Investigatory Powers Bill

Debate between Edward Leigh and John Hayes

Report: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Monday 6th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I understand that example, but it can be taken to extremes. Every day of the week the Speaker makes decisions. He decides how we conduct our business and who should be called, and we could always argue that we should not give the Speaker more powers because he might make a mistake or be called to account. We are not talking about the Speaker being involved in whether we should pass a particular Bill or controversy; we are talking about a very narrow circumstance in which the Government of the day have decided to intercept the communications of a Member of Parliament. All I am suggesting is that before they take that step, they consult the Speaker.

[Mr John Hayes]

There are few Members of this House whom I hold in higher regard than I do my hon. Friend, but like it or not, his proposal would draw the Speaker into issues of national security. He is describing highly sensitive matters of a kind that Speakers have not historically been involved in. It would be a radical change.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

The Minister makes that point, but as Members of Parliament we should try to think outside the political box and our natural loyalties, and just for a moment think about what might happen in future in a time of crisis. Do we really want to codify the Wilson doctrine in legislation, and say that in future any Government—it does not matter that the Prime Minister ticks a box, because he is also a member of the Government—without any independent second guessing, can intercept those communications and act on them? I understand the Minister’s arguments and assure him that I am not trying to drag the Speaker into politics. I am trying only to protect the traditional privileges of the House. “Privileges” is the wrong word, because it conveys the impression that we are concerned about ourselves. We are not important in all this. What is important is people’s confidence in communicating with their Member of Parliament.

Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Debate between Edward Leigh and John Hayes

Thursday 17th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Compared with the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), I am a mere callow youth in the House, having sat through only 35 Budgets, I think, and spoken in most of them. I sometimes feel I am constantly repeating the same theme, but generally in this place, unless one stays with a personal theme and keeps repeating it, one will probably not get anywhere.

Over those 35 Budgets, I have argued constantly for tax simplification. For instance, the cut in corporation tax is no doubt greatly welcomed by our larger companies, which have been the biggest cheerleaders for our remaining in the UK, but whatever they save from these modest cuts in corporation tax has been clawed back in other parts of the Budget. Unless we can achieve tax simplification and move gradually towards a flatter tax system, instead of having one of the longest tax codes in the developed world—as long as India’s—we will never make progress on tax avoidance.

[The Minister for Security (Mr John Hayes)]

My hon. Friend’s consistency and sagacity are well established in the House, and I take his point about tax simplification, but would he not agree that the best form of simplification is to take people out of the higher tax band and out of tax altogether? Is that not the ultimate simplification and precisely what the Chancellor has done—once again—in this Budget?

[Sir Edward Leigh]

Yes, of course I acknowledge that, and I congratulate the Chancellor, the Government and my right hon. Friend the Minister on creating an economy in which more people are in work than ever before and more people are being taken out of tax than ever before. We are returning to the historical position of actually making work pay for people at the bottom of the heap. Helping people at the bottom of the heap and taking them out of tax is what the Government should be doing. So everything he says is absolutely right.

If I make a few suggestions or criticisms in the few minutes allowed to me, I do not want it to take away from the Government’s achievement in their macroeconomic management of the economy, and nor do I want to resile from my criticism of Labour Members, who must learn from history and become a credible Opposition. It is not good enough for the shadow Chancellor to come to the House today and refuse to answer any questions about his borrowing plans. There is no point just repeating a generalised mantra about borrowing to invest. It is fair enough to say that—it is the old golden rule of Gordon Brown, and we know how that was broken—but one must be prepared to provide concrete facts and figures. Would the shadow Chancellor borrow more than the present Government?

I repeat, however, that I am in favour of a much-simplified, flatter tax system, and in that context, I recognise that the Chancellor is at last—I have been campaigning for this for years—indexing the higher 40p tax band.