Participation in Debates

Valerie Vaz Excerpts

Monday 16th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I can certainly answer the last bit of the question first. I would always be delighted to meet my hon. Friend at any point, and we can do it virtually or simply by telephone, if that is convenient for him. As Leader of the House, I have made it clear always to all right hon. and hon. Members that it is my role to have as many meetings as right hon. and hon. Members want, so it would be a pleasure to see my hon. Friend. He raises a very important point and one on which I have the greatest sympathy with him and other right hon. and hon. Members: it is, of course, difficult for those with family responsibilities and those with obligations both to themselves and to others who are concerned about their safety and the safety of members of their family. There are, however, a number of constraints on what can be done practically, so these are the considerations we have to take into account before making the decision as to what we are to do in this Chamber and how we are to react to all the various circumstances of individual Members of Parliament.

First, it is important that the House of Commons is a covid-secure workplace, and— very much under your auspices, Mr Speaker, but also under the House authorities’ —that has been ensured. Great steps have been taken since March to ensure that covid security is of the highest level. I think there would be few workplaces in the country that can compete with that. That is important because ensuring that people who come into this place are safe has been your highest priority, Mr Speaker, and also, of course, the high priority of the Clerk of the House of Commons, who has the technical legal responsibility for the safety of this place.

The second point is that it is important that legislation passes and that the Government are held to account in an effective way. There, I look at what happened in May and June, when a number of activities were cancelled altogether: we did not have Backbench business days and we did not have Westminster Hall, but we had three days a week primarily of Government business. The Government business was very heavily truncated and Ministers, to my mind—and I think of many right hon. and hon. Members —were not fully or properly held to account during that period. It was, in the words of the Chairman of the Procedure Committee, “sub-optimal”, a word that became very fashionable. My right hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Karen Bradley) is very much a leader of fashion, and certainly in linguistic fashion she set the tone with the word “sub-optimal”. But it also meant that Government legislation was not getting through in a timely manner. Government legislation is not just important from the point of view of Government, it is important from the point of view of democratic propriety. The Government were elected just about a year ago on a manifesto and they have a duty to the British people to deliver on what was proposed, in addition to ensuring that we are prepared for 31 December, which is quite an important date, because on that day the transition period ends and legislation has to be in place to ensure that. Unfortunately, with the fully hybrid proceedings, that was not working and that is why we had to move back to a more physical Parliament to ensure that we could deliver on the manifesto commitments, ensure that the Government were held to account, allow for Backbench business debates and get on with business.

There is one other very important and fundamental point which I would like to make to my hon. Friend, because I am sure he will understand it and will sympathise with it. As Members of Parliament, we are key workers and we must behave as other key workers do. Last week, I had to write to a constituent of mine in exactly the same position as my hon. Friend. The Government guidance is that if you are living with somebody who is clinically extremely vulnerable, it does not mean that you should not go to work in a covid-safe environment. That is the advice of Her Majesty’s Government to our constituents, and I do not think it would be right of me to stand here and say that we should treat Members of Parliament differently from the way we are treating our constituents. Indeed, I believe it is of fundamental importance that, as we carry out our duty as key workers, we must consider how other key workers are operating, and we must be shoulder to shoulder with them. So to ensure the legislative programme and proper accountability, we are able to make further steps to allow more remote participation, but we are not able to make remote participation unlimited, much though I think everybody sympathises with my hon. Friend and other Members in similar positions.

[Valerie Vaz (Walsall South) (Lab)]

I thank the hon. Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Baron) for securing the urgent question and you, Mr Speaker, for granting it. Why did the Leader of the House think it was necessary to make some sort of announcement on Twitter without having the courtesy to let the House know? He will know that I wrote to him on Friday, along with the chair of the Human Rights Committee, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman), and the Chair of the Women and Equalities Committee, the right hon. Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes), to ask him to look again at participation of hon. and right hon. Members in debates. The Leader of the House has been warned on a number of occasions that this would happen, and on each occasion he has said no, no, no, without even considering what we have been saying.

I agree with the right hon. Gentleman: everyone was moved by the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) when she asked at business questions why she was not allowed to take part in the debate—if she had been able to, imagine how someone going through what she is going through could have informed that debate.

I have previously raised the point that there are two classes of Members, and that that is undemocratic. The right hon. Gentleman says that it is our duty to be here but it is our duty to represent our constituents, and the Leader of the House is suppressing and extinguishing the voices of right hon. and hon. Members in that debate. Effectively, he is saying that all Members are equal but some are more equal than others. Where have we heard that before?

Will the Leader of the House now accept that he has excluded hon. Members from doing their democratic duty for their constituents, and will he please revert back to the world-leading system that worked? Such debates should be for every Member, not just a certain class. Why should hon. Members be identified as clinically extremely vulnerable? That is a privacy issue.

The contacts of the hon. Member for Ashfield (Lee Anderson) may well have been identified and isolated, but he did not have a proxy and he was in the queue—that means that he has exposed all hon. Members who were in that queue. Will the Leader of the House look again at remote voting? He said that the system broke down, but that was once and it was corrected. We are so far down the road from the start. The Lords are actually undertaking seven to eight hours of virtual proceedings and they are now looking at the second Chamber. Debate is controlled by call lists, anyway, so will the right hon. Gentleman look at Westminster Hall and Public Bill Committees, which involve small groups and could be done by Zoom? Will he also confirm how long the proposed changes will last and commit to cross-party talks before they are removed?

Finally, I wish a speedy recovery to the Prime Minister, the hon. Member for Ashfield and all other Members who are isolating.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

Indeed. We all wish all hon. Members who are suffering from covid a speedy recovery and let us hope that those who are isolating have not caught the disease.

I really would not hold up their lordships’ House as a model. Having a voting system that collapses is deeply unsatisfactory and meant that their business for a day was lost. That was a failure of their system—

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I begin by wishing the hon. Lady well in her recovery.

I am sure the whole House would like me to do that.

[Valerie Vaz]

indicated assent.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I doubt the hon. Lady can see, but the shadow Leader of the House is nodding. I know everyone here wishes her well.

As I said earlier, this is a balance between ensuring that parliamentary business is carried out properly and allowing those who are extremely clinically vulnerable to be able to participate. That will not be perfect in terms of debate—they will not be able to take interventions, nor will they be able to intervene. It is hard to see how that could function effectively. The greater the numbers who were involved, the harder it would be to make the system work effectively. I think we have the balance about right, although I absolutely understand that it will be difficult for some right hon. and hon. Members.