Steve Baker
Main Page: Steve Baker (Conservative - Wycombe)Department Debates - View all Steve Baker's debates with the Leader of the House
(12 years, 6 months ago)
Commons ChamberMy hon. Friend raises the point that there are now other mechanisms. The Backbench Business Committee is one and Westminster Hall debates, in which Ministers are held to account and have to give answers, are another. There are new avenues for Back Benchers now.
It is this frustration that led me to table my own, admittedly tongue-in-cheek, early-day motion 432, calling for early-day motions to be reformed or abolished. I believe that the other 44 Members who have kindly signed my early-day motion share my frustration—
If I signed early-day motions, I would have signed my hon. Friend’s early-day motion.
I am grateful to my hon. Friend.
As I was saying, the signatories include Members from both sides of the House, with several senior Members and former Cabinet Ministers and, astoundingly, my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley). When I first discovered he had signed my early-day motion, I wondered whether it was perhaps by accident—