Ceasefire in Gaza

Neil O'Brien Excerpts

Wednesday 21st February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his point of order. He speaks with his usual passion. He is absolutely right to say that what we now need to do is to move on. I want to put the Question and then we will move on to a further debate.

[Neil O’Brien (Harborough) (Con)]

rose—

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I do hope that Mr O’Brien is following in that spirit.

[Neil O’Brien]

Further to that point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I believe that today the SNP has been treated unfairly. But it is not just the SNP that has been treated unfairly. Those of us who would like to vote for the SNP motion must now, if we want to do so, vote against the Labour party’s amended motion—a motion that the hon. Member for Rhondda (Sir Chris Bryant) has just said would, if we voted for it, lead to an immediate general election, so we are being placed in an unfair position if we wish to support the SNP motion. We have now seen the exit of SNP Members and many Conservative Members from the Chamber. We are clearly in an intolerable situation. It is a sad situation, Madam Deputy Speaker.

I believe that the current Speaker is a man of honour who has done a great deal over recent years to restore the reputation of the Chair after a dark period for this House. However, even if he believes that the constitutional innovation that he has introduced today is a good one, this was not the time to change the rules. We have heard from the Chair of the Procedure Committee that there is a serious question about the order here and the constitutional propriety of the order in which these questions are being taken—a question being put by the SNP too. May I suggest, Madam Deputy Speaker, that if you are not prepared to suspend the House, we at least defer the Divisions that are supposed to be happening this evening until we can resolve these issues?

Finally, because in this House it is courteous and traditional that the person about whom one is talking is always in the Chamber when they are discussed, we should defer those Divisions so that we can hear from Mr Speaker himself before we come to vote on these issues, because otherwise a great injustice is being done to the SNP and to other Members of the House.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his point of order. I just want to be clear again that there was the ability to have a vote on all three motions that were before the House. The situation has changed, but that does not mean that I would then withdraw the questions and not put them, because they are still before the House, and I intend to proceed with them in the way that I have suggested.