Business of the House

Jeff Smith Excerpts

Thursday 25th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Jeff Smith (Manchester, Withington) (Lab)]

Last night, we saw once again unsafe bottlenecks in the corridors and behind your Chair, Mr Speaker, as Members queued to vote and then queued to leave after voting. Of course, we had a perfectly good remote voting system that had been developed and refined and was working well until the Leader of the House insisted on abandoning it. Can he tell us the cost of developing that system and the total cost of the various iterations of voting systems that have been developed in recent weeks? If he does not have the figure to hand—I would not necessarily expect him to—I am happy for him to write to me.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

That is a matter for the House of Commons Commission. However, the hon. Gentleman should be proud to be back. It is wonderful that this House is back and doing its duty in getting legislation through, and that people are here and we are operating as a proper Parliament, not going for country walks while voting on serious matters affecting the lives of the British people. We should be really proud that we are back.