Neale Hanvey
Main Page: Neale Hanvey (Alba Party - Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath)Department Debates - View all Neale Hanvey's debates with the Leader of the House
(2 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising this question. Just before the 2017 general election I was on the Treasury Committee, and I lobbied the then Chairman for an inquiry into exactly this subject. Councils are not there to speculate; they are there to run public services and to handle taxpayers’ money well. I have a great quibble about using the word “investment” for local government expenditure, because actually it is spending taxpayers’ money. Local government should not be talking about investing; it should recognise that it is using other people’s money and therefore has a great fiduciary duty to spend it wisely. Councils that do not spend it wisely should be held to account both by Members of Parliament and, as they ultimately will be, by their electors.
Neale Hanvey (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (Alba)
During yesterday’s covid statement the Prime Minister made certain assertions, in response to the shadow First Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner), about the UK Government’s support for the domestic diagnostics industry that were patently untrue. In my Adjournment debate last night, the Paymaster General failed to answer any of my questions other than to demonstrate his enthusiasm for profiteering. The UK diagnostics industry only wants a level playing field. That is all it is asking for. Will the Government bring forward a debate in their time to set out in detail the support they claim to be giving to the domestic diagnostics industry?
Mr Rees-Mogg
The purpose of business questions is to ensure that Members have the opportunity to raise the issues they wish to raise for debate. The hon. Gentleman tells me he has had the chance to question the Prime Minister and the Paymaster General on exactly this question. The fact he does not like the answers does not mean that the answers have not been given and that satisfactory parliamentary time has not been spent on the issue.