Draft Postal Packets (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2023

William Cash Excerpts

Monday 17th July 2023 General Committees

[Mr Mark Francois (Rayleigh and Wickford) (Con)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Pritchard. I have two quick points.

First, I understand that the knife on the Illegal Migration Bill will fall at 6.26 pm. If you were a cynic, you would believe that the Government deliberately timed this debate for this evening, knowing that it would be ripped up by all those votes, bearing in mind we had 18 votes on the Bill last week. If you are a cynic, it is perfectly obvious to see what the Government have done; they have timed the debate now so it will be interrupted by the votes. However, can you confirm, Mr Pritchard, that if these proceedings are interrupted, there will be injury time so the debate will begin again quite a long while later, after the votes have taken place?

Secondly, for the record, the Committee of Selection nominated Members to this SI Committee last week in the normal way, including my hon. Friends the Members for Windsor, for Rochford and Southend East, for Devizes, for Dudley North and for Don Valley. I understand that some or all of those people indicated to the Whips in conversations over the weekend that they had what theologians might call “doubts” about the Government’s approach. Some even threatened to vote against the legislation, whereupon they were summarily removed from the Committee by the Whips, using a procedure that is normally used only for last-minute substitutions and very special circumstances—for instance, if a family member is ill.

In 22 years in this House, I have never known the Whips, from either side, to do this. This is beyond sixth-form politics. This is manipulating the parliamentary process because the Windsor framework is clearly a failure, and it is such a failure that the Whips have to rig Committees to get it through, so they have found a bunch of other Members, at short notice, who perhaps, shall we say, are not quite as inquisitive as the five who were nobbled. You have been here a long while, Mr Pritchard; have you, in your time in this House, ever known anything quite as shameful as this?

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Pritchard, I thoroughly endorse what my hon. Friend the Member for Rochford and Southend East and my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford have said. I have been here nearly 40 years, and I have never seen anything like this. I really do deeply resent the fact that this has been done in the manner in which it has been done. Already, comments are being made on the Floor of the House, which are part of the record, and it is an extraordinary situation. I have never seen anything like it and I think that it is outrageous.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

I am grateful for that point of order, and I can say to you that the Clerk very ably read out why we are here. We are definitely going to move on to it as some point.

[Sir William Cash]

On a point of order, Mr Pritchard. So many of our arrangements are exercised by virtue of conventions. The question of what the precision of a particular rule is has to be weighed against the conventions, against which the debate is being conducted on this occasion. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford and my hon. Friend the Member for Rochford and Southend East made clear, the bottom line is that there are occasions when the conventions are bypassed for good reasons. But under the precept that convention is about the reason for the rule, I can say only that this is a gross breach of the convention, because it is perfectly apparent that the reason for making the changes that have been made in this Committee has nothing to do with the question of whether the people who are being substituted on the Committee were there in the first place. It is precisely because it is quite clear that the Government would lose the vote in Committee—that is where the problem lies. That is the constitutional problem with which you and we are faced, Mr Pritchard.

[The Chair]

On the point about convention, the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, but he will know, probably more than anybody else on the Committee, that this House, apart from “Erskine May”—parallel to that—runs very much on convention. I refer him to the most recent ruling on such an occurrence happening, which was from Mr Speaker in the main Chamber this afternoon. That is the very latest ruling from the Speaker, drawing on convention. I am just a minor Member of the Panel of Chairs: the hon. Gentleman would not expect me to take a different view from that of Mr Speaker, given all the advice he received.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

I am grateful for that point of order, which comes from possibly the master of civility himself. He will recognise that my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford has put the record straight, even if he did not have to in the opinion of my right hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset, and I am grateful for his doing so.

[Sir William Cash]

On a point of information as well as a point of order, Mr Pritchard. If I heard you correctly, I think you said that the decision was taken by the Committee of Selection. I do not think that is necessarily the case, but I would be grateful to know whether the changes were made by the Committee of Selection or by other persons.

[The Chair]

No, I said that the Committee sets its own rules. I was not referring specifically to whether the Committee of Selection was involved in any of the changes. I refer the hon. Gentlemen to the reply I gave some moments ago on convention—whether it is popular or not, it is convention. If the House wants to change the rules, the House and hon. and right hon. Members in this place might want to raise it elsewhere. If they want to raise this debate more comprehensively over a wider expanse of time, they can do so, as I set out earlier.