John Bercow
Main Page: John Bercow (Speaker - Buckingham)
Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. May I ask your advice, drawing on “Erskine May”? The Chief Secretary has repeatedly said that he has been advised by the DWP that the future jobs fund is not working. He said that it is not working; he did not say that it was more expensive than other cheaper programmes. Given that that is very different from the advice given to previous Ministers, and from the views of Jobcentre Plus, those on the future jobs funds and doing those jobs, and those running those programmes across the country—and also different from the view of the Prime Minister who described one of the future jobs fund programmes that he visited during the election as a good scheme—will the Chief Secretary now publish the advice that says it is not working, according to “Erskine May”, which states that
“it has been accepted that a document that has been cited by a Minister ought to be laid upon the Table of the House”?
Mr Speaker
The right hon. Lady has again demonstrated her parliamentary ingenuity, but I fear that she knows very well that what she has just raised is not a point of order, but a point of debate, and she has put her views—and probably the views of her colleagues—fairly and squarely on the record.
Did Mr Straw wish to raise a point of order?
Mr Speaker
We are grateful to the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) for his sedentary commentary.
Bill Presented
Identity Documents Bill
Presentation and First Reading (Standing Order No. 57)
Secretary Theresa May, supported by the Prime Minister, Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, Secretary Hague, Secretary Kenneth Clarke and Damian Green, presented a Bill to make provision for and in connection with the repeal of the Identity Cards Act 2006.
Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time tomorrow, and to be printed (Bill 1) with explanatory notes (Bill 1-EN).