Points of Order

Toby Perkins Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

The response to the hon. Gentleman is twofold. [Interruption.] Order. If a Minister wishes to catch my eye, he or she is perfectly entitled to do so, but the hon. Gentleman raised his point of order, at least ostensibly, with the Chair and therefore perhaps he will rest content with my answer, and the answer is, as I said, twofold. First, it is up to Ministers to decide whether they think an oral statement is required. Secondly, in the absence of an oral statement, it is perfectly open to the hon. Gentleman to seek a debate in this House on the Adjournment. To the best of my knowledge, the hon. Gentleman has not thus far done so, but he might find that he is successful if he does. We will leave that matter there for today.

[Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I have notified the Justice Secretary of my intention to raise this point of order. Yesterday in Justice questions he claimed that my allegations about the selection process for the south Yorkshire probation service were nonsense and that there was a carefully constructed process of selection and a proper appeal mechanism for those who were not selected. I have here a letter from Angela Tinker, the human resources systems manager at South Yorkshire Probation Trust, to my constituent, Gwen MacDonald, in which she says:

“There was a random selection process and employee numbers were used to select between NPS”—

national probation service—“and CRC”, or community rehabilitation companies. It continues:

“Employee numbers were drawn out of a hat”,

which confirms exactly the allegations I was making, and also that yesterday the Justice Secretary inadvertently misled the House. Can you, Mr Speaker, let us know how he might have the opportunity to set the record straight?

[Mr Speaker]

There are two points here. First, everybody takes responsibility for his or her utterances in this House. There is a formal means by which a Minister can correct the record, if he or she judges it necessary to do so, and that is through a statement to colleagues. Secondly—and I say this in all politeness to the hon. Gentleman, as I did to another Member—Members should not use the point of order procedure to continue debate. Although I am greatly flattered by the extent of the powers that hon. and right hon. Members think I enjoy, they sometimes have a somewhat exaggerated notion of what, in practice, I can be expected to achieve. The hon. Gentleman is, I am sure, now an increasingly experienced and discerning fellow. Judging by the broad smile on his face, he knows that he has had a go and he has got it on the record, and he can now go and enjoy his lunch, resting content. We will leave it there.