Oral Answers to Questions

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Wednesday 29th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

Further to the Prime Minister’s answer to my right hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband) on the Leveson inquiry, he is of course absolutely right that we need a free press, but the nation will not thank him if he goes along with the suggestion made by Tory peer Lord Hunt, chairman of the Press Complaints Commission, that the Defamation Bill, which is coming forward in September, should be used to legislate for a new system. That would pre-empt the Leveson inquiry. Will the Prime Minister make it clear that he will not do that?

[The Prime Minister]

I am glad that the hon. Lady asked that question, because I have absolutely no intention of pre-empting the Leveson inquiry in any way at all. I think that if we look back to the debate we had in this House, we will see that both the leader of the Labour party and I said how important it was to trust Leveson to get on with the job and to give every signal that we want to be able to adopt what is proposed without there being regulatory arbitrage between the parties. I think that there is an understanding on that basis but, given that there is that understanding, I repeat again that it is important that hon. Members on both sides stress the importance of a free press to the health of our democracy.