Oral Answers to Questions

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Thursday 24th May 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

Do the Government accept the evidence from R3 that businesses in administration find it expensive or impossible to trade because of the ransom tactics of suppliers, particularly on-suppliers. Will they address the shortcomings in the Insolvency Act 1986, which fails to provide firms with the protections they would have under chapter 11 in the United States?

[Norman Lamb]

I will look into the issue the hon. Gentleman raises and will be happy to discuss it with him.

Oral Answers to Questions

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Thursday 31st March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

The Minister might be aware that the Office of Fair Trading is receiving complaints about the market dominance and business practices of Electoral Reform Services. Will he encourage the OFT to be more attentive and responsive to those complaints than it has been to previous complaints?

[Mr Davey]

The hon. Gentleman will know that the OFT is an independent body, and I am sure that he would not want the Government to breach the law by intervening in that way. However, I am sure that the OFT has heard his question.

Schools White Paper

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Wednesday 24th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Absolutely. We are going to say to all higher education institutions that are currently involved in the provision of initial teacher training that we want them to open lab schools, in the same way that such schools have been developed in Finland and the United States. Those schools are run by education departments and they act as showcases for the best in teacher training, and I believe that education departments here can grasp this opportunity. We are working with the Training and Development Agency to ensure that they have the resources to do so.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

The Minister said in his statement that he wanted to bring back an emphasis on punctuation. However, his 10-page statement contains no more than 16 full stops. In the middle of the statement, we have to read nearly 300 words before we find a full stop, and at the end, there are more than 300 words before we find a full stop. How would the statement be marked under his system?

[Michael Gove]

I almost wish that the hon. Gentleman had not put a question mark at the end of that. All I can say is that my approach as a Minister has been to eat, shoot and leave when it comes to making a statement such as this.