Business of the House

Peter Bone Excerpts

Thursday 26th February 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

That is an interesting idea. I salute the courage of the individuals whom the hon. Gentleman met. I have had many distressing conversations internationally with victims of sexual violence—he will be aware of my campaign on that—and I am very much aware of the courage that it takes to speak out and to speak to other people about such experiences. We will have to consider with other authorities in the House whether it is possible to do what he has just proposed, but we should give consideration to that.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

I wonder whether the Leader of the House could give me some guidance on next week’s business. I have a number of private Members’ Bills that I can move on Friday. Will he indicate which ones the Government are going to support so that I know what to concentrate on? Here is the list: the Wind Farm Subsidies (Abolition) Bill, the Department of Energy and Climate Change (Abolition) Bill, the Foreign National Offenders (Exclusion from the United Kingdom) Bill, the Free Movement of Persons into the United Kingdom (Derogation) Bill and—my personal favourite—the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (Abolition) Bill.

[Mr Hague]

I cannot indicate a sudden rush of Government support for the massive legislative programme on which my hon. Friend has embarked so indefatigably—indeed, we have all seen on the BBC how many sleepless nights he had in order to put together this massive legislative programme. As he might anticipate, his Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (Abolition) Bill could run into handling problems in the coalition Government, to put it mildly, so I do not expect the Government to perform a sharp about-turn on these issues, but he will have to wait until the day—it will be exciting—to see which Bills the Government object to.