Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Mark Menzies

Tuesday 5th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

It is precisely to get to the bottom of exactly how many people who are not on the register but should be that we commissioned detailed research from the Electoral Commission to establish the facts. As I said earlier, we are running these projects so that we can have access to other publicly available databases to make sure that they are consistent with the electoral register.

[Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)]

T8. Does the Deputy Prime Minister agree that by delivering 103,000 more adult apprentices than were promised by the previous Government, this Government are delivering on their promise to rebuild the economy?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

Yes, and I would add that those 103,000 apprenticeships are twice the target number that had originally been set for this year. In total, we will deliver 250,000 more apprenticeships during this Parliament than Labour would have delivered if they had been in power. We believe that apprenticeships are a tried, tested and successful way of getting people from full-time education into full-time work. That is what we are absolutely dedicated to deliver.

Political and Constitutional Reform

Debate between Nick Clegg and Mark Menzies

Monday 5th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

Thanks for the relevant question.

As the hon. Gentleman is aware, the loan pledged by the last Government to Sheffield Forgemasters—an outstanding company about which I suspect I know a great deal more than he does—was announced for political purposes, just before the general election, to allow the then Prime Minister to make a late-night photo-opportunity visit to Sheffield Forgemasters two days before the election, and the Government made that announcement in the full knowledge that they did not have the money to make the promise in the first place. What was cynical—deeply cynical—was for a Government to raise the hopes of people in Sheffield by making promises which they knew they could not afford.

[Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)]

In his statement the Deputy Prime Minister mentioned sorting out the influence of big money in politics. Does that include trade union money?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

Clearly, any new arrangement for the funding of political parties will need to be binding on all political parties in a consistent manner, and that is what we will aim to achieve.