Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Robert Halfon

Tuesday 12th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

It is entirely legitimate to have disagreements on the measure, but to claim that 660,000 will be booted out of their homes—that is simply not true—is outrageous Labour scaremongering. As the hon. Gentleman knows, there are a number of ways in which to address the additional £14 for those who encounter it—a £50 million discretionary fund is being made available to local authorities. Why should his constituents who receive housing benefit for use in the private rented sector have to cut their cloth to suit their means according to the amount of space they have available in their homes while those same rules do not apply to those who receive housing benefit in social housing?

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend take action against those MPs who use the conflict in Israel to make inflammatory statements about Jews, and does he not realise that his party is getting a reputation—sadly—among some of its senior members for being hostile to Jewish people?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I am unambiguous in my condemnation of anyone, from whatever party, including my own, who uses insensitive, intemperate, provocative and offensive language to describe that long-running conflict. People have strong feelings on one side or the other, but everybody is duty bound to choose their words carefully and tread carefully when entering into that heated debate.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Robert Halfon

Tuesday 8th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I certainly stand shoulder to shoulder with the hon. Gentleman on his long-standing critique of the over-centralisation of power in Westminster and Whitehall. I know that he has welcomed some of the initiatives that we have taken. They do not provide all the answers, but they are significant steps in the right direction. The retention of 50% of business rates by local authorities is probably the biggest act of fiscal decentralisation in England for several years. The city deals, in my view, are a radical template of a wholesale transfer of responsibilities, ranging from transport and capital investment to skills and training, to local authorities. The question that the hon. Gentleman’s Committee is posing is whether that can be done in a more systematic, neat and formalised way, and I am certainly open to look at any suggestions in that respect. It is the tradition in this country to do things in a slightly more informal and uneven way, but his Committee’s report will be taken very seriously by us in government.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Can my right hon. Friend set out what powers have been devolved from central Government to the big society?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

As my hon. Friend knows, whether it is in planning, control over business rates, significant powers over skills, transport and capital investment in our cities or in the enactment of a general power of competence—whereby we recognise in law for the first time the general power of competence for local authorities—I believe that, in all of those areas, as well as, of course, the new referendum powers available to local neighbourhoods and local authorities, we have made a significant step towards creating a more decentralised nation.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Robert Halfon

Tuesday 7th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Nick Clegg)]

The establishment of the commission was announced by written ministerial statement on 17 January and the commission is due to report during the next parliamentary Session.

[Robert Halfon]

Treasury figures show that every English household pays £420 in tax to subsidise Scottish services, which means that Harlow families from my constituency are sending £16 million a year to Scotland. Is it not time to redress the balance and have English votes for English laws?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I am sure that my hon. Friend will want to take the opportunity to make his views known to the commission. As my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary has just explained, the commission is of course focused on procedures in this House, as they are affected by the process of devolution. I am not sure whether the concerns of my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) will be directly relevant to the commission’s central terms of reference.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Robert Halfon

Tuesday 1st March 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

What an extraordinarily laboured question! The right hon. and learned Lady may have forgotten that her party promised an emergency Budget some time soon, and £14 billion of cuts starting in a few weeks. She complains about the difficult decisions that we are having to take, yet I have not heard her and her colleagues make a single suggestion about how to fill the enormous black hole in the public finances that they left to us to sort out.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

T5. Will my right hon. Friend agree to consider extending the terms of the Protection of Freedoms Bill to give stronger powers to the Information Commissioner to fine internet companies who misuse people’s personal data? Does he not agree that we need an internet Bill of Rights to stop the advance of the privatised surveillance society?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

This is a very important issue. As it happens, since April last year the Information Commissioner has had the power to impose a penalty of up to half a million pounds for serious breaches of the Data Protection Act, and that applies to internet companies who misuse personal data. The commissioner can also serve information notices and enforcement notices, apply for warrants, pursue prosecutions and accept undertakings. As my hon. Friend may know, the commissioner has issued a code of practice for collecting personal information online. Finally, he might be interested to know that the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills are working on updating the relevant regulations and are considering extending the powers of the Information Commissioner and the sanctions available when privacy is breached.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Robert Halfon

Tuesday 22nd June 2010 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

It is an important constitutional change—I recognise that. We believe that it is right to separate the power to pass a motion of no confidence in a Government from the power to pass a motion of Dissolution. Let us be clear about why we are doing this. We are doing it because we want to introduce fixed-term Parliaments. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister is the first Prime Minister to give up his power to dissolve Parliament. I should have thought that the right hon. Gentleman and all Members of the House would welcome that change. However, we all understand that the proposed 55% figure is controversial. It is up for discussion and scrutiny, and if the case is made that another figure might be better, of course we are open to those arguments.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

T5. Does the Deputy Prime Minister not find it astonishing that some Members of this House do not believe that every vote should have equal value? People in Harlow and the villages hope that their say at the ballot box will one day have as much weight as everyone else’s, with fairer and more equal-sized constituencies.

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I agree with my hon. Friend. We have a general problem. The Labour party has leapt from being in government, where it created endless problems, to coming into opposition and airbrushing those problems from the record altogether. Labour Members used to talk about fairness, reform and constitutional change. They now talk about manufacturing, but manufacturing declined three times faster under Labour than it did under previous Conservative Administrations.