Business of the House

John Cryer Excerpts

Thursday 12th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

There will be a general debate on covid on 18 November, when my right hon. Friend will have the opportunity to raise these points. I cannot pre-empt the decisions that will be made prior to 2 December, but everybody hopes that our liberties will not be destroyed. Nobody wanted to take them away, but as the right hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) pointed out, 50,000 people have died with covid. It is a very serious problem, and difficult decisions needed to be made.

[John Cryer (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab)]

The Leader of the House, as well as every other Member of this House, will be acutely aware of the 3 million excluded people who have fallen between all the Government covid schemes. Many of them are facing, and have faced for the past few months, destitution and poverty. We had a debate about two or three months ago on the 3 million excluded. Would it be possible to have another debate, but this time in Government time, on those people who are facing such gut-wrenching problems?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

We all have great sympathy for those people who have been excluded. We all have constituents in that situation, and it is important to raise their cases. Inevitably, even though £200 billion of taxpayers’ money has been spent, as the Chancellor set out, it is not possible to save every job that is in existence at the moment or was in existence at the beginning of March, but enormous efforts have been made. As regards a debate, the Government have set out a lot of Government time for debating covid. That is an opportunity to raise the subject in the round, and that obviously includes the people who are excluded.