Government Policy on the Proceedings of the House

Debate between Pete Wishart and Lucy Frazer

Tuesday 10th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

I am really grateful to the hon. Gentleman for mentioning that point. I was going to come on to that, because it is really important to understand how minority Governments respond to defeats in Parliament. The right thing to do is what the Scottish Government do, which is to review, reflect and consult. Let me cite one issue as an example. We were defeated on fracking. What did we do? We did not attempt to ignore that vote. We consulted, reviewed and came back to Parliament with a ban on fracking. That is the responsible behaviour of a minority Government. I will take no lecture from the hon. Gentleman whose party’s commitment to democratic decisions extends to the hon. Member for Angus (Kirstene Hair) not even voting in the European Union referendum.

There are certain things that a party has to learn when it is in a minority situation in Parliament. The first lesson is that, sometimes, Governments get beat. They get beat here and they get beat in the Scottish Parliament. That is a feature of minority Government and it is alright—it happens. It happens normally in Parliaments right across Europe. This Government should not overly fret about it. They paid £1.25 billion to the Democratic Unionist party to ensure that they had a majority in the event of a threat to their existence. This House must also recognise how we can represent and reflect the democratic will of the people of this country. Sometimes I enjoy being lectured by Conservative Back Benchers about parliamentary sovereignty.

[Lucy Frazer]

The hon. Gentleman has twice mentioned sovereignty and respecting the will of the people. Does he respect the will of the people in the two referendums that have recently taken place—one in Scotland, and one on the European Union?

[Pete Wishart]

I will tell the hon. and learned Lady what I think about the will of the people. I was elected just a couple of months ago—I won an election. The gentleman I beat in that election is now in the House of Lords as an unelected Scottish Office peer. That is how to reject democracy; that is how to play fast and loose with the will of people—rejected one minute and ennobled the next. So I will take no lectures from the hon. and learned Lady.

Nomination of Members to Committees

Debate between Pete Wishart and Lucy Frazer

Tuesday 12th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

Let me tell the hon. Gentleman about my party, and maybe he will listen. Between 2010 and 2015, the Scottish National party had a majority in the Scottish Parliament, and with that majority we had a majority on the Committees of the Scottish Parliament. Unfortunately, we lost that majority last year by one seat. We had a much bigger percentage share of the vote than this Conservative Government have. What was the first thing we did when we accepted that result? We gave up the chair and the majority on each of the Scottish parliamentary Committees without a sigh of protest. That is how to respect parliamentary democracy and the outcome of the people, so I will take no lessons about the example set by my party.

[Lucy Frazer]

Does the hon. Gentleman accept that, if legislation that would otherwise go to Committee went instead to the Floor of the House, it would be passed because the Government have a majority to pass it? If that is true, is it not to be accepted that the Government have a majority?

[Pete Wishart]

Parliamentary democracy, and I say this candidly, is sometimes messy. There are sometimes issues and difficulties, but the way to do our business is enshrined in centuries of tradition and convention. We have a Second Reading, we send a Bill to Committee and then it comes back on Report. We then have a Third Reading before sending it to the unelected cronies down the corridor. That is how we do business in the House. Sometime it does not work out quite perfectly, and we have to accept that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lucy Frazer (South East Cambridgeshire) (Con)]

In June, there was a vote to leave the EU. Both the Labour and Conservative parties committed in their manifestos to deliver that, so we have a duty to deliver it. The question that arises is how we do it. How do we fulfil the promise to deliver it? There are a number of practical issues that we need to overcome. There are thousands of pieces of legislation that need to pass into our law. Many are technical changes, but we need to ensure that our laws are certain so that businesses are able to be clear about their future.

I listened carefully during the two-day debate to speeches made by Opposition and Conservative Members, by leavers and remainers. Well-respected Members on both sides of the House recognised the importance of ensuring that there are practical solutions to avoid our country’s legislative process becoming gridlocked. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) said that we cannot get rid of EU legislation overnight “without leaving enormous gaps.” The right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) said that the task was “Byzantine in its complexity” and recognised the need to ensure that Ministers have

“latitude and flexibility to do what needs to be done”.—[Official Report, 7 September 2017; Vol. 628, c. 381.]

The method that this Government have put forward is not unprecedented for two reasons. First, as we have heard, the Labour Government in 1976 were in the minority and passed similar motions to ensure that they had a majority on Committees.

[Pete Wishart]

Will the hon. and learned Lady tell us what the sainted Margaret Thatcher thought about that arrangement in the 1970s?

[Lucy Frazer]

We can talk about what was said in the debate, but the outcome was that Labour secured a majority in Committee when it did not have one on the Floor of the House.

Yesterday, the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Kate Hoey) said that the previous Labour Government actually doubled the number of statutory instruments that introduced new laws, so if legislating through Committee is accepted, as it has been for many years, as a means of government, and if ensuring that the governing party has a majority was accepted by the Labour party when it was in power, it is inappropriate for Labour to object to that when it is proposed by Conservative Members.

Scheduling of Parliamentary Business

Debate between Pete Wishart and Lucy Frazer

Monday 17th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)]

We welcome this debate and share the concerns about the arrangements for this parliamentary Session over the next two years. We agree that clarity is needed on the scheduling of Back-Bench and Opposition business.

Since we have come back, the pace at which the House’s usual arrangements have been put back in place has been woeful and unsatisfactory. There are only three full days left until the long summer recess, yet this House’s Select Committees are still not up and running, nor do we know the arrangements for its Standing and Statutory Instrument Committees. Given that they are going to be particularly burdened by the repeal Bill, we need clarity and certainty about them.

[Lucy Frazer (South East Cambridgeshire) (Con)]

I think I heard earlier that neither the Scottish National party nor the Labour party has yet agreed on its own members for Select Committees—

[Lucy Frazer]

I am sorry if I am in error, but it is only recently that it has been possible to agree on Select Committee membership and we are about to go into recess.

[Pete Wishart]

I am grateful to the hon. and learned Lady for her intervention, because I can say with certainty that we are ready to supply SNP names for Select Committee membership, and I am pretty certain that the Labour party is in the same position.

You made a generous offer last week, Mr Speaker, to help facilitate arrangements for any political party that is finding it difficult to arrange its membership of Select Committees, but I do not know whether the Conservative party has approached you to fulfil that promise. It is not the Labour party or the SNP that is holding up the creation of Select Committees, but the Conservative party, so I ask it to make use of your very kind offer.