Business of the House

Hilary Benn Excerpts

Thursday 24th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)]

Will the Leader of the House give us the forthcoming business?

[The Leader of the House of Commons (Sir George Young)]

The business for next week will be:

Monday 28 March—Continuation of the Budget debate.

Tuesday 29 March—Conclusion of the Budget debate.

Wednesday 30 March—Remaining stages of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill (Day 1).

Thursday 31 March—Conclusion of remaining stages of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill (Day 2).

Friday 1 April—Private Members’ Bills.

The provisional business for the week commencing 4 April will include:

Monday 4 April—Opposition Day (14th allotted day). There will be a debate on an Opposition motion, subject to be announced.

Tuesday 5 April—General debate on Britain’s contribution to humanitarian relief in Libya, followed by a general debate on matters to be raised before the forthcoming Adjournment. The latter debate has been nominated by the Backbench Business Committee.

I should also like to inform the House that the business in Westminster Hall for 31 March 2011 will be:

Thursday 31 March 2011—A debate on high-speed rail.

[Hilary Benn]

I am grateful to the Leader of the House for that reply. The House will welcome today’s statement on Libya and will look forward to being further updated.

The Welfare Reform Bill will involve a large number of regulations being presented to the House. Will the Leader of the House assure Members that they will appear in good time to allow for full parliamentary scrutiny?

The Government gave a clear undertaking that they would talk to the Opposition about their draft legislation to increase—in a terrorist emergency—the number of days for which someone can be held from 14 to 28. To date, the shadow Home Secretary has not been consulted, despite a number of requests to the Home Secretary. Will the Leader of the House encourage his colleague to respond?

On section 44 stop-and-search powers, the Home Secretary has got herself into a difficulty and has had to introduce, by way of a remedial order, the new provisions on stop and search that were due to be included in the Protection of Freedoms Bill. She has done that by means of a written statement, thereby denying the House the chance to debate and scrutinise the change before it was made. May we have an explanation of why that happened?

Given that just about everything that we heard in yesterday's Budget statement had already been leaked to the media in advance, could the Leader of the House look at a different system for next year? Perhaps the Chancellor could get up, simply say, “I refer the House to the briefing I gave the newspapers a few days ago,” add anything new and sit down. Then we could move straight on to the Leader of the Opposition and the debate. It might help some Members to stay awake.

Will the Business Secretary make a statement on the failure of the Government’s much trumpeted one in, one out policy on new regulations? For the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills—the Department meant to be leading on the policy—it has been a case of 46 regulations in since May, and no regulations out. In fact, the majority of Departments have introduced more regulations than they have removed.

It seems that the policy is being observed only by the Liberal Democrats, although in their case they are applying it not to regulations, but to their principles. One principle out—opposition to trebling tuition fees; one new principle in—helping to undermine the NHS. We also read with interest that the Liberal Democrats are planning to issue a pocket-sized card listing every one of their many achievements in government. Will the Leader of the House find time for a statement on that? After all, it would not take very long.

May we have a statement from the Health Secretary explaining why the latest polling results from Ipsos MORI on public satisfaction with the NHS have still not been published, six months after they were submitted to the Department of Health? It is reported that they show that more members of the public than ever believe that the NHS is doing a good job—not exactly the message that Ministers have been seeking to convey. This is a very curious case of Ministers trying to bury good news.

Also on the health service, we read with great interest this week that the Deputy Prime Minister has told his MPs that he will be “taking the lead” in reining in his own Government’s plans for the national health service. He is said to be determined to make changes to the Health and Social Care Bill, which is currently in Committee, and a senior party source said that he had decided to “front up” the issue with the Health Secretary.

This is quite extraordinary, and presents a bit of a parliamentary challenge for the Leader of the House. Now, the right hon. Gentleman is a reformer, so I wonder whether he would be prepared to break new ground by organising a joint statement at the Dispatch Box from the Deputy Prime Minister and the Health Secretary, so that they can slug it out under the full glare of parliamentary accountability. Or perhaps we could make use of the Procedure Committee’s welcome recommendation—published in the last hour—that we allow the use of iPhones and iPads in the Chamber in place of paper, and the two members of the Cabinet can have an online argument instead. It could probably work, as long as Vodafone kept us all connected.

Finally, on Westminster council’s infamous ban on feeding the homeless, I am sure that the Leader of the House was as pleased as I was to read last week that a Home Office spokesman had said:

“The Home Secretary has no plans to ban soup runs.”

I am delighted that the coalition—if I may describe it as such—between the right hon. Gentleman and me has forced the Government finally to make their position clear. Will he simply confirm for us today that when Westminster’s draft byelaw is put to the Department for approval, it will be treated with the contempt that it deserves and sent packing?