Business of the House (Today)

Philip Davies Excerpts

Monday 20th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

Go on, Peter.

[Mr Bone]

My hon. Friend may want to bring this up afterwards, but the motions are very complicated and it might take the Minister of State, Department for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Pendle (Andrew Stephenson), at least an hour and a half to explain to the House what on earth they mean. Perhaps he does not know—I do not know—as they are extremely complicated.

This is not about that, really. I am trying to complain about the Government’s habit of tabling business of the House motions to eat into the time for debate so that anyone with a concern about the procedure who speaks to the business of the House motion is hurting the people who want to talk about the actual issue.

Will the Leader of the House tell us that, in future, the Government will stick to the Standing Orders and allow a proper one and a half hour debate after the business of the House motion has been decided upon? It is a small but important part of our democracy that the Government do not tweak our Standing Orders to their own advantage.

We have a great Leader of the House, and he does not need to detain the House much longer. Will he just say that this will not happen in future?