§ Mr. PagetOn a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I do not know whether you observed that on Tuesday we had two Questions to the Prime Minister, and we had two yesterday and none today. This process of Questions seems to be becoming slower and slower. Is there anything that you can do about it?
§ Mr. SpeakerI am obliged to the hon. and learned Member. He gives me a cue at the end of this Session to renew my standard plea to hon. Members 2580 to help me in making progress with Questions. Today, I suspect that the fault was largely mine in allowing too many supplementary questions, but on no occasion when I stopped a topic was there any lack of hon. Members seeking to ask them.
§ Mr. LiptonCould consideration be given by the Leader of the House to the suggestion which I made that Prime Minister's Questions should start at No.—
§ Mr. Emrys HughesOne.
§ Mr. Lipton—No. 30, or, I accept the suggestion, No. 1, on one or two days a week?
§ Mr. ShinwellHave I not on previous occasions suggested that the Prime Minister's Questions might be brought forward? I do not suggest that they should start at No. 1 or No. 10, but that they should start at a quarter-past three. That would be reasonable. I am sure that it must be embarrassing to the Prime Minister, who is anxious to furnish information to the House, that he is prevented from doing so by an out-of-date regulation. Surely something of that sort could be done. The Prime Minister could prevent this difficulty himself if he so decided.
§ Mr. Emrys HughesWill you not give consideration to the Prime Minister coming on to bat first, because that will give us an opportunity of bowling him out?
§ Mr. Hector HughesDoes not the difficulty arise partly from the fact that Ministers have departed from the time-honoured custom of making statements involving long Answers at the end of Questions? Lately, the habit has grown of Ministers answering at inordinate length instead of postponing—