Business of the House

Derek Twigg Excerpts

Thursday 25th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

As I said in reply to an earlier question, the Finance and Services Committee is considering how economies can be made in the running of the House. As my hon. Friend may know, older EDMs have not been reprinted weekly since the start of the current parliamentary Session, which has saved 2.5 million sheets of paper and up to £300,000 a year in printing costs. I will pass his comments to the House of Commons Commission and the Finance and Services Committee.

[Derek Twigg (Halton) (Lab)]

May we have an urgent debate on the Government’s migration policy? In response to questions from my hon. Friends the Members for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger), and for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) and me, the Home Secretary said—I cannot do the French accent—

“Listen very carefully, I shall say this only once: we aim to reduce net migration from the hundreds of thousands to the tens of thousands by the end of this Parliament.”—[Official Report, 23 November 2010; Vol. 519, c. 183.]

A few hours later, No. 10 Downing street issued a statement saying that that was an aspiration. If I may use the language of the new Government, is it an aspiration, a target, a milestone or a horizon?

[Sir George Young]

Before she made those remarks, the Home Secretary said that she would “say this only once”, and I think that that was the right thing to do.