Kashmir

Debate between John Spellar and Philip Davies

Wednesday 13th January 2021 Westminster Hall

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Luton North (Sarah Owen) on securing this debate and introducing it so well. It is very noticeably a cross-party assembly here, and we will be hearing many views from all sides. Frankly, this is not a matter of left and right; it is a matter of right and wrong.

We are not against India. It is a huge country with an incredible history and limitless potential, but that does not mean that we should not hold the Indian Government to account for their abusive behaviour, especially in Kashmir. We also reject any argument in relation to Kashmir, the Punjab or the Uyghurs in China that these are internal matters and of no concern to those outside. Human rights are actually a universal matter and universal concern. That was unambiguously established 75 years ago this week, just across the road from here, when the United Nations had its first meeting of its Assembly and its Security Council.

Britain, of course, has a special place in raising this matter, not just because of our history but because of the concern of thousands of our constituents, who are desperately worried about their families in Jammu and Kashmir. It is made even worse when communications are shut down and they have to spend weeks and sometimes months with no idea what has happened to their loved ones. Obviously, that is of deep concern to them, and that is why it should be of deep concern to us.

Can we be clear? The current crisis has been deliberately instigated by the Indian authorities with their rewriting of the long-standing constitution, which has been left by parties of different stripes in India before. That has undermined the autonomy of Kashmir. There has also been the change to property law, to try to change the facts on the ground in Kashmir, fundamentally by changing the population and therefore trying to secure a different outcome from a possible referendum.

Then, in the face of understandable opposition, there was a dramatic and brutal shutdown of communications and there were beatings of individuals, shootings—including many well attested cases of people being hit by birdshot and blinded as a consequence—arrests and disappearances, which I have to say were also an appalling feature of the crackdown in the Punjab after the assault on the Golden Temple. And many report that this is still going on.

So bad was the situation that for quite a long time Indian opposition politicians were denied the right to visit the area by the authorities. In spite of condemnation from around the world, oppression continues to this day, and we have the dangerous situation of two nuclear powers facing off and shooting against each other across the border. Clearly, not only is that a matter of concern to those in the area, but it should be of great concern to the international community as a potential threat to world peace and international order.

I hope that the Minister will acknowledge in his reply the suffering of the people of Kashmir—previous Ministers have indicated that they have raised the issues strongly with Indian Ministers—and his concern. Will he tell us what the Government intend to do to bring about peace and justice to this beautiful but troubled land, and to bring peace of mind to its people and to their families here in the United Kingdom?

[Philip Davies (in the Chair)]

It may help to say that after the next speaker, I will have to reduce the timing to four minutes.

Voter Engagement

Debate between John Spellar and Philip Davies

Thursday 5th February 2015 Westminster Hall

[Philip Davies (in the Chair)]

The hon. Gentleman has made his point, but, as I am sure he knows full well, that is not a point of order.

[Mr John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Davies. Could we not ask the House authorities to send a letter to Ministers’ diary secretaries so that they are fully aware of the times of the House and can ensure that Ministers have the right times in their diaries?

[Philip Davies (in the Chair)]

I am sure that everyone is grateful for the right hon. Gentleman’s suggestion.

[Mr Allen]

They say that what we say in Parliament does not count for anything, but those two points of order have counted for a great deal, because I see that the Minister has now arrived, and very welcome he is too.

As I was saying, large numbers of people are very much engaged in the process, but we are almost at a crisis point. We are coming to the end of a five-year Parliament, and I think we have 91 days left before the election and 72 days left before the close of registration. Therefore, if we are to encourage the millions of people out there who are not on the register to get on to it, we have 72 days.

It is relatively easy to get on to the register these days, particularly for those who are online. It can be done in a minute, even by those who are not technologically adept. I managed to help my daughter to get on the electoral register on an iPhone, but there are still the normal ways to do it through post and telephone among others. However, the figure of 72 days should be sobering for all of us. Parliament has only 38 days of involvement left. I hope that those are not 38 days to bob, weave and not do anything, but 38 days of great action from the Minister in particular to encourage people to get on the register for the important election that is coming up.

Sittings of the House (22 March)

Debate between John Spellar and Philip Davies

Wednesday 6th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hollobone]

rose—

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

rose—

[Mr Spellar]

I will give way to the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies), seeing as he has not intervened yet, and come back to the hon. Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone).

[Philip Davies]

The right hon. Gentleman prompts me with his talk about the Budget perhaps being on a Tuesday. For many years it was on a Tuesday, but it was changed to a Wednesday. That was before my time in the House, so I wonder whether he could tell me when the Budget was changed to Wednesday from Tuesday in the first place. Did it have anything to do with Tony Blair changing Prime Minister’s questions to Wednesday so that he could not be questioned about the unravelling of his Chancellor’s Budget the day after he had delivered it? Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman could help us.

[Mr Spellar]

I find it strange that the hon. Gentleman should talk about unravelling Budgets, given the experience of the last Budget—it was never fully ravelled, let alone unravelled. As I recall, he played some part in helping to unravel that Budget. We are happy and pleased that he took such a principled position. [Interruption.] Fortunately his Whip is in conversation with someone else and will not have noticed.

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, and I tried to check how far back Budgets were changed from Tuesday to Wednesday. It is some way back, although I do not know whether it was anything to do with the bank rate or whatever. It is an interesting subject; unfortunately, I did not have time to research it. However, when Budgets were on a Wednesday, with PMQs on Tuesdays and Thursdays, that would have enabled questions to be asked of the Prime Minister. It would be perfectly proper—I would have thought it would be extremely helpful for the public debate—if the Budget was on a Tuesday and then the Prime Minister answered on the Wednesday. However, that is slightly separate; we would be able to fit in that time scale. What all this shows, yet again, is an inattention to detail and organising the business of the House.

[Mr Spellar]

It is very much—this ties in with when Easter is. It would be much better not to have such substantial gaps. Given the Prime Minister’s experience of trying to answer questions about the bedroom tax and his inability to answer the questions or, even more fundamentally, show an understanding of his own legislation, that is fairly worrying.

Let me turn to the question of Fridays. I am slightly surprised by the Leader of the House’s comments—as though Friday and Wednesday were comparable in terms of the constituency pattern. Members of Parliament often establish a pattern with their local organisations—schools, charities and businesses—that ties in with having their advice bureaus on a Friday. Members will ensure that they have a full programme during the day on a Friday and, often, an advice bureau in the evening. It might be all right for Members who only have to nip up the road to St Albans if Parliament sits until 2.30 pm, but for those who have to go further afield, getting back to undertake their advice bureaus becomes a significant problem. I suspect that most Members will have publicised when and where their advice bureaus will be at least six months in advance; many will have done it a year in advance. Indeed, they will have put up posters around their constituencies to advertise them, because they had not anticipated that the Friday under discussion would be a sitting day in the Commons.

Surprisingly, the Leader of the House has said that Members can speak on other days, but that is not how things work. Usually, under a very helpful Speaker, there is a bit of flexibility with regard to Budget debates, but the reality is that particular issues are debated on particular days. Members therefore need to know when subjects in which they are interested will be the prime focus of debate.

The Leader of the House has also said that the Government do not intend to make statements, but if he does some research, he will find that statements have been made on Fridays in the past. That would make the situation even more difficult for certain Members.

[Philip Davies]

The point is that it is up to the right hon. Gentleman and other hon. Members to decide where they want to be on the Friday under discussion. If he decides that it is more important for him to turn up at the advice surgery that he has advertised six months in advance, there is nothing to prevent him from doing so, even if the proposed debate takes place. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman already does that during the House’s sitting Fridays for private Members’ Bills. He did not want to prevent the Opposition from calling for a recall of Parliament when the riots were taking place, but Members may have arranged to do other things during that summer recess.

[Mr Spellar]

I am not entirely sure that I follow the hon. Gentleman’s train of thought. He is right to say that debates on private Members’ Bills occur on Fridays, but Members know about them for a long time in advance. They can, therefore, set their constituency calendar some distance ahead and say, with assurance, “This is a non-sitting Friday, so there won’t be a Bill that’s of interest to my constituents and I can make arrangements.” That seems perfectly sensible. My point is that all of those elements were known and we find it slightly strange that, initially, the Leader of the House, at fairly short notice, tried to spring this change on the Commons. Fortunately that was spotted, so we are having a proper debate and exploring the issues.

It is becoming clearer that there are two fundamental issues, the first of which is the steady disorganisation of parliamentary business and the Order Paper. For example, there are increasing incidents of the House of Lords and the House of Commons not sitting during the same weeks. In some cases, that causes considerable discontinuity for Bills moving between the two Houses.