Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Alan Reid

Wednesday 15th May 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I am sure everyone shares my instinct that, as with all sensitive issues in Northern Ireland, the more we can talk across parties and across traditional divides and hostilities, the more we promote the prosperity and security of the people of Northern Ireland and of the people of the United Kingdom as a whole.

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

Q5. This Government have helped motorists in my constituency by cutting fuel duty by 13p on the mainland and 18p on the island, compared with Labour’s disastrous plans. Now that the European authorities are investigating the oil companies, will the Government ensure that oil companies here obey the rules and end any price fixing that might be going on? It is important that the Government’s good policy on fuel duty means that the benefit ends up in the pockets of the motorists, not the oil companies.

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for reminding the House that the price of fuel on the forecourt would be 13p higher under the plans embarked on by the Labour party—[Interruption.] Labour Members hate to hear this and to be reminded of it, but I am afraid it is true—the price would be 13p higher, which would be a crippling additional cost of living for millions of people in this country. I agree with him that the large oil companies now under investigation for these allegations should, of course, fully co-operate with the European Commission.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Alan Reid

Wednesday 7th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I hope the hon. Lady will recognise that we have been working on a cross-party basis, particularly with those parties that believe in maintaining the family of nations in the United Kingdom, to ensure a fair, legal and decisive vote in the referendum. I certainly agree with her characterisation: the spectacle of the SNP Administration using taxpayers’ money to stop disclosure to the public of legal advice that they never sought in the first place—honestly, you couldn’t make it up. It is almost a bit like dropping Iceland from the arc of prosperity.

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

Q14. Rising prices to heat their homes and drive their cars are putting enormous pressures on people, particularly in large rural areas such as Argyll and Bute. What steps will my right hon. Friend take to make the tax system fairer and put more money in the pockets of people on low and middle incomes to help them to pay these rising bills?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Alan Reid

Tuesday 20th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

The reasons why we are withholding publication of the risk register are precisely the same as the reasons why the Labour Government withheld their consent for publication on three occasions—[Hon. Members: “Have you seen it?”] Yes, I have seen the risk register. As the hon. Lady knows, it is a very important tool to allow civil servants to give frank and fearless advice to Ministers. As champions of freedom of information such as The Guardian and The Independent have said, publishing the register would inhibit civil servants from providing such frank and fearless advice to Ministers in future.

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

Yesterday the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs published a report recommending the devolution of the Crown Estate, sea bed and foreshore rights in Scotland to local communities as far as possible. That would be a massive transfer of power from Whitehall to communities in the highlands and islands, exactly in line with the big society agenda. I hope that the Government support the recommendation.

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I understand that those proposals were published just yesterday, so the Government have not had a great deal of time to consider them, but we will do so carefully.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Alan Reid

Tuesday 5th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

As I said earlier, the Culture Secretary is acting in a quasi-judicial role, he is doing so in line with advice that he has received from Ofcom and the Office of Fair Trading, and he is reflecting the legal position as it currently is. The hon. Lady may shake her head and wish that the law were different; she may wish that competition provisions could somehow be applied here, although the European Commission cleared the transaction on in competition grounds—but that is the legal position as we currently find it.

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

Sex discrimination and religious discrimination should have no place in our society, so I am pleased that the Government are bringing forward measures to reform the succession to the Crown. However, the discussions with other Commonwealth Governments do seem to be dragging on for a long time. What is my right hon. Friend doing to ensure that those discussions come to a speedy and successful conclusion?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Alan Reid

Tuesday 24th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

The Prime Minister gave an unambiguous answer to the question about the Parliament Act at Prime Minister’s questions last week. Not only was the commitment made by all three parties in their manifestos, but it is one that we entered unambiguously into the coalition agreement.

[Mr Reid]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is important that the reforms lead to an increase in the diversity of representation in the second Chamber? What steps will he take to ensure that that is the outcome of the reform?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

One of the advantages of the system that we are introducing, as explained in the White Paper, is that it will permit political parties to take active steps, in so far as they wish to do so, to use elections to the other place to increase the diversity of representation in Westminster as a whole.