Oral Answers to Questions

Paul Flynn Excerpts

Monday 31st October 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Robert Neill)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that important point, because this is precisely why we are working with the Local Government Association on its local procurement programme. The programme is looking in particular at what are sometimes described as micro-lots, which are used as a means of breaking up a large contract into smaller bundles, which are specifically designed to be more accessible to smaller firms and providers.

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

T4. Even though a five-star dinner at the Savoy, which was paid for by the lobbyist Bell Pottinger, had in attendance at least one firm that had an application in with the Secretary of State’s Department, he says that he has no reason to register it in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests because that day he was eating not as a Minister but as a private person. If we are to have a robust, transparent system of lobbying, does he not think that that loophole needs to be closed, so that we do not have to guess on which days Members are eating privately and on which they are eating ministerially?

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I wanted to hear the question, but the registration of Members’ interests is undertaken by Members in their capacity as Members, rather than as Ministers. I suspect that there will be a correspondence or exchange subsequently, but that is my understanding of the position.