Housing and Planning Bill

Debate between Pete Wishart and Graham Stuart

Tuesday 12th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

I do not know whether I am grateful or not to the hon. Lady for her intervention. I think she is saying that she wants great dollops of cake so she can spend her time eating it and having a singularly English Parliament. Let us just use the House of Commons to accommodate that. The thing that has been created here is a quasi-English Parliament, but this Parliament belongs to me as much as to her. It belongs to the Scottish people as much as to the English people. What has happened today with the Legislative Grand Committee is that she will be able to represent her constituents in all Divisions, but my hon. Friends and I will not.

[Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)]

I think what the House will take from the hon. Gentleman’s animated, passionate and, as ever, fluent speech is the fact that he is furious about a typically British evolution in the system of government that blocks his most devout desire, which is, of course, separation for Scotland. This system makes it fair in England. It deals with that grievance and means that his hope for independence disappears. That is why he is so angry.

[Pete Wishart]

As with so many things, the hon. Gentleman is half right. This has been noted in Scotland. A lot of people are observing this and seeing this Parliament becoming, in effect, an English Parliament. They are seeing the voices of their Members of Parliament, so recently elected, diminished in this House. They will not be able to speak or vote in particular circumstances.

Throughout the debate on EVEL, the Leader of the House gave the impression that these votes would be subject to a double majority—that the whole House would express its will and then there would be a vote for English Members, which would effectively be their veto—but that has not happened. Instead, there has been a banishment. That is the brutal reality of EVEL. This is what happens when we start mucking about with the Standing Orders and our membership arrangements. We are left with some Members who can do anything—participate and vote on any issue—and others who cannot. It is totally unsatisfactory.

We have wasted God knows how much time discussing these issues today. It has made such a mess of parliamentary proceedings and added extra elements to the functions of an already hard-working House when considering Bills. It is a total mess.

English Votes for English Laws

Debate between Pete Wishart and Graham Stuart

Wednesday 15th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

It is almost difficult to try to explain ever so gently to the Leader of the House how it works. It is a solution that works across the world and it is called federalism. It is where we do our thing and English MPs do theirs. I know they are unhappy—I hear it again and again—and so we then come together in this Parliament, where we all have the same rights and same status. What is happening now is the creation of a quasi-English Parliament within the unitary Parliament of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. It is that solution that is totally unacceptable, gives us a second-class status and stops us being able effectively to represent our constituents. It is not on.

[Graham Stuart]

The power of the hon. Gentleman’s performance—I agree with colleagues that it is first class—is matched only, I think, by the fundamental dishonesty of the message. He knows that simply providing the simple consent of English Members of Parliament—with no Executive, no English Parliament—to measures going through this place means that his fox has been shot. He hoped for measures that would allow him genuinely to say that he and his colleagues were second-class MPs, but they will not be. They will be voting on everything, and we will simply have to give consent, too. He knows that that is right and he hates it.

[Pete Wishart]

I invite the hon. Gentleman to look at the explanation of what will happen as shown in the wonderful graphic displayed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Gordon. This is great, isn’t it? It is like the line-up to the battle of Bannockburn—all we need is William Wallace in the middle to go over the edge. It is just ridiculous. I think it was the Conservative Chair of the Procedure Committee who identified that there are another four stages to parliamentary Bills in all this—God knows how we will get through a parliamentary Session with all the extra work that will have to be done.

We are excluded from two sections of the procedure and then we are back in and out. I am having difficulty understanding. I know that my right hon. Friend is better at looking at these things than I am, and he may be able to come to terms with this smorgasbord of traffic lights. The illustration shows that the second-class Members on the SNP Benches will not be able to participate in the extra Grand Committee stage for England. I do not know whether the Serjeant at Arms is going to get his little sword out and stop us coming in. I am not sure how will we be barred from participating. If we were to intervene or to try to say anything, would we be named or thrown out? These are some of the absurdities that are part of this dog’s breakfast of a proposal.