Business of the House

Paul Flynn Excerpts

Thursday 15th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)]

Will the Leader of the House give us the business for the week following this unnecessarily protracted recess?

[The Leader of the House of Commons (Mr David Lidington)]

The business for the week commencing 10 October is as follows:

Monday 10 October—Motion to approve the Second Report 2016-17 from the Committee of Privileges, followed by Second Reading of the Neighbourhood Planning Bill.

Tuesday 11 October—Second Reading of the Small Charitable Donations and Childcare Payments Bill.

Wednesday 12 October—Opposition day (8th allotted day). There will be a debate on an Opposition motion. Subject to be announced.

Thursday 13 October—General debate on baby loss, followed by debate on a motion on the inquiry into hormone pregnancy tests. The subjects for these debates were determined by the Backbench Business Committee.

Friday 14 October—The House will not be sitting.

The provisional business for the week commencing 17 October will include:

Monday 17 October—Second Reading of the Savings (Government Contributions) Bill.



I should also like to inform the House that the business in Westminster Hall for Thursday 20 October will be:

Thursday 20 October—Debate on the Education Committee reports on mental health and wellbeing of looked after children and on social work reform, followed by general debate on national arthritis week 2016 as recommended by the Liaison Committee and Backbench Business Committee.

Colleagues will wish to know that, subject to the progress of business, the House will rise for the February recess at the end of business on Thursday 9 February and return on Monday 20 February.

[Paul Flynn]

I thank the Leader of the House for giving us the business.

May we deal with the new Select Committees and the date for the election of Chairs? Will the Leader of the House confirm that the Business, Innovation and Skills Committee will be renamed and continue with a Labour Chairman; that the new International Trade Committee will be chaired by a Member of the Scottish National party; and that the new Brexit Committee will be chaired by a Labour MP?

We join you, Mr Speaker, in sending our best wishes to the retiring Speaker’s counsel, Michael Carpenter, and in welcoming Saira Salimi, who has been appointed to the role.

Today is the International Day of Democracy. Democracy was invented in Greece two and a half thousand years ago and has come to these islands in instalments. We are the only country in the world, other than Lesotho, that still has hereditary chieftains in its legislature. David Cameron’s final awards have been described in the Daily Mail and The Guardian—at both ends of the political spectrum—as “devalued”, “debased”, “discredited”, “egregious”, “grubby”, “tawdry”, “tainted” and “tarnished”, but otherwise okay. At the heart of our democracy is this rotten system with, as the Lord Speaker said, 200 unnecessary people prancing around in ermine down the other end of the corridor. The changes introduced by the former Prime Minister over the years involve £34 million of spending. This is a wanton waste of public money at a time when his justification for the massive disruption to elected Members by the boundary changes was that it would save peanuts. Will the Leader of the House add some new lustre to his parliamentary halo and not be just a leader who is here today and nowhere tomorrow, but take on real reforms?

I also strongly recommend that the Leader of the House takes up this report I have with me, published this week by distinguished Members of all parties. For 25 years, parties of all colours have failed to respond to the appeals from the seriously ill who have suffered agonies of pain when they ask for relief that is provided by the only medicine that works for them, which is cannabis. Because of the prejudice-rich, cowardly, knowledge-free policies of both Governments, we have continued with a system that has criminalised seriously ill people. Now there is a clear call from distinguished and knowledgeable Members here and in the other place to end this barbarous practice whereby we criminalise people for using cannabis but allow heroin to be prescribed. Other countries throughout the world are doing this; there is no excuse for continuing with this practice.

[Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)]

Hear, hear!

[Paul Flynn]

I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s warm support on this matter, which I have enjoyed over the years.

How does today’s decision on Hinkley fit into the parliamentary timetable? It has never been properly debated here, and any new proposals have certainly not been debated here. This could be the greatest financial and technological catastrophe for 50 years. The price is a rip-off and the technology does not work. Finland was promised that nuclear power from the EPR would be working by 2009, but it is still not working and no date has been offered for when it will, while Flamanville is in a mess because of a technical problem. Yet the Government are going to blunder ahead because they do not have the courage to examine the scheme again. They are going ahead because of political inertia. My party’s policy will be spelled out later by my hon. Friend the Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner), but in the meantime we have to tell the Leader of the House that he must gain parliamentary approval, because this is going ahead without any parliamentary imprimatur at all. As the years and decades go by, and as the futility of this operation continues, this will be seen not as a parliamentary disaster or a parliamentary error, but as a Tory error.

[Mr Lidington]

Let me first agree with and join the hon. Gentleman in wishing a successful retirement to Speaker’s counsel, who has served this House and you in particular, Mr Speaker, with distinction over many years. I can confirm the arrangements that the hon. Gentleman mentioned with respect to the Chairs of the Select Committees.

On the hon. Gentleman’s point about the use of cannabis in medical treatment, it is of course perfectly possible for medicines derived from cannabis—medicines that include cannabinoids—to go through the normal process of medical licensing and approval. I am not attracted to the idea that, without that sort of analysis, checking and approval by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, we should simply agree to particular drugs being made available to patients who might be suffering from all kinds of different and sensitive conditions.

On the hon. Gentleman’s points about Hinkley, I have to say that I gained the impression that this was, for him, a therapeutic experience rather than a quest for truth. He will have the opportunity in a relatively short space of time to put questions on this subject directly to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, so I urge him to contain his impatience that little bit longer.



The hon. Gentleman also asked about the International Day of Democracy, which I think members of all parties would wish to celebrate today.

As the hon. Gentleman knows, my own voting record on House of Lords reform is recorded in Hansard. The fact is, however, that the House of Commons had an opportunity very recently to vote for reform, and this House—this elected House—voted down every option that was available. Whatever views one holds about the second Chamber, I do not think it right to denigrate the very hard work of scrutiny and review that is put in by members of all political parties, and Cross-Benchers, in that Chamber in order to play their part in the legislative process.

I find it a bit rum that the hon. Gentleman should denounce the House of Lords in such florid terms when so many of his former right hon. and hon. Friends have been in a rush to go and serve there. Only earlier this week, a new life peer, sent there by the Leader of the Opposition, took her seat. I think that the hon. Gentleman needs to have some words with his own leader about his views.