Points of Order (Hansard, 21 June 1995)

§ Sir Peter Hordern (Horsham)
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Will you tell the House what can be done to protect the rights of right hon. and hon. Members when it is quite clear from press reports that officials in the Scott inquiry have been leaking misleading information to the press? I have in my hand an article that appeared in The Times today, which says: Sir Richard is understood to believe that the leaks are intended to undermine his report…and believes that some of those criticised in his report are seeking to discredit his findings before they are"—

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris)
Order. The Scott inquiry has absolutely nothing to do with the Chair.

§ Mr. George Robertson (Hamilton)
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I seek advice in relation to what the Prime Minister told the House yesterday afternoon, when he said: I have made it clear in 'Questions of Procedure for Ministers' that Ministers who deliberately mislead Parliament should resign, except in exceptional circumstances like a devaluation". Only a couple of minutes later he referred to me individually, when he said: If the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair) is so concerned about open government, will he say today that he will publish the earlier, secret report held by the Labour party into Monklands council, which the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. Robertson) has consistently refused to make public?"—[Official Report, 20 June 1995; Vol. 262, c. 149–150.] That statement is untrue. The report to which the Prime Minister referred was published in March 1993, and it was made available to the press and to the public. Therefore, what he told the House yesterday, with specific reference to me, was not true. I can say only that he must have been misleading the House.
I wrote to the Prime Minister yesterday, pointing that out to him, and asked him whether in honour he would come to the House to clarify the point and apologise to me and to the House. He replied to me this morning, acknowledging that what he said was not true. He said: You know as well as I do that … a report may have been published as a result of your Party's internal inquiry. Have you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, had any indication from the Prime Minister that he will now come to the House to give the apology and the clarification that, in honour and integrity, he should give us?

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
I have had no communication from any hon. Member, least of all the Prime Minister.

§ Mr. Patrick McLoughlin (West Derbyshire)
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Will you advise the House on whether there is any way in which the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair), one of the Opposition Members who is paid extra out of the public purse, can come to the Chamber to make a statement on whether he will permit the report to be published? The evidence has remained secret. What has Labour got.to hide?

Several hon. Members
rose—

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
Order. Hon. Members know full well that the Speaker has no power to demand that any hon. Member makes any statement on any matter.

§ Mr. Alex Salmond (Banff and Buchan)
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. You, as Chairman of Ways and Means, and, indeed, Madam Speaker herself, have made clear on a number of occasions the preference that the House be told first of any new developments in Government policy. All of us would have seen on our television screens yesterday evening the President of the Board of Trade, and, indeed, the Minister for Industry and Energy, make a series of belligerent statements to the effect that Shell Oil might not be given permission for onshore disposal of the Brent Spar oil rig. Those statements may have been made in a fit of pique, and they were incredible statements to make, but even if the Government are advancing such an incredible argument, do they not have a duty to come before the House and be subjected to questioning about that extraordinary behaviour?

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
The hon. Gentleman knows that Ministers must respond as they feel appropriate to what they believe to be their duty.

§ Mr. David Shaw (Dover)
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker.

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
I hope that it is a new subject.

§ Mr. Shaw
We have just heard the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. Robertson) say that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said something that was untrue yesterday—

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
Order. I said that I hoped that the hon. Member's point of order would be on a new subject.

§ Mr. Shaw
It relates to the fact that 100 Labour Members have lied in the House about Monklands—

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
Order. The hon. Member might like to rephrase that or withdraw it altogether. What he has said is not acceptable.

§ Mr. Shaw
I shall say exactly—

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
No, a straight withdrawal.

§ Mr. Shaw
The fact is that 100 Labour Members—[Interruption.]

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
Order. The hon. Member deserves to be heard in silence.

§ Mr. Shaw
I would like to rephrase my point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker, because I think that it should be phrased in the way that hon. Member for Hamilton phrased his point about my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. One hundred Labour Members made false statements, untrue statements, on the Order Paper about the cover-up by Labour of Monklands district council.

§ Mr. John McFall (Dumbarton)
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker—a new point about the progress of my private Member's Bill, the Wild Mammals (Protection) Bill, which received more support than any other private Member's Bill. Despite that, hon. Members considering the Dogs (Fouling of Land) Bill are deliberately filibustering. The public cannot understand the difference between the antiquity of the rules and procedures of the House and public opinion. Will you, 351 Mr. Deputy Speaker, do something to repair the dislocation between our procedures and public opinion so that my Bill might go into Committee?

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
I am confident in the Chair of that Committee and confident also that there cannot have been filibustering. In any event, what happens in a Committee has nothing to do with me today.

§ Mrs. Alice Mahon (Halifax)
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Today, the audit commissioners warned that patients' lives were being put at risk because of the chaotic state of hospital medical records. As the Government have spent millions of pounds on administrators over the past few years, has the Secretary of State for Health said whether she will come to the House to explain exactly what is going on?

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
Madam Speaker has made it absolutely clear that that sort of manoeuvre to ascertain whether there will be a statement is unacceptable.

§ Mr. John Sykes (Scarborough)
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I do not normally raise points of order, but I had no idea that the hon. Member for Dumbarton (Mr. McFall) would raise a point of order about his Bill. May I inform you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that last week the Committee considering the Dogs (Fouling of Land) Bill spent about an hour discussing manuscript amendments that had been tabled by the hon. Member for Burnley (Mr. Pike)?

§ Mr. Tony Banks (Newham, North-West)
rose—

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
Is it a point of order?

§ Mr. Banks
Yes, Mr. Deputy Speaker. It relates to the point of order raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Dumbarton (Mr. McFall). Surely his point about proceedings in Committee is an example of where the will of the House as expressed on the Floor is being frustrated.

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
We will not go back to points of order on which I have already ruled.