Business of the House

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Monday 2nd November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

The testing capacity is now at 480,000, 9.6 million people have been tested at least once, and 30.5 million virus tests have been carried out, which is more than in any other European country. I saw my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care lurking behind the Speaker’s Chair, and I think he deserves a great deal of credit for the enormous amount of hard work he has done to get up to those 30.5 million tests. That is not to pretend there is not more to be done—there is, but what has been done so far is absolutely remarkable, from a standing start.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

I think the expression of sheer despair from my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) in response to that answer has just demonstrated that we can see people’s reactions on screen.

The Leader of the House is waxing lyrical about how important it is for us to be here and fully play our role as representatives—I am asking my third question of the day, and I am more than happy to do that—but he cannot say that on the one hand and then allow only 90 minutes for the regulations to be debated on Wednesday. Surely at least half that time will be taken up by the Front Benchers. That means that there will be very little time and very few Back Benchers will be able to speak up on behalf of their constituents. That is just not right.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

We are having a debate immediately after this session, we have had two hours from the Prime Minister, and we had a debate on the Thursday before the House rose. Therefore, a great deal of time has been made available out of the scarce resource that time is within this House for debating the coronavirus, and our Standing Orders provide for 90 minutes under an Act.