House of Commons Financial Plan and Draft Estimates

David Linden Excerpts

Tuesday 11th December 2018 Westminster Hall

[David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure, as ever, to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Howarth.

I suspect that members of the Finance Committee will be wondering, “Who on earth is this guy? He isn’t the hon. Member for Airdrie and Shotts”. I bring the apologies of my hon. Friend the Member for Airdrie and Shotts (Neil Gray), who had hoped to be here but has had to remain in Scotland due to family illness. I am sure that I speak on behalf of all of us here in Westminster when I wish him well.

When I spoke to my hon. Friend last night, he said he was grateful to me for taking on this speaking commitment about “one of the driest Committees in the House”, but I have to say that having sat through the debate, I have often found myself saying, “Be still my beating heart”. I sit on the Procedure Committee, so this is positively exciting—I might speak to my chief Whip to see whether I can get a swap. In all honesty, I am grateful to the Finance Committee for its report, which was very illuminating at 1 o’clock this morning when I read it. I will touch on that in a moment.

The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) is absolutely right about the need to be diligent about how we spend taxpayers’ money, and that the scrutiny of the process in the past has been less than satisfactory. Wearing my Procedure Committee hat, I know that there are issues with how Committees are set up—particularly after general elections, when the scrutiny is not there. The public look to us, as Members of Parliament, to lead that scrutiny. It takes several months at a time to get Committees up and running, and that is a very different context from that of the Finance Committee. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for putting that on the record.

The hon. Gentleman was also absolutely right to pay tribute to the Clerks and the House staff, who do a magnificent job—I know he intended to do that, although it came towards the end of his speech. I certainly felt that yesterday, when watching the chief Clerk chairing what was a very volatile day. We really do get our money’s worth out of those guys. The hon. Gentleman was right to place that on the record.

I shall sum up the contributions. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) spoke about security and the importance of looking after our staff, not just in our constituency offices but here in the Palace—the staff here are the real heroes of the House. He went on to speak about restoration and renewal, which I will touch on, and he said that perhaps some of the issues could be solved if we withheld our payment from Europe. I am not necessarily sure he will find agreement from me on that.

I was not aware that the hon. Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) had been on the Committee since 2005. If my heart is beating very fast from just one debate, goodness knows what that amount of time serving on the Committee does for the soul. The hon. Gentleman spoke about the importance of learning from past mistakes, and had some fairly sage advice in regard to Portcullis House.

That brings me nicely to my own contributions to the debate. I have looked at the front page of the report and seen the draft estimates, or the financial plan to 2022-23. As a Scottish National party Member of Parliament, I make no apology for not intending to be here in 2023. That is not because I plan to lose my seat; it is because the hon. Member for Ochil and South Perthshire (Luke Graham) and I will be surplus to requirements, because Scotland will be an independent country and we will not need Members of Parliament down here. Perhaps that would be a good way of saving money.

The Minister is in her place; I have a standing engagement with her on Wednesday mornings, as the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Afzal Khan) is trying valiantly to bring through a Bill that would stop the Government from reducing the number of Members from 650 to 600. It is interesting that the report talks about increased scrutiny throughout, whereas the Government are trying to reduce that scrutiny. Page 10 talks about what is probably the biggest elephant in the room: the decision to leave the European Union—well, it is not an elephant in the room, because we are all talking about it. We can clearly see that the implementation of that decision has an impact on the budgets in the report.

There are certain things for which the Scottish National party would clearly support increased budgets, some of which I have touched on, including security and perhaps the independent grievance process. However, I am accountable to my constituents back home, and I find myself talking to them about this place and the eye-watering sums being committed to restoration and renewal. The hon. Member for Rhondda spoke about building a replica Chamber; the fact that we are building a Chamber that looks exactly the same as the current one when that Chamber is so unfit for purpose sends a clear signal to ordinary members of the public.

We are recreating Division Lobbies that we can troop through. People regularly come to this place on tours, and I explain to them how we conduct our votes, walking through corridors—I mean, what an absolute waste of time! It is great that we have invested in the education centre, but the ironic thing is that when the children there cast their votes, they do so using an electronic keypad. How much time is wasted by the fact that we have Clerks sitting in the House for numerous votes as we walk around and around?

[Chris Bryant]

I sympathise with some of the arguments that the hon. Gentleman is making, particularly because at the moment, as I understand it, one in 10 Division lists is wrong. The new system is more difficult to use than the old paper system, although I am not arguing in favour of going back to the paper system. I like us gathering in the Lobbies, as it means we have an opportunity to see Ministers and all the rest, but by now we should be able to use our thumbs or our fingerprints to vote in the Division Lobbies, as we do for our phones, and still be counted through by the Tellers.

[David Linden]

I have a huge admiration for the hon. Gentleman. He is one of the great custodians of the traditions of this House, and there is a place for respecting those. He has spoken about being in the Lobbies with Ministers as a great thing, but I can think of probably only one occasion when I have been in a Lobby with Ministers. As an Opposition MP, it makes not a jot of difference to me, because I am seldom in a Lobby with a Government Minister.

We have to think about how we are spending money. There has been some chat about the new fire doors that have been put in place; I managed to provoke a degree of ridicule—based on my part, largely—a couple of months ago when I had an interaction with the Chair of the Administration Committee, the hon. Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford), who could not understand what I was saying. The point I was making was about disability access in this place.

We have just spent what was presumably a lot of money on upstanding fire alarms. I gather that the reason for that is the wiring in this place, but now a person cannot turn a corner in the main Palace because of these obstructive upstanding fire alarms. In one respect, we send strong signals about this place being fine for somebody with a disability, yet because we are trying to adhere to the customs of this place we have those ridiculous, massive alarms, which I suspect came at great cost.

I was speaking about restoration and renewal. I make no apology for the fact that I would be quite happy to see us decanted to a sports centre in Milton Keynes, although I know that, for some people, being on the banks of the Thames and in the big House of Commons is a status symbol.

[Luke Graham (Ochil and South Perthshire) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman is talking about decanting to a sports centre in Milton Keynes. Would he be happy with decanting the Scottish Parliament to a sports centre in Glasgow or Perth? Of course, the construction of that building went 10 times over its planned budget. Rather than disrespecting the Parliament of our country—which it still is, unless the hon. Gentleman gets his way—he should focus on scrutiny, to make sure money is spent in the right way so that this Parliament is the most accessible Parliament for all the peoples of the United Kingdom.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Linden]

I am very happy to stick to your guidance, Mr Howarth, and will not take any gratification from having managed to provoke a PPS into speaking from the Back Benches. The reality is that I would be happy for us to meet in Glasgow, Edinburgh or Liverpool. The hon. Member for Ochil and South Perthshire is fond of saying that this is the United Kingdom Parliament, but it seems to me that we are very London-centric, and some of these cost issues arise because we are so determined to be in the absolute centre of London.

I have already mentioned security issues; the hon. Member for Rhondda touched on some concerns, and I would echo some of them. There is clearly a focus on making sure that our security is very strong. I probably feel most secure when I am here in the Palace of Westminster; I feel a lot less secure when I am sitting in Baillieston library—that is not necessarily concern for my security, but for that of the staff who are with me. I am very happy to endorse the security budget.

I did not intend to speak for nine or 10 minutes, but it is possible to go down a rabbit warren on this subject, and it does get quite interesting. I will close by saying that at a time when austerity is not over, and our constituents are struggling with austerity, we need to be mindful about the decisions we make. As a fairly new Member of this House, I am not always convinced that we get value for money. Nevertheless, in all sincerity, I pay tribute to the Finance Committee for carrying out a job that I am sure can be very dry, but is none the less very important.