Privileges Committee Special Report

Debate between Desmond Swayne and Karen Bradley

Monday 10th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley (Staffordshire Moorlands) (Con)]

I rise to speak in my capacity as Chair of the Procedure Committee. I have to start by apologising to my Clerk, who wrote a detailed technical note about the procedures involved in this motion. All the technical points that my Clerk made have been made already, so I will not detain the House with them, but I thank her for the work she did.

Instead, I will make some general points about what we do in this place and how I hope we might be able to start behaving in a slightly different way. I will start by referring to the point about Committees. We cannot cover every issue on the Floor of this House, and that is why we depute Members to serve on Committees, whether Select Committees, House Committees such as the Procedure Committee, or Bill Committees. We ask those Members to spend their time—they do take up significant amounts of their time—scrutinising legislation and looking at issues that have been raised with them.

The members of the Standards and Privileges Committees have the most difficult jobs of effectively having to police the behaviour of their own colleagues. They have personal reasons often for not wishing to be part of that, but they do it because this House has asked them to do it. We should always remember that point: they are serving because the House has asked them to serve; they are not serving through choice, and they are doing a difficult job. I will come on to the point that the hon. Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle) made about policing ourselves, because there is a real danger if we do not take this matter seriously.

When it comes to Select Committees that report, there is absolutely nothing to stop any Member from criticising a report once it has been published. In fact, Governments usually criticise such reports substantially in their responses. Select Committees expect their reports to be scrutinised and examined, and they expect criticism of them—that is the very nature of our parliamentary debate and democracy. Nobody is saying that, once a report has been published, Members cannot criticise it. The important point is that there are ways in which we can interact with Committees while they are doing their work. Those are set out clearly in the report.

[Sir Desmond Swayne]

The substantive part of the motion, paragraph (b)—that the Committee should have the same protection as the Standards Committee—is uncontroversial. What has become clear is that the way in which Members feel they have been impugned without a say, which makes paragraph (a) of the motion controversial. It might be best if the Leader of the House were to withdraw the motion and re-table it with just paragraph (b). We might then avoid the argument and Division that we are going to have.

[Karen Bradley]

I served with my right hon. Friend in the Whips Office and have enormous respect for him. The Committee proposed the motion. We asked the Committee to do its work, and it proposed the motion. There is nothing unparliamentary about what it has put forward and there is nothing that is not procedurally accurate in what it has done. I for one will back my colleagues, because I would ask them to back me on a motion about a report that I had put forward as a Select Committee Chair, and I would hope that they would do so.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Desmond Swayne and Karen Bradley

Wednesday 3rd July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

I agree wholeheartedly. I had the honour of visiting Portrush and Royal Portrush last week, and saw the beaches at their best in the sunshine. Mr Speaker, you will be delighted to know that the Open starts after Wimbledon finishes, so I hope that you will be able to enjoy it.

[Sir Desmond Swayne]

And city deals, surely?

Northern Ireland Assembly Members (Pay) Bill

Debate between Desmond Swayne and Karen Bradley

2nd reading: House of Commons & 3rd reading: House of Commons
Wednesday 21st March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

At Question Time, we had a question about the transparency of donations and I am pleased that the House has passed the order to start to increase such transparency. I know that the hon. Gentleman is keen to see further work on that, but I ask that we should see how the order works first. If more needs to be done, we will need to look at that.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

I am surprised but delighted when, during election campaigns, I continue to receive a salary, notwithstanding the fact that the House has been dissolved. What is the difference in principle between us receiving salaries when Parliament has been dissolved and Members of the Assembly receiving salaries when there is no Assembly? I do not mean to be difficult, but I would not want us to set an unhelpful and unwelcome precedent.

[Karen Bradley]

My right hon. Friend always asks helpful questions; he is not known for doing anything other. We are looking to have the power in this House to vary the salaries of Members who serve in the Northern Ireland Assembly—MLAs—in response to the fact that there has been no functioning Assembly for 14 months and the clear public concern about people receiving salaries when the Assembly is not sitting. He is correct, of course, that Members of Parliament receive a salary for the period in which an election runs, but I believe that the rules are different for the period when Parliament is dissolved as opposed to when it is sitting. I understand his concerns, but I assure him that this relates specifically to MLAs’ pay, not MPs’ pay.

BBC

Debate between Desmond Swayne and Karen Bradley

Thursday 15th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

Will the Secretary of State ensure that no decisions are taken about the monitoring service at Caversham Park before important Select Committee inquiries are held next month? And can I just say that I do not share this unhealthy obsession with what other people earn? I was always told that it was rude to ask.

[Karen Bradley]

I will write to my right hon. Friend on that matter.

Digital Economy Bill

Debate between Desmond Swayne and Karen Bradley

Tuesday 13th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Karen Bradley)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

We live in a digital economy. Almost £600 billion of online sales were made in the UK in 2014. That is the largest per capita online sales figure in the world, of all the major economies, at just over £1,500 per head. To put that figure in context, it is more than 50% higher than that of the United States, which is the next highest valued market. The rate of job creation in digital industries is nearly three times as fast as in the rest of the economy; it was 1.56 million in 2014, and it is growing. Supporting the digital economy was core to our manifesto, and that is why this Bill is a central plank of the Government’s legislative programme in this Session. The Government are working tirelessly to help people and businesses to benefit from digital.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

On that point about benefit, is the purpose of part 5 to claim rights of ownership over all data? The definition of benefit in clause 29 is so broad that I cannot think of a piece of information that would elude it. Can the Secretary of State name a piece of information that falls without that clause?

[Karen Bradley]

I think my right hon. Friend has just made a bid to serve on the Bill Committee. He has clearly taken a great interest in the Bill—although, as a former Whip, I wonder whether that much interest qualifies anybody to be anywhere near a Bill Committee. I assure him that that is not the function of the Bill or the intention behind it. I am sure that my right hon. Friend will be able to explore that question further during our line-by-line scrutiny in Committee.

To return to digital, our £1.7 billion roll-out plan means that 95% of all homes and businesses will have access to superfast speeds by 2017. We have one of the fastest 4G roll-outs in Europe, and 98% of premises will have indoor 4G coverage by the end of 2017.