§ Mr. Eric S. Heffer (Liverpool, Walton)On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. You probably consider me to be a nuisance but, as I have always been a nuisance, I intend to continue to be one as long as I am here. I think that you have to reconsider your ruling on hon. Members raising genuine points of order when an issue is raised in Question Time or at any other time. I know that you, or perhaps your predecessors, were quite rightly concerned about frivolous points of order, for example, when hon. Members got up, as a knee-jerk reaction, to say that they disagreed with an issue, and that they would raise it on the Adjournment debate. That used to annoy all of us, as they never raised it on the Adjournment anyway. Other hon. Members use points of order to stop the proceedings of the House.
I understand your point of view, Mr. Speaker, but once hon. Members know that there is no point in raising frivolous points of order, they will raise only genuine points of order.
The hon. Member for Antrim, East (Mr. Beggs) raised a point of order today but he has had to go. That is understandable. He has probably had to go to another meeting. The Minister has also had to go. Ministers cannot remain in the House. However, an hour and a half later the issue is being raised, and the hon. Members involved are not here. The issue needed to be dealt with there and then.
I am serious about this matter and I have raised it before. I understand your position, Mr. Speaker, but I ask you to reconsider. If a genuine point of order is not dealt with at the time, the issue is lost sight of.
§ Mr. SpeakerI shall deal with the matter now, because I have given it careful consideration over a long time. It is the consistent practice of the Chair to hear points of order after questions and statements. The whole House knows that; but I will always hear a point of order if it concerns irregularities which require immediate attention. Today, the hon. Member for Antrim, East (Mr. Beggs) raised a point of order to argue that he did not like the answer that he had been given in Question Time. That was a clear continuation of Question Time.
I say to the whole House that if I allowed that, the danger, when the Commons is televised, is that there could be a rash of points of order at what is judged to be prime time after questions, thereby delaying the debate, and taking time from right hon. and hon. Members who wish to participate in subsequent business.
I shall always hear points of order if they require my immediate attention. Otherwise, points of order should come in their proper place which is after questions or statements or Standing Order No. 20 applications.
§ Mr. Richard Holt (Langbaurgh)On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Not long ago, we sought to protect Back Benchers by reducing the number of questions asked by the Leader of the Opposition. At that time it was normal for him to ask two questions; occasionally, you said that that might spread to a third. Now he is asking three on a regular basis. Will you, Sir, take the usual opportunity to speak to the right hon. Gentleman and tell him to get his questions down to two?
§ Mr. SpeakerIt has always been the practice for the Leader of the Opposition to be allowed a certain tolerance at Question Time.
May I remind the House that many hon. Members wish to participate in today's debate? Some may already be seeking to raise points of order.
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. Points of order take time out of debates, and that is unfair on hon. Members' colleagues.
§ Mr. Peter L. Pike (Burnley)On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. It concerns efforts by South Africa to influence unduly the elections taking place in Namibia. I wonder whether it would be possible to arrange—[Interruption.]
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder.
§ Mr. PikeThere is a British involvement, Mr. Speaker, in that the signals that South Africa is claiming to intercept are British signals. [Interruption.]
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. But that is plainly not a point of order for me. If the hon. Gentleman had risen to ask me whether I had received a request for a statement, that would be another matter, but I cannot hear arguments about what is going on in South Africa. That is not a matter for me.
§ Mr. Campbell-Savours (Workington)On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I want to raise again a matter that I raised with you nine months ago. You will know, Mr. Speaker, that when a Minister says that he has nothing to add to a statement, he is, in effect, blocking questions. I tabled 10 questions at 2.5 pm today about insider dealing in the City—
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. The hon. Gentleman has not tabled the questions; I understand that they are still in draft.
§ Mr. Campbell-SavoursI tabled them, and was told that they might well be amended. That is where my point of order comes in.
§ Mr. SpeakerIt has never been the practice for hon. Members to challenge Mr. Speaker on matters that he has not had an opportunity to examine. The hon. Gentleman cannot do that in the Chamber.
§ Mr. Campbell-SavoursThat is not the question, Mr. Speaker. The issue is that the questions that I have tabled are now the subject of a block, and I am asking you to exercise your discretion to allow my questions—
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. I was in the Chair before the hon. Gentleman tabled his questions. How on earth can I have an opportunity to make any definitive promise or statement on a matter that I have not even considered?
§ Mr. Dave Nellist (Coventry, South-East)Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. I think that the point that my hon. Friend is trying to make concerns not what you may not yet have seen, but what has taken place in the Chamber this afternoon while you have been in the Chair, namely that in several answers the Leader of the House —the deputy Prime Minister—has used the phrase, "I have nothing further to add." That phrase becomes a blocking motion, which may then prevent the tabling of further 485 questions. My hon. Friend and I are asking you to consider that, Mr. Speaker, and to rule against the Leader of the House.
§ Mr. SpeakerI certainly cannot make such a ruling until I have had an opportunity to look at the matter.
§ Mr. Kenneth Hind (Lancashire, West)On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Between 1976 and 1979, on every occasion but three, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister—then Leader of the Opposition—was at the Dispatch Box to ask the Leader of the House in the then Labour Government to name the business for that week. That tradition seems now to have lapsed: the Leader of the Opposition appears only infrequently to make the request. Surely that is a grave discourtesy to the House, and I seek your ruling on it.
§ Mr. SpeakerIt has been the practice that when the Leader of the House announces the business, he is frequently asked to do so by the shadow Leader of the House. There is nothing wrong with that.
§ Rev. Martin Smyth (Belfast, South)Further to the point of order raised by the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer), Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the difficulty, but my hon. Friend was not trying to continue an earlier debate; he was trying to clarify an issue. It is one thing for a Minister to make a statement politically, outside the House. It is another matter for him to make a statement in the House that has the import of misleading the House.
You, Mr. Speaker, do not expect Back Benchers not to be interested in a statement made from the Front Bench on their behalf. Is it not a tradition of the House that when a party's spokesperson makes a statement, responding to a departmental request in writing, that is taken to be the response of his party? That was the issue on which my hon. Friend the Member for Antrim, East (Mr. Beggs) sought your guidance.
§ Mr. SpeakerI ask the hon. Gentleman to calculate what would happen if that practice became general. There would be a rash of hon. Members seeking clarification of answers to their questions. Question Time is limited, because otherwise we would never have time for the business before by the House.
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. I call Mr. Molyneaux.
§ Mr. James Molyneaux (Lagan Valley)I shall be brief, Mr. Speaker, because I know that many hon. Members wish to participate in the next debate. The Leader of the House came to your aid, Mr. Speaker, when he put his finger on the spot by deploring the fact that the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heifer) had asked a question in the absence of the Minister. However, it could not have been otherwise because the Minister had left the chamber. The hon. Member for Walton raised that point to obtain a correction at the time but naturally you had ruled against it. I believe that the Leader of the House has got the message.
§ Mr. SpeakerThe truth of the matter is that Northern Ireland questions come to an end at 3.15 pm.
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. I must advise the House that about 30 hon. Members, many on the Opposition Benches wish to take part and may be disappointed.
§ Mr. Andrew Faulds (Warley, East)Further to an earlier point of order, Mr. Speaker. You will doubtless be delighted to see me back in action, so that we can continue our dialogue about points of order. You said just now, Sir, quite clearly, that it was your consistent practice to take points of order after other procedures in the House had been pursued. May I simply point out with great respect, Sir, that that was not the practice of your predecessor? You also said, Sir, that the proper place for points of order was where you had chosen to put them. The proper place for points of order is when they arise—
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. The hon. Gentleman has not been here for a while, and I welcome him back. May I repeat and underline—because perhaps he does not read Hansard as regularly as some hon. Members—that I will always take points of order—I said this to the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heifer)—on matters that need my immediate attention. Other points of order are taken in their proper place—it is not a new practice—which today was after business questions or after a statement if there had been one. That has always been the practice, and that I shall continue.
§ Mr. Dennis Skinner (Bolsover)Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. I have listened closely to what you have said during this exchange about points of order being taken at various times—either before Question Time, in the middle of Question Time, at the end of Question Time or after statements have been made. You will recall, Mr. Speaker, that some considerable time ago you tried to take a definitive stance on taking points of order at the very end. It was suggested by some hon. Members, including myself, that that could not be carried through successfully because there would be cases when Front-Bench spokesmen in particular would want to raise points of order. Eventually, the thing broke down, albeit on a limited scale.
Today, for instance—it is important that we get this right before the cameras or anything else intrude—at the very opening of Question Time, my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, North (Mr. Wall) raised a point of order about a Northern Ireland case in his room. You allowed that point of order, and heard it and I believe that it was sensible of you to do so. However, an hon. Member representing a Northern Ireland constituency later tried to raise a point of order, but before the proper explanation was given—it was about misleading the House—the whole thing collapsed because of your intervention. At the end, my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heifer) then wanted to raise a point of order arising out of something that occurred during Question Time, but before you had heard what he had to say, you said that he would not be allowed to make his point of order.
If you say, Mr. Speaker, as you have said three times —or rather twice—today, that you will allow points of order where they are attributable to procedure as distinct from argument, and if you want matters to continue on an even and decent plane, I suggest that you give Back Benchers an opportunity to raise points of order—Front Bench spokesmen always have their chance—and my guess is that you would be wise to hear what. hon. Members have to say before giving any ruling.
§ Mrs. Alice Mahon (Halifax)rose—
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. I shall first deal with the point of order raised by the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner).
The hon. Gentleman is totally incorrect. I heard the point of order from the hon. Member for Antrim, East (Mr. Beggs), but it was plainly not a matter of order for me; it was challenging what the Minister had said. I am not responsible for that.
I will always hear points of order if they need my imediate attention. I am not prepared, however—and I believe that the House would not want it either—to have a rash of points of order arising out of Question Time. That would merely mean that we would delay the start of a debate. Other points of order should be raised at the proper place which, as the House well knows, is after a private notice question, a statement or a Standing Order No. 20 application.
§ Mrs. MahonOn a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I seek clarification from you. You will be aware that I asked the Leader of the House a question about troops in secret bases in Thailand, which was based on a question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Cynon Valley (Mrs. Clwyd) last week. Then, the Leader of the House said that an explanation would be given by a Minister, but things seem to have changed this week because a procedural gag appears to have been used. The Leader of the House said that he had nothing further to add. Does that mean that I cannot table a question asking whether British Troops are being used from secret bases in Thailand?
§ Mr. SpeakerThat is a hypothetical question, and until the hon. Lady tables her question it is difficult to say whether it will need my attention. I think that we should move on to the Adjournment debate.