Points of Order

Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Shaun Bailey (West Bromwich West) (Con)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I get what time of year it is, and we all know the game, but sticking to the courtesies of this place outside the Chamber is important. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Preet Kaur Gill) has appeared in my patch twice over the last two days, without giving me any notice. I made her aware yesterday of my intention to raise this point of order. She has not even deigned to respond to that in any way, shape or form, and I forwarded that notification to your office this morning. Mr Speaker, I anticipate what your response will probably be, and I appreciate that, but for the courtesy of Members of the House, will you restate the expectation of Members when they attend other constituencies in their capacity as Members of Parliament? We are a very welcoming place, but we want to make sure that everyone plays by the rules.

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving notice of his point of order. The booklet “Rules of behaviour and courtesies in the House of Commons” makes clear that Members should make “all reasonable efforts” to notify colleagues if they intend to visit constituencies, except on purely private visits. I have said that time and again to Members across the House. I know it is fever time at the moment, but please, they should show the respect that each Member is due by letting them know when a visit is taking place.

[Dawn Butler (Brent Central) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. My right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Sir Stephen Timms) asked the Prime Minister to correct the record as he misled the House last week—[Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. We do not say that. He unintentionally or inadvertently misled it.

[Dawn Butler]

Okay, he inadvertently or unintentionally misled the House last week. Unfortunately, the Prime Minister has inadvertently misled the House this week when he claimed that the former Tory Prime Minister built more houses than the current Labour Mayor. Official statistics are not open to interpretation. Last year, the number of new homes in London was up 22% compared with the Tory Mayor’s final year. More than 23,000 new City Hall-funded council homes have been started since 2018, with more than 10,000 in the last year alone. Latest figures show that London started more than double the number of council homes last year than the whole of the rest of England, and Sadiq, the Labour Mayor of London, has delivered more than 10 times the number of the previous Tory Mayor—[Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Please, I think I have got the message and I need to reply—[Interruption.] No, let me reply; it might be helpful to us all. I am grateful to the hon. Member for giving notice of her point of order. She will know that the Chair is not responsible for a Minister’s answers. If an error has been made, it should be corrected—I make that very clear. It is not for the Speaker to determine whether an error has been made, but the hon. Member has, quite rightly, given us a fruitful line that has ensured that the point has been made correctly. I will therefore move on to the next point of order.

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Forgive my eagerness as I have never done this before, but today at Prime Minister’s questions I believe the Prime Minister inadvertently and unintentionally misled the House on the question of disadvantaged children in Scotland going to universities. The figures he used are simply the UCAS applications directly from school, but in Scotland, as I well know as a former further education lecturer, most disadvantaged children and adults go through the college route, whereby they can do a higher national certificate or higher national diploma, moving to first, second or third year of a university course, or join an access to higher education course at any time.

[Mr Speaker]

It is exactly as I said to the hon. Member for Brent Central (Dawn Butler). I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving notice of her point of order, but I am not the one who makes such a determination. I say again that if an error has been made, I expect it to be corrected. The point is certainly now on the record.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. During Prime Minister’s questions, the Prime Minister used a figure for crime that did not include fraud, even though that is the fastest-increasing crime and has been one of the most prevalent and damaging crimes. He has been repeatedly challenged on this but again used the figure without fraud, and he did so on the day on which he is supposedly launching a fraud strategy. Does that not show that the Government’s fraud strategy is actually a total fraud and a con? Do you think that the Prime Minister will be ready to correct the record?

[Mr Speaker]

I think that I have already answered that, but actually we have got a Minister who is itching to respond.

[The Minister for Security (Tom Tugendhat)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. Thank you very much for allowing me to correct the record. The fact is, we were not counting fraud in 2010 when we took over the Government, so it is difficult to draw comparisons from before. What we have seen since, though, is a record number of police officers who are solving crimes. We have seen car crime down 22% since 2019, and neighbourhood crime and community crime down 50%. This is a success for the Government.

[Mr Speaker]

What I would say is, if research is going to take place, we ought to try to get the figures out correctly in the first place. Let us come to a more sedate moment and the ten-minute rule Bill.