Health
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 3 months ago)
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The Lord Commissioner of Her Majesty's Treasury (Angela Watkinson)
May I start by saying that I appreciate the waiving of my customary Whiply silence, albeit temporarily, to enable me to participate in this debate?
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) for raising the important issue of the loneliness and isolation that can affect older people. I welcome the good work done by Independent Age, Age UK Oxfordshire, Counsel and Care, and the WRVS on the campaign to end loneliness. We are living longer, healthier lives. We should celebrate that, and seek to unlock the rich potential of our older population, as well as promoting their well-being.
We recognise the terrible impact that isolation and loneliness can have on people’s health and well-being. We know that multi-professional collaboration from a health and social care perspective on the needs of older people—including recognising isolation and those at risk from it—will make a huge contribution to keeping older people well and independent in their own homes, and to helping to maintain a decent quality of life for them. Of course, combating loneliness and isolation cannot be the job of health and care services alone. A range of services must be involved, including transport, housing and leisure.
We recently concluded the caring for our future engagement exercise, and we will produce a White Paper and a progress report on funding. That is planned for spring 2012. The engagement exercise considered six areas: quality and work force; personalisation and choice; shaping local care services; prevention and early intervention: integration; and the role of financial services. Throughout this engagement exercise we heard from a wide range of organisations, carers and people who use services, and the issue of loneliness and isolation among older people was raised.
Under the provisions of the Health and Social Care Bill currently before Parliament, local health and wellbeing boards will take responsibility for producing the joint strategic needs assessment and a local health and well-being strategy. I pay tribute to the London borough of Havering; it has shown great commitment in setting up its health and wellbeing board and it has already made significant arrangements for taking on this important new role. I also applaud the good work done by Age Action Alliance, an independent alliance of organisations working together to improve the lives of older people. It is aiming to prevent deprivation in later life, as well as challenging age discrimination and seeking to make older people feel valued and able to contribute to their local communities and the wider society. We look forward to the ideas that will emerge from that alliance.
We are doing everything we can, and we also support the efforts of others, to ensure that older people have access to all the help they need to reduce social isolation. I hope that that reassures my hon. Friend.
The hon. Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Alison Seabeck) made a thoughtful contribution about the understanding, patience and sympathy people with hearing loss need but do not always receive. She described the limitations on everyday activities such as using the telephone, and the absence of subtitles on television, which greatly disadvantage those with hearing loss. I shall refer those matters to the relevant Minister. We hope to improve the quality of life of people with hearing loss.
My hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire (Pauline Latham) raised concerns about two constituents who were unable to receive specific cancer drugs under their NHS treatment from the East Midlands strategic health authority. She has made her feelings very clear. The health authority will have heard her and will wish to respond with some urgency; and the Secretary of State will, I am sure, expect that to happen.
I thank the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) for his question and his continued support for diabetes prevention and improving outcomes for people with diabetes. We pay particular tribute to his work through Silver Star, a charity he founded in Leicestershire that is invaluable in tackling diabetes within south Asian communities. As president of the Havering branch of Diabetes UK, I should like to take this opportunity to pay tribute to the late Sue Braeger, who sadly died recently. As chairman of the Havering branch, Sue was a formidable campaigner on diabetes issues, especially the management of diabetes medication for pupils in schools. She will be a hard act to follow.
We have learned this year—in the last few months, in fact—that nearly 3 million people in the United Kingdom have diabetes, a number that grows year on year. Worse, 24,000 people each year die unnecessarily from the disease—deaths that could have been prevented with better management and care. Much progress has been made in diabetes care since the publication of the national service framework in 2001, but prevention and early diagnosis remain a Government priority.
Next year, the National Audit Office and the NHS leadership team will be reviewing progress and considering whether there is need for further work, co-ordinated at a national level. Any such work would of course seek to reinforce and support activity led by clinicians at local level to improve outcomes for people living with diabetes.
We will also depend on the NHS health check programme, which has the potential to prevent many cases of type 2 diabetes and identify thousands more cases earlier. We will be continuing the change for life campaign, which raises awareness of the importance of maintaining a healthy weight and being physically active. As type 2 diabetes is linked to both obesity and inactivity, these public health initiatives are crucial.
For people diagnosed with diabetes, our priorities for treatment and care are to improve quality of life and reduce complications, and as a result to reduce cost. People with diabetes account for 15% of in-patient hospital beds in England. Their hospital treatment costs £600 million a year more than that for patients admitted without diabetes. Poor management of diabetes and insulin leads to emergency admissions and readmissions, and increased lengths of hospital stay. Poor care can also lead to deaths and permanent disability, with an estimated 80% of the 73 lower-limb amputations suffered each week by people with diabetes considered preventable.
The NAO will be reporting next summer on its study of the management of diabetes services. We expect it to provide robust recommendations on improving services and outcomes for patients and the public, and we look forward to seeing the results.
My hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston) raised the important issue of the role of community hospitals and leagues of friends. I should like to assure her that the Government are committed to helping the NHS work better by extending best practice on improving discharge from acute hospitals, and increasing access to care and treatment in the community. Community hospitals can be an important part of delivering this, especially in rural areas, providing both planned and unplanned acute care and diagnostic services closer to home. Community hospitals support best practice in admission avoidance and provide a range of services, from treating minor injuries to intensive rehabilitation. Subject to the passage of the Health and Social Care Bill through Parliament, clinical commissioning groups will be responsible for securing the best health care and health outcomes for their patients and locality.
The Department announced on 4 August that NHS trusts and NHS foundation trusts will also be given the chance to acquire estate from primary care trusts, including the community hospital estate. PCTs have reviewed and provisionally agreed lists of property for transfer to NHS bodies, and those will shortly be approved by the Department of Health. It is expected that the actual transfers of estate will commence in 2012. I know that this is a concern of my hon. Friend, but it is not expected that these changes will affect the role or function of local league of friends’ volunteers, who provide such valuable and important services in community hospitals around the country
The Government are also committed to increasing the scope of a more transparent rules-based funding system, where money follows the patient. Since its introduction, the payment by results national tariff has been mainly restricted to treatments provided in acute hospitals. We want to change that, but in a way that supports the delivery of high-quality services. That will not be easy, as there are significant challenges for us to overcome, such as making sure that activity that takes place in community settings is recorded and reported, as this is essential to plan services and drive payments, but we are making good progress. From April 2012, we will introduce the first ever tariffs for post-discharge care, with transparent prices to give more certainty about funding. I hope that that sets my hon. Friend’s mind at rest.
Finally, may I take this opportunity, Mr Deputy Speaker, to wish everybody the season’s greetings?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Absolutely, and I am sure that it is warmly welcomed with Christmas and the new year upon us.
May I say that we have reduced the time limit to five minutes as we come to the general debate?
Royal Bank of Scotland (FSA Report)
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 3 months ago)
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Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
We have quite a few Members to get in, so please could we have brief questions and answers?
Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con)
The shadow Minister said that the regulation did not work and the regulator did not do anything sufficiently. Surely the reason for that was because the regulator was put under sustained and unacceptable political pressure by two former Prime Ministers and by the current shadow Chancellor. Will my hon. Friend confirm to the House that this Government, and the Treasury under the stewardship of this Chancellor, would not put such pressure on regulators and that the constitutional convention as to how a Government should work with regulators will be properly observed?
The Economy
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 4 months ago)
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Matthew Hancock (West Suffolk) (Con)
Youth unemployment in my constituency is falling because of a work experience programme that has now been rolled out across the country. I say that to preclude the shadow Chancellor’s rebuttal. He has just argued in response to my hon. Friend the Member for Bedford (Richard Fuller) that private sector debt is a good thing. Will he have the balls to say that explicitly?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. I am not quite sure we are going to allow “balls”. I am sure you can think of a better word, Mr Hancock.
Matthew Hancock
I withdraw it. Will the shadow Chancellor have the weight to state explicitly what he has just argued, which is that private sector debt is a good thing?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. I just remind Members that there is a six-minute limit on speeches.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
A few Members have risen, but I must remind colleagues that if any of them wish to catch my eye, it might help if they stand up. I call Mr Edward Leigh.
Fuel Prices
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 4 months ago)
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Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
I have to tell the House that no amendments have been selected.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. We are not meant to be waving around the Chamber, Mr Carmichael. I am sure that you have already caught Mr Halfon’s eye.
Tessa Munt (Wells) (LD)
I should like to add my comments to those of my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron). I want particularly to draw attention to the fact that young people in my constituency, which is very rural, are limited in their choice of education because there are no bus services to speak of, and they are sorely tested in trying to get to their schools and colleges if they choose to use a school outside their area. This was highlighted even more by the fact that they brought transport—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. This is far too long an intervention. We want to get through a lot of Members who wish to speak. Some people are trying to intervene who wanted to catch my eye early on, and I will put them further down the list if that carries on. I want to get as many people in as possible.
Robert Halfon
I understand and agree with the sentiments expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Wells (Tessa Munt). I am grateful to her for supporting the motion and for backing me at the Backbench Business Committee.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. I remind the House that there is a four-minute limit on speeches. Members should restrict the amount of time that they use wherever possible. Brevity will be helpful in this debate.
Mr Dave Watts (St Helens North) (Lab)
I am sorry that my amendment was not selected by Mr Speaker, because I believe that the motion is wishy-washy. I will explain the reasons for that later. My amendment went into some of the details that need to be addressed to help hard-working families.
Like many Members, about four or five weeks ago I started to receive letters from constituents on this issue, mainly prompted by the FairFuelUK campaign. At the time I wrote back to my constituents to tell them that I could not support the campaign because it called for tax cuts without saying how they would be paid for. I have little time for campaigns by the Daily Mail, the Daily Express, FairFuelUK or the TaxPayers Alliance, which are extreme right-wing organisations that promote tax cuts at the expense of public services.
However, I have now changed my mind after speaking to some of my constituents. There is no doubt in my mind that high fuel prices are having a tremendous impact on many low-paid and middle-paid families in my constituency. It is clear that the Government have no idea about the impact that high fuel prices are having on many constituents around the country. It is also clear that they have no understanding of the impact that wage freezes, high inflation, tax increases and high unemployment are having on the general public and the economy. Many of my constituents will have no pay increase for two years. Prices go up in the shops virtually every week. Heating and petrol prices are a particular problem for many of my constituents, and many of them are struggling to stay afloat.
The second reason I support the campaign is the decision by the Liberal Democrats and the Tories to raise VAT to 20%, which has had a massive impact on the cost of living and on my community. It has made the situation worse. We have now had a flatlining economy for 18 months and unemployment is at a 17-year high. Those who believe that the motion will address those issues are sadly mistaken. What we need is a complete review of economic policy in this country, taking on board something like the Labour plan for jobs and growth. Unlike Labour, the Government parties have no policies for growth. Labour’s policies of providing 100,000 jobs for young people, bringing forward investment in major projects and schools, a temporary reversal of the VAT rise—
Mr Watts
I am sticking to them, because the people promoting the motion believe that it will address their constituents’ problems. We have heard many Members talking about the impact that high fuel prices are having on their constituencies. I know that to be the case, but it is only part of the problem that people face on a daily basis. We need a review. At the last election the Tories promised to cut fuel costs and to stabilise them in the immediate future and the long term.
Many families depend on cars to get themselves to work and to deliver their children to school—
European Budgets 2014 to 2020
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 4 months ago)
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Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Many Members still wish to speak, so I ask Members to be as brief as possible.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. There are three speakers and eight minutes.
Summer Adjournment
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 8 months ago)
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Natascha Engel (North East Derbyshire) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered matters to be raised before the forthcoming adjournment.
Thank you for calling me, Mr Deputy Speaker; I thought that this moment would never arrive. A total of 66 Members want to participate in the debate, including our newest Member—my hon. Friend the Member for Inverclyde (Mr McKenzie)—who is hoping to make his maiden speech. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] It is unfortunate therefore that two Government statements, important though they both were, have taken almost two hours out of Back Benchers’ time. To set an example of brevity and to prepare us for all the constituency carnivals and fairs at which we will be spending most of our time during the recess, I hereby declare the debate open.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
We are now coming to a maiden speech, and I remind hon. Members not to intervene on it.
Business, innovation and skills
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. Time is pressing, so I am introducing a four-minute limit.
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)
Let me first pay tribute to the hon. Member for Inverclyde (Mr McKenzie) and commend him on his maiden speech. It was good to hear from a Member who, like me, was born in the constituency that he represents. Given his description of his constituency’s stunning natural beauty, it clearly has similarities with Cleethorpes.
I will be as brief as possible, Mr Deputy Speaker. The economy of northern Lincolnshire could be described as “stuttering” at the moment. It has taken many knocks, but it has the potential of a new dawn from the renewables sector. Despite its name, Cleethorpes is a highly industrialised constituency, containing Immingham docks and much of the Humber bank. Associated British Ports operates the Grimsby-Immingham docks complex, which is the largest in the country. However, expansion and regeneration are being held back by transport infrastructure that is in urgent need of improvement.
The northernmost town in my constituency is Barton-upon-Humber, which is just 20 minutes’ drive from the centre of Hull, but Humber bridge tolls are a tax on jobs. The free movement of labour is restricted. It is totally unrealistic to expect someone in Barton to accept a job in Hull paying the minimum wage, and even more unrealistic to expect people to take part-time work.
The hopes of all local people are resting on the current Treasury-led review, which is due to report in November. The business community and local people are encouraged by the work of the review team, and by Ministers’ determination to deliver a sustainable solution that may well be based on a social enterprise model. It is essential to have lower tolls in the relatively near future; we do not want promises that may never materialise.
In the East Halton and Killingholme area of my constituency sits the site of the proposed south Humber gateway development—in which Able UK Ltd has invested £100 million—alongside the largest undeveloped deep-water channel in the UK. It is thought that £1.5 billion of private sector development may follow, much of it in the renewable sector. That would offer an opportunity to develop a cluster for the sector, involving the construction of wind turbines. The ports of Immingham and Grimsby are ideally located for the service and supply of offshore wind farms—and offshore is where we want them to be, rather than in the countryside.
A major problem with the gateway development is the bottleneck in the planning process. It has been caused by a number of Government agencies, notably Natural England. Such agencies, including the Environment Agency, must appreciate that planning issues are commercial issues, and that they must move at the same speed as the demands of investors and developers. The current leisurely pace is not acceptable.
Northern Lincolnshire has taken a bit of a body blow in recent times, with the announcement of 1,200 job losses. Many of those jobs were done by my constituents at the Tata Steel works in Scunthorpe. It is encouraging that the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills will be visiting the steelworks tomorrow. It is also encouraging that the Prime Minister has taken an interest, and we eagerly await a meeting with him. I hope, however, that Ministers will be able to give us some confidence that not only the Secretary of State and the Prime Minister, but the Government as a whole, will support the local infrastructure. The highways, particularly the A160 route to Immingham, urgently need an upgrade, and it is desperately important for that to be included in the first phase of the next building programme. I hope that the Minister will be able to assure me that he will press our case with transport Ministers at the earliest opportunity.
The area is building itself up for the renewables sector. There are great training prospects at the Grimsby institute, Lincoln university and other institutions—
Sovereign Grant Bill (Allocation of Time)
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 8 months ago)
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Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. I just need your guidance as I have a particular general point that I wanted to make. It pertains to clause 13 but I would normally have made it on Second Reading. Will you immediately call me to order if I seek to raise it?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
I think we will need to listen to what the hon. Gentleman has to say.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
The stand part debate on clause 1 will be quite broad.
Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)
May I raise an issue in support of the points that many people have made about the role of the monarchy outside the well-known ceremonial role—the crucial role of Head of State? This matter gets little or no attention. The Conservative historian, Robert Rhodes James, a former colleague of ours, gave a lecture in Cambridge, which was largely ignored, about a time when the role of the monarchy might have been absolutely crucial in our history. It was at the time when the skids were under Margaret Thatcher and everyone wanted her to go and tearful members of the Cabinet were coming to No. 10 Downing Street asking her to go. Robert Rhodes James, who was a very distinguished and respected Member of the House at that time, said that the Conservative party suddenly became terrified because there was a possibility that Mrs Thatcher might call a general election and she could not have been stopped by the Conservative party, the Cabinet or the House of Commons.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. We are talking about the allocation of time. I know that history is part of time but I am not sure it is relevant to the Bill.
Paul Flynn
This point is crucial to why we need extra time. This issue is virtually unknown, but it is important because the only person who could then have stopped Margaret Thatcher from acting in her own interests rather than in the national interests, as she might well have been elected, was the Queen. This is a question about the personality of the monarch, because the strong personality of the monarch might have been vital then. This matter is so important that we should have a greater allocation of time and a full debate.
Sovereign Grant Bill
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 8 months ago)
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The Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
The Committee will have seen from the provisional selection list that I have selected a number of manuscript amendments tabled by the Minister this morning. I would not as a rule select such manuscript amendments without good reason. I can see no reason why they were not tabled in the proper time, but in the unusual circumstances of the Bill, I am prepared to select them.
Clause 1
The Sovereign Grant
Paul Flynn
I do not think it is fair to blame the monarch for the way in which the measures were rushed into the House. Normally, if there is a change to business, a business statement is made to the House as early as possible; I cannot remember one being made at all in this case. Most hon. Members had other pressing business on that day, and only those who were here in the morning had any idea that the measures were going ahead.
The Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. I have sympathy for the hon. Gentleman, but we have just decided on the process that we are following; we now have to stick with where we are.
Mr Osborne
All I would say is that I have followed the advice of the House authorities throughout. The procedure has been unusual. People have said that this is the most important change since 1760, but of course in the early 1970s the House made some significant changes, so we are partly following procedures laid down then.
Let me get on to the substance of the Bill. Everyone has now had a chance to read it. Amendments have been tabled by Opposition Back Benchers, Opposition Front Benchers, and Government Front Benchers, and I shall say something about that. We have basically accepted some of the amendments that the shadow Chancellor and his team tabled, and I will explain why later.
I will begin, as we should do on such occasions, by putting on the record the House’s gratitude for the service that the Queen has provided to our country over many decades. Indeed, her time on the throne recently exceeded that of George III and she now has Queen Victoria in her sights. The recent visit by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to Canada and California reminded us that other members of the royal family also make an enormous contribution. As I said a couple of weeks ago—it is a view shared by nearly everyone in the House—we want a system that provides the Queen with dignity and allows her and her family to do their official jobs, which in her case is Head of State, but to do so in a way that is accountable, transparent and delivers value for money for the taxpayer.
The current system of financial support has some very serious shortcomings. It is very inflexible, so money saved in one spending area such as travel cannot be spent in another area such as the maintenance of royal palaces. It is not very transparent, as the National Audit Office is not the auditor of royal finances; that is done by the permanent secretary to the Treasury. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Mr Leigh), the former Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, for the work it did in recent years to look at value for money studies on particular areas of royal financing, which has been quite opaque and which this Bill seeks to change. Critically, the current system has relied on a reserve of public money that was built up over the past 20 years and is now depleted. That was a crucial part of the royal household’s annual funding for the continuance of their official duties. That money has run out, so in other words the system is broken and we have to fix it.
Finance (No. 3) Bill
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 9 months ago)
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Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 14, page 1, line 9, at end insert—
‘(3) A report on the impact of the current rates of income tax on inequality in the United Kingdom, also taking into consideration all other direct and indirect taxes including duties and excises, council taxes and mandatory charges for the use of cars and televisions and making specific reference to the overall tax rate of taxpayers grouped by decile in the United Kingdom and by each individual constituent country shall be prepared by HM Treasury and laid before the House of Commons not later than 1 December 2011.’.
Amendment 30, page 1, line 9, at end insert—
‘(3) All public sector employees whose earned income does not exceed £21,000 shall be entitled to a £250 reduction in tax liability for the tax year 2011-12.’.
Mr Hanson
I do not intend to detain the House for long on these amendments, although they are important. I particularly welcome amendment 30, which stands in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mr Field), and which I will touch on briefly. Clause 1 deals with rates of taxation and, if approved, will set the rates for the next financial year at 20%, 40% and a special rate of 50%. Amendment 10, which is simple and straightforward, has been tabled by the shadow Treasury team because we want to shed a little light on how the Government will report on their future plans for the 50% rate of tax.
We already know certain key facts. We know that the Chancellor has asked HMRC to collect tax receipts for this financial year and that he has assessed the revenue levels of the 50% rate for this year. In Committee, the Exchequer Secretary said:
“The Chancellor’s Budget statement to the House on 23 March simply highlighted the fact that he has asked Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, as part of that ongoing work, to see how much the additional rate actually raises. HMRC will look at all the available evidence about the impact of the 50% rate, including data from the 2010-11 self-assessment returns, which will become available next year.”––[Official Report, Finance (No. 3) Public Bill Committee, 10 May 2011; c. 22.]
My concern, which I will put directly on the table, is that the Government have already prejudiced any decision on the 50p rate of tax by stating clearly that they believe it will do lasting damage to the economy. We want further explanation of the methodology that they will use to consider the 50p tax rate for future Budgets, and I think that the best organisation to do that is the Office for Budget Responsibility. The Government set up the OBR and gave it a number of key roles, one of which I have helpfully drawn from its own website. Under the heading “What we do”, it states:
“We scrutinise the Treasury’s costing of Budget measures: During the run-up to Budgets and other policy statements, we subject the Government’s draft costings of tax and spending measures to detailed challenge and scrutiny.”
All the amendment would do is formally recognise that role in relation to the Government’s forthcoming review of the 50p additional rate.
The Chancellor has said to the House of Commons, the public and anyone who will listen that he sees this as a “temporary measure” and that it will do “lasting damage” to the economy. He has signalled that he will abolish the 50p rate as soon as he can, in line with Conservative thinking before the election. However, the timing remains uncertain. I believe that the Chancellor has pre-empted the review. When HMRC undertakes the review, it will do so on the assumption that at some time around 2013 the Chancellor of the Exchequer will abolish the rate on incomes above £150,000.
Civil List
Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts(14 years, 9 months ago)
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Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. The right hon. Gentleman is in danger of straying into—
Mr Deputy Speaker
No, I will finish. Individual names are being attached to what is being said, and that is not what we should be doing. This is a general debate on the civil list, and we should not refer to individual members of the royal family or to individual amounts spent.
Mr Deputy Speaker
Order. I will go on to the next speaker if the right hon. Gentleman does not accept it.
Mr MacShane
I said that I accept your ruling fully, Mr Deputy Speaker, and I will not say another word, save that—[Laughter.] If it is in order, Mr Deputy Speaker, I should like to say that it is not right for this debate to take place in the Daily Mail, The Daily Telegraph and The Independent but not on the Floor of the House. That is all.
Mr Deputy Speaker
Order. There are clear rules for this House that we have to abide by. The right hon. Gentleman might not like it, but that is the case.
Mr MacShane
I actually believe that a plane should be made available for the use of senior Government Ministers, including the PM. He had to scrounge a lift from Prague to Brussels with the Czech President the other day. He got something out of it, but frankly, every senior Minister in most democracies has that mode of transport available to them. Our planes are continually available to any member of the royal family, while elected Ministers come second.
We then have the problem of explaining why the present monarch and the next one are such giant landowners. Is that an issue that we might be able to debate, Mr Deputy Speaker?
Of course we all enjoyed the royal wedding celebration this year and we will enjoy the diamond jubilee next year. Roman emperors promised their subjects panem et circenses: the current Government are doing their best to reduce the quota of panem with their cuts and cruelties imposed on the poor and handicapped, but they are increasing the availability of circenses through the royal shows.
I do not believe that there is any kind of republican mood in the country. It was interesting to hear the oleaginous loyalty, if I may put it that way, expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn), who had a tremendous enthusiasm for the monarchy, which has surprised many of us. I remember the silver jubilee in Rotherham in 1978, when I am told that 41,000 Union Jack flags were sold in the socialist republic of South Yorkshire.
If we look at the European Union, we see that the states that are monarchies—Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands and even, with all its troubles, Spain—enjoy less partisan and less conflictual politics. When it comes to growth, distribution and a fair social settlement since the second world war, we find that the EU’s monarchies generally have a much better record than the EU’s republics. The royal families, however, are also much cheaper there. In Spain, with its King, Queen and wonderful royal palace where I had the privilege and honour of having dinner with the Crown Prince of the Asturias and the lovely Princess—and Prince Charles—a few weeks ago— [Interruption.] The food was free, but I paid for my own air fare. The total cost of the whole Spanish monarch is €8.4 million, while the Queen of the Netherlands gets by on €828,000.
I ask only that we do some comparative analysis before simply continuing with an arrangement that, even with the Chancellor’s proposed modernisations, remains deeply anachronistic.