Helen Jones
Main Page: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Mr Speaker
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his point of order, and also for giving me advance notice of it. He will understand that I am reluctant to be drawn into the detail of the debate, but I will say this to him. As I have already indicated, statements to the House should be both timely and accurate. Obviously, if something said to the House is misleading—that is a strict and tough test—it should be corrected; if any apology is required—I do not know whether it is—I hope that it will be forthcoming.
I did comment yesterday on the difficulties for the House of learning about detailed announcements when a Secretary of State possesses full details and the House does not. I made very clear my view that in the name both of courtesy and of effective scrutiny, if a Minister making a statement possesses a list, he or she has a duty to put that list on the Table of the House or in the Vote Office or both, at the start, not the end, of the statement.
It may also be helpful if I say to the hon. Gentleman and the House both that his point will have been heard on the Treasury Bench—I am delighted to see that the Leader of the House is present—and that there will be further opportunities to take up the matter, not least during oral questions to the Department for Education next Monday, 12 July. I have not, however, been notified of any further statement to be made on this subject today.
Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. It has been said on a number of occasions from the Treasury Bench that the previous Government made unfunded spending commitments. Labour Members have repeatedly asked Ministers to produce, if that were the case, the letter to the permanent secretary giving a ministerial direction for those things to take place. Is there any way that you, as Speaker, can ensure that a Minister comes to the House and produces that letter of direction—or, if not, that Ministers apologise for the slurs that they have placed on Members?
Mr Speaker
The hon. Lady is a very wily and experienced operator, and she knows that I could be forgiven for concluding that she is attempting to continue a debate started yesterday by the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood, the shadow Secretary of State for Education, and continued with some poise and persistence by the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker), who is still sitting on the Front Bench. In fact she may, for all I know, be engaged in a double act with the hon. Gentleman. However, she has made her point with her customary eloquence, and it is on the record.