Business of the House

Baroness Winterton of Doncaster Excerpts

Thursday 1st July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Ms Rosie Winterton (Doncaster Central) (Lab)]

Will the Deputy Leader of the House give us the forthcoming business for the week.

[The Parliamentary Secretary, Office of the Leader of the House of Commons (Mr David Heath)]

My right hon. Friend the Leader of the House has given notice to the shadow Leader of the House and to you, Mr Speaker, that he is attending a memorial service this morning. I will therefore be announcing the business and answering questions on his behalf. The business for the week commencing 5 July will include:

Monday 5 July—Motion relating to the Clear Line of Sight project, followed by opposed private business named by the Chairman of Ways and Means for consideration.

Tuesday 6 July—Second Reading of the Finance Bill.

Wednesday 7 July—Opposition day [3rd allotted day]. There will be a full day’s debate on Government support for jobs and the unemployed. This debate will arise on an Opposition motion.



Thursday 8 July—General debate on defendant anonymity.

The provisional business for the week commencing 12 July will include:



Monday 12 July—Proceedings on the Finance Bill (day 1). At 10 pm the House will be asked to agree all outstanding estimates.

Tuesday 13 July—Proceedings on the Consolidated Fund (Appropriation) Bill followed by proceedings on the Finance Bill (day 2).

Wednesday 14 July—Motion to approve a statutory instrument relating to counter-terrorism, followed by motion relating to police grant report, followed by motion to approve a European document relating to the European External Action Service.

Thursday 15 July—Proceedings on the Finance Bill (day 3).

I should also like to inform the House that the business in Westminster Hall will be:

Thursday 8 July—A debate on energy security.

[Ms Winterton]

I thank the Deputy Leader of the House for the business statement. I think it is in order to welcome him to his first business questions. I know that he has a long record of campaigning for respect for Parliament. Indeed, I was looking through his contributions to the last Parliament and noticed that he said Ministers should remember that

“their first responsibility in terms of information is to the House and nowhere else”.—[Official Report, 3 July 1998; Vol. 315, c. 657.]

I am sure that he was horrified when the Home Secretary was forced to come to the House to apologise for giving the media the statement on the immigration cap, which should have been given here.

Now at least the Home Secretary realised that this had been a step too far, but will the Deputy Leader of the House undertake to tick off the following offenders in respect of whom we would like to set up an early release of information scheme? First, there is the Defence Secretary for briefing on the departure of Sir Jock Stirrup. Secondly, there is the Secretary of State for Education for briefing on plans for schools. Thirdly, there is the Secretary of State for Health for briefing on the NHS operating framework. Then there is the entire Downing street staff for briefing on the whole Queen’s Speech. Then there is the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who has achieved a hat-trick here for briefing on spending cuts, financial reform and the Budget. Then there is the Secretary of State for Justice for briefing on prison reforms. I hope that the Deputy Leader of the House can assure us that he has checked with the Foreign Secretary to ensure that nothing has been said to the media this morning that should have been said to the House first. I am sure that the Deputy Leader of the House will seize this opportunity to take up the cause for Parliament, as I know he would hate to be accused of saying one thing in opposition and another thing in government.

Speaking of that, I was leafing through the Conservative-Liberal Democrat programme for government only this morning and came across the section on Government transparency. It is well worth a read, especially the bit that says:

“We will create a new ‘right to data’ so that government-held datasets can be requested and used by the public”.

Can the Deputy Leader of the House tell us whether that right extends to Members of Parliament, particularly when they are asking for figures such as those produced by the Treasury which showed that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had been warned that measures in the Budget would lead to 1.3 million people losing their jobs?

Given the Prime Minister’s extraordinary performance yesterday, when he refused even to acknowledge that those figures existed, will the Deputy Leader of the House place the Treasury documents in the Library? Will he also ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer to make a statement to the House telling us when he first saw those documents, and why he did not include them in his Budget statement? In that statement, will the Chancellor of the Exchequer be able to confirm whether there was any contact between Ministers and their Office for Budget Responsibility before the publication of their job forecasts yesterday?

Will the Deputy Leader of the House tell us whether there will be any report to the House on the Cabinet’s visit to Yorkshire? I noted that during that visit the Prime Minister was quizzed on how the Government’s protestations of support for manufacturing tallied with the withdrawal of the loan to Sheffield Forgemasters. Perhaps the Deputy Leader of the House will also explain why the Leader of the House of the House said last week that

“the Deputy Prime Minister is meeting Sheffield Forgemasters tomorrow in his constituency.” —[Official Report, 24 June 2010; Vol. 512, c. 433.]

I understand that no such meeting was planned, or took place. I can only imagine that the Leader of the House was misled by the Deputy Prime Minister. I am sure that the Deputy Leader of the House will want to clarify exactly what happened, so that Members can be clear about what support is actually being given to important manufacturing companies such as Sheffield Forgemasters.

Can the Deputy Leader of the House also help us out by telling us whether there will be a statement on the future of the Tenant Services Authority? Apparently the Housing Minister has called it “toast”, but the Chief Secretary has said that abolishing it would put the finances of housing associations at risk. It would greatly assist the House, and Opposition Members in particular, to know that there is absolutely no sense of disagreement between Conservative and Liberal Democrat Ministers. We certainly wish to be assured that the Liberal Democrats are 100% behind all Conservative policy, including putting up VAT, putting people out of work, and the huge cuts that are to be made in public services.

[Mr Heath]

The shadow Leader of the House has asked me to restate a position that I stated many times in opposition, and I have no hesitation in doing so. It is entirely clear, not only to me but in the ministerial code of conduct, that announcements of substantive changes in policy should be made to the House in the first instance, and I know perfectly well that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House brought that to the attention of the Cabinet yet again only this week. You, Mr Speaker, made it very clear in your statement yesterday, and it is our clear intention that it should be the case. I have to tell the shadow Leader of the House that occasionally there will be mistakes—[Interruption.] Even Government Departments sometimes make mistakes, and that is obviously what happened in the case of the Home Office announcement last week. What happened was that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary came to the House to apologise for that mistake, and that is the right way of dealing with it.

It is important that we make sure that changes of policy are properly represented to the House, but I say gently to Labour Members that there is very little point in raising as points of order or at business questions issues raised by Ministers that are clearly set out in existing policy in the coalition document. I am so pleased that the shadow Leader of the House bothers to read that document. If it is policy set out in the coalition document, it should be no great surprise that Ministers adopt the policy and are prepared to speak about it. Therefore, it is not the case that that is an inappropriate way of addressing political issues.

I shall now deal with the other issues that the right hon. Lady raised. She mentioned an issue relating to housing associations. That is important and I shall take the matter back to the Departments and ask whether it is possible for a clear statement of the position to be given—we will ensure that that is the case.

The right hon. Lady asked about the position on the employment figures and the expectations set out by a variety of economists on what might happen. I have to say that I do not always have great faith in what economists predict; nevertheless this is an important issue. What I do have faith in is the newly established Office for Budget Responsibility, which is independent of Government and has set out the figures. I thought that the Opposition supported it. I thought that they saw it, as we do, as being a gold standard of accurate information presented to the House, but they prefer to bang on about figures that they want to choose instead. There will be an Opposition day debate next week, when the Opposition will choose the matters that we will be debating. So she asks for an opportunity to raise these issues with Ministers and she will have the opportunity to raise them with Ministers. Finally, I have to say to her that the figure that was given—the 1.3 million losses that she cited—was coupled with 2.5 million increases in employment in the very same breath. By my simple arithmetic that makes a 1.2 million increase, and the fact that Labour Members cannot do that simple sum explains to me why this country is in the position it is.