Business of the House

Helen Jones Excerpts

Thursday 1st November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lansley]

I fear, Mr Speaker, that I am at risk of repeating a number of times that there is an opportunity to raise issues with the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards. It is examining a very important area, and it could consider the topic my hon. Friend raises. I will also make sure that we take it into account as we look at opportunities for discussions relating to banking, perhaps as legislation on banking reform comes forward in the new year.

[Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)]

Will the Leader of the House find time for a debate on transparency in pay and taxation, because I am sure the House would like an opportunity to debate recent reports that the interim chief executive of the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority is being paid off the books through a company, thus, one assumes, saving a great deal in tax and national insurance contributions? Could we also then debate why IPSA, an organisation dedicated to transparency, refuses to publish details of these arrangements and say to its press officers that no matter how many stories they then leak, we will keep raising this issue?

[Mr Lansley]

I remind the hon. Lady that we will—not immediately, but at a future date—have an opportunity to discuss the appointments of further lay members to IPSA, which might enable her to raise such issues. On the specific point about the temporary chief executive, I should point out that it was very much a temporary appointment, with a contract for a short period of time, and those are precisely the circumstances in which, as is the case in business life, one would tend to have a special contracting procedure.