Business of the House

Debate between Greg Knight and Thomas Docherty

Wednesday 14th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Thomas Docherty]

I can assure the Deputy Leader of the House that the Chairman of the Procedure Committee would not respond favourably to such a suggestion, such is his independence of thought. However, why have the Government made it clear to my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham East (Chris Leslie) that they do not believe it appropriate to pause slightly, so that the Committee can carry out a public, transparent and short inquiry in the new year? Perhaps the Deputy Leader of the House’s diary is so busy in the new year that he cannot do that.

The Government seem to be assuming that we will prorogue in the spring, and I look to the Treasury Bench for some clarity on that. My understanding is that all their Bills are currently jammed up in the House of Lords and there is absolutely no sign of their making any substantive progress on clearing the backlog. That is why, with the greatest of respect, we are having a series of Opposition debates and one-line Whips—because the Government have no business in the House of Commons.

[Mr Knight]

I remind the hon. Gentleman and ask him to reflect on the fact that not one single member of the Procedure Committee, including the Labour members, asked for any sessions on this issue to be held in public. I say to him seriously that if, having put to the House that this is a technical alteration to accommodate the Government’s wish to change when the House prorogues, the Government were to use this as a lever or mechanism to reduce the House’s scrutiny of its business, there would be one hell of a row which many Government Members as well as Opposition Members would join, saying that the Government had misled the House and would have to retract what they were doing. The hon. Gentleman’s fears do not therefore amount to very much, because the Committee has proceeded with this measure on the basis on which it was introduced to the House today: that it is a technical change. If it became something else, there would be one hell of a—