Business of the House

Ian Mearns Excerpts

Thursday 3rd February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for highlighting the success of Harlow Council. It is amazing what good Conservative councils can do: we look at Westminster and Wandsworth, which for decades have been able to keep the council tax down when other socialist councils have kept on putting it up. Harlow should be held in light, not least for having my right hon. Friend to represent it, which he does with such distinction and panache. It is important to recognise that local council spending is the responsibility of local councils, and good, well-run councils—Conservative councils—are able to save taxpayers money.

[Ian Mearns (Gateshead) (Lab)]

I thank the Leader of the House for the business statement and for announcing the Backbench Business debates for next week. I understand there will be some time for the House to spend considering remaining departmental estimates—I believe it will be in early March—so hon. Members will need to be preparing to make applications to the Backbench Business Committee for time in those debating slots on the return from the February recess. I also remind the Leader of the House that we have date-specific applications on the stocks already, for Welsh affairs and St David’s Day for the first week in March, and for International Women’s Day for the second week in March.

Could we have a statement on the increasing use of off-road motorcycles for criminal purposes? We have a scourge of that in my own constituency; unfortunately the local constabulary, Northumbria Police, having been hit by severe cost cutting, does not have any equivalent motorcycles with which to apprehend those individuals. Can we have a statement from the Home Secretary about what can be done by constabularies around the country to cut down on that menace?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I am grateful, as always, to the hon. Gentleman. I have done quite well so far this Session in providing him with the debates he has asked for when he has given me long notice; I cannot promise to be able to do the same, but I always try, if possible, to make time available for the time-sensitive debates. Off-road motorcycling, which has been raised by others in this House, is clearly a problem, but the police must set their own policing priorities. The Government have provided the funding for, I think, an extra 11,000 police officers so far, with a target of 20,000 over the course of the Parliament. I encourage him to put further pressure on his local police force to enforce the law as it is. I do not think it is really for the Government to set policing priorities from the Dispatch Box.