Points of Order

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Monday 10th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker—

[Alec Shelbrooke (Elmet and Rothwell) (Con)]

We haven’t started.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. That was an exceptionally ignorant observation from a sedentary position by the hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke). If he would sit quietly and listen, instead of pontificating from ignorance, he might one of these days learn something.

[Yvette Cooper]

Will you confirm, Mr Speaker, that the motion on the Order Paper refers to the criminal justice and data protection regulations, which, as you have said, include 11 measures, none of which is the European arrest warrant? Will you therefore confirm that this is not a vote on the European arrest warrant today?

[Mr Speaker]

I can. Members can interpret all they like, but there will not today be a vote on the specific matter of membership of the European arrest warrant. That is the reality.

[Mr Speaker]

I will come to other Members, as these are important matters that have considerably and understandably exercised hon. and right hon. Members, but first I call Yvette Cooper on that point of order.

[Yvette Cooper]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. I thank you for your response, which is very clear. The Home Secretary wrote to me on 9 November and said that she wanted to be absolutely clear that Monday’s debate and vote in the House of Commons would be a debate and vote on the whole package of 35 measures, including the arrest warrant. Will you therefore confirm that that is not correct?

[Mr Speaker]

I stand by what I have said. The House will understand that in doing so I do not act entirely alone and certainly I do not do so without studying the matters and taking the advice of disinterested experts. That is what I have done, because that is my responsibility. The Home Secretary, of course, can offer her own take on the matter and doubtless she will do so. I have advanced the position in what I believe to be factual terms, unadorned but benefiting from expert advice.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Speaker]

The answer is that we are voting on the regulations, which I am sure the hon. Gentleman has studied comprehensively. When he says that he is confused, I find it hard to credit. He is a sophisticated barrister and has served in the House for 31 years and five months—[Interruption.] Yes, and a day. He has served in the House for 31 years, five months and a day, so I cannot believe that he is confused about anything.

Nine hon. Members wrote to me, presumably independently of each other because I do not think that Members are in the habit of sharing their letters to the Speaker with each other, to indicate that they intended to speak in the debate on the European arrest warrant. They obviously all thought the same thing. I will let the hon. Gentleman into a secret: I, too, thought that we would be debating and voting on the European arrest warrant. However, I ask him to bear it in mind that I am just the Speaker. Government Whips sometimes have another language altogether, which only they understand.

[Yvette Cooper]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. Given the confusion and secrecy that there has clearly been, the difference between your clear advice to us and the Home Secretary’s letter to me, and the fact that the Home Secretary is sitting here, do you not think that this is a great opportunity for her to stand at the Dispatch Box and make a point of order to clarify the position—are we voting on the European arrest warrant or not?

[Mr Speaker]

It is open to the Home Secretary to do so. She may feel that she wants to set out her thoughts in the debate, and she is welcome to do that.

In all courtesy, I must come to the point of order from the hon. Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg).