Oral Answers to Questions Debate

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Department: Cabinet Office

Oral Answers to Questions

John Bercow Excerpts
Wednesday 25th June 2014

(10 years, 4 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Lord Maude of Horsham Portrait The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
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Mr Speaker, with permission I will take questions 1 and 10 together.

At the time of the last general election, there was no monitoring of taxpayer-funded trade union facility time in the civil service. We now have controls in place that saved £19 million last year, and we have already reduced the number of taxpayer-funded full-time union officials from 200 in May 2010 down to around a dozen this month.

John Bercow Portrait Mr Speaker
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I allowed the right hon. Gentleman to continue his answer, but my office advises me that it has not been notified of the grouping to which he refers. It might have been the intention, but my office indicates that it has not been notified of it, which obviously it should have been.

Alec Shelbrooke Portrait Alec Shelbrooke
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In the past, Departments gave paid time off for union conferences. Can my right hon. Friend confirm that this Government will not be spending taxpayers’ money packing civil servants off to the seaside?

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Jessica Morden Portrait Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)
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I want the Minister to understand just how fearful and uncertain staff at the MOJ shared services centre in Newport feel after this week’s announcement of privatisation. How can he justify the hypocrisy of the Prime Minister talking about the UK becoming an onshoring nation when under this contract jobs could be offshored? What guarantees are the Government offering that these jobs could stay in Newport?

John Bercow Portrait Mr Speaker
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Order. Before the Minister answers, the hon. Lady must withdraw the use of the word “hypocrisy”, as it relates to an individual Minister.

Jessica Morden Portrait Jessica Morden
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I withdraw it.

John Bercow Portrait Mr Speaker
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I am grateful to the hon. Lady.

Lord Maude of Horsham Portrait Mr Maude
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The hon. Lady is making assumptions about what will happen to those jobs which I have no reason to believe are justified. If the quality of the work and the efficiency at Newport is as good as she believes, I am sure that the management of SSCL will want to look carefully at retaining jobs there.

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Jim Cunningham Portrait Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)
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T5. The Government agreed to refund the Big Lottery Fund the £675 million taken for the Olympics. With the sales of the Olympic assets, is that still going ahead? How will the lottery be refunded if Olympic assets are leased instead of sold?

John Bercow Portrait Mr Speaker
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If the Minister heard that, I congratulate him on his hearing. The acoustics were not great.

Lord Maude of Horsham Portrait Mr Maude
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I heard some of it, Mr Speaker—enough to know that the right thing for me to do is to write to the hon. Gentleman with a detailed answer.

John Bercow Portrait Mr Speaker
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Before I call Mr Damian Collins at the start of questions to the Prime Minister, I wish to inform the House how I will be applying its sub judice rules to any exchanges on Mr Coulson’s case. I ask the House for some forbearance, as it is important to Members and those outside the House that the position is clear.

The House will know that Mr Coulson has now been convicted on a charge of conspiracy to intercept communications. The court has not yet sentenced Mr Coulson for that offence. There has as yet been no verdict on two charges against him of conspiracy to commit misconduct in public office. The rules of the House’s sub judice resolution, which the House rightly expects me to enforce, apply to criminal cases which are active. They cease to be active when

“they are concluded by verdict and sentence”,

so they apply in this case.

At the same time, the House’s resolution gives the Chair discretion in applying the rules. I have taken appropriate advice, as the House would expect—and, indeed, been in receipt of unsolicited advice, for which I am of course grateful. In the light of all the circumstances, I have decided, one, to allow reference to Mr Coulson’s conviction; two, not to allow reference to his sentencing by the court, such as speculation on the nature of that sentence; and three, not to allow reference to those charges on which the verdict is awaited. I rely upon hon. Members to exercise restraint, but if that proves unavailing, I will of course intervene. I hope that that is helpful to the House.

The Prime Minister was asked—
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Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton Portrait The Prime Minister
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Every single one of these issues was dealt with by the Leveson inquiry. [Interruption.]

John Bercow Portrait Mr Speaker
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Order. Mr Lucas, calm yourself. I am trying to offer you, on a weekly basis, therapeutic guidance, but there is a long way to go. There needs to be calm on both sides of the House.

Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton Portrait The Prime Minister
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Every single one of these issues was dealt with exhaustively by the Leveson inquiry. The terms of reference of the Leveson inquiry were agreed by the right hon. Gentleman, and they included

“the extent to which there was a failure to act on previous warnings about media misconduct”.

That is what Leveson looked into. He looked into all of these questions about the warnings I was given and the response I gave, and he made no criticism of my conduct. I know that the right hon. Gentleman was disappointed by the Leveson inquiry, but he called for it, it took place, and he should heed what it said.

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Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton Portrait The Prime Minister
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All of these issues—every single warning—were dealt with by the Leveson inquiry: an inquiry the right hon. Gentleman called for and an inquiry whose terms of reference he agreed. I know he cannot bear it, but Leveson made no criticism of my conduct in this regard whatsoever. You cannot call for a judge-led inquiry, participate in a judge-led inquiry, write the terms of reference of a judge-led inquiry, and then ignore what it has to say. I have to say, Mr Speaker, that all of the questions he is raising today are not new; they are the questions dealt with by the Leveson inquiry. I know—[Interruption.]

John Bercow Portrait Mr Speaker
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Order. The Prime Minister is offering an answer and it must be heard. [Interruption.] Order. It must be heard by the House. Both sides must be heard by the House, and that will happen, as it always does, however long this session has to run—about that, let us be absolutely clear.

Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton Portrait The Prime Minister
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I can quite understand why the right hon. Gentleman does not want to listen to an eight-month-long inquiry that cost £5 million, that interviewed people under oath, and that was led by a judge, but that is what he asked for, that is what was delivered, and it did not criticise my conduct in this regard at all. Instead of casting aspersions about that, he should accept the inquiry that he supported.

Ed Miliband Portrait Edward Miliband
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No answer—[Interruption.] No answer on any of the questions. No answer on why he did not act on The Guardian; no answer on why he did not act on the Deputy Prime Minister; no answer on why he did not act on The New York Times.

Let us come to the issue of vetting. Amid all those warnings, the very least he should have—[Interruption.]

John Bercow Portrait Mr Speaker
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Order. I apologise for interrupting the right hon. Gentleman, but there is the usual ranting from the usual suspects. Be quiet, or if you cannot be quiet, and you have not got that level of self-restraint, leave the Chamber—we can perfectly well manage without you.

Ed Miliband Portrait Edward Miliband
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Let us come to the issue of vetting. Amid all those warnings, the very least that the Prime Minister should have done was insist immediately on coming to office that Andy Coulson should have the highest level of security vetting, as his six predecessors over the previous 14 years had had. Why did he not insist on that?

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Ed Miliband Portrait Edward Miliband
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Now it is clear from the Prime Minister—[Hon. Members: “Weak!] I will tell them what is weak: failing to stand up for doing the right thing, and that is what this Prime Minister has done. Now we know the rule of this Prime Minister: the buck does not stop here, and he blames the civil service. On the civil service—[Interruption.]

John Bercow Portrait Mr Speaker
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Order. Sometimes one has to repeat a thing because people do not get it the first time. If there is quiet, we will continue. If people try to shout other people down, against the principles of British democracy, they will be stopped in their tracks. It is very simple and, I would have thought, pretty clear.

Ed Miliband Portrait Edward Miliband
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On the civil service, can the Prime Minister assure the House that at no time did Sir Gus O’Donnell, the then Cabinet Secretary, or any senior civil servant raise concerns with him or his office about hiring Andy Coulson?

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Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton Portrait The Prime Minister
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The right hon. Gentleman brought up the warning from The Guardian. I totally disproved him using the evidence. He brought up the idea of direct vetting. I have totally disproved him using the evidence. He cannot bear the fact that an eight-month inquiry which he hoped would pin the blame on me found that I had behaved correctly throughout. That is the case. All these issues were examined by the Leveson inquiry. If the right hon. Gentleman wants to debate the calls we make and the leadership we give, I am happy to do so anytime, because it is leadership that has got this economy moving, it is leadership that has got our deficit down, it is leadership that is putting Britain back to work, and it is the total absence of leadership from the Labour party that shows that it has nothing to say about Britain’s economic future.

John Bercow Portrait Mr Speaker
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Jake Berry—not here.

Elfyn Llwyd Portrait Mr Elfyn Llwyd (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)
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After many months of vehement anti-Iranian rhetoric from the Government and now the sudden change of heart, does the Prime Minister believe that the maxim “My enemy’s enemy is my friend” trumps all else?

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Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton Portrait The Prime Minister
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My hon. Friend is right to say that after the disappointment of the football, and also of that stunning test match where we lost on the second last ball, it is perhaps time to look to rugby to provide us with something to lift our spirits.

John Bercow Portrait Mr Speaker
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Last but not least, Caroline Lucas.

Caroline Lucas Portrait Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)
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In my constituency, one-third of homes are in the private rented sector. Tenants are often ripped off and forced to move at a month’s notice, and the average rent for a two-bedroom home is £1,200 a month. Will the Prime Minister back my call for a living rent commission to explore ways of bringing rents back into line with the basic cost of living?