Business of the House

Owen Smith Excerpts

Monday 21st October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

May I thank the Leader of the House for confirming what I suspect the rest of the country has long thought: that the Queen’s Speech does not really matter to this Government and is a sham, which is why it has now been postponed? May I ask him, as he is someone who clearly believes in historical precedent in this case: is he serious that we are going to try and ram through this Bill dealing with an international treaty in three days, when Lisbon was debated for 11 days, I believe, Maastricht for 23, and the treaty of Rome for 22? Is he serious about this?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

The hon. Gentleman’s appetite for debate is touching, but we have been debating these matters for three years. We have had endless debates; we have had endless statements by both this Prime Minister and his predecessor; we have had endless reports from the Brexit Select Committee. It is hard to think of any matter that has been more carefully looked at—and, rather splendidly, not just by this House but by the country at large who have engaged with politics. One of the great virtues of Brexit has been the way it has encouraged our constituents to be interested in our activities.

Bullying and Harassment: Cox Report

Owen Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 16th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Andrea Leadsom]

My hon. Friend makes an interesting point. The complaints procedure that we have established is a means for anybody who works here to make a complaint, but it does not address the specific points in Dame Laura’s review about the structures of the House of Commons. He makes the point that it might be necessary to make further changes to the way in which the House of Commons is managed to improve and support the work of the independent complaints procedure.

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

This is a deeply dispiriting report containing some profoundly serious comments. I do not know about other Members, but I was shocked to hear that 200 or more people had come forward to express their concerns. First, will the Leader of the House reassure me that she will not be subjected to any pressure from the people who I fear are exploiting this issue to serve their own personal or political agendas? That might be uncomfortable to say, but it has been evident in the newspapers and here in the House today. Secondly, does she believe that there needs to be a greater measure of independence in whatever way we take forward these processes in future?

[Andrea Leadsom]

Firstly, I can certainly give the hon. Gentleman the reassurance that I will not be pressured by anyone in any direction. I think that I have evidenced that throughout the work of the working group in setting up the complaints procedure. Secondly, he is exactly right to say that we will need to consider again how the structures in this place work, but as I have said, that is a matter not for me but for the House.

Points of Order

Owen Smith Excerpts

Thursday 22nd October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his point of order, and for his courtesy in giving me notice of it. On the basis of what he has told me in writing, I have to tell him that it is not for me to conclude whether there has been a change of policy or not. I leave others to make that judgment. However, it is a long-established principle in this place that if a Minister has a policy announcement to make, that announcement should first be made to the House. The Minister concerned will therefore have to consider whether he or she believes that a change is involved, and to draw the appropriate conclusions. The hon. Gentleman is a sufficiently adroit and dextrous Member of the House to be well aware, if he is dissatisfied with the development of events in the coming days, of the toolkit available to Members to draw the urgent attention of the House to a matter that they believe warrants its consideration.

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. May I ask for your guidance on how we might secure an opportunity for the House to question the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions about the desperately inadequate response to the Work and Pensions Select Committee report on the extraordinarily important issue of benefit sanctions? The response has been snuck out this morning in a written statement, it is four months late, and it does not appear to address any of the principal recommendations. In particular, it does not address the recommendation on an independent review into the matter of those people who have died while subject to benefit sanctions. That is an extraordinarily shoddy way for the Government to behave. May I also ask for guidance on whether the Select Committee might, under the new Back-Bench business procedures, seek time to debate the issue and question the Secretary of State on why he has snuck out this response and why it is so poor?

[Mr Speaker]

Certainly, Backbench Business Committee debates can take place, and the hon. Gentleman requires no encouragement from me on that front. More widely, I note that he is a most assiduous member of the shadow Cabinet and that he is somewhat of a highbrow academic type. He will therefore know perfectly well what the opportunities are to air matters in the House. I have a hunch that he simply wanted a prime-time opportunity to tweak the Government’s tail. I know that he would not think it right to abuse his privileges as a Member on the Front Bench, however. These matters can be aired on a subsequent occasion, but time is pressing and we will leave it there for today.

English Votes on English Laws

Owen Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 7th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Antoinette Sandbach (Eddisbury) (Con)]

I am grateful to be called in this debate. I am unusual in that, having represented north Wales for some time and having seen devolution in action in the Welsh Assembly, I find myself over the border, representing an English constituency where the voices of my constituents cannot be heard in the way that my constituents in Wales were heard. I would have had a great deal of sympathy for the Opposition, but these arguments were known at the time of the asymmetrical devolution settlement.

My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) spoke powerfully about the impact of an Act and why it is so important to introduce these proposals through Standing Orders. We saw with the Agricultural Sector (Wales) Act 2014 how powers given away from this place by Act were changed by judicial law making. That effectively changed the constitutional settlement in Wales and made it a reserved powers model, expressly contradicting the provisions of the Bill. Furthermore, that substantially delayed the impact of legislation and changed the settled will of this House through judge-led law making.

It is for those reasons that many Members on the Government Benches have considerable concerns about a written constitution. I hear the cries for a constitutional convention, but the opportunity was there in 1999 and the vital question of English votes for English laws was not addressed, and it should have been. To paraphrase what my right hon. and learned Friend said in another debate, “If not now, when?”

We need this change. English voters are increasingly resentful. Research shows a consistent message that the people of England do not think that it is right that MPs from Scotland should be allowed to vote in the House of Commons on laws that affect only England. That research is from the National Centre for Social Research. [Interruption.] Does the hon. Member for Pontypridd (Owen Smith) wish to intervene?

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

I was simply saying that the hon. Lady really ought to have listened to her hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg), who effectively said that English Members need to be far more generous, considering the size of England compared with the other parts of the UK, and not legislate on the basis of imagined resentment.

[Antoinette Sandbach]

These are proper findings established by the National Centre for Social Research. What I am saying is that changing the Standing Orders is an appropriate way to act. I heard the powerful and appropriate speech from my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg), in which he made some very relevant points. He was arguing against an alternative English Assembly, and I agree with him entirely. The matter should be dealt with in this Parliament. This Parliament should put in place the processes to ensure equality—[Interruption.] No, we do not need a referendum, because we have just had a general election in which the majority of the British public voted for these measures. The people of the United Kingdom have spoken in support of English votes for English laws.

Points of Order

Owen Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 17th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. We are not going to have a protracted exchange on this matter. I think that people are perfectly capable of making their own assessment—those in the House and outside it. The hon. Member for Caerphilly (Wayne David) made a point about a letter from individuals who did not receive a direct reply. The Leader of the House has made the point that there was a letter from an hon. Member to which the Prime Minister replied. We really do not have to go into the interstices of this, and it would be a disservice to the House to do so when we have pressing demands on our time, and, before we even reach those other matters, more points of order. [Interruption.] I think that I have given a very fair hearing to both points of view on this matter, and I am grateful to participants.

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. You will be aware that the Chief Secretary to the Treasury has in the past hour published the Government’s initial response to the Silk commission on the devolution of taxation to Wales, but you may not be aware that it was leaked to the media at about 7 o’clock this morning and appeared on the BBC website. I know, Mr Speaker, that you take very seriously the role of Ministers to inform the House first, so could you please offer some guidance on the appropriateness of the response and, given that the former Secretary of State for Wales, the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan), had committed to a full debate about these important matters on the Floor of the House, on whether it is appropriate that the Government should issue a scanty, one-page response on the penultimate day of this term?

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that point of order, to which I respond as follows. First, if material has been leaked to the media in the way he suggests, that is entirely inappropriate and I deprecate it in the strongest possible terms. Important announcements should be made first to the House and it is a discourtesy to the House of Commons if people have pursued alternative methods.

Secondly, as to the question of a prior commitment to there being a debate on the Floor of the House, that is not a matter for the Chair. I note the moral point that the hon. Gentleman is making in a sense. He may well seek to make it again in business questions tomorrow or, if for some reason he will not be available to do so, it will not be beyond his wit to ensure that the point is aired. It will be a question of airing it for a second time, given that he has done so for the first this afternoon.

Business of the House

Owen Smith Excerpts

Thursday 23rd June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

As I am my hon. Friend’s constituency neighbour and constituents of mine also work at Porton Down, I understand the concern felt locally about this matter. I will raise my hon. Friend’s concerns with the relevant health Minister in order to try to discover the timetable for this decision.

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

The Leader of the House will be aware that his colleague the Secretary of State for Wales has failed in the last 13 months in that job to say a single word from the Dispatch Box about Wales, save at Wales Questions. Will he prevail upon her to try to raise her subterranean profile in this House, and secure a debate in Government time on matters of importance to the people of Wales?

[Sir George Young]

I have the good fortune to sit next to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales at Wales Questions, and I would have thought that 15 or 30 minutes would be sufficient time to deal with all the questions likely to be raised by Opposition Members. So far as the call for a debate is concerned, the hon. Gentleman will know that following the recommendations of the Wright Committee a decision on a debate on Wales—or London or any other part of the country—is now a matter for the Backbench Business Committee.

Business of the House

Owen Smith Excerpts

Thursday 17th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

My Cabinet colleagues and I enjoyed our visit to Derby last week, including the presentations from Rolls-Royce and from other entrepreneurs in the area. Enterprise zones are currently being considered. Having been a Minister in the 1980s, I think that enterprise zones were a particular success, for example in transforming the London docklands development area. I hope that my hon. Friend will have an opportunity in the four-day debate on the Budget to develop her views on how we might help the east midlands and the enterprises to which she referred.

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

During yesterday’s debate on the NHS, the Secretary of State for Health implied that the Health and Social Care Bill will not extend competition law into the NHS to a greater extent. That contradicts the Minister of State, Department of Health, the right hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns), who told the Public Bill Committee that competition law will affect the NHS to a much greater extent. Can we have an urgent statement on how competition law will bite on the NHS under the Bill?

[Sir George Young]

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health made it crystal clear in yesterday’s debate that under the Bill before the House, there is no change in EU competition law.

Business of the House

Owen Smith Excerpts

Thursday 3rd March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I do not remember that, although my hon. Friend may do. It is important to put our proceedings in context by a short period of reflection and prayer before we commence the parliamentary day, during which we are sometimes less than courteous to each other.

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

Will the Leader of the House please have a word with the millionaire Transport Secretary about his decision earlier this week on the extension of the electrification of the Great Western line to Swansea? There is still a great deal of controversy about the business case on which that decision was ostensibly predicated, so we would be grateful to know more about that business case by having an early debate on the extension of the line through to Swansea, which is so needed for the west Wales economy.

[Sir George Young]

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport made a very welcome statement on Tuesday announcing the electrification of the Great Western railway to Bristol, Cardiff and, indeed, the south Wales valleys, and at the same time he announced new rolling stock. He made it absolutely clear that even if electrification were carried through to Swansea, it would not affect the time already saved in travelling from London and the hon. Gentleman will already get a 20-minute saving anyway. I therefore very much hope that he will be slightly more enthusiastic about the Government’s announcement and about the reduction of the time it will take him to get home on a Thursday evening.

Business of the House (Thursday)

Owen Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 8th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Hilary Benn]

Indeed—that may well be the case. As the evening wears on and as the sense of anger grows among Opposition Members at the inadequacy of the time, more Members will probably be encouraged to go to Mr Speaker’s office to indicate that they wish to take part in tomorrow’s debate.

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

Is it not instructive and illustrative that we will have just five hours tomorrow to debate the Government’s proposals? Does that not tell us, as we heard from the Leader of the Opposition today, just how extraordinarily out of touch the Government are with ordinary working people in this country? The measures will be a strong disincentive to those people to go to our universities. That is why the debate deserves far more than five hours. It is not us who deserves more than five hours, but those students.

Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Owen Smith Excerpts

Monday 1st November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

Is not the point that my hon. Friend is making—and making very eloquently, I might add—that we should consider the aggregate effect of the Bill on Wales to be just as legitimate a question? We should not just compare one seat with another, but compare England with Wales.

[Susan Elan Jones]

I agree, and Government Members are showing that they have absolutely no understanding of the historic nature of Wales inside the Union.