§ Mr. J. Enoch Powell (Down, South)On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I wish to raise with you a matter of which I have given you notice. Hon. Members recently received notice to the effect that as from next Monday they would be entitled, upon request, to receive during the course of a sitting a clean copy of the corrected Hansard report of what they had said during that sitting.
I understand that the utilisation by Members of the record of their contributions to the debate is a matter within the scope of the Chair. I therefore wish to raise with you the question of the use in debate by hon. Members of the reports of their speeches thus obtained.
It has, I think, been a convention of our debates that we do not quote documentary evidence to one another as to what has been said previously in the course of the same debate. It appears from the wording of the notice which hon. Members have received that that possibility would be open. I wonder whether, having given consideration to this, Mr. Speaker, you would wish to make a ruling upon that aspect of the new arrangements.
§ Mr. SpeakerI am much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman for the notice that he gave me of this point of order. It enables me to tell the House that when the Services Committee agreed and recommended that hon. Members could be supplied by the Official Report with corrected typescripts of their speeches in the Chamber, for their personal use, there was no intention to go back upon our former custom. There was no conferring upon hon. Members of the right to quote in debate from the typescripts as evidence of what they had said earlier. Hon. Members will still follow the usual form of debate that we have followed through past years. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman is clear on that point.
§ Mr. PowellI am much obliged to you, Mr. Speaker. Since you half invite me, perhaps I may say that I fear that the temptation may at times be too strong to be resisted.
§ Mr. Arthur Lewis (Newham, North-West)Further to the right hon. Gentleman's point of order and your explanation, Mr. Speaker. If no hon. Members are allowed to use or to quote from the typescripts, what is the point of the extra cost, when hon. Members receive Hansard the following day? Why should we waste taxpayers' money in making available something for which hon. Members have to wait only 10 or 12 hours? You may smile, Mr. Speaker, but I am serious. It is a complete waste of money. I therefore hope that you, as the custodian of the practices of the House, will say that this waste of money should not take place and that we as Members of Parliament do not want it.
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. It may be that the hon. Gentleman speaks for the House, but the Services Committee felt that there was a general desire on the part of the House—
§ Mrs. Renée Short (Wolverhampton, North-East)Nobody asked us.
§ Mr. Speaker—and that hon. Members wanted a correct report in order to use it not in this Chamber but outside it—something that is equally near to the hearts of hon. Members on both sides of the House.
§ Mr. Kevin McNamara (Kingston upon Hull, Central)Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. As I understand the ruling on this matter, there was also a reference to interventions in hon. Members' contributions. One is not able to comment on interventions made in a contribution. It seems very strange to publish outside the House a report of a contribution that makes no reference to interventions, taken as a record of what people are saying here.
§ Mr. SpeakerIn view of the exchanges this afternoon, I shall ask the Services Committee to look at this matter again.