HC Deb 09 March 1973 vol 852 cc846-7

Order for Second Reading read.

Hon. Members

Object.

Mr. Patrick Cormack (Cannock)

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I seek your guidance and help, though I realise that you may not be able to give me an answer now. In December 1970—I think that it was on 13th December, but I do not have HANSARD with me—Mr. Speaker King ruled that the names of two Members be deleted from the list of sponsors of the Hare Coursing (Abolition) Bill because they had acted as Tellers for the Noes in order to provoke a spurious Division.

I submit that, although there is not an exact parallel here, there is something of a parallel in the antics of the hon. Member for Fife, West (Mr. William Hamilton). He objects to my unit pricing Bill week after week, as he is perfectly entitled to do, but he is himself thoroughly in favour of the principle of unit pricing.

When Mr. Speaker King gave his ruling, he said that it was a common practice and custom of the House from time immemorial that a Member's vote should agree with his voice. I humbly submit that there may well have been something of a precedent created then, and that it should now be honoured by the hon. Member for Fife, West.

Mr. William Hamilton (Fife, West)

The rules of the House, as the hon. Member for Cannock (Mr. Cormack) knows, enable a Member to do what I am now doing, irrespective of the merits of the Bill before the House. My own Bill has just had the same done to it by the hon. Member for Glasgow, Hillhead (Mr. Galbraith).

Mr. Cormack

That is nothing to do with it.

Mr. Hamilton

It has everything to do with it, so long as the House behaves in the absurd way it does after four o'clock on a Friday. Any Member is allowed to use, or abuse, the rules as he thinks fit. I do not try to hide my identity, either.

Mr. Deputy Speaker

Order. There is no need to take this matter further. The hon. Member for Fife, West (Mr. William Hamilton) is within his rights in objecting. I cannot uphold what the hon. Member for Cannock (Mr. Cormack) has said.

Mr. Anthony Fell (Yarmouth)

Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. With the greatest respect, although the general principle is as you have enunciated it, is it in order for the hon. Member for Fife, West (Mr. William Hamilton) to talk about the absurd way that Parliament behaves on every Friday?

Mr. Deputy Speaker

I am the judge of order, and I have seen nothing out of order in that respect so far.

Mr. Cormack

Further to my point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I am sorry to raise the matter again, but I was seeking your guidance, although I well appreciate that you may not be able to give it today. My point concerns Mr. Speaker King's ruling that a Member's vote and his voice must agree.

Mr. Deputy Speaker

Perhaps the hon. Member will take steps to find out the answer to that elsewhere.

Second Reading deferred till Friday next.