenally rude across the Chamber. I am not going to stop being rude, but may I just say thank you to those who have been truly, truly lovely, including the Leader of the House herself?
Andrea Leadsom
Let me say first to the hon. Gentleman that he is very special to me, and he is very special to many other people both in the House and outside it. He has made some incredibly important points, not the least of which was that his own skin cancer was under his hair. We often put sun cream on the exposed bits, but not necessarily in our hair, because that would be slightly odd. I absolutely agree with the hon. Gentleman about the need to wear a hat.
Proxy Voting
Chris Bryant Excerpts(5 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Speaker
I thank the Leader of the House for that useful clarification. For the avoidance of doubt, if it is necessary for me to trog around the offices of the individual party leaders in order to secure those signatures, I shall be happy to do so.
Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab)
I know that the Leader of the House wants proxy voting to happen. I am a member of the Procedure Committee and I say to all Members that procedure is fun—never more so than in recent months.
Chris Elmore
Indeed, I am sad.
I ask the Leader of the House, in all sincerity, if, as I fear and perhaps she fears, the proposal does not go through on the nod on Monday, how soon will she bring back a substantive motion with a vote? The following day, we are expecting votes on Brexit legislation, which means that my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq), who has a new-born baby, could lose out again. I am sure that the right hon. Lady agrees that that is simply not acceptable.
Andrea Leadsom
I have certainly made it clear that the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) should be able to spend critical time with her baby, and I sincerely hope that she will avail herself either of nodding through, or a pair in the event that proxy voting is not available. However, as I have said, in the event that somebody regrettably decides to object on Monday, I will table a substantive motion as soon as possible.
Chris Bryant
As it happens, I do not have children, although I was told categorically by an eight-year-old in Ton Pentre school last week that I have two sons, aged two and six, which goes to show that the internet is not always accurate. Perhaps it was another Chris Bryant.
All my friends in the House who have children say that the most useful thing for them is certainty about when votes will be held and when the end of the day will come. Of late, we have had a lot of Tuesdays and Wednesdays that have gone later than 7 o’clock and votes at strange times, and we do not have any certainty about whether the proposal will be accepted next Monday. I urge the Leader of the House to think again about whether it is possible to have a 45-minute or hour-long debate on Monday, with a vote at the end so that we have a guaranteed chance of getting this through. While we are talking about certainty, many parents are uncertain because there are rumours that there will no longer be a February recess during half-term. Will the right hon. Lady make it clear whether that will happen?
Andrea Leadsom
The hon. Gentleman will know that the House has agreed its recess arrangements in February. It is a matter for the House, but I have no plans to change that. I have tabled the motion for Monday and I sincerely hope that it will be successful.
Business of the House
Chris Bryant Excerpts(5 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Andrea Leadsom
I think that we are all incredibly sympathetic to the hon. Lady’s constituents who were given such terrible news in the run-up to Christmas, and we join her in congratulating and thanking all those who made sure that they could still celebrate Christmas. She raises some important points about how businesses behave if they are failing. She will be aware that the Matthew Taylor review has raised some serious issues relating to pensions management and so on, which the Government are looking at closely. I encourage her to apply for an Adjournment debate so that the matter can be raised directly with Ministers.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
I say to the Leader of the House that I do not think there is anything wrong with a good flounce—sometimes in life it can be useful—but I do not think that we should flounce out of the European Union. I am concerned that the Solicitor General said that we would manage to have Second Reading of the European Union withdrawal agreement and implementation Bill before Christmas. That cannot now happen until at least 28 January, if at all, and only if next Tuesday we proceed as the Government intend. Therefore, what will the Government do to ensure that we have proper legislation in place before 29 March, and will the Leader of the House seriously consider—do not rule it out now—that we might have to delay leaving beyond that date?
Andrea Leadsom
First, I simply concede to the hon. Gentleman that I am quite sure he would be a better flouncer than me in all circumstances.
Andrea Leadsom
Not in the slightest—we love the hon. Gentleman dearly.
It is absolutely not the Government’s intention or policy to do anything like flounce out of the EU. We are looking at our meaningful vote on Tuesday and it is absolutely our intention that we win that meaningful vote, introduce the withdrawal agreement Bill and have a smooth transition out of the European Union. As the hon. Gentleman will know, my job is to make sure that the legislation passes through both Houses, and it will not surprise him that I look at that issue closely on a daily basis. I am confident that we have enough time to get the withdrawal agreement Bill through both Houses.
Business of the House
Chris Bryant Excerpts(5 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Andrea Leadsom
The hon. Gentleman often raises the suppression of religious freedom and is absolutely right to do so. He will be aware that the Government entirely support the rights of all individuals to express their religious preferences. I encourage him to seek an Adjournment debate so that he can raise the matter with Ministers.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
I am absolutely delighted about “Erskine May” being online, not least because when I called for that on 2 November 2017, both you, Mr Speaker, and the Leader of the House were ever so slightly sniffy about the very idea. I am absolutely delighted that we are united in wanting it online.
It is preposterous for us to delay endlessly the vote on Brexit. If we bump up against 21 January, businesses in this country will be wasting time, energy and money worrying about whether there will be a no-deal situation. We need to get on with it. I say this to the Leader of the House: please ditch all next week’s business. Let us get on with the debate and get on with making a decision. That is what Parliament is for—decisions.
Andrea Leadsom
I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman is delighted. I do not think Mr Speaker or I were sniffy.
On the hon. Gentleman’s main point on the meaningful vote, when hon. Members look at themselves in the mirror, they know full well that the country needs a decision to support a withdrawal agreement. We were looking at a decision not to support a meaningful vote. That is precisely why the Prime Minister decided that we would not go ahead with the vote—she was concerned that hon. Members would not support the withdrawal agreement. If the hon. Gentleman wants to come forward with a worked-out and negotiable alternative, that would be great, but the reality is that the Opposition have no alternatives to suggest. All they want to do is have a vote so that they can vote no. The Prime Minister, in the interests of the country, is trying to find a withdrawal agreement that the House will support.
Business of the House
Chris Bryant Excerpts(5 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Andrea Leadsom
Let me first point out to my hon. Friend that the Prime Minister was here answering questions on all aspects of the withdrawal agreement. She was not here simply to reassure people; she was listening to all Members. In answer to the second part of my hon. Friend’s question, let me say that I think the Prime Minister fully understands that there are serious questions about the backstop, and a desire on the part of Members to see changes in the legal text.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
It is sad, really: we often boast about our historical freedoms and liberties and we often preach to other countries about how to run parliamentary democracy, but, to be honest, this is a prime example of how not to do it. I would have had respect for the Leader of the House and the Government if they had come forward with a motion saying, “All right, we’ll put it to the House that we are not going to put it to the House,” but they are instead relying on a shabby little trick, where a Government Whip will just shout “Tomorrow,” which in this Parliament does not mean tomorrow: it means mañana; it means never. It is a shabby little trick, and is not the ultimate irony that the Government are preventing the people from having a vote on it and preventing the Commons from having a vote on it, but the House of Lords is going to vote on it tonight? What is good enough for earls and barons is good enough for us.
Andrea Leadsom
The hon. Gentleman knows that that is a bit of parliamentary pantomime. He knows full well that the Government often name tomorrow as the next date for deferring an Order of the Day. So after a First Reading, when naming a date for the Second Reading debate if it is not “Now” then it is “Tomorrow,” and then the Government decide. There is nothing unusual about that at all.
Privilege (Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Advice)
Chris Bryant Excerpts(5 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
Your wisdom, Mr Speaker, in always making that point just before you call me is shared by the whole House, I am absolutely sure. So we are all united now and everybody can just agree with what I am about to say.
Although I sympathise with the arguments made by the Father of the House and for that matter with the points made by the hon. Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg), I disagree with the conclusion to which they have come. I am delighted that the motion does not mention the Attorney General by name because I do not think this is a matter of the Attorney General being a dishonourable man at all. I am very fond of the Attorney General. I think he is a wonderful man. I think he is entirely honourable and, yesterday, he did his level best in the Chamber to provide what he thought he could, within the terms and the strictures given to him by the Government. However, I would say that we are today facing an extraordinary moment. I cannot in the history of Parliament find a moment when the Government have referred themselves to the Committee of Privileges. The best argument they have today, in response to the motion moved by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer), is—“Instead of deciding already on the House’s behalf that the Government are in contempt, we will refer it to the Committee of Privileges.” Always in the past, that has been to decide, prima facie, that there is a case to answer. So the Government themselves accept at the very least that there is a case to answer about their being in contempt. I cannot think of another moment in our history when that was true.
In fact, as several Members have already said, the Attorney General himself in a sense confessed his own guilt to the charge of contempt yesterday. He said on the motion for the debate we had previously:
“We should have voted against it.”—[Official Report, 3 December 2018; Vol. 650, c. 579.]
Of course we should have done. It would have been good if the Government had made in the debate back then all the arguments they are making today and made yesterday afternoon. Some of us might have listened to the argument about national security then. It might have been an appropriate argument then, but it was not an appropriate argument yesterday and, for that matter, it is not an appropriate argument today.
The Attorney General repeated time and again yesterday that he knew he was not fulfilling the will of the House. That is what we are asked to decide today—whether the Government are fulfilling the will of the House. He himself said yesterday that he was not fulfilling the will of the House. In an extraordinary moment, he said:
“The House has at its disposal the means by which to enforce its will.”—[Official Report, 3 December 2018; Vol. 650, c. 574.]
That is what we are doing now. To all intents and purposes, the Attorney General yesterday asked us to do what we are doing this afternoon and I think he fully accepts that the House has to be able to have its way in the end.
I say to the right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) and the hon. Member for North East Somerset, the other thing that is extraordinary about the motion before us—the Opposition motion, supported by the other Opposition parties—is that there is no sanction involved in it. In fact, the only thing it requires to happen is that the will of the House is abided by. That is the only thing. It may be that we have to return to this if the Government choose to ignore it, but my suspicion and hope is that, if the Opposition motion is carried today, the Government will say, “Alright. Fair do’s. That’s twice we’ve been told now. We do actually have to abide by the decision of the House.”
Mr Rees-Mogg
Could the hon. Gentleman help the House by explaining what the next step would be if the Government did not then publish the information and what procedural effect could be had or what motion could be brought forward to follow up on the motion before the House today?
Chris Bryant
I do not want to go back to 1340, as the hon. Gentleman did, and I am not going to. I prefer to cross my bridges one at a time. I am hopeful for all the good reasons that he himself adduced that, if the House for a second time decides to insist on its will, the Government will then comply. To be honest, if that were not to be the case, I hope other hon. Members who today are dubious about this procedure would want to stand in favour of more robust measures. The anxiety is of course that there is a time factor. We cannot let this roll on until after next Tuesday because then the Government would have completely defied the will of the House beyond the time necessary.
Chris Philp
A few moments ago, the hon. Gentleman referred to having to implement the will of the House. Does he believe that there should be any limitation on the House’s ability to impose its will, for example, if it came into conflict with an individual’s personal or civil liberties?
Chris Bryant
In the debate that would transpire, I do not think that hon. Members would vote for such a motion. The hon. Gentleman asks me a hypothetical question, and we have been dealing with lots of hypotheticals. I have tried to search through history for a moment when the Government refused to abide by the will of the House when there was a Humble Address and I simply cannot find one. We should therefore deal with the actuality rather than the hypothetical. I say to Conservative Members that it is all very well when sitting on the Government Benches to say that the Government should have their way, but that does not normally serve the long-term interests of the nation, and in our current system, the Government have phenomenal power.
Sir Oliver Heald
The hon. Gentleman knows that our Committees often ask for papers and sometimes the response to such requests is to say that the documents are legally professionally privileged. In those circumstances, the House tends to use a bit of discretion and common sense and often an agreement is reached about exactly what is to be disclosed. Is not that what is needed here?
Chris Bryant
It would have been interesting if the Government had made that argument, but they did not. They made no argument—they allowed the motion to go through. If they had said in the meantime, for example, yesterday afternoon, “We will provide the document that you want. We’ll give it to the Chair of the Exiting the European Union Committee, which has a majority of Conservative Members, and it can decide what should be in the public domain”, I think the House would have been content. That would have been a perfectly logical process to adopt, but the Government have not done that. Perhaps they will do it later today if they lose the motion—I do not know.
Let me consider the important substantive point. Can the House require the Law Officers to provide their legal advice to Parliament? It is important that Select Committees can require documents of all sorts of people outside Parliament, and it is difficult to enforce that if we cannot even require documents of Ministers. Yesterday, the Attorney General referred several times to “previous editions of ‘Erskine May’” to show that “the motion to return” is traditionally always
“confined to documents of public and official character.”—[Official Report, 3 December 2018; Vol. 650, c. 563.]
That was his argument for saying that “Erskine May” did not really allow for Law Officers to provide anything that was sought by the House, even though the current 24th edition does exactly that. He suggested that the 22nd or the 23rd edition had changed the rule and that we should return to a previous version.
Perhaps the Attorney General was referring to the 10th edition of “Erskine May”, which, as I am sure the hon. Member for North East Somerset knows, came out in 1893. In that, the traditional version of this doctrine, which I think the Attorney General meant, is laid out:
“The opinions of the law officers of the Crown, given for the guidance of ministers, in any question of diplomacy or state policy, being included in the class of confidential documents, have generally been withheld from Parliament.”
I think that the Attorney General believes that that should still be the case, although that has been superseded. Unfortunately for the Attorney General, “Erskine May” goes on to say:
“In 1858, however, this rule was, under peculiar and exceptional circumstances, departed from, and the opinions of the law officers of the Crown upon the case of the Cagliari, were laid before Parliament.”
I will not go into the instance—I know that hon. Members are saddened by that.
The point is that, when the House has required that the Law Officers provide the information, they have always done so. The Attorney General’s argument therefore does not stand.
Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)
That also appears in the 17th edition of “Erskine May” from 1964, to which I will refer if Mr Speaker calls me. In the case to which the hon. Gentleman refers, in the middle of 19th century, the Minister voluntarily gave that advice, which was not demanded by the House.
Chris Bryant
It was required by the House. Indeed, it was required by the House of Lords and the House of Commons. The point about the 1893 version, which survived for a while, was that the information was provided
“under peculiar and exceptional circumstances”,
but they were peculiar and exceptional in a remarkably similar way to the current case, because the information dealt with international treaties and the relationship between other countries in Europe.
The House must surely be able to require documents. Just as the Speaker is the servant of the House, so in the end, the Government have to bow the knee to Parliament. It is not good enough for the Government to say, “You’re all wrong; you’re benighted; you don’t understand the full implications. We, the Government, are the only people who have seen the whole truth and understand the security implications.” If they want to find some other arbitration method through the processes of the House, such as a Select Committee, that is fine, but that is not what they have done.
In the end, we reach the simple point, which I do not think a single one of my constituents would understand: the Government look as if they are trying to keep something secret; the Law Officers want to say one thing in private, in Cabinet, and another in Parliament. That is not to accuse anybody of hypocrisy. It is simply to say that my constituents would not understand why the Government would want to keep the information secret. I say to Government Members: one day, you will sit on the Opposition Benches and if you vote against this being contempt and therefore against requiring the Government to produce the documents, that power will be gone forever.
Several hon. Members rose—
Robert Courts
I am grateful to the right hon. and learned Gentleman for making that point. Of course, he has considerable experience in those matters, but we are dealing here with a wholly different consideration. He deals with circumstances in which he has been subject to a court order, which brings me precisely to my point. No doubt he will say to me that Parliament is a court—it is the high court of Parliament, the highest court in the land—and I accept the force of that point, but the court before which he has been used to appearing, and the court before which I have been used to appearing at the Bar, has a procedure for dealing with such matters that we do not have here.
A number of Members have already referred to the Freedom of Information Act, which contains exemptions for certain purposes. The right hon. and learned Gentleman will also be aware of public interest immunity applications, which are made when cases are being prosecuted, and a judge can look confidentially at documents and there can be redactions and so forth. None of that applies here, because this procedure is not designed for the purpose for which it is being employed by the Opposition. There simply is no mechanism for this procedure to deal with issues of the gravity of those with which we are dealing now. To its great credit, the Government’s proposal offers a way of looking at that.
Chris Bryant
When I sued Rupert Murdoch for hacking my phone, the court required him, under the Norwich Pharmacal procedures, to provide all the documents. His team legally had to do so, because if they did not, they would be in contempt. That is an exact parallel of what is happening here.
Robert Courts
The hon. Gentleman is right—he makes a good point— but he is referring to something wholly different. He is referring to disclosure, not the waiving of privilege. Any Member—[Interruption.] I am sorry, but they are wholly different concepts. I did not wish to sound patronising to the hon. Gentleman, but, as any lawyer—including those on the Front Benches—will realise, legal privilege is protected. That is totally different from the disclosure of relevant documents, when someone is expected by a court to disclose documents that can assist the other side. For example, the prosecution may be expected to disclose documents that undermine its case or could be reasonably expected to assist the other side’s. There are procedures laid down in law, through practice and regulation, which deal with those circumstances. They do not apply here, because they do not exist, and they do not apply with regard to legal privilege. That is the crucial difference. There is no mechanism to weigh, under the Humble Address procedure, all the subtle points that we have been discussing today.
I will end my brief remarks by making the point that the Attorney General has come down to the House and spent two and a half hours answering questions—
Business of the House
Chris Bryant Excerpts(6 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)
The Leader of the House will be aware that there are 115 pieces of proposed legislation to be debated on 23 November, including the beautifully written Workers (Definition and Rights) Bill—
Chris Stephens
Funnily enough, it was the Member for Glasgow South West. Can the Leader of the House indicate whether more time will be allocated for the House to debate private Members’ Bills in the future?
Andrea Leadsom
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for raising this point again—it has been raised a number of times at business questions. As I have explained to other hon. Members, the Post Office is moving some of its centres into WH Smith. That is designed not to reduce the services in any way, but to rationalise them. Indeed, in taking on banking and other services, the post office network around the country is often enabling people to get a better service than previously.
Chris Bryant
I am delighted that the Leader of the House is staying in her job because I will admit—as long as she does not tell anybody else—that I quite like her. [Interruption.] Blowing kisses is not going to get her anywhere, however.
Chris Bryant
Easy!
As the Leader of the House will know, the House passed a Magnitsky-style measure in the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018. The Government have provided three excuses for not doing anything about this yet. One is that it cannot be done until the end of Brexit, and the Foreign Secretary says that that means after the transition period is over. Another reason is that we would have to table statutory instruments and that there is no time for SIs. However, everyone in this House would love to get this done as quickly as possible. Other countries in Europe have already done it, so will she please stay in her job just to get this thing done?
Andrea Leadsom
I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman; I also enjoy our little altercations across the Floor of the House on so many different subjects. I hear what he is saying, and I would be happy to raise this with Ministers directly on his behalf.
Bullying and Harassment: Cox Report
Chris Bryant Excerpts(6 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Andrea Leadsom
My hon. Friend is right: it is about leadership. The complaints procedure is vital to give satisfaction, justice and clarity to those who have suffered at the hands of any Member or, indeed, any member of staff, but my hon. Friend is right that leadership is key.
Andrea Leadsom
I would like to make one point—I think the hon. Gentleman will be interested to hear it—before I give way.
We need to democratise the House of Commons, but governance change cannot and should not happen overnight. The then Public Administration Committee, chaired, as the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee is now, by my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin), said in written evidence to the House of Commons Governance Committee, which held the last review of House of Commons governance in 2014:
“Any structural or organisational change should only be considered as a consequence of a full understanding of the underlying causes of difficulty or failure. If this is not done, structural change, with all the disruption which that involves, will become no more than a distraction. This may be welcomed by those who want to avoid the more difficult, personal causes of problems in the organisation, which are likely to be in the culture. By culture, we mean what is embedded in the attitudes and behaviour of the people in the organisation, and PASC has found this is by far the most important determinant of organisational effectiveness.”
That still rings true—structural change needs to be considered in the context of an organisation’s culture.
Chris Bryant
I completely agree with the point that the right hon. Lady just made.
Leadership comes in many different styles. There are autocratic styles of leadership: when I was on the Culture, Media and Sport Committee many years ago, our Committee was run in that way and it was inappropriate. Now most Select Committees are much more likely to work as a team. I wonder whether the House of Commons Commission would be better if it were constituted more like a Select Committee that worked as a team of people, throughout a Parliament, with each individual in the team able to assume responsibility. That might be a better way of leading change within the House.
Andrea Leadsom
The hon. Gentleman makes a very good point and I am keen to hear all Members’ views on how we can improve the democracy in this place.
Dame Laura’s report has made it clear that we need to consider first, changing the power balance in this place; secondly, giving staff a stronger voice; and thirdly, addressing how to stop failures at the top infecting our entire workplace. Therefore, one of the questions I would like the House to consider and give views on today is whether the current structure of the House of Commons leadership is fit for purpose.
The Commission has tasked the Commons Executive Board with bringing forward a speedy action plan, and I support that. My vision for a future democratisation of governance is a leadership structure that is fully and fairly representative of all who work here, and accountable for all actions and decisions. Any changes to governance need to be carefully considered, and they need to be fit for a 21st-century Parliament. My three personal tests for considering future proposals for change in the House’s leadership are, first, will they mean that everyone who works here can expect to be treated with dignity and respect? Secondly, will they rebuild the confidence of those who have suffered in the past? Thirdly, do all those who work here feel they have a proper stake in the decisions that affect them?
Valerie Vaz
The Leader of the House has set out the new process, so people should feel confident.
The Opposition are grateful to all those who contributed to the report. I say to those members of staff: I acknowledge the hurt that you have suffered and the courage of those who have spoken up. Those who work in the canteens and throughout the House, you undertake your work professionally and with integrity. You are helpful, creative, and supportive of Members. There is a very high standard of work here, which is appreciated. This place simply would not function without you.
I hope that the debate will do justice to the responses and the work that was put into the report, and I will highlight just a few areas. The report notes that a cultural change needs to happen. In paragraph 67, Dame Laura Cox says that,
“structural and governance arrangements have changed several times over the years, while the organisational culture has remained firmly in place.”
I know that the Leader of the House agrees that a culture change is needed and has previously said in the House that it will “not happen overnight”. However, will she update the House on how a cultural change will be measured so we know we are making progress?
Dame Laura Cox highlighted the gender and racist dimension to bullying and harassment. Paragraph 123 states that,
“some areas of the House were described as having a particularly bad reputation for sexist or racist attitudes”.
Of the 200 people who came forward to give information to the inquiry, the majority, nearly 70%, were women. The House of Commons and Parliamentary Digital Service diversity and inclusion strategy 2019 to 2022 is evidence of the House service’s commitment to ensuring that this place is a positive and inclusive environment to work in. Jennifer Crook is head of diversity and inclusion, and work is already under way. She has produced a very good report highlighting successes in, for example, talent management, and rolled out unconscious bias training.
According to the recent staff survey, staff with disabilities have the highest rates of experiencing discrimination, bullying and harassment and are less likely to agree that the House service provides an inclusive environment. That is followed by black, Asian and minority ethnic staff, particularly black British staff. The Cox report, taken together with results from the staff survey, which suggested that 18% of staff had experienced bullying or harassment in the past 12 months, most of it at the hands of other staff, and that 3% had experienced sexual harassment, shows we clearly have a long way to go before we can claim we have an inclusive workplace.
Dame Laura Cox raises the need for training. In paragraph 311, she states:
“Even those Members most implacably opposed will gain from it, despite any current intransigence.”
At the urgent question on 16 October, the Leader of the House said:
“available is a wide range of optional, voluntary training in how to carry out appraisals, how to lead an office and so on.”
She went on to say:
“Compulsory training for new Members will be introduced after the next election. It was decided that there was no consensus in favour of compulsory training for those who were already Members”.—[Official Report, 16 October 2018; Vol. 647, c. 541-2.]
In my view, if we want cultural change everyone should have training and it should be compulsory. Will the Leader of the House please reconsider, in the light of the Cox report, that compulsory training should be discussed again?
Chris Bryant
My personal suspicion is that if we made training very available so it was easy for Members to attend, the vast majority of Members would sign up to it without us having to get to the compulsory stage. I am up for making it compulsory if we have to do that, but I am sure the vast majority of Members would not be intransigent. Most of us would not even know whether we had been inappropriate because we have not had proper training and we would be delighted to do it, but it needs somebody to get on the phone and persuade us all to turn up.
Valerie Vaz
I think my hon. Friend is saying two slightly different things: that someone has to get on the phone and that Members will do it. We could say to people that training is available and that everyone has to undertake it. For example, people in the civil service have to go through training before they can interview anyone. I think it is perfectly reasonable to say to Members that they should undergo some training.
Gillian Keegan
I had this conversation with someone at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development and I asked what they do in business, and he said that there is no time limit for sexual harassment, but that they impose some kind of time limit on bullying and harassment, because cultures and expectations have changed over time. I am not suggesting that for this place, but that is what somebody at the CIPD advised, and we could examine what different industries do, because most people have already faced this issue.
Chris Bryant
The most basic thing that every serious company does is ensure that there is a proper HR function to provide support whenever it is needed. When new Members come into the House, some may have employed hundreds of people, but some may have never employed another person and may be desperate for more support. Should we not put far more energy into that if we are to prevent such problems?
Gillian Keegan
I completely agree. It is unfair to expect a simple, well understood, consistent and fair process if we have not trained people about that expectation. In business, people would be given induction training on the standards and then top-up training every year, and whether the top-up training had been done would be publicised.
Dame Laura Cox’s report runs to 155 pages and I agree with all its points. The answer, however, is perhaps simpler than the length of the report suggests. This is about prevention and cure. It is about being seen to take action. It is about each and every one of us demonstrating the correct behaviours and showing, by example, our commitment to make this great institution a modern, respectful, inclusive workplace fit for the 21st century. It is not about trying to scapegoat individuals or outsource the solution to a Committee or indulging in a trial by media. In fact, I would go so far as to say that if we tried to suggest that others are responsible for our collective failings, we will certainly demonstrate that we have not at all grasped the systemic nature of the problem we face.
Let us remember that we are all collectively responsible for this system, and we must work together to improve it. Even though, as the report is keen to point out, the vast majority of MPs are courteous and entirely respectful of staff, our reputations sink or swim together. If each and every one of us takes steps to implement Dame Laura’s report, and if we report on progress at regular intervals, we will begin the journey to better support our staff and to recover our reputation, which goes to the heart of the credibility of this place.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
I agree with nearly every word that the hon. Member for Walsall North (Eddie Hughes) just said, apart from one thing: I do not think that everybody does necessarily know what inappropriate behaviour is. He was right in what he said about women, and I completely endorse everything he said in that respect. When I first arrived here in 2001, as a gay man, I certainly faced bullying in this place. We have to be alert to the fact that we can all still learn more about the way we present ourselves and how we behave. There is not a single Member of this House who could not benefit from proper training, because the biggest driver of cultural change in any institution in the world is always education and training. That is what we need to do more of in this House.
I know that in a few moments the Leader of the House is going to mouth at me, “But we are doing it!” We are, and lots of training is available, but sometimes it is not very well advertised; sometimes people are not aware of when it would be available to them; and sometimes it is put on at a time when a Member simply would not be able to go. The hon. Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford) was absolutely right to make the point about predictability. Sometimes, we might want to go and do a training programme and we simply cannot, because suddenly something happens in the parliamentary day that makes it impossible for us to go.
Incidentally, there is something that the Speaker could help us with. When a debate under Standing Order 24 is decided the day before and is it not going to be voted on, why do we not hold that debate at the end of the day, rather than at the beginning, so that Members can have the certainty of being able to go home at the time at which they thought they would go home? That would mean that we could still have important debates such as the one we had on Yemen, but it would not necessarily make life difficult for everybody.
I completely agree with the Leader of the House about democratising the Commission. I have worked in many institutions, including the Church of England and the BBC, and I am now here—it is like a Daily Mail terrible headline, is it not?—and in all those institutions, the problem is that all too often the institution’s first reaction when there is an action or story against it is to defend itself. That has happened here in the House, for the whole House, but it is also intrinsic in the nature of the Commission, because each of the Commission’s members is appointed by their party political leader. It would be better if we elected the Commission and it started to behave more as a team, rather than just one person leading for the whole House.
One thing that I have been asked by a large number of staff, particularly women, who work here is whether we could do something about lighting in the House. When we did work on disabled access to the building for the restoration and renewal report, the thing that came up most was that the building is very dark. People cannot read their papers. There are parts of the building that feel dangerous. If we are to talk about safety, why not light the public access ways and the corridors, so that the corridors of power are not a frightening place?
Finally, many members of staff have seen what has happened in relation to this issue and despaired because they think change is never really going to be possible. Do not despair. Even in the time for which I have been here, there have been changes. Portcullis House is a far more democratic space than many of the eating places and drinking places in this part of the estate—and guess what? That is where everybody gathers. MPs, their staff and people who work for the House all gather there together. Change is definitely possible. As my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders) said, we now have an induction programme; we should have a really good induction programme. Would it not be great if every single member of the Cabinet and the shadow Cabinet and all the members of the Commission committed by the end of this week to do full training on bullying and harassment within the next 12 months?
Business of the House
Chris Bryant Excerpts(6 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Andrea Leadsom
We are all big bus fans, although, sadly, I do not think I have ever taken that bus. My right hon. Friend should certainly challenge any reduction in bus services, and I thoroughly recommend that she raises the matter directly with Ministers to see what pressures can be brought to bear on the Mayor.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
The Leader of the House knows that we produced a report on acquired brain injury recently. One of the new statistics is that about 60% of people going into prison, when they have been properly screened, have had a brain injury; many of them did not know that. In January, we are going to have a brain screening session for all Members of Parliament. I wonder whether she could make a room available so that every Member of Parliament can go through the screening that we would like to see for prisoners.
Andrea Leadsom
I know that my hon. Friend has volunteered at the event for many years, and I understand that everyone who helps out is treated to a feast of stovies or macaroni in the village hall after the display. I absolutely join him in congratulating Kenny Gunn and all the volunteers for everything that they do to make the event bigger and better every year. Fireworks night has a particular historic resonance for us in Parliament, so it is rather fitting to be talking about it at a time when we could say that the debate here has been quite explosive on a few different fronts.