§ Mr. SpeakerIn accordance with my undertaking to the House yesterday, I have looked at the speech made by the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry last Thursday, and in particular at the passage in that speech in col. 1167 of the Official Report which the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) alleges to be a quotation from an official document.
The passage in question describes what happened at a meeting on 17 October last between the Secretary of State and Sir John Cuckney. The passage is couched in reported speech, and as such is in the appropriate form for a paraphrase of the minutes of the meeting on which it is doubtless based. Therefore, I rule that it is not a quotation.