Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

Debate between Simon Hoare and Caroline Nokes

Friday 16th May 2025 Commons Chamber

[Simon Hoare]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I do not wish to be flippant or to test the patience of the House, but we have just heard an important speech from a former Attorney General on some key legal points. This is still a private Member’s proposal. How can the promoter of the Bill, the hon. Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater), respond to whether to accept amendments to her proposed legislation if she is not in the Chamber to hear the arguments? Is it not a discourtesy to the House and those who have spent some considerable time working on amendments, on both sides of the argument, for her not to be here to hear what they are advocating?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I thank the hon. Member for his point of order, but he will know that that is not a matter for the Chair.

I remind the House that although there is no formal time limit, many Members wish to contribute in this very important debate and it would be helpful if Members could keep their remarks to within the eight minutes that was suggested.

House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill

Debate between Simon Hoare and Caroline Nokes

2nd reading
Tuesday 15th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Simon Hoare]

Labour were very keen to stop the Member for Stoke Newington being elected, and doubtless she would have been donning ermine at some point, so again I think the hon. Gentleman is on slightly thin ice. I say to the hon. Member for Calder Valley (Josh Fenton-Glynn), who is looking confused, that I am talking about the Mother of the House, the right hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott). I say to him, “Keep up, 007!” I do not know whether he noticed it during the election campaign, but there was quite a lot in the media about it. He should look it up—the House of Commons Library is frightfully helpful on these sorts of things.

So I say to my right hon. Friend the Member for Hertsmere, with huge reluctance and sadness, that I am more than likely to sit this one out, as the Chair of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee—and I am sure that the Committee will want to look at this in more detail when we are up and running. But the underlying principle that the Minister has set forward is a compelling one. It is a sadness, a disappointment and a surprise that he is not taking this opportunity, after 14 years preparing in opposition, and after a century of making the case from the centre-left of British politics, and with a massive Commons majority, and that this timid little church mouse of a Bill is the best that he can offer us this afternoon.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call Claire Hazelgrove to make her maiden speech.