Peter Bone
Main Page: Peter Bone (Independent - Wellingborough)
Mr Speaker
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for the warmth and courtesy of his remarks in respect of the late Sir Gerald Kaufman.
The right hon. Gentleman raises an important matter, but it is a matter of debate. I would say two things to him. First, as he will probably have noticed, this matter was treated of by the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms) and others yesterday, although that does not preclude further consideration of it today. Secondly, the right hon. Gentleman is a wily old hand in this House, and he knows that by raising the matter in this way on the Floor of the House in front of Members on the Treasury Bench, he has found his own salvation. I cannot help but think that on this occasion he is more interested, as I often observe, in what he has to say to me than in anything I have to say to him.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. Could you give guidance to the House? Is it not more appropriate that these matters are raised in departmental questions, and is it not a fact that no Liberal Democrat was present during Work and Pensions questions?
Mr Speaker
It is better for these matters to be raised in the relevant Question Time session. The hon. Gentleman is well seized of that age-old principle of campaigning, namely quantity, persistence and, above all, repetition. I think my short-term memory serves me well. His observation about the absence of members of a particular political party was made the other day, but he has opportunistically seized his chance to repeat it this afternoon. He has made his own point in his own inimitable way.