Business of the House

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Thursday 1st May 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lansley]

I understand what my hon. Friend is saying, and he is quite right. The Prime Minister has made it abundantly clear that, by establishing the work of the new flooding Cabinet Committee, he is ensuring that there is strategic ministerial oversight of policy on flood recovery and long-term resilience, which is exactly the point that my hon. Friend makes. As those lessons are learned and exercises come together, Ministers who are overseeing the matter will, I am sure, take an opportunity to update the House as soon as possible.

[Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

A month ago, the Business Secretary told me that links between donations to the Conservative party and profits made from the sale of Royal Mail shares were nothing to do with him. Now that we know there are links, may we have an urgent debate on propriety in politics? In a week in which my constituents have seen a Member resign over propriety issues, it is clear that these matters go right to the heart of belief in British politics.

[Mr Lansley]

The hon. Gentleman is simply wrong; there are no such links. I was involved in this area more than 20 years ago, and we made it absolutely clear that in the Conservative party, donations never buy influence over policy. I wish it were the same in the Labour party, but it is not. Last year, Len McCluskey gave the Labour party £1.2 million and said that the time had come to have a policy for rent controls. What did we get—a policy on rent controls.