Business of the House (Private Members’ Bills)

Philip Hollobone Excerpts

Thursday 23rd February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

I welcome the publication of the suggested 13 sitting Fridays for private Members’ Bills, but I must add that I think it discourteous to the House for the Government to publish the calendar and circulate it widely before a motion has been passed on the Floor of the House. I understand that the calendar was published several weeks before today’s debate and, ultimately, the decision.

The timing of some of the Fridays is different from that in previous years. For example, I think that this is the first occasion on which both Fridays during the September sitting have been devoted to private Members’ Bills, and I should be interested to hear from the Deputy Leader of the House why those two dates have been chosen. I am not sure whether it is a good thing or a bad thing, but presumably there is at least a modicum of reasoning behind it, and I should like to know what that reasoning is.

I should also like the Deputy Leader to reassure me that the Government have no intention of doing in the next Session what they did in the present Session, when they blocked the progress of at least two private Members’ Bills by failing to move in a timely manner the money motion attached to them. I refer, of course, to the Local Government Ombudsman (Amendment) Bill, promoted by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope), and the Daylight Saving Bill, promoted by my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Rebecca Harris). The latter attracted huge support from Members on both sides of the House, and more progress would have been made on it—indeed, it could well have completed its passage through the House—had the Government not delayed the moving of its money motion by nine months.

I hope that, in seeking the House’s approval of the proposed dates, the Deputy Leader of the House will place on record his intention of ensuring that the timetable is realistic, and that the Government will not try to muck about with money motions as they have done during the current Session.