Participation in Debates

Chris Elmore Excerpts

Monday 16th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab)]

Embarrassing!

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

As the hon. Gentleman says from a sedentary position, that was embarrassing—I happen to agree with him on this occasion.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I am in great agreement with my hon. Friend. It is important that we keep working here, and I would encourage those who can to come in. Indeed, I would go further and say that they have a duty to come.

[Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab)]

I am sure the Leader of the House would agree that it is not appropriate, or indeed proper, for him to announce these types of changes on Twitter, so will he first apologise for that, given that, as great champion of this House, he should have made the statement here and not announced it on Twitter on Saturday? I also know that he will think that it is not appropriate to suggest in a tweet that this is a capacity issue within the House service. That simply is not correct. These things have been in place with increased capacity since May of this year, and he knows that.

On Bill Committees, I cannot believe that we are back to the same debate of April and May. The Leader of the House knows, on the record, that it is not correct to say that there was a blockage of Bill Committees. Labour Members had been put forward and there had been trials for hybrid proceedings. The official Opposition had put forward Members for either hybrid or physical Bill Committees. The Leader of the House knows that.

This is not about interventions in this House; it is about the right of Members to take part in a debate. The Leader of the House knows that it was a simple change of Standing Orders to allow that those who take part in a Back-Bench or Opposition day debate in a hybrid system would accept not having interventions while Members in the Chamber could. He knows he is not correct in what he is saying. This is deeply unfair to those Members. It is about time he acknowledged his fundamental duty as Leader of the House to represent all Members of this House to the Government.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

The hon. Gentleman stands up and says that what I am saying is something that he does not believe. At some point he made a little comment about the enormous enthusiasm with which the official Opposition are trying to help Her Majesty’s Government to get their business through. I say to him: pot and kettle.