Ministerial Statements

Sarah Wollaston Excerpts

Monday 5th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Knight]

The complainant might indeed be being political, but if a complaint was made with no grounds, in fact I would expect Mr Speaker to block it. I do not know whether my hon. Friend was suggesting that there would be a difficulty in the process, but I do not particularly think that there would. I have every confidence that the occupant of the Chair—whoever it was—would see that justice was done.

The Government made some issue of the fact that the Procedure Committee did not receive any formal evidence from the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards on this proposal. I am rather baffled by that comment, because the Procedure Committee’s report does not suggest that the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards has any role in the process, so it is not clear why the Government think that we should have received evidence from him.

The Government said that they do not accept the Committee’s recommendation that the penalty for a breach of House protocol would be a recommendation from the Standards and Privileges Committee that the Minister concerned should apologise to the House. Instead, the Government note that there is no evidence that there is a significant problem with Ministers refusing to apologise to the House when a breach occurs. However, that rather misses the point, which is that the Standards and Privileges Committee would have no need to use its powers if there was no problem to be dealt with. If a Minister had already apologised, there would be no need to go there.

It is perhaps also worth reminding those on the Treasury Bench that the Government have repeatedly expressed support for their own protocol and that the Government are saying that they agree with the majority of Members of this House that the House should be told first when there is an announcement of Government policy. It seems to me, therefore, that the serious leaks that occurred last week should also be deplored by those on the Treasury Bench. I hope that the Leader of the House, when he comes to address us, will add his voice to those that have already placed on record a number of concerns about the leaking of large parts of the autumn statement. Many Members wonder why the Chancellor has not apologised.

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend referred earlier to the discourtesy of leaking to the press, but does he agree that these leaks involve a discourtesy in that they might be given to some hon. Members before others, placing some Members at a disadvantage?

[Mr Knight]

I do indeed, and I believe that that happened last week. For example, the BBC television news in Humberside had the Chancellor’s announcement on the plan to reduce the tolls on the Humber bridge pretty much word for word and ran it 24 hours before the House was told. It seemed rather strange to me that a couple of hon. Members who happened to have seats near the Humber bridge were available on the bridge itself to do media interviews when the leak occurred.

If the Government do not believe what they say about Parliament being told first and want to leak or announce policies or decisions to the press first, they should come out in the open and say so and they should change their ministerial code.

I now turn to the motion before us. Although I think we are all grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering for bringing this matter before us today, I must say that I would have preferred it had he consulted the Procedure Committee before he settled on the wording of the motion. I understand that the right hon. Member for Rother Valley, to whom I have spoken about this matter and who chairs the Standards and Privileges Committee, was also not consulted on the terms of the motion before it was tabled or the timing. That is unfortunate. I do not want to tell the right hon. Gentleman, who does his own job perfectly well without any intervention from me, what he might or might not want to do, but he might have wanted to take the matter to his Committee and to have shown it the scope of the draft motion before it was brought to the House.

It is a pity that neither of the two Committees that the House has asked to consider these matters was consulted by the signatories to the motion. That is important because we have not yet debated the Procedure Committee’s report in the House, but the motion addresses only some of the issues raised by the Committee in its report on ministerial statements and ignores others. It is a cherry-picking motion and its scope has been determined without any reference to those who have responsibility for looking into this matter, having been asked to do so by the House.

The motion ignores the Procedure Committee’s recommendations on urgent questions and written statements. For example, we believe there are some occasions on which written statements should be open to oral scrutiny. The motion is therefore unsatisfactory and its timing, coming as it does without that consultation having taken place, is unfortunate. I do believe that action on this issue is necessary, as Governments of both political persuasions have been prepared regularly to flout the ministerial code when it suits them by leaking news to the press. However, I also believe that the way this matter has been brought forward today is unfortunate. Rather like the leaks themselves, it is no way to do business.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Syms]

We have to look at the situation realistically. When the Prime Minister goes to the EU to negotiate with other leaders, at the end of that negotiation he stands on a platform next to the Union Jack and the EU flag and announces what has been discussed, what we have agreed with and what we have disagreed with. He sets out how he has been batting for Britain. What we are now saying is that whereas Merkel, Sarkozy or any of the other leaders can put the best face on their negotiation, the British Prime Minister will not be able to do so because he will have to come back here to make a statement, which he does anyway.

[Dr Wollaston]

Clearly, in that instance, Members of this House hear the statement at the same time as members of the press. If leaks are going to take place, which my hon. Friend is justifying, should they also be to Members at the same time?

[Mr Syms]

We all watch the news. I suspect that the vast majority of us are addicts of the 24-hour news channels. I keep being criticised by my wife for switching from channel to channel watching what is on the news, on Bloomberg, on ITV and on Sky. We all watch what goes on. Other Government leaders can stand up and announce what they have negotiated, but we are saying to our Prime Minister, “You can’t do that. You’ve got to whiz back here and give a statement.”

Let me give another example. We have a eurozone crisis. The markets are moving faster than the Governments and the political leaders. What happens when there is a eurozone crisis at the end of business on a non-sitting Friday, and the Chancellor has to make a statement before the markets open on Monday, which is a sitting day? Does he sit in the Chamber till 3.30 pm before he sets out what the Government are going to do, or does he make a statement setting out the Government’s emergency plans before the markets open in Europe and in the UK? If we think it is more important for him to speak to the House, he shuts up and people get plastered in the markets.

The reality is that we want Ministers in whom we have confidence and who speak for the majority of the people in the House. They have to command a majority. The Chancellor would have to come here eventually to answer questions about why he had conducted business in a particular way, but modern markets and modern international negotiation sometimes mean that Ministers make statements in press conferences and for the TV, rather than in the House.