Peter Bone
Main Page: Peter Bone (Independent - Wellingborough)
Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)
Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker.
Mr Speaker
They were there, as the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) chunters from a half-sedentary position. We will come to him in a moment. I am saving him up; it would be a pity to waste him too early in our proceedings.
Mr Speaker
I am always grateful to the hon. Gentleman for providing a bit of extra information to me, which, in one form or another, he has been doing for over 30 years. I am greatly obliged to him.
Mr Speaker
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I know he always likes to be helpful to the Chair and to the House. He anticipates me, but he is right in doing so. There will be a transcript of the proceedings, and I rather imagine that, in conformity with the usual practice of the House and of our distinguished Committees, it will be published sooner rather than later. I know it will then be subject to the beady eyes of colleagues on both sides of the Chamber and on both sides, if I may put it that way, of the Brexit argument. They will read into it what they wish and pursue their cause as they choose.
What I would say to the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra) is that if there is a material change in Government policy or intended practice on a very significant matter, it is customary that there should be a statement to the House. It would not always be an oral statement, but it might very well be an oral statement. The House knows very well that there are means by which to secure the attendance in the Chamber of a Minister if such a statement is not proffered. The position of the Chair is that the Chair does not seek to take sides on this matter. The Chair simply seeks to facilitate the expression of opinion. I would add that in addition to all the other debates we might have on these matters, there will in due course be legislation returning to the House, and it is a matter of public record that very large numbers of amendments have been tabled to the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill. At the Committee stage, the Chairman of Ways and Means will make a proper and judicious selection, based upon advice but deploying his own judgment, and at Report stage that responsibility will fall to me. I think Members know that I always will the fullest possible debate on the widest range of issues pertinent to a Bill, and so both sides of the argument can always feel that they have a friend in the Chair.
Mr Bone
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I do not know whether you recall what you were doing six years ago today. I suggest you were recovering from a mammoth session in the Chair, following a Backbench Business Committee debate, in prime time, when 81 Conservative Members declined to accept the advice of their Whips and voted for a referendum on the European Union. How could we mark that event, sir? Does it not show that Backbench Business motions do have an effect on Government policy?
Mr Speaker
Not for the first time, the hon. Gentleman is right on a matter of parliamentary history and precedent. I well recall that debate. It was a very significant debate, and I am going to vouchsafe to the hon. Gentleman something he probably did not know—he might not even want to know, but he is going to know. I regularly refer to that debate, together with the debate on Hillsborough and a number of others, as an example of a very significant debate under the auspices of the Backbench Business Committee—it was significant not just because of the quality of the debate, but because it had an impact on public policy. These references are in speeches that I make at universities and in front of other forums around the country, most recently at the invitation of the Hansard Society. I do not suppose the hon. Gentleman is such a sad anorak that he wishes to attend to all of my speeches on these occasions, but I am giving him the highlight.