§ Mr. David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside)On a point of order, Madam Speaker. This morning, the Government published a report by Professor Alan Wilson on complaints and redress procedure. I leave aside the fact that its criteria excluded the impact of national health service changes introduced in 1990, and the operation of professional misconduct procedures. An important report of that kind, dealing with issues of great moment to people using and working in the NHS, would normally have been presented to the House in the form of an oral statement.
What I wish to raise, however, is an aspect of the report's publication that I would expect hon. Members on both sides of the House to consider important. In the press release put out by the Secretary of State for Health when she launched the report this morning—at public expense —five individuals were quoted. At least one of those individuals, as chief executive of the National Association of Health Authorities and Trusts, has a direct interest in the outcome and recommendations of the report. They had seen it before its publication, and the Department had allowed them to place their comments on record, for publication, before hon. Members—including the official Opposition—had had access to it.
I seek your guidance, Madam Speaker. Does not that extraordinary action by the Department of Health—finding a way around allowing hon. Members the privilege of seeing reports at the time of their publication and enabling those with an interest in such important matters to comment on them at that time—infringe the privilege to which I have referred?
§ Madam SpeakerThe hon. Gentleman and the House are well aware of my strongly held view that statements on Government policy, and other important statements, should be made in the House in the first instance, whether they are made orally or by means of written answers. It is for the Minister concerned to determine the category into 328 which he or she wishes the statement to fall. I am informed that, in this instance, the Secretary of State has written to all hon. Members, and that copies of the relevant document to which the hon. Gentleman has referred have been placed in the Vote Office and the Library.
§ Mr. Dennis Skinner (Bolsover)On a point of order, Madam Speaker. This is a completely different point, although it concerns a Minister misleading the House.
A few moments before the exchanges about the Minister for Social Security and Disabled People, the Minister for Energy implied in his reply to my question that I had supported opencast. I know that the Minister has not the guts to come back and admit that he misled the House. The truth is that—as can be seen from the record of the Report stage of the Coal Industries Bill a few weeks ago—I have opposed every opencast application in my constituency since I came to the House 24 years ago; but I do not suppose that the Minister has the guts to withdraw what he said.
§ Madam SpeakerThat was not a point of order; it was more like a personal statement.