Exiting the EU: Sectoral Impact Assessments

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 1st November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Walker]

I do not think that I have personally ever made that contention. We need to ensure that businesses have the best outcome from this whole process. With that in mind, it is important to note that this analysis is closely tied to our negotiating position. There is therefore a significant chance that it would be detrimental to our interests in negotiation to publish all the analysis in full, as the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras acknowledged.

[Mr Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I notice that a right hon. Gentleman is reading all your documents over your shoulder. Is it in order for somebody to read the advice that you are getting? He is doing it right now. I think that is rather out of order.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I am extremely grateful for the protection of the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith). It is quite in order and normal for a Member to approach the Chair. It is not normal for anyone to read my papers while I am on my feet.

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[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving me time. I must say it would not matter whether “Erskine May” was written in black and white, or green and yellow, or purple and orange. The fact is that the rules on privilege are not a matter that can be decided immediately without consideration of all of the circumstances. I am not going to make a ruling here and now about the way in which the Minister and his colleagues should interpret what is happening in the House today.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Further to that point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. “Erskine May” is quite clear. The reference to the Canadian position was in the event that the Government chose to ignore what the House had said and called for. The Government have made it clear already, in the Minister’s opening remarks, that they have not chosen to ignore this particular outcome, whatever that outcome is. That is clear. The word “ignore” is very clear. It means to disregard and to refuse to reflect on. The Government have made it clear that they will not ignore it and therefore this tautological debate should now end.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I am grateful to the right hon. Member for his point of order. The difference of opinion between him, the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) and the right hon. Member for Broxtowe (Anna Soubry), whom I can hear making further points on my right, simply proves the point that I have made to the House, which is that privilege is not a black and white matter. Privilege and the way in which it is interpreted is a matter that takes some consideration, and I reiterate that I will not make any ruling from the Chair which has an effect right now on this Minister in this Chamber. But I am now making a ruling that this is a short debate, that there are many matters to be discussed, and that I have a long list of names of people who wish to participate in this debate, and I will take no further tautological points of order. I want to hear what the Minister has to say, and I suspect that everyone else wants to hear what the Minister has to say.

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[Mr Speaker]

The Leader of the House said what she did in response to representations that were made by Members on both sides of the House in the specific context of earlier Opposition day debates, the motions for which were not binding. I hope the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, but the Leader of the House, in a perfectly procedurally legitimate fashion, about which people can have different political opinions, offered to the House an indication of the intended Government handling of situations of the kind that occurred in recent weeks. Today’s debate was on a different type of motion, and therefore I would go so far as to say that I think it wrong to conflate tonight’s motion, with the instruction that it contains, with the Leader of the House’s response to a different set of circumstances a week or so ago. The situations are different and the response offered then should not necessarily be thought to apply to the situation now.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I quite enjoy voting in this place, but it was our determination not to do so. As I was listening to the debate—you were not in your Chair at the time, but a deputy of yours was—I thought the Government responded to this point and said that they would not choose to ignore this binding motion. Some of these points of order seem to be asking whether or not this House of Commons is in fact a court of law, which it is not. Any Government, in choosing not to vote against a motion, therefore accedes to the idea that it is bound by the process and will respond in due course. Given that basis and the earlier response, I must say, Mr Speaker, that I think your earlier pronouncement was an end to the matter, as far as I can see, because it is quite clear that the Government have to respond.

[Mr Speaker]

Well, I am very grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. The Government do have to respond. He is quite right that I was not in the Chair, though of course the Chair is seamless—there was a distinguished occupant of the Chair at the time—and I have received advice on what took place when I was not in the Chair. I think, from an earlier point of order, there was some exchange about what constituted, and what did not constitute, ignoring a motion. Suffice it to say that enough has been said tonight. Points of order have been raised. I think that I have given a clear indication of what the general practice has been and what I would do if I were approached in writing, and it is right and proper, as the right hon. Gentleman implies, that we leave it there for tonight.