Gareth Johnson
Main Page: Gareth Johnson (Conservative - Dartford)Department Debates - View all Gareth Johnson's debates with the Leader of the House
(6 years, 4 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
Each Urgent Question requires a Government Minister to give a response on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Andrea Leadsom
I was delighted to take part in the debate to which the hon. Lady refers. It was a very good debate. As I recall, there were about 10 or 11 contributors, but those contributions did not necessarily look at some of the broader issues around, for example, the unintended consequences of one person on parental leave deciding to take a pair and another to proxy vote, thereby potentially leading to misunderstanding among constituents. Such issues would be very personal to the individual. It is important that the House discusses these matters and draws a conclusion with the benefit of a proper debate.
Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con)
My understanding is that a number of agreed pairings in place for yesterday’s Divisions were adhered to completely. Would the Leader of the House agree that, regardless of whether we end up with a form of proxy voting, we should not allow one error to cloud our judgment of the effectiveness of the pairing system, no matter how regrettable that error may have been?
Andrea Leadsom
My hon. Friend is quite right. We have had about 2,000 pairs in this Parliament. Some have been broken, owing to administrative errors, but nevertheless it remains a good means by which Members can take either urgent or unexpected absences and not have their votes just omitted from the overall Division result.