Prisons and Courts Bill (Second sitting)
Debate between Matt Warman and Michael TomlinsonTuesday 28th March 2017
(8 years, 3 months ago)
Public Bill CommitteesRead Full debate Prisons and Courts Bill 2016-17 View all Prisons and Courts Bill 2016-17 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: Public Bill Committee Amendments as at 28 March 2017 - (28 Mar 2017)
Michael Tomlinson
Q If it were possible to overcome that, for example by having proper briefings with lawyers in advance and debriefings after the hearings, that would allay some of your concerns. Would that be fair?
Richard Miller: Yes, it probably would. We would obviously need to see the detail, but the main concern is to ensure that all those issues properly are taken into account.
Matt Warman (Boston and Skegness) (Con)
Q I used to write about technology and in 2010 I covered the launch of FaceTime. I wonder whether the panel collectively agree that commercial products such as that have fundamentally changed the way that almost the entire public engage with this kind of video communication. Sitting here trying to put my old journalistic hat on, we are talking about technology based on a report from 2010, but it seems fundamentally a different world. I suspect that Richard Susskind might agree, but I wonder whether Penelope Gibbs or Richard Miller could try to convince me that the technology of 2010 is even relevant in 2017.
Richard Miller: I want to pose a challenge in response to that: how far has the technology actually available in the courts moved on from 2010 technology? The real issue is whether the courts actually have this up-to-date technology which, as you say, is leaps and bounds ahead of what was going on in 2010.
Broadband
Debate between Matt Warman and Michael Tomlinson(8 years, 4 months ago)
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Matt Warman
Exactly. The right hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) is right to mention that this is not just a rural issue but an urban one too.
Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)
My hon. Friend is being generous; he has given way to 100% of the official Opposition’s Back Benchers who are here and nearly 100% of the Government Back Benchers. This is not just a rural and urban issue; it affects semi-rural areas, too. Will he reflect on the fact that in individual postcodes, speeds differ vastly from those that are advertised, possibly because of different exchanges?
Matt Warman
Absolutely. We need to end up in a position where at least half the people to whom a service is advertised—the distribution of advertising, particularly postal advertising, is often based on postcodes—should be able to receive the service that they are invited to pay for.