Points of Order

Dan Jarvis Excerpts

Tuesday 20th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. In response to a recent parliamentary question on the staffing levels of the Child Poverty Unit, the Minister for Employment said:

“responsibility for child poverty policy and analysis transferred to the Department for Work and Pensions.”

Given the significance of the decision to abolish the Child Poverty Unit, may I seek your guidance, Mr Speaker, on whether it would not have been more appropriate to have made a written ministerial statement, at the very least, informing the House of that decision?

[Mr Speaker]

The means by which a Minister seeks to clarify a matter that is the subject of parliamentary interest is for that Minister. Sometimes a Minister will sense that the salience of the issue or the inquisitorial appetite of the House is such that a statement, rather than simply an answer to a written parliamentary question, might be judicious, but that is a judgment for him or her to make, not the Chair.

On the closure of the Child Poverty Unit, I note that the hon. Gentleman has a Westminster Hall debate on that matter this very afternoon. It would be surprising, to say the least, if he did not raise and ventilate fully his concern, on this and related matters, on that occasion.