European Council

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Monday 10th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I think that my right hon. Friend is right. All these events should always cause us to look again at our strategy and at the decisions we have made. I think that they emphasise the importance of standing by our NATO allies and strengthening NATO. They also emphasise the importance of dealing with new threats, such as cyber. Obviously we will take all those things into account in the next strategic defence review.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

Since the Prime Minister has become an expert on promising referendums on the EU, then postponing them, and then promising another, what right has he to tell Putin that he cannot have one in Crimea?

[The Prime Minister]

I think that I answered that question pretty comprehensively in response to my right hon. Friend the Father of the House. Of course, any country that wants to can hold a referendum under its constitution—that is what constitutions are able to deliver—but it has to be fair and legal. It is quite clear—everybody agrees, except the Russians—that this referendum is illegitimate, illegal and will not be recognised by the international community.

House of Lords Reform (No. 2) Bill

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Friday 28th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. My preference is for amendment 3, as it would ensure that people retired from Parliament when they were coming to the end of their working career. It is wrong for people to use membership of the House of Lords as a point on their CV. It is not an internship that people do for a little while to get a bit of work experience before taking on another job. It is such an exciting and great honour to have—why would these people wish to give it up? I recall that when Disraeli went to the House of Lords, he said that he was not dead

“but in the Elysian fields.”

Who, having entered the Elysian fields, wants to come back down to earth? It seems extraordinary in the first place that anyone would want to leave those glorious red Benches and the gilt around the throne—the magnificence that the House of Lords shows to the world—and trot out into the humdrum life in front of them. [Interruption.] My hon. Friend the Member for North Warwickshire (Dan Byles) asks whether this is a job application. I am by no means grand enough to enter their lordships’ House. I like representing the British people—vox populi, vox Dei—through this illustrious Chamber rather than in their lordships’ noble House. Given the question of why anybody would want to leave, they ought to live up to the commitment they have made. Ten years seems reasonable; I would have been happy with 15 or 20 years.

Moreover, crucially, when Ministers go into the House of Lords they may want to be there only while they are in ministerial office. That is not a proper way of treating the constitution. Ministers who go into the House of Lords ought to stay there for an extended period to show a commitment to the legislature, not just to being appointees of the Executive who are here today, gone tomorrow. These amendments are important and would improve the Bill. Had we been debating them in a Committee of the whole House, it is likely that some of these changes would have been made.

Amendment 4 is about the witnessing of the peer’s statement that he wishes to retire or resign. The statement may be witnessed by anybody, but I think that it should be witnessed by two people, both of whom must be peers of the same degree. Is that because I think that lots of fraudulent certificates will be issued by random people wandering around signing things and pretending to be witnesses to statements that peers have not made? No, I do not think that, but these resignations are essentially proceedings in Parliament, and they should be a formal parliamentary proceeding registered by people who are also Members of Parliament. This would be a safeguard to ensure that somebody did not resign in a light moment and then regret it, or have the statement signed in their office and send it in having been pushed into doing it by offers of who knows what—perhaps an offer of becoming a European commissioner or something grand and fancy such as that, although I know that there is a special way for such people to stay in the House of Lords with a formal leave of absence. We should ensure that the grave and important decision to leave the upper Chamber is made properly and thoughtfully and that there is a formal process by which to register that decision.

That ties in with amendment 6, which says:

“after the date specified in 2(a) above”.

The problem with reading out amendments without reading out the relevant part of the Bill is that they sound rather obscure, so it may be sensible to explain. The Bill says that if somebody signs a form resigning from the House of Lords, that notice is irrevocable from the point at which it has been signed, even if it is a long-post-dated cheque. So if a peer entered the House of Lords and said that he intended to resign in eight years’ time, the document would be irrevocable, even though all sorts of things may change. That person would then be ineligible to be a peer again in future. I think that that is a mistake. There should be an ability to withdraw the notice prior to its becoming effective; otherwise, appointments to the House of Lords are opened up to abuse.

I have heard former Leaders of the House of Lords—noble Lords themselves—talk about what happens when people ask for peerages. It may shock you, Mr Speaker, that people ask for peerages. I would have thought it was an enormous impertinence for anybody to say to the Prime Minister or to the Leader of the House of Lords that they would like a peerage, but people do. Apparently, they knock on their doors to ask to be given a peerage; they queue up outside their offices as though they were waiting for an omnibus. When they do so—I really have heard Leaders of the House of Lords make speeches along these lines—they say anything that the people dishing the peerage out may wish to hear. They say, “I’ll always vote with the Government line, I’ll never disobey, I’ll do what I’m told”, and so on and so forth.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

Why don’t you name a couple?

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

Sadly, I have heard Leaders of the House of Lords talk only in general terms—they have not named names—so the hon. Gentleman cannot lead me down that route, and if I did I might be out of order because saying anything critical of a noble peer is against the forms of this House, and neither would I wish to do so.

There is the risk that peers, before they are appointed—therefore, of course, they are not yet peers—are in the position of asking for something that they want that is in the Government’s gift, and the Government want to have some leverage over them to ensure that they behave in the way the Government want when they are appointed. One of the glories of the House of Lords is that once people are there, they are independent because they are there for life. That preserves them from the terrors of the Whips. We in this House live in daily terror of the fierce power the Whips have whereby they may do all sorts of extraordinary things to us with any amount of instruments of torture that are maintained in the bowels of the Palace of Westminster, but in their lordships’ House those instruments are ineffective—they have rusted away because the peers are there for life. That is a great protection for them. If somebody could give a post-dated cheque—if someone could say, “I will leave the House a few years after going in”—that protection would begin to ebb away. But if they had the power to rescind the notice, whatever they said at the point at which they were grubbing round for the peerage, they would be able to withdraw it, and the independence of being a peer for life would be maintained.

This flexibility ought to be added to the Bill because it would allow peers to maintain that which is the essence of the success of our revising Chamber. What makes the House of Lords successful, and different from this House, is that because peers are not standing for re-election and do not need to be readopted by their parties, and because very few of them are Ministers, there are many fewer baubles that may be offered to them to maintain party discipline.

Party discipline is very important. It is important that a Government are able to get their business through, but party discipline in a revising Chamber is unhelpful, because instead of doing its job of revising it tends simply to go along with what is asked of it by the party managers. That is damaging both ways: it is damaging if Governments do it, because it means that they are not necessarily putting through Bills that have had the wisdom and benefit of the proper revising process, and it is equally bad when Oppositions do it simply to oppose what the Government are doing. We have seen that on a number of occasions in the House of Lords when, out of party loyalty, rather than according to the argument, the will of the House of Commons has been thwarted.

Oral Answers to Questions

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Tuesday 7th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I strongly agree. I think the fundamental insight from Lord Heseltine was one that we have ignored at our peril as a country for far too long: we have relied on a culture of government that has always assumed that Whitehall knows best. Whitehall does not always know best—I have certainly learned that after four years in Whitehall. The more we can allow local business leaders and local politicians to come up with locally innovative solutions, the better for our country in the long run.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

When the Deputy Prime Minister kicked off this session, he said he supported the Government’s policies. I have to tell him, looking around the Chamber, that I do not think the leading Members of the Tory party are supporting him. They have not turned up. Three Tories have not even asked their questions. The only one who has been here all the time, the Chief Whip, is not a proper member of the Cabinet. Why can the Deputy Prime Minister not read the signs? The Government are disintegrating before our eyes. Why does he not do the decent thing and pack it in and let us have an early election?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I might ask: where is the hon. Gentleman’s deputy leader? I ask him to stop insulting the Chief Whip, who I consider to be a fully fledged member—[Interruption.] Stop denigrating the Government Chief Whip—very unfair on him indeed. Far from this Government disintegrating, we have continued steadfastly to clear up the mess left by the party of the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr Skinner), to fill the black hole in our public finances, to give tax cuts to millions of people on low and middle incomes, to introduce the pupil premium, to increase apprenticeships on a scale never seen before, and finally to put this country economically back on the straight and narrow.

G20

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Monday 9th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful for my right hon. Friend’s question. He is absolutely right. One of the important aims of the G20 is to maintain clear rules for the success of the global economy. Nothing is more important on that front than maintaining free trade. The G20 has had a prohibition year after year on further protectionist measures, and this time we managed to push that from 2014 out to 2016. The next G20 chair will be Australia. I am sure the House will want to welcome the election of Tony Abbott, and I am sure Prime Minister Abbott will want to lead the charge for free trade.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

Is it not a bit premature to be talking about the real recovery? Does the Prime Minister not realise that that is insulting to those 4 million people who do not have a full-time job, all those people on zero-hour contracts, and those people without money who are borrowing from Wonga, which is lending more money than many of his beloved banks? This Government would not recognise the truth if it was sprayed on their collective eyeballs.

[The Prime Minister]

I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman cannot welcome the 1.3 million extra private sector jobs, the fact that almost a million more people are in work, and the record number of small businesses. If he is so against zero-hour contracts, he might want to have a word with all the Labour councils that currently provide them.

Oral Answers to Questions

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Wednesday 19th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. It is very good news that this free trade agreement has been launched at Lough Erne in Northern Ireland. It will now take many months of very difficult and patient negotiation. It is a hugely complicated problem, because we want it to cover all sorts of areas, such as public procurement and services, and not just manufactured goods, but it is good that it is getting going, because this could mean millions of jobs right across Europe and great benefits for us here in the UK.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

On the subject of giving money back, which the Prime Minister has just referred to in respect of the Labour party, will he now explain to the House why when he had a windfall he decided to write down his mortgage at Notting Hill instead of writing down the mortgage on the one that he was claiming for from the expenses allowance in the House of Commons?

[The Prime Minister]

I think that what the hon. Gentleman needs to do is concentrate on the massive problem on his Front Bench. Every week until they pay the money back, they will get a question about the £700,000 that they owe to the British taxpayer.

Bilderberg Conference

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Monday 10th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Hon. Members]

Have you been there, Dennis?

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

I wouldn’t be seen dead with them.

How come when all those media moguls, the bankers and politicians have been meeting together since 1954, not one of them was able to spot the recession coming—or maybe they caused it?

[Mr Clarke]

We have had trade unions there sometimes, and there are plenty of social democrats. I do not think anybody as left wing as the hon. Gentleman has ever attended, but if I scratch my memory I will probably remember somebody. Obviously, the hon. Gentleman forecast with absolute precision the collapse of capitalism in 2007. In that respect, I agree that his foresight was rather better than that of most pundits. We continue to meet, in the hope that next time we will see it coming with slightly more clarity.

EU Council and Woolwich

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Monday 3rd June 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

How best to ensure a Syria that can protect minorities is an important issue. I would challenge the idea that Assad, in taking on those in the opposition, has shown any respect for people’s religion or ethnicity. His bombs, planes and apparent use of chemical weapons have been quite indiscriminate, so I do not accept the idea that somehow minorities will be better off in Syria under an Assad regime. I do not believe they will be. What we should be doing is supporting a Syria that will look after minorities, and that is what the official Syrian opposition is committed to doing.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

Is not the Prime Minister aware that he is playing with fire when he talks about lifting the arms embargo and supplying weapons? Does he not understand history at all? The Americans a few decades ago thought they knew who the real enemy was, and they ended up arming Osama bin Laden and they paid a heavy price. What mechanism will the Prime Minister use to ensure that the weapons do not fall into the hands of the al-Qaeda supporters among the Syrian opposition?

[The Prime Minister]

I would make two points to the hon. Gentleman. First, even with the arms embargo in place, arms have been getting to extremist elements of the opposition, and we are more likely to stop that happening by being engaged rather than disengaged. If he wants to go through the history lessons, what about the history lesson of Bosnia? In this House—he was a Member of the House at the time—it was endlessly said that we must not intervene, must not help those who are being slaughtered by Milosevic and must not take any action; to arm them would create a level killing field, we were endlessly told. It was only when the Americans stepped in and helped the Bosnians that we were able to have a peace conference that brought about the peace that that country now enjoys.

Speaker’s Statement

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Monday 15th April 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I am extremely grateful to the right hon. Gentleman.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

Further to that point of order—

[Mr Speaker]

No, I am not taking further points of order at this stage. We have an urgent question and a statement, and there will no doubt be other points of order.

Royal Charter on Press Conduct

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Monday 18th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Nick Clegg)]

I am delighted to support this motion and welcome the royal charter.

The last time the three party leaders addressed the House on this issue it was because we could not agree; this time, thankfully, it is because we have. I would like to thank your office, Mr Speaker, and the Clerks of the House for accommodating today’s unusual procedure. I am also delighted to see that all sides are claiming victory today. If everyone acts like this after the general election, they will have trouble fitting us all into Downing street.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

It won’t be you.

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

The hon. Gentleman is always on cue, even at the most solemn moments.

When Lord Justice Leveson published his recommendations, the Liberal Democrats supported them. I agreed with his basic model of a new, independent, self-regulatory body for the press, with the new recognition body authorised to check periodically that the system is working properly. Given the importance of the relationships between politicians, the public and the press, I said at the outset that we should not become fixated on the means of change, but stay focused on the end we all seek: an independent press watchdog in which people can place their trust. My party has been clear from the outset that the worst outcome of all would be for nothing to happen—a very real possibility at points.

Oral Answers to Questions

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Wednesday 6th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

I think that there is a different story. I visited the office of Fairplay in Derbyshire the other Friday and met the people there who look after, for instance, disabled teenagers. I have also visited various other voluntary organisations. Their story is that they are being cut left, right and centre, and are having a job making ends meet. When will the Government support the voluntary workers who are trying to rescue those people, and to help all kinds of individuals? This really has reached a chronic stage. Get something done!

[Mr Hurd]

We are doing a great deal. I totally accept what the hon. Gentleman says: there is a lot of pressure on charities in all our constituencies. We all know that there is less money around, but I would like to hear a little more honesty and recognition from the Opposition Benches as to why the cuts in public expenditure are necessary. They are the direct result of the fiscal incontinence of the hon. Gentleman’s party’s Government.