Commons Sitting of 27 November 2000

Preamble
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[MR. SPEAKER in the Chair]
Oral Answers to Questions
  DEFENCE
  The Secretary of State was asked
  DEFENCE

    Bosnia and Kosovo
    Siobhain McDonagh: What recent discussions he has had with his European and NATO counterparts on Bosnia and Kosovo. [138571]
    The Minister for the Armed Forces (Mr. John Spellar): I and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence take every opportunity to discuss issues relating to the Balkans, including Bosnia and Kosovo, with our European and NATO counterparts. The informal NATO Defence Ministers' meeting held in Birmingham in October this year covered these issues, as will the NATO Defence Ministers' meeting in Brussels next week. In addition, my right hon. Friend has recently met his French and German counterparts, and the Balkans region was discussed.
    Siobhain McDonagh: Does my hon. Friend agree that, with the onset of winter, it is particularly important to ensure that our forces in Bosnia and Kosovo are adequately housed? If so, will he inform me of what the Government are doing about this matter?
    Mr. Spellar: It is a question not just of what we are doing, but of what we have done. Although the temporary improved tented accommodation was by no means as bad as it was depicted, we certainly needed to make improvements. The new field accommodation is excellent, it is bedding in well and it has been well received. Arguably, it is among the best in the region.
    Mr. Paul Keetch: Can the Minister confirm that, in his discussions with NATO and European Union allies, he has continued to receive advice at the highest level on Kosovo and Bosnia from Sir Charles Guthrie, the Chief of the Defence Staff? Has not Sir Charles always offered high level, independent advice to successive Governments, not just as Chief of the Defence Staff, but when he was leader of the SAS? Are not the recent attacks on him by the Conservative press a thinly veiled political attack?
    Mr. Spellar: I can only find myself in agreement with the hon. Gentleman. [Interruption.] I notice that the
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    hon. Member for Reigate (Mr. Blunt) is laughing, but he was in the forefront of previous attacks on the Chief of Defence Staff during the Kosovo crisis. The politicisation of attacks on senior members of the military is disgraceful, but I firmly believe that they relate to the underlying problem that the "born to rule" lot on the Opposition Benches cannot accept a different Government. They will attack any public servant who does his job properly by working for the democratically elected Government.
    Mr. Fabian Hamilton: Can my hon. Friend assure the House that KFOR will do all that it can to protect the interests of minority ethnic groups in Kosovo? That is the key to achieving a long-term settlement.
    Mr. Spellar: Not only can I assure my hon. Friend of that, but I have seen it in action when I have been to Pristina. It is enormously important to maintain the peace, and that is why urgent talks are taking place on the situation in the Presovo valley.
    Mr. Iain Duncan Smith: Can the Minister explain, for the benefit of the whole House, Her Majesty's Government attitude to the latest developments in the Presovo valley, particularly in light of Belgrade's demands that the Komanovo agreement be renegotiated? Over the weekend, three Serb policemen were murdered and President Kostunica has sent armoured troops into the area nearby. He wants the villages taken by the Albanians to be returned and he has made two demands, not least that armed Serb police be moved into the buffer zone.
    Will the Minister say for the benefit of the whole House and the nation whether, if President Kostunica gets his way, the Government fear that British troops will be put at risk by Albanians who are disgruntled that NATO is perhaps siding with the Serbs? Alternatively, if President Kostunica does not get his way, does the Minister think that that might result in his position in Serbia proper being destabilised?
    Mr. Spellar: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his balanced question. It is a difficult issue and we went in to maintain a multi-ethnic Kosovo. We and the other nations involved in KFOR are concerned by any moves that could be destabilising. That is precisely why discussions have taken place between KFOR and the representatives of the Yugoslav Government, and I understand that a leading representative will go to Belgrade for further talks. I can also report to the House that arrangements are being made for the handover of the bodies of the three Serb policemen who were killed in the recent engagement, so there have also obviously been discussions with representatives of the Albanian side to try to stabilise the position.
    That is all that I can say today about an uncertain situation. I would argue that it is returning to normality, but that does not mean, by any means, that we are through the problems yet. Further talks are required, but I pay tribute to the leadership of KFOR, which is handling the matter extremely well on behalf of both communities in the area.
    Mr. Mike Gapes: My hon. Friend referred to the importance of stability in Kosovo.

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    Does he agree that any move by the new United States Administration to take precipitate action to withdraw their forces from Kosovo and Bosnia could only be destabilising, and could lead to an upsurge of violence and renewed conflict throughout the region?
    Mr. Spellar: We have had no indication from either representative who could form the new Administration that he is proposing precipitate action in Kosovo or the Balkans more widely.

    EU Defence Initiatives
    Mr. Desmond Swayne: What plans he has to meet the German Defence Minister to discuss EU defence initiatives. [138572]
    The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Geoffrey Hoon): I met the German Defence Minister on 20 and 21 November at the capabilities commitments conference in Brussels, and I shall meet him again at the North Atlantic Council Defence Ministers' meeting on 5 and 6 December, at which the European defence initiative will undoubtedly be discussed.
    Mr. Swayne: The declaration from the conference on 20 November refers to a force catalogue which specifies the detailed commitments of member states. Will the Secretary of State place a copy of that in the Library?
    Mr. Hoon: As I have already told the House, the representation by United Kingdom forces in the force catalogue can be made available. The amount and nature of the offering from other member states are a matter for them.
    Mr. Geoffrey Robinson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that our decision to participate in the European defence initiative has been widely welcomed by Labour Members? In light of the robust support that it has received from Madeleine Albright and other spokesmen for the American defence department, can he assure the House that our participation in the joint strike fighter programme with the Americans, of which we are funding £200 million of the development phase, will be unaffected by our role in the European initiative?
    Mr. Hoon: We have also had a good deal of support from the Opposition—the former Deputy Prime Minister, the former Chancellor of the Exchequer, the former Foreign Secretary and the former Conservative party chairman—together with all the leaders of NATO who see improvements in the European defence capability as being good for Europe and good for NATO. As for the JSF, although no decisions have been taken, I can assure my hon. Friend that the proposal is being carefully considered.
    Sir Peter Tapsell: When the Secretary of State meets the German Defence Minister, will he tell him by how much the Government intend to increase the number of people in the British Army, at present 106,000, to meet the new obligations that will be incurred by membership of the European rapid reaction force?
    Mr. Hoon: I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman, who usually speaks knowledgeably on such matters, has not read the observations that the hon. Member for Salisbury
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    (Mr. Key) made on the radio on Sunday, in which he made it clear that the European rapid reaction force is not a standing force. There is no additional requirement. We only have one set of British forces and we will be able to use them once at the behest of a British Prime Minister.
    As I listened to the hon. Member for Salisbury on Sunday morning, I heard the distinct sounds of a U-turn, perhaps provoked, from his point of view—or at least that of the Conservative party—by an unhelpful poll in the Mail on Sunday which showed that the great majority of the British public welcome Britain's participation in improving European defence capability.
    Mr. David Borrow: May I tell my right hon. Friend how important European co-operation in defence is to my constituents who are employed on the production of the Eurofighter? They are greatly concerned that if the Conservative party were to return to government, many of their jobs would be at risk as a result of the party's opposition to European co-operation. Will my right hon. Friend assure me and my constituents that a Labour Government will never put those jobs at risk?
    Mr. Hoon: I can give my hon. Friend that assurance. That matter shows how much the Conservative party has changed. It used consistently to support European co-operation through the Eurofighter project, but now questions whether it is a useful additional capability for the British armed forces—and certainly questions consistent involvement with our European partners in almost any aspect of defence co-operation. That must be a matter of grave concern to those people in the Conservative party who support co-operation in Europe.
    Sir Sydney Chapman: Has the Secretary of State made any assessment of whether it is more likely that United States troops will be withdrawn from Bosnia as a result of the creation of the European rapid reaction force? If they were withdrawn, is he satisfied that the new European rapid reaction force could fill, fully and effectively, the role of the United States forces in that region?
    Mr. Hoon: The hon. Gentleman really should know that there is absolutely no connection between the two subjects that he thrusts together in that way. The American Administration, from the President down, has consistently supported the development of European defence co-operation, recognising that that co-operation is good both for Europe and for NATO.

    Flooding (Armed Forces)
    Ms Sally Keeble: If he will make a statement on the deployment of the armed forces to assist the public during the recent floods. [138573]
    Mr. Andrew F. Bennett: If he will make a statement on the deployment of the armed forces to assist the public during the recent floods. [138578]
    The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Geoffrey Hoon): Members of the armed forces from more than 60 different military units provided help for flood victims in numerous locations across 15 counties during the period 30 October to 14 November. In addition, personnel from

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    Territorial Army units also participated. I congratulate them on their achievements in saving life and protecting property.
    The Ministry of Defence is also helping in the recovery phase. Some 200 MOD houses have been made available to those evacuated owing to flooding, and around 50 of these have already been taken up. The armed forces and the MOD remain ready to serve the community and to respond to emergencies of all kinds, at all times.
    Ms Keeble: I thank my right hon. Friend for that reply. I draw particular attention to the work of the Territorial Army which, in my constituency, played a prominent role in saving lives during the floods a couple of years back. Will my right hon. Friend assure the House that the experience of the TA and other forces will be properly pulled together and recorded, so that they can learn the lessons of how to protect people during floods and make sure that their excellent work continues? Will he pay particular tribute to the Territorial Army, which does an outstanding job, especially in such circumstances?
    Mr. Hoon: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her observations, particularly about the Territorial Army, although its members and Regular Army units would have been the first to pay tribute to the role of all the emergency services in responding to the crisis all over the country. There is no danger of the experience or expertise being lost, simply because the organisation of the Army, particularly in respect of emergency assistance, parallels precisely the arrangement of the emergency services. When there is a crisis requiring help from the armed forces, the decision to assist is taken at local level, working with the experience acquired on previous occasions.
    Mr. Bennett: I echo the sentiments and expressions of appreciation of all the hard work put in by service personnel. Is my right hon. Friend aware of the view of the Environment Agency that the help was crucial in the protection of places such as York? Can he confirm that if, sadly, the weather goes on being bad for the rest of the winter, enough sandbags and sand to fill them will be available?
    Mr. Hoon: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his observations. I went to York during the crisis and saw for myself the work that the armed forces were doing—together, incidentally, with some tremendous work being conducted by the Environment Agency. That was a great example of all the emergency services and Government, at both national and local level, working extremely effectively together. I can give my hon. Friend the assurance, if not about the specific number of sandbags, at least that the armed forces stand ready to assist should they be required again.
    Mr. Christopher Fraser: Does the Secretary of State accept that the invaluable contribution of the TA in the recent floods underlines the mistake that he made by massively slashing 18,000 TA officers?
    Mr. Hoon: On the contrary: the fact that the TA was operating so successfully across many parts of the country demonstrates the wisdom of the decisions that we took.
    Miss Anne McIntosh: Will the Secretary of State join me in paying particular tribute to the Royal Engineers based at Rippon and to the Environment Agency, particularly for the work that it did at Rawcliffe, where, as the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Mr. Bennett) implied, there were no sandbags available and no pumping? Does the Secretary of State accept that as a result not just of the cuts in the TA but of the overstretch brought about by the additional commitments of the regular forces, the severe weather forecasts for the Christmas and new year period are putting extreme pressure and intolerable demands on our armed forces?
    Mr. Hoon: It was—[interruption]—an example, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) indicates sotto voce, of the rapid reaction capability of the British armed forces. I had the opportunity and privilege of visiting both Selby and Chilwell during the crisis. A member of the armed forces said—it is significant in this context—that he was pleased to assist local communities in the United Kingdom. He added that it was the first time in his military career that he had helped in the United Kingdom.

    RAF Portreath
    Ms Candy Atherton: What progress has been made by the land survey at RAF Portreath. [138574]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Dr. Lewis Moonie): Earlier this year we engaged a specialist contractor, with significant experience in dealing with contaminated sites, to undertake further land quality assessment at RAF Portreath. This followed on from the phase 1 land quality assessment undertaken at the site by the RAF. The work is proceeding well, and sample results taken to date do not indicate any contamination by chemical weapons or their breakdown products. We have found small amounts of chemicals associated with general industrial activity.
    Ms Atherton: I thank my hon. Friend for that answer. Will he confirm that the survey will include the mine shafts and dumps at RAF Portreath? Does he agree that it is outrageous that previous Governments failed to conduct safety surveys?
    Dr. Moonie: I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the work that she has undertaken on behalf of her constituents in pursuing this matter. This is the beginning and not the end of the investigations that we are undertaking at RAF Portreath. It is our intention carefully to examine the final results from this phase of the study when they are presented to us in the new year. We shall take further action as necessary.
    Mr. John Bercow: Is the hon. Gentleman anticipating compensation claims from employees who claim that their health has suffered in consequence?
    Dr. Moonie: I have no record of any such claims.

    Armed Forces (Education and Training)
    Fiona Mactaggart: If he will make a statement on developments in education and training for the armed forces. [138575]
    The Minister for the Armed Forces (Mr. John Spellar): As has been well demonstrated by the recent deployments to Sierra Leone and in the Balkans, the training of our armed forces is of a very high standard. To maintain that standard and ensure that our training and education arrangements for the armed forces and Ministry of Defence civilians continue to meet defence needs in the 21st century, my noble Friend Lord Robertson, when Secretary of State for Defence, announced a wide-ranging and fundamental review of education and training in the Department. This review is due to complete next spring, when I will make a further statement to the House.
    Fiona Mactaggart: Can my hon. Friend assure me that the review will make a high priority of ensuring that service personnel obtain qualifications that they can use in their future careers when they leave the armed forces, so that they can participate fully in civilian life, which in the past people leaving the armed forces have often had difficulty in doing?
    Mr. Spellar: Yes; there is no doubt that the level of training that we provide for our service men and women is superb, as demonstrated by the number of employers who are often actively trying to poach many of our trained personnel. There has been a difficulty when qualifications do not necessarily match civilian qualifications, and are less portable in civilian society, which these days is far more certificate based. We are working with the relevant agencies to ensure that the training that our people undertake in specific skills and more general areas are properly recognised with qualifications that they can carry. That is good for the armed forces and very good, as my hon. Friend has said, when service men and women re-enter the civilian employment market, when they are able to capitalise on the training and experience that they have gained.
    Mr. John Wilkinson: Can the Minister explain what the effect has been on the throughput of trained pilots into the Royal Air Force of the grounding of the Tucano aircraft? What are the technical problems; when will they be solved; what will the additional cost to the defence budget of rectifying the problems be; where are they being sent; and is this part of the problem with the shortfall of RAF fast jet pilots? Is the problem a lack of training facilities or is it something much more fundamental?
    Mr. Spellar: There has been a failure of a part, and we are working with the aircraft's manufacturers to rectify the problem as soon as possible. That introduces a training gap, so those who are in training will undertake part of their training in Australia. We have already reached an agreement with the Royal Australian Air Force to cover that, so we hope to be able to maintain training. However, the hon. Gentleman identifies, rightly, the difficulties facing all air forces throughout the world: there is a shortfall of pilots, especially because of the extremely
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    buoyant civilian air transport industry. We are working on several measures to alleviate the problem, some of which have been implemented, with others to follow shortly.
    Ms Sandra Osborne: My hon. Friend will be aware that the search and rescue function of HMS Gannet in my constituency is under review and might be removed. Is he aware that the site has the potential to provide an excellent education and training centre; and will he consider that as an alternative use?
    Mr. Spellar: I thank my hon. Friend for her question. We are considering suitable alternative defence uses for the site and, as usual, discussing with appropriate local authorities alternative uses in the event that defence has to vacate the site. We recognise the contribution that the Prestwick area has made to defence and, as always, we want to assist the area as much as possible in dealing with the inevitable and unfortunate consequences that arise whenever we reduce a capability. However, I take my hon. Friend's point and will draw it to the attention of the defence training review.
    Mr. Robert Key: Will the Government, on behalf of the whole nation, give their wholehearted support to the Royal British Legion campaign to construct an education centre on the site of the battle of the Somme, where 420,000 patriotic British soldiers laid down their lives? Is the Minister aware that the French department of the Somme and the European Union have each promised £300,000, but that the British Government, reluctantly, have promised only £30,000?
    Mr. Spellar: As the hon. Gentleman knows, we hold regular discussions with the Royal British Legion on a number of issues. I am not aware that the issue he raises has been discussed by Ministers and the Royal British Legion, but I shall certainly check. We shall look into the matter and we thank him for raising it.

    European Missile Defence
    Mr. David Atkinson: What recent discussions he has had with his Russian counterpart on European missile defence. [138576]
    The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Geoffrey Hoon): I have had no recent discussions with my Russian counterpart on European missile defence, but we regularly discuss ballistic missile defence during other consultations with the Russian Federation, and there has in recent months been discussion between NATO and Russia on the scope for co-operation on theatre missile defence and related issues. We want that dialogue to continue.
    Mr. Atkinson: Does the Minister recall the offer that President Putin made to President Clinton last June for Russia to help to put in place a missile defence system for Europe? Did the Prime Minister discuss that offer with President Putin during his meetings with him in Moscow last week? Can he tell the House the nature and the source of the threat to Europe that could have motivated President Putin to make the offer in the first place?
    Mr. Hoon: It is right to say that Russia has presented, at least in outline, a number of proposals on co-operation

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    on ballistic missile defence involving Russia and NATO; it is however fair to say that the Russians have not yet set out any specific details of those proposals. When they do—we have encouraged them to do so—we and our NATO allies will consider them carefully, as the House would expect.
    Mr. Malcolm Savidge: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the new United States Administration—whoever eventually wins—should take full account of both Russian and European concerns before taking any decision on national missile defence, and that they should pay heed to the report by our own Select Committee on Foreign Affairs?
    Mr. Hoon: That is the position that the present US Administration have taken. We believe that it is an extremely responsible position; indeed, we have encouraged it.
    Mr. Hoon: That is the position that the present US Administration have taken. We believe that it is an extremely responsible position; indeed, we have encouraged it.

    Cadets
    Mr. Nigel Waterson: What steps he plans to take to encourage participation in the cadet forces. [138579]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Dr. Lewis Moonie): The cadet organisations are primarily responsible for their own recruitment, but the Ministry of Defence provides practical support and funding. Between April 1999 and April 2000, the total number of cadets rose by more than 3,600, to 131,954. We hope to see a continuation of that very encouraging trend over the coming years, so that more young people can benefit from the personal development opportunities offered by cadet organisations. If the hon. Gentleman is not already aware of the fact, I am happy to inform him that the Army cadet force in his constituency is the largest in Sussex.
    Mr. Waterson: I am grateful for that answer. People in Eastbourne and elsewhere take real pride in the obvious enthusiasm and commitment of the young people in the cadet forces, who go on to provide 35 per cent. Of serving officers in our armed forces. That being the case, why are the Government putting some cadet forces at risk by cutting back Territorial Army facilities?
    Dr. Moonie: I can assure the hon. Gentleman that, far from putting facilities at risk, we have guaranteed that whenever a TA hall is closed, funding will be provided to give cadets proper accommodation.
    Mr. Denis MacShane: The cadet forces are warmly welcomed in Rotherham. I reached the highest rank of my life as company sergeant-major in my school's combined cadet force. That taught me quick thinking under pressure, the value of partnership and the need to accept discipline—which are all attributes of the parliamentary Labour party. Would my hon. Friend consider creating a special combined cadet force for the rabble on the Opposition Benches so that they can learn to march in step, speak in unison and stop accepting orders from extraneous people such as the editors of the Daily Mail and The Daily Telegraph?
    Dr. Moonie: I am not sure how to answer that, other than to point out that if my hon. Friend's record is as good as he seemed to suggest, we may well need him in future.
    Mr. Jonathan Sayeed: Landlocked Bedfordshire is not normally associated with the Royal Navy. Nevertheless, there is a sea cadet corps unit in Flitwick, which is well supported by young people. For many years, that unit has requested affiliation to one of Her Majesty's warships. Will the Minister expedite that?
    Dr. Moonie: I should be very happy to follow up what sounds like a very good idea.

    Sierra Leone
    Mr. Phil Woolas: If he will make a statement on the deployment of British armed forces in Sierra Leone. [138580]
    Mr. David Heath: What the current deployment of forces is in Sierra Leone, including Royal Navy and Royal Fleet Auxiliary ships in the immediate vicinity. [138586]
    The Minister for the Armed Forces (Mr. John Spellar): British armed forces are deployed in Sierra Leone in accordance with the Government's policy to help build a lasting peace in that country. That policy was set out by the Foreign Secretary in the House of Commons on 6 June. At present, there are about 600 service personnel deployed in Sierra Leone, including the crew of RFA Sir Percivale. That is higher than usual, owing to the handover that is currently under way from the joint taskforce headquarters to 1 Mechanised Brigade headquarters, which is taking over the role of providing the operational HQ. Once that handover is complete, the numbers in theatre will be over 400, depending on the type of training that is being conducted.
    Mr. Woolas: I thank my hon. Friend for his reply. Will he assure me that, contrary to the political sniping from the Opposition, the recent landings involving the Royal Marines, HMS Ocean and HMS Fearless show that, as a result of the reforms, our forces are more deployable and capable than they were before? Will my hon. Friend further assure me that, despite the success of the training that is being given to the Government forces in Sierra Leone, there are no plans to withdraw United Kingdom forces?
    Mr. Spellar: I join my hon. Friend in paying tribute to the landing conducted by the amphibious group. It demonstrated once again the superb professionalism of our forces and, as he said, their deployability and flexibility. As my hon. Friend knows, we have been undertaking a considerable amount of training of the forces of the Government of Sierra Leone. However, there is still further work to be done, not only with troops, but with personnel at officer level. We will continue our work so that those forces can ensure peace and stability in their country.
    Mr. Heath: Given that there was a clear justification for protecting British citizens in Sierra Leone and for providing support to its democratically elected

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    Government—I acknowledge also that the recent show of strength by the amphibious ready group was justified and demonstrated its excellent capabilities—does the Secretary of State agree that it is impossible to justify an open-ended agreement that would effectively provide a garrison to Freetown or any expeditionary activities in the wider sense in Sierra Leone? Is not that a job for the United Nations and for a properly constituted international force? What agreements has the Secretary of State secured with other countries to provide such a force?
    Mr. Spellar: We are working with the United Nations to persuade other countries to make a significant contribution, and that work is starting to come to fruition. I would not say that our action was merely a show of strength. It was also a genuine exercise to demonstrate the deployability of our forces, not only in the situation in question, but in any comparable one. I do not want to give a defined time limit, not least because we do not want to provide an indication of termination to opposing people or forces who might take it the wrong way and be encouraged.
    As I said, we are trying to ensure that the forces of the Government of Sierra Leone—the Sierra Leone army—are increasingly better trained, better equipped, better able to move forward, and thus able to secure their own country and establish peace and stability there. We are playing our part and United Nations mandated forces, with which we are working, are playing their part. That is enormously welcomed by the people of Sierra Leone and is appreciated in the wider world.
    Dr. George Turner: Will my hon. Friend say a little more about the tangible benefits of the training and explain whether the capability to deal with rebels is being significantly changed? Furthermore, does the training programme have a defined schedule and time scale to which we are working?
    Mr. John Bercow: "Schedule" is an American word.
    Mr. Spellar: It is interesting that the hon. Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow) is now becoming anti-American as well as anti-European. That is an historical throwback—now it is foreigners whom the Conservatives do not like.
    In response to my hon. Friend the Member for North-West Norfolk (Dr. Turner), we have a programme and we are also working with other agencies on the disarmament and reconstruction programme, to ensure that those who have been involved in rebel bands can be reintegrated into society—another important aspect of our activities. We have been enormously encouraged by the progress made by troops in the Sierra Leone army. As I said, we are now working on the structure of command and control in those forces and providing assistance in that respect. We are not working to an exact or predetermined time scale, but we are satisfied that we are making considerable progress with which the Sierra Leone forces are also very pleased.
    Mr. Quentin Davies: The Secretary of State cannot be allowed to get away with blatantly inventing citations of Conservative policy. The Conservative party is utterly committed to the Eurofighter
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    programme, which we launched. We are also looking forward to taking delivery of the first aircraft on forming the next Administration.
    On Sierra Leone, there have been stunning examples of military professionalism and courage since our forces were deployed there. There is no question of that. However, our forces and the public are surely entitled to what they have not received from the Government during their involvement for the past several months: a clear authoritative statement about our interests in Sierra Leone; about the criteria on which we decided to become involved there and not in any other nasty civil war elsewhere in Africa; about whether the Government have any clear idea about the maximum resources that we might utilise to restore peace; or about a deadline. Do they have any idea even in their own mind, or is their involvement simply an open-ended, undisciplined commitment?
    Mr. Spellar: Opposition Defence Front Benchers—let alone other Conservatives Members—know all about ill discipline, as we have observed over recent days.
    Imposing a deadline or timetable on any operation would be the best encouragement to the Revolutionary United Front and others to hold out until such time as the deadline was reached. That would not help us to achieve the objectives that I am sure we all share.
    On our reasons for intervening in Sierra Leone in the first place, there was a real risk of Freetown falling and of murder, massacre and mayhem taking place in the area. The British public understand very well, having seen on their televisions the appalling acts that were perpetrated on civilians during the war in Sierra Leone, exactly why we intervened—to try to bring peace and stability and the chance of a better life to those people. That is the right action; it is endorsed by the international community and I hope that it will be more generally supported.
    On the previous aside of the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford (Mr. Davies), it is interesting that the Conservative party has come late in the day to the defence of Eurofighter. Perhaps it has decided that Lord Tebbit is dispensable and that his slurs on Eurofighter have to be taken on. Opposition Back Benchers and Front Benchers still refuse to commit themselves to the A400M, which will give us a considerable heavy lift capability and which is important for the European—and British—aerospace industry.

    Nuclear Threat
    Mr. Graham Brady: What his assessment is of the threat to the UK from nuclear weapons. [138581]
    The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Geoffrey Hoon): We assess that there is no significant threat to the United Kingdom from nuclear weapons at present, but we continue to monitor developments very closely.
    Mr. Brady: I am grateful to the Secretary of State for his response. Does he accept that within five years the Iranian regime may have the capacity to produce nuclear

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    weapons? Does not that make it essential for the British Government to give full support to America's steps towards ballistic missile defence?
    Mr. Hoon: The hon. Gentleman needs to distinguish carefully between a threat to the United States, which is the current concern of national missile defence, and a threat to the United Kingdom. As I said earlier, we continue to monitor threats from around the world as they might affect the United Kingdom and our allies.
    Mr. Lawrie Quinn: My right hon. Friend knows of my interest in RAF Fylingdales, which is adjacent to my constituency. The people of Scarborough, Whitby and the north York moors are very interested in who will form the future American Administration. If a President Bush is appointed, many people in my constituency will be concerned about the likely effect on my part of the world, which may become a defence target. What discussions has my right hon. Friend had about the future of RAF Fylingdales in that respect?
    Mr. Hoon: The Americans have decided, for the moment at any rate, not to take national missile defence forward, and will not therefore be making any requests of the United Kingdom in relation to Fylingdales or any other facility that might be available until they reach a decision.
    Mr. Crispin Blunt: The next United States Administration is likely to take ballistic missile defence forward at an early stage. If they do so, will they have the involvement and support of the United Kingdom?
    Mr. Hoon: When and if a new Administration is appointed in the United States, and when and if they reach that conclusion, we might well consider it.

    European Defence
    Mr. Syd Rapson: If he will make a statement on recent progress towards the headline goal on European Defence. [138582]
    Mr. Andrew Robathan: What recent discussions he has had on the European security and defence policy project with (a) the EU's Foreign Affairs Commissioner and (b) French Ministers. [138584]
    The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Geoffrey Hoon): As I have already made clear today, I attended the capability commitments conference on 20 and 21 November in Brussels, where European partners—both in the European Union and outside it—identified the type and level of forces that they might be able to make available to Petersberg operations. Those constitute not a standing European army but a pool of potentially available national forces. The UK contribution to the headline goal was announced to the House on 20 November.
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    I last met Javier Solana and the French Defence Minister at the conference.
    Mr. Rapson: Following the success of the conference, what other countries outside the European Union but in Europe have volunteered forces and facilities for the purpose of the Petersberg tasks?
    Mr. Hoon: At the conference there was a meeting not just among the 15 EU member states but among the 15 applicants for membership, all of which expressed willingness to participate in an appropriate way—according to their national capabilities—and all of which strongly supported the idea of developing a European capability. That contrasts with what I described to the House on 20 November as the complete isolation of the Conservative party, which appears in this context to be opposed not only to every European nation, but to the United States Administration.
    Mr. Robathan: I am sure that every Conservative Member applauds greater co-operation with our European allies in defence, and would applaud any greater commitment on their behalf to increasing their defence spending. But will the Secretary of State tell us his assessment of the motivation behind the enthusiasm of the French for the project, especially given that they left the NATO military structure in 1968 and show no inclination to return to it? Will the right hon. Gentleman also tell us his assessment of Turkey's reaction, given that throughout the cold war it was a vital European ally on the southern flank of NATO? Finally, will the right hon. Gentleman tell us what financial commitment any of our European allies have made to extra defence spending specifically for this project, in terms of training, headquarters planning or, indeed, C3I—command, control, communications and intelligence.
    Mr. Hoon: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is not seriously inviting me to assess French motivation. I find it difficult enough to understand the psychological obsessions of Conservative Members when it comes to questions affecting Europe.
    Turkey attended the meeting that I mentioned, and offered its own contribution to satisfying the headline goal. Indeed, it did so in terms that indicated its enthusiasm about participating in an improvement in European military capability. [Interruption.]
    As for finance, if the hon. Gentleman—instead of shouting from a sedentary position—gave a moment's thought to what is being attempted in terms of improving European capabilities, he would realise that satisfying the headline goal will require some countries to contribute extra expenditure. That is precisely the purpose of establishing the goal and trying to work towards it.
    Mr. Casale: Is not recent progress in European defence a result not only of Britain's leadership in Europe but of the qualitative shift in the relationship between Britain and individual European nation states?
    Do not the idea of a rapid reaction force in general, and the idea of a headline goal in particular, have their origin in British-Italian diplomatic initiatives, some of which go back to the time of the Maastricht treaty, when Lord Hurd was Foreign Secretary? The last Government, however,

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    lacked the support of other European nation states for the bringing to fruition of such initiatives, whereas this Government are demonstrating that they can deliver what is best for Britain through constructive engagement with Europe.
    Mr. Hoon: I have certainly been puzzled in recent days by the attitude of certain elements of the Conservative party—what I might call their "ground zero" attitude to any event that took place before May 1997.
    The Conservatives have a track record, and as far as European defence co-operation is concerned it is quite a good one. I find it astonishing that the present incumbents of the Conservative Front Bench, and large sections of the present Conservative party, seem to want to deny any involvement in effective European co-operation in the past. Fortunately, however—as I said earlier—the Conservatives' former Deputy Prime Minister, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Foreign Secretary, Lord Hurd, as well as their former party chairman, all have rather better memories than their present Front-Bench team.
    Mr. Iain Duncan Smith: I absolutely agree that we need greater European capability and greater European co-operation. I agree with Lord Healey and Lord Owen; but I also agree with Lord Hurd, who stated clearly in 1993:
    A common foreign and security policy does not transform the European Union into a defence organisation.—[Official Report, 30 March 1993; Vol.222, c. 179.]
    Before the Secretary of State starts going on about Maastricht, perhaps he will bear in mind what was said when the legislation went through—although he, it must be said, voted against it.
    Last week, did not we yet again have the Prime Minister being a little economical with the truth? When he decided to say why he voted against these very proposals in 1997, he said that they
    would have meant that NATO and European defence ran alongside one other.—[Official Report, 22 November 2000; Vol. 357, c. 301.]
    That was his fear, but is not the reality the right hon. Gentleman has agreed to exactly that? There is not one single link between NATO and the European Union force. General Ralston, the Supreme Allied Commander Europe, said the other day that he would play no direct part in the European endeavour, and that all he had was the prospect of linking NATO and the European Union together, so that is the reality. Will the Secretary of State answer this simple question: is the proposal not exactly the same as that refused in 1997 by the Prime Minister?
    Mr. Hoon: We have made it clear in the negotiations, in which we have been closely involved, that there will be a close link between the European Union rapid reaction capability and NATO planning processes. Indeed, much of the work on describing the scenarios that are part of the headline goal was done in NATO planning units. That will continue. We have made it absolutely clear that we anticipate the use of NATO planning processes in order to achieve deployment of any rapid reaction force, in a situation where, formerly, NATO itself was not engaged.
    As for the hon. Gentleman's opening remarks, it is all very well agreeing with all manner of people who appear to be putting forward contradictory views. The real
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    question for him is whether he agrees with Baroness Thatcher, who is clearly leading the Conservative party on the issue.
    Mr. Duncan Smith: Here we go again. The Secretary of State does not bother to answer the question. All Ministers do is try to claim that our position will end co-operation and production on EFA—European fighter aircraft—and so on. Soon they will be talking about its being the end of televisions in Europe and of bath tubs. They never deal with the key point, which is: what is the initiative for? The reality is, as he knows, that the French said clearly in 1999, "You would never get a right of first refusal for NATO." If we do not get that right of first refusal, we will have NATO and the EU in due course disagreeing about which will operate. Is not that the point? There is no military capability enhancement. It is far from being a European rapid reaction force. It is not even European. It certainly is not rapid. But it is reactionary, anti-US and anti-NATO.
    Mr. Hoon: Perhaps it might help if I said it a little more slowly. I shall try to explain it in such a way that the Defence Secretary can understand—[HON. MEMBERS: "Ah"]—so that the shadow Defence Secretary can understand it—[Interruption.] I already understand it. Let me make it clear. NATO fully supports the European Union's work on European defence. It absolutely unequivocally supports what is happening, as do the current Secretary-General of NATO, the United States President and the United States Defence Secretary. They have all said categorically that it is good for both European defence and NATO. Is the shadow Defence Secretary saying that they have all got it wrong—each and every one of them—and only he knows the truth? If that is his position, no one will believe it.
    Mr. David Winnick: If the position gets even worse, and in order to maintain the peace, about which we are all concerned, has any discussion taken place at European level about using the rapid reaction force to stop rival Tory factions from tearing each other apart over Europe? Is that a possibility?
    Mr. Hoon: The Petersberg tasks include humanitarian relief, so that might be appropriate.

    Western European Union
    Mr. Stephen Day: If he will make a statement on the merging of the WEU's functions with the EU. [138583]
    The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Geoffrey Hoon): The Western European Union is not merging with the European Union. As announced at the WEU Council of Ministers in Marseille on 13 November, the WEU is being wound down and it is planned that some of its functions will be transferred into the developing EU defence structures. Those functions will include the WEU Institute for Security Studies, the WEU satellite centre and the WEU multinational advisory police element in Albania. A residual WEU body will be maintained to

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    service commitments under the modified Brussels treaty and to administer other remaining functions, pending decisions about their future.
    Mr. Day: I am grateful to the Secretary of State. I see that he has lost none of the Government's Orwellian talents in using language. The fact is that only one organisation will come out of what is effectively a merger of the Western European Union and the European Union. I would like the right hon. Gentleman to explain why, in 1997, the Government made it clear that such a merger—or, if he prefers, a joining together—of the two organisations would be a threat to NATO, whereas now the Government say that the same action will strengthen NATO. Which is right?
    Mr. Hoon: I feel that I should apologise to the hon. Gentleman for answering the original question before he asked his supplementary one—which, unfortunately, has already been dealt with. The reality is that the two bodies are not merging; significant parts of the WEU will still be in existence. His question has already been answered.

    Defence Medical Services
    Laura Moffatt: If he will make a statement on recruitment into the defence medical services. [138587]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence(Dr. Lewis Moonie): Recruitment into training is generally satisfactory. We have increased our targets for medical cadets and trainee nurses, and I am happy to say that we have attracted a good response. Recruiting fully or partially trained personnel, particularly doctors and nurses, is more difficult, and we are currently working on measures to improve that.
    Laura Moffatt: I thank my hon. Friend for that response. Does he agree that the Department could work very closely with the NHS in dealing with the difficulty in recruiting trained people to the defence medical services? As the NHS knows a little bit about the difficulties of recruitment, are there discussions with it on how to ensure that the armed forces get the very best personnel that they deserve?
    Dr. Moonie: I am happy to give my hon. Friend that assurance. A number of liaison groups and committees are discussing a range of matters of common interest, such as personnel issues, operational planning and the application to the defence medical services of developments in civilian medical practice. Additionally, a joint steering group has been established by the Ministry of Defence and the Department of Health, with the Scottish Executive and the Wales Office also represented. Its work includes matters such as future manpower planning and the recruiting of reserve medical personnel. Moreover, I work very closely with my ministerial colleagues in the Department of Health on what I consider to be a very important issue.
    Mr. Julian Brazier: Will the Minister confirm that, at a time of extreme manpower shortages, more than 5,000 personnel are medically unfit? Will he also confirm that, this year, the defence medical services
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    took a hit in so-called efficiency savings in its budget, and that the number of people on that unfit list is still increasing?
    Dr. Moonie: I have been concerned for some time about the number of personnel who are medically downgraded. That is why the defence medical services has recently introduced schemes in certain hospitals to hasten people through surgical treatment. It is also why, when I recently visited Redford barracks, in Scotland, I was very pleased to see a very strong system for providing orthopaedic and physiotherapy support, which provides quite a dramatic means of shortening the time in which personnel are downgraded.

    Armed Forces (European Exchanges)
    Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: If he will make a statement on the programme of exchanges between British armed forces and those of other EU states. [138588]
    The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Geoffrey Hoon): British armed forces carry out wide-ranging exchanges with the armed forces of other European Union states, as they do with other, non-European Union states. The exchanges are designed to be of mutual benefit to both parties.
    Mr. Clifton-Brown: Given the Secretary of State's overwhelming enthusiasm for the European rapid reaction force, can he give us any good reason why the force catalogue is not to be published, so that we could see precisely what the other European nations are committing to the force?
    Mr. Hoon: If the hon. Gentleman had stuck to his question and asked about bilateral exchanges, I would have been able to tell him that, even in the context of improving European capabilities, it is important that forces work together, regardless of whether those forces are in the European Union or in other European nations. When the forces are deployed together into crises, it helps that they have had previous experience of training and conducting exercises together and of developing the type of mutual understanding that is necessary. That is precisely why it is such a good thing that we have developed the headline goal and improvements in European capability.

    Service Accommodation
    Mr. Gwyn Prosser: If he will make a statement on accommodation for (a) single and (b) married members of the British armed forces. [138589]
    Ms Hazel Blears: If he will make a statement on accommodation for (a) single and (b) married members of the British armed forces. [138594]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Dr. Lewis Moonie): The Defence Housing Executive, which manages and allocates service housing for armed forces personnel and their families, is continuing with its modernisation programme of service families accommodation in Great Britain and is on target

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    to complete 3,000 upgrades to standard 1 at a projected cost this financial year of about £68 million. The DHE aims to bring most of its core housing stock—that which is needed in the longer term—up to the standard required over the next five years. We have a firm projects programme and contract strategy in place to ensure that this programme can be achieved.
    A review of single living accommodation has been completed recently and steps are being taken to improve the standard of such accommodation across all areas of the Department.
    Mr. Prosser: Does my hon. Friend accept that the effectiveness of the armed forces is linked closely to
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    morale, which is linked closely to standards of accommodation and conditions, and that there are areas in which accommodation falls way below the standards that we should have in the armed forces? The five-year plan is ambitious and encouraging. Will he do all that he can to accelerate it and put things right as soon as possible?
    Dr. Moonie: I am happy to give my hon. Friend that assurance. I have recently seen accommodation in some barracks in which I was ashamed to think of our armed forces personnel being housed. My hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces and I are engaged in constructive discussions with officials to accelerate the programme of upgrading.

Climate Change Negotiations
3.31 pm
The Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions (Mr. John Prescott): As the House will know, the outcome of the climate change talks in The Hague last week was a real disappointment for all concerned—[Interruption.] It was indeed a disappointment, but at the end of the conference all parties remained committed to reaching agreement when they meet again in May next year.
If nothing else, the negotiations have highlighted the pressing need to take action to cut greenhouse gas emissions. It was clear that all countries are experiencing climate change problems, that the situation is getting worse and that a global solution is needed. The House will recall that the Rio convention said that developed countries should reduce their greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2000.
At Kyoto in 1997, we agreed legally binding targets for developed countries to take us up to 2012. Most notably, the European Union agreed a target of an 8 per cent. cut in 1990 levels of greenhouse gas emissions; the United States agreed 7 per cent.; and Japan agreed 6 per cent.
Nations signed up to the Kyoto agreement under conditions that involved mechanisms for implementation, including the clean development mechanism, joint implementation between developed countries, emissions trading and the use of carbon sinks such as forests. Those were contentious issues, and after Kyoto groups were set up to decide how the proposals could be implemented.
The Hague conference was about how the mechanisms would work. The talks started on Monday 13 November. On the evening of Thursday 24 November, the president of the conference, Jan Pronk of the Netherlands, tabled proposals for compromise solutions to the most contentious problems facing the conference, but they failed to gain agreement.
Between 2 am and 3 am on Saturday morning, we consulted the president of the European Union delegation, and indeed the president of the conference. They were extremely pessimistic about the pace of negotiations. I agreed with the European Union president, the French Environment Minister, Dominique Voynet, that we would urgently explore a possible compromise with the United States and its allies in the umbrella group. The key issue concerned carbon sinks such as forests, which absorb and store carbon, and how far they could be used in developed countries and elsewhere under the clean development mechanism.
I must make it clear that both the sinks and the clean development mechanism were part of the Kyoto protocol, not loopholes first raised in The Hague. It was always understood that they would form part of the 5.2 per cent. overall cut in emissions to which developed countries agreed. Early on Saturday morning, I met Ministers from France, Germany and the United States to draw up compromise proposals to solve the main issues of contention between the European Union and the umbrella group. I then agreed these with a core group of 10 Ministers representing the European Union and the umbrella group.
The agreement, if accepted, would have been passed on to the president of the conference, to feed into his final proposals for consideration by the G77 and other countries.
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The agreement would have prevented developed countries from gaining credits from the clean development mechanism for planting forests in developing countries. This was felt by many countries, particularly the green groups, to be a huge loophole. The agreement would have placed a ceiling on the use of forest sinks by the United States, Japan and Canada—a ceiling which Europe had been asking for—and strengthened the scientific requirements applied to the domestic sinks.
Overall, compared with the president of the conference's original proposal, we estimate that that would have saved around 150 million tonnes of carbon a year. However, European Union Ministers failed to endorse the proposals. Many felt that a deal was very close and welcomed the initiative, especially the exclusion of sinks from the CDM, but expressed uncertainty about the overall impact on the emission reduction targets agreed at Kyoto. They believed that further negotiations were necessary and that that should be communicated to the conference president. However, the president took the view that there was not enough time to present a new compromise package.
The failure of these talks is not the end of the story. We have a meeting of the European Union Environment Ministers in December.
Let me make one thing clear to the House: I have worked and negotiated with Dominique Voynet for three years now. Her commitment to securing an agreement is as passionate as mine. We will both work together to ensure that the agreement is reached. Let me also make it clear that my experience in negotiations in these areas leads me to believe that working together with other European countries can provide a stronger negotiating position in achieving those ends. [Interruption.] That is precisely how the Kyoto agreement was achieved.
I also want to emphasise that the climate change conference did not end formally on Saturday. It will be reconvened in May.
The outcome of The Hague is disappointing. We all did our best, and we came very close to agreement. I still hope that we can secure sufficient agreement in May to secure ratification by the European Union and others by 2002. We should remember that we are not just looking to the first 10 years but to setting up a framework that will hold for 50 and 100 years. That is what really matters to this and future generations.
Mr. Archie Norman: I thank the Deputy Prime Minister for his statement on a setback that will be regarded on both sides of the House with great regret. The Deputy Prime Minister has had our support in his efforts to bring about progress on climate change. The groundwork for the Hague talks were laid not just at Kyoto but by the previous Government, not least by my right hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk, Coastal (Mr. Gummer). The Deputy Prime Minister has pursued the matter with determination and has made progress on climate change the hallmark of his green credentials. We applaud him for that.
The right hon. Gentleman set high expectation for the Hague talks. He said, in the vernacular of the professional footballer, that he was "gutted" by the breakdown. This was a unique opportunity, but the talks have broken up amid disarray and recriminations. The world will pay a price for the breakdown. Yet the omens seemed so promising.

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Does the Deputy Prime Minister now believe, with hindsight, that the breakdown was inevitable or was it a failure of diplomacy? If it was inevitable, why did the Minister for the Environment say on the "Today" programme on Saturday morning, only a few hours before the collapse, that the compromise they tabled was "a very important achievement"? Yet, only three hours later, the Deputy Prime Minister found himself completely outvoted by our European partners. How does he explain this misreading of our negotiating position?
Does the Deputy Prime Minister now regret that more time was not spent laying the groundwork and understanding the subtleties of the European position? He started the week posing for photo calls on the Dutch flood defences and ended it claiming victory on the "Today" programme at the most delicate stages of negotiation. Is not the real truth that he has been more concerned with the media and with exploiting the talks for party political reasons than with the hard grind of negotiation? He wanted all the credit for success; does he now accept part of the credit for the failure? Does he feel that he had sufficient support from the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary?
President Chirac played a direct role at The Hague, but where was the Prime Minister? What part did he play? What has happened to his much-vaunted claim to be at the heart of Europe? Where is his influence now? Was there any contact at all between Downing street and the French Prime Minister during the course of the week? Was there a single telephone discussion between the Prime Minister and the White House, or does his renowned disdain for all matters environmental mean that he did not want to be involved, and that the Deputy Prime Minister was hung out to dry? [Interruption.] No, that is not all.
Does the Deputy Prime Minister now regret the recrimination that followed the breakdown of the talks? Was not that the moment for statesmanship, for understatement and for understanding of our partners' point of view? The French Minister held the presidency, and whatever the right hon. Gentleman may feel about her personally, it was not helpful of him to storm out with such petulance, and to dismiss French anxieties as "cold feet". The French Minister, for her part, said that the right hon. Gentleman had lost his nerve and his cool, and described him as "an inveterate macho man". Does not that breakdown of personal relationships suggest that, in trying to salvage his own reputation, he has not only burnt his bridges but set back the prospects for any future settlement?
Is not this breakdown the last nail in the coffin of the right hon. Gentleman's stewardship of the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, following the collapse of the transport system, under-investment in the roads, the flop of the urban White Paper a week ago, the row about National Air Traffic Services, and the stalemate over the tube? Is it not the final indignity that the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland—the man whom the right hon. Gentleman held up to the world as a crab in a jar—is now briefing that he wants the right hon. Gentleman's job? Was not the Evening Standard right to
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describe the Deputy Prime Minister as "Blair's greatest embarrassment"? Was not yesterday's collapse the final collapse in credibility of a failed Deputy Prime Minister?
Mr. Prescott: The hon. Gentleman often fails to speak to the issue, but it particularly annoys me to hear him talk about the collapse of the transport system, given that he was a director of Railtrack—an organisation that even his own party has disowned as unable to do anything for the railway industry.
I shall return to the issue under discussion. I welcome the hon. Gentleman's support and the regret that he rightly expressed over the breakdown of the talks. I also acknowledge that the previous Administration were involved in the early stages—in the Rio conference—and in the early stages leading to the Kyoto conference. Despite their involvement, they did not hold the same position that we do, nor did they necessarily endorse the agreement that we reached at Kyoto. However, I am grateful that they were involved in the process. I inherited their programme and developed it.
On climate change, the hon. Gentleman must recognise that more than 160 nations were involved in the negotiations at The Hague. It is very difficult to get agreement between 160 nations. It was difficult to get agreement at Kyoto, where only 40 nations were involved, but we managed to do so. Nevertheless, our great problem was that there was no further time for negotiation.
In the early stages of the negotiations when my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Environment was involved with me, with European Ministers and Ministers from the umbrella group, we reached the agreement that I mentioned to the House. My right hon. Friend then went to the programme, hoping that the agreement that we had all reached would be taken to the president. However, the European Ministers decided—[Interruption.] They did not hold a vote on the issue—they did not reject the proposal; they said that there was not enough information. They assumed that the agreement would be taken to the president to put into his final document—[Interruption.]
I can only give hon. Members the facts as they were: there was no vote on the matter; there was no rejection by Euro Ministers—they did not have enough information to endorse the agreement. The agreement was then to be sent to the president, who would discuss it with the Group of 77. That was the negotiation process that had been agreed. We put those negotiations to the president so that they could be put before the whole conference. That is what we were involved in doing.
There were great difficulties—certainly passions were involved—but when I left the negotiations, they had well finished. We had reported back to the group. Other Ministers had left. My plane home was at 2 o'clock. I left that building after other Ministers had left and after the president had made clear that there would be no further negotiations. In fact, I had not been home for three weekends, so I admit to the weakness of wanting to go home that night. I leave the House to make a judgment about that.
As to the accusation that I am a macho man—moi? The remark leaves me most gutted. I did what I thought was best. We came close to an agreement, but time ran out for us. The conference president has now remitted the conference to its next meeting in May. I shall work hard with my French colleagues and with European Ministers

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to reach a final agreement. This country and the rest of the world expect us to do something about climate change and we are committed to doing that.
Mr. Andrew F. Bennett: I thank my right hon. Friend for his statement and for all the hard work that he and my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Environment put in to the negotiations. I share his frustration that an agreement was not reached; I hope that he can go back and get that agreement. Does he agree that most people in Britain, and many in British industry, cannot understand why the United States is unable to make the sort of contribution that a civilised country should make to this problem?
Mr. Prescott: I am grateful for my hon. Friend's remarks, but I must correct him on one point. Those of us who negotiated at Kyoto know that the concepts involved—clean development mechanism, emissions trading and some forest sinks—were part of the agreement and were put forward by the Americans. If they had not been, we should not have been negotiating at The Hague. To be fair to the Americans, the concepts about which we had reservations, but which the Group of 77 have very much come to accept, were part of the final agreement.
There may be disagreements with the Americans about their proposals; after all, they negotiate according to their interests—and why not? That is precisely what European nations should do, too. However, the process of negotiation is to try to set limits on what is agreed, and that is what is difficult. The Americans played their part in the negotiations just as much as anyone else.
Mr. Don Foster: May I join the Deputy Prime Minister in expressing genuine regret at the failure of the Hague talks? What lessons on climate change can he take from the Conservative party, which recently announced its intention to scrap the climate change levy? Will he confirm—
Mr. Speaker: Order. That is not the business of the Deputy Prime Minister.
Mr. Foster: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Will the Deputy Prime Minister confirm that at lunch-time he held a meeting with representatives of a large number of non-governmental organisations; that he was specifically asked whether the deal that he had negotiated would reduce carbon dioxide emissions from the US; and that he was unable to give a straight answer? Given the confusion that clearly exists on this issue, can he understand why other countries were not prepared to sign up to the deal that he put on the table? Is it not the case that—at least on this occasion—no deal is better than a bad deal?
Mr. Prescott: It is for all of us to make judgments on whether no deal is better than a bad deal. I personally think that it was a good deal. Had we been able to get the package together, we would have reduced carbon emissions, which was the proposal; we would have tightened it up so that the countries would not have exploited the planting of forests in developing countries, which was a major concern; and we would have had an overall reduction in carbon gas emissions in 2010.
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The hon. Gentleman refers to the meeting that I held with the green groups. I told them that, yes, there was a reduction and I gave the amounts.
Mr. Foster: What are the figures?
Mr. Prescott: I shall give them now for the record, and the hon. Gentleman can write them down and then tell the green groups. It was clear that the Americans proposed that forest sinks would equate to 300 million carbon tonnes. That figure went down to 125 million tonnes during the negotiations. I negotiated it down further to 75 million tonnes, and I believe that that was still not the end of the road, but time was short and the document had to be taken up to the conference itself so all the parties to the negotiations could endorse or reject it. It is not true that I did not give the amounts earlier, and they are now on record. On that basis, it can be seen that there was good faith in the negotiations. We got a reduction and, as the hon. Gentleman will know from his knowledge of such issues, planting forests in developing countries under the clean development mechanism was seen as a major loophole. I was the first to get it removed from the deal with the Americans.
Joan Ruddock: May I, too, congratulate my right hon. Friend on the role that he has played? May I tell him how important many of us regard the removing of forest sinks from the clean development mechanism and, indeed, the capping of the contribution that such sinks could make in the United States? Will he do his utmost to ensure that both the outline agreements are kept on the table in all future talks, while continuing his pressure on the United States to make real cuts in domestic emissions?
Mr. Prescott: I thank my hon. Friend for her words of support. As I have said, I am pleased that we stopped the development of forest sinks under the clean development mechanism. That major, fundamental change was very much welcomed by the European Ministers when I proposed it to them. On the capping of the United States, it is true that the amounts that we were talking about required not only a ceiling, but greater scientific assessment so that we could judge, over time, whether the science worked and whether it was being abused. The Americans agreed to that at that stage.
On whether the same documents will be put on the table, I must be fair, as one of those in the negotiations, and say that when Ministers get to that stage they have to cut a political deal. At the end of the day, that is what it is all about. Politicians have to use their judgment because all the evidence might not be as clear as they would want. A deal has to be made, and no party to it would want to start the negotiations again if they had already given everything that they thought they could at that stage.
I regret that it is most likely that the negotiators will go back to their original positions. We have already been told that the document used by the president is likely to be used. Given that the settlement that I negotiated, with others, was far better than the president's, we will start off in a worse position, but I hope that we shall reach the better one than I proposed.
Mr. John Gummer: I wonder whether the Deputy Prime Minister would agree,

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especially after today's announcement, that it would have been better if he had not made the personal comments that appear to have been made, given that he has to negotiate further with those people? Does he agree that there is considerable doubt about the effect of the agreement that he wanted? His recent answer did not dispel that doubt, so will he answer a simple question? By how much would the United States domestic emissions have been reduced under the agreement that he hoped he would get, and how does that compare with the domestic reductions of the European Union?
Mr. Prescott: The right hon. Gentleman was greatly involved in leading the negotiations in the early stages. I think that I must be the first Minister to include an opposite number on the delegation; I recognise the role that he has played. He will know that it is difficult to get precise information when it is based on such variables. Indeed, that was my real problem with the European Ministers, who asked exactly what the reduction would be. Let me give an example. If the opportunity to include forest sinks in the clean development mechanism for developing countries no longer exists, a judgment has to be made about how much they save. Some say that it is as much as 35 per cent. of the effort required, but what is that as a proportion of the American or, indeed, global contribution? It was very difficult to make a precise definition in the two hours that we were negotiating—I readily admit that. We talked the matter over with the Ministers, but, at the end of the day, we have to obtain a reduction in emissions and make sure that it is a reduction and not a plus. All the figures show that an agreement would have led to a clear reduction in Europe as well as in America. It would have been a greater reduction in America, because it is the greatest emitter.
Mr. Dale Campbell-Savours: My right hon. Friend has been talking to representatives of a Democratic American Administration and we are likely to have a Republican one in January. Can he assure us that he will develop close relations with the people with whom he might have to sit at a future conference to re-address the same issues?
Mr. Prescott: I must admit that that was one of my considerations, although people will understand that I do not wish to pass comment on who should be the next President of the United States. The political climate can change in six months as it can in six years. It is an important consideration for anyone in negotiations and it certainly was in my mind. We had an opportunity, because Ministers from America and other countries were prepared to come to an agreement. As we have seen from past negotiations, Ministers, Governments and policies change, and we have one opportunity to reach an agreement. I thought that this was the opportunity, but I will not give up looking for another one. However, it is a pity that we did not take this one.
Mr. John Redwood: I believe that the US and the UK position has to be different from that of the French and that we need to move the French to reach an agreement, so will the Deputy Prime Minister take advantage of this opportunity to apologise to his opposite
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number in France? I do not think that personal abuse helps to achieve agreement. Does he agree that, if he apologised now, we might get the agreement that he wants?
Mr. Prescott: As the right hon. Gentleman has a reputation in the House for apologising for nothing and for being highly personal in most of his comments, his question is a bit of a cheek. Let me make the position absolutely clear. It was not simply the French who opposed the deal. European Ministers agreed by about 2:1 that they did not have sufficient information to endorse the agreement. However, all that was required was to send the agreement to the president to put it to the conference of delegates who were negotiating. I put together an agreement between two important parties—the umbrella nations and the European nations. An agreement was reached by 10 Ministers from Europe and the umbrella countries but, when it was properly and democratically presented to Ministers from the European Union, those Ministers took the view that, although they endorsed the initiative and particularly the clean development mechanism proposal, they did not have enough information to judge whether it was a good or bad deal. They wanted more negotiations and the deal to be sent to the president.
Mr. Denzil Davies: Was the European Union supposed to be negotiating as a single bloc at the conference? If so, was that done under the specific provisions of the treaty or was it merely an informal ad hoc arrangement?
Mr. Prescott: My right hon. Friend knows that the Commission has certain responsibilities in international negotiations and often negotiates on behalf of the Community. We were at this conference as European Ministers deciding common policy in negotiations. As he knows, even if we come to a common European position, as we did for the target of 8.5 per cent., Europe then decides the variation of targets between the nations known as the "bubble" and Britain's contribution was 12.5 per cent. We all signed individually to the protocol; it was not signed simply by the Commission, which signs in its own right.
Mr. Michael Howard: As someone who helped to broker agreement between the European Union and the United States in the run-up to the Rio summit—which started the whole process—may I congratulate the Deputy Prime Minister on the efforts that he made last week? However, does he think that the anti-American tirade in which President Chirac engaged early in the week was helpful? Does he not think, on reflection, that the French were probably always determined to do what they could to subvert any compromise so as to enable them to pillory the United States and put it in the stocks?
Mr. Prescott: I am not sure that that is entirely right, although when President Chirac made the valid point in his opening statement that, taking account of population, the amount of gas emissions in America is far greater than that of France, it was interpreted as a criticism. He also said that there should be a levy—a kind of tax—on the mechanisms so that they can be accepted by the third world. Although that was proposed by the president of the

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Council of Ministers, it was opposed by many European countries at the conference which interpreted it as an anti-American, and therefore difficult, proposition because the Americans had made it clear—as we did—that they would not accept such a deal. The conference president included that and other measures, including our proposal, in his document, but it is important to get on with making a deal and negotiating to produce the agreement that is necessary to improve our climate by implementing the changes advocated in the protocol.
Mr. Tony Lloyd: In joining others who have congratulated my right hon. Friend on his role in searching for a deal, can I urge him to reconsider the matter so that next time the deal sticks? Does he believe that public opinion in the United States—which is, as he said, the overwhelming emitter of carbon gases in the world—is being led by the political leadership in a way that allows it to realise the enormous tasks that American society faces if we are to achieve such changes?
Mr. Prescott: I thank my hon. Friend for his support. We have to return to all the parties involved. It has been suggested that perhaps we could negotiate without including the Americans, but people who believe that America, as the greatest emitter of gases, should not be part of the negotiations are kidding themselves about a successful conclusion. We must bear it in mind that, although the overall cut in emissions worldwide under the Kyoto agreement was estimated to be about 5.5 per cent., all the environmentalists tell us that it needs to be nearer 60 per cent. to achieve any real effect. Although this is only one small step, it is an important step in the right direction with the machinery that can bring about far better changes.
As for public opinion, I have no doubt that it is changing in every country, including those that I have visited, such as India, China or the United States. People, including Americans, are connecting the climates in their countries with climate change problems. The oil companies, the car industry and others formed a coalition against the changes proposed at the Kyoto conference three years ago, and I am especially pleased that those interests have changed their minds completely and are working to bring about the technological changes that are necessary to improve the environment. We will hear the same arguments, hopefully with the same people, and, hopefully, with a better result.
Mr. Dafydd Wigley: Although in parts of the United States the opposition to such issues is diabolical, is there not a whiff of hypocrisy from the French Minister, whose Government allow French hauliers to enjoy the advantage of diesel at 62p a litre compared with 87p a litre here? What chance is there of getting a sensible compromise and a level playing field on such issues within Europe when the French Government seem to take a mutually contradictory posture?
Mr. Prescott: To be fair to the French Government—[HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"] Why not? To be fair, European Union nations reach a common decision on most agreements. We have agreed in the climate change protocol that the world target should be reduced by 5.5 per cent., of which Europe would contribute 8 per cent., but nations will have different objectives—I think
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that Germany's is 21 per cent. and ours is 12.5 per cent. Each European nation must have a set of proposals to achieve those objectives, some of which are to do with fuel prices and other matters with which this country is involved. There may be different priorities, and we will have to live with those, but achieving the overall objective is the most important consideration.
Dr. Stephen Ladyman: Those of our constituents whose homes are threatened by rising sea levels will want to know the answer to a simple question: where next? In particular, how do we make the green politicians on the continent accept the practical realities of the situation in which they have to negotiate, and how do we get the United States to start moving forward in lieu of an agreement?
Mr. Prescott: It is important to get movement. Three years ago in Kyoto, the European nations wanted a target of a 15 per cent. decrease in gases, whereas we eventually settled for an average of 8 per cent. The European nations agreed a set of policies and a set of targets to achieve the objectives. The fact that a compromise was reached, with the European nations moving from 15 to 8 per cent, and the Americans moving from 0 to 8 per cent, and that compromises took place at The Hague on the part of the Europeans, the Group of 77, the Americans and the umbrella group, fills me with enough confidence to believe that an agreement will eventually be achieved. The overall feeling at the conference was in favour of an agreement. We came close, but unfortunately we did not achieve one.
Miss Anne McIntosh: With your permission, Mr. Speaker, I shall ask the question in English, for the benefit of the Deputy Prime Minister. What was the extent of the mandate that the Deputy Prime Minister was given to negotiate on behalf of the European Union delegation with the American delegation? Bearing in mind that he wishes to be regarded as a sensitive, charming soul, did he really mean to offend the French Minister by referring to her lack of understanding of the complex issues involved? Was it a lack of time or a lack of charm on his part? What damage does he think has been done to the entente cordiale in the run-up to the Nice summit?
Mr. Prescott: The hon. Lady's question would have sounded better in French. What we should keep to the fore of our minds is the importance of getting an agreement, whatever the passions, feelings and expressions of the Ministers involved.
May I make a correction? I did not say that the lady was tired; she herself constantly said that she was too tired at the time to take in all the complexities. That is not condemnable, as the negotiations were extremely complex. That must be taken into account. I quoted her words; I did not pass the judgment. I was trying to explain why we did not come to an agreement when she sat with the European Ministers, took part in the negotiations with me, and then went into the main meeting and said that she was too tired to think through all the complexities. To be fair, it was the same for most Ministers who had

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been involved in negotiations for 36 hours. I did not intend any comment about her tiredness; it was her comment.
Mr. Dennis Skinner: Is my right hon. Friend aware that at many such summits, someone trots out a long declaration of all the wonderful things that have been achieved, and when one deciphers it, one finds that the summit has probably been a failure? When my right hon. Friend came out of those discussions and said, "I'm gutted", that said everything. It was like a breath of fresh air. In the heartlands in Britain, my right hon. Friend's statement was enough for people. They knew what had happened. One of the things that sticks in my craw is the fact that those Tories, who have jumped on every bandwagon that they can find, have now jumped on a French bus round the Paris périphérique.
Mr. Prescott: My hon. Friend sums up the position very well.
Mr. Eric Pickles: Did the Deputy Prime Minister have a chance to read the comments of the Danish representative at the conference, who suggested that the right hon. Gentleman's description of the French arose from the fact that he was under strain? Will he assure the House that that was not the case, and that it was all part of a careful and subtle piece of diplomacy to sweet talk the French round? Does he understand that, in talking the French and our other European partners round, the most important thing is for him to be able to answer the basic question: after his compromise deal, will the United States' level of emissions be greater or less? If they will be less, by how much?
Mr. Prescott: I shall deal first with the remarks of my Danish colleague, if that is what he said. There is a great danger in commenting on press reports which wrongly attribute remarks to me. The same may have happened in his case, so I shall not enter into that game of exchanges. He was in the negotiations with me, sat in the committee, heard what the final agreement was, chaired a committee that dealt with the clean development mechanisms with the Group of 77 and the Americans, and entirely failed to get what I achieved—getting the Americans to drop the clean development mechanism. [Interruption.] I have been asked about individuals who were involved in the negotiations. My Danish colleague then congratulated me on achieving that. It might be thought that I was under strain, but we must keep our eyes on the main ball. Our intention was to remove sinks from the clean development mechanism—that was the main ball. I achieved that. That alone was a major change in the negotiations. We were able to deny developed countries access to planting forest sinks, which meant that the deal was reduced, the American proportions being cut back. The tonnages were reduced from 300 million tonnes to 125 million, down to 75 million. That made a considerable difference.
Mr. Nigel Griffiths: Will my right hon. Friend resist the new Conservative policy to sweet talk the French, and instead turn his attention to the Americans and bring home to the new American President
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the deep concern throughout the world that the Americans cannot continue to consume a quarter of the world's oil supply every year when they have less than 4 per cent. of the world's population?
Mr. Prescott: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the factual point that he makes about America. I have had many discussions with Vice-President Gore during the past three years, and I have no doubt that he understands the point. He has used it in the elections when talking about the environment. It perhaps is more difficult to make the point in America, given public opinion, than it is here. Nevertheless, there is awareness of it. Vice-President Gore has been an active campaigner for global environmental changes.
Dr. Vincent Cable: As the Deputy Prime Minister has attributed the breakdown of the negotiations to one issue, can we assume that the other big issues, which were matters of difference, such as compensation for oil-producing companies and the demand of the large intensive energy developing countries such as China for financial assistance, have been resolved?
Mr. Prescott: I am sorry if I misled the hon. Gentleman into believing that the negotiations broke down on one issue. It was, however, a major issue between European countries and umbrella countries that could be settled only by ourselves. That is why I sought to intervene as I did. Many contentious issues were being dealt with. As for the specific issues to which the hon. Gentleman has referred, there was talk of compensation being paid to the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries. There was not a great deal of sympathy for the idea that we should raise money and give it to the oil companies. That was a matter of contention for the oil companies, which were quite strong in the negotiating group, the Group of 77.
There was the prospect of a major agreement of a billion-dollar fund that would be available to help developing countries, which they welcomed. It would have come from various sources of funding. There had been agreement between the three major parties to the negotiations. I am sad that the fund has not been put into effect because we did not reach an agreement. We will keep on trying.
Mr. David Chaytor: May I ask about another issue that was originally in dispute between the United States and the European Union, and that is the role of nuclear energy in the clean development mechanism? The issue has not been reported over the weekend. Can my right hon. Friend say something about what agreement, if any, was reached about the role of nuclear energy and the CDM?
Mr. Prescott: That is an important point, and a controversial one in the European group of Ministers. The issue is that, with any aid that is given to developing countries under the CDM, we should not be supporting any nuclear projects. There are those who say that even the huge dams that are being created should not be included. There was great disagreement about that within the European group. More importantly, the Group of 77 took the view—I am sympathetic to the view—that it was not prepared to

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have developed countries tell developing countries how they should deal with their industrialisation. I think that I referred to that approach as a new form of economic colonialism. There was a controversial debate within the European group. However, the Group of 77 would not agree that developed countries should dictate to developing countries. I have some sympathy for that. The discussion added nothing to the process of agreement, but because the European group was talking about the issue, that added to the problems of time, delay and eventual failure.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr. Speaker: Order. We must move on to the next statement.

Local Government Finance
4.14 pm
The Minister for Local Government and the Regions (Ms Hilary Armstrong): With permission, Mr. Speaker, I should like to make a statement about local authority revenue finance for England for 2001–02.
The Government are committed to improving public services, because they make a real difference to peoples' lives. That commitment underlies the proposals that I shall outline for the finance settlement. Taken together with best value and modernised leadership, it will give local government the means to provide effective, efficient services that best meet people's needs.
We know that that presents a challenging agenda for local government. Councils are having to address a backlog of past under-investment, they are modernising decision-making processes, and they need to engage in partnership with a range of local stakeholders and deliver best value across the whole range of their responsibilities. To deliver that agenda, they require adequate financial support from the Government. They also require a reasonable degree of certainty about future funding, so that they can plan ahead with confidence. Erratic and unpredictable funding leads to the stop-go approach that has bedevilled public sector investment and service provision in the past. Today, I shall address those two issues: adequacy of funding and stability of funding.
The Government are delivering a stable economic environment and can therefore provide the resources needed for strong public services. Total support from Government grant and business rates will be £44.4 billion next year—an increase of £2.8 billion or 6.7 per cent., which is three times the underlying rate of inflation. Of that total, £8.3 billion will be specific and special grants available to councils; those will be the subject of separate announcements. My primary concern today is the £36.1 billion of general Government support, made up of £21 billion of revenue support grant and the £15.1 billion of business rates that the Government will redistribute to local authorities next year. That will be 4.4 per cent. more than in 2000–01.
The 4.4 per cent. increase in general grant is a national average figure. It must be allocated between authorities. The current method of allocating grant uses the standard spending assessment formula, but the operation of the SSA formula for 2001–02, if left unchecked, would produce what I regard as an unacceptably wide range of outcomes: some authorities would receive grant increases of nearly 10 per cent., whereas others would have their grant cut in real terms. Many hon. Members will know the facts. There are large changes in the estimated population of local authority areas, and there have been changes in the earnings data used to calculate the area cost adjustment.
In the interests of predictability and stability, we already publish three-year plans for total grant and limit the extent to which the SSA formula will change. From this year, we will go further and provide information on the majority of capital allocations and specific grants on a three-year basis. The population and earnings data changes in the SSA formula threaten to undermine those benefits, and I am particularly concerned about the effect that that would have on the delivery of the Government's

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priorities of education and social services. Nevertheless, I have concluded that I should use the new data. I cannot justify ignoring them.
I consider that the best approach is to accelerate the introduction of a reform canvassed in our Green Paper on modernising local government finance. It involves setting floors and ceilings on grant increases. Therefore, in the consultation on the local government finance settlement which I am launching today and which is to run until 9 January, I will make it plain that I am minded to include floors and ceilings in the distribution of revenue support grant for 2001–02 to authorities with education and social services responsibilities. RSG would be distributed so that all such authorities receive at least 3.2 per cent. more Government support in 2001–02 than they did in 2000–01; that is 1 per cent. more than underlying inflation. The ceiling for such authorities would be set at 6.5 per cent.
A floor increase of 3.2 per cent. should be sufficient to allow an authority that is improving its efficiency to maintain and enhance its services. The 6.5 per cent. ceiling represents a good increase in grant for the authorities that receive it, and helps to support the cost of introducing the 3.2 per cent. floor. However, it is not possible to set a ceiling to cover the whole cost, so those authorities that are not at the floor or the ceiling will receive an increase in support that has been marginally scaled back. For example, an authority that would otherwise have received an increase of 5 per cent. will receive 4.8 per cent.
There will be no floors or ceilings for local authorities that do not have education and social service responsibilities. I propose to continue the guarantee provided for the last two years, which ensures that no such authority will receive less central support from the Government in 2001–02 than it did in 2000–01. Some may feel that the Government are jumping the gun if floors and ceilings are implemented before consultation on the Green Paper is complete. However, this year shows conclusively how unwise the Government would be to rely totally on the traditional data-driven formula to distribute grant. Indeed, the current method of distribution by SSA has included the principle of a floor below which increases for authorities would not fall.
We would be wise, therefore, to avail ourselves now of what appears to be the best available solution. For the future, the Government will consider further whether floors and ceilings should be a permanent feature of the grant distribution system, whether they should be extended to all local authorities, and the levels at which they should be pitched. I realise that many councils will have expected proposals on grant distribution to follow a similar pattern to that which we used last year. I am therefore issuing for consultation a proposal that distributes grant without incorporating any rules about floors and ceilings. That proposal, however, includes the same minimum grant guarantees as last year, which means that no authority would receive less Government support in 2001–02 than it did in 2000–01. Support for authorities with education and social services responsibilities would be increased by at least 1.5 per cent. All those comparisons need to be adjusted to allow for changes in the functions of councils or the financing of particular services to permit a fair year-on-year comparison.
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I want to touch briefly on three other issues. First, following consultation, we intend to make one adjustment to SSAs. The under-fives education SSA methodology will change, following the transfer of funding for nursery education for four-year-olds. That will improve stability of funding by ensuring that its distribution matches as closely as possible the previous distribution under specific grant.
Secondly, the guideline for the council tax benefit subsidy limitation scheme for the 2001–2002 scheme will be the same as last year, so there will be a 4.5 per cent. increase in council tax or such increase as is necessary to give the council an increase in its budget requirement equal to its full cash SSA increase. The scheme will continue to operate cumulatively. For each authority, we will use the previous year's council tax guideline, after certain adjustments, as the starting point. I am issuing today full details and guidance on the scheme for 2001–02.
Thirdly, the additional resources being provided through the neighbourhood renewal fund will help the most deprived authorities to target services on their most deprived areas. That will contribute to the neighbourhood renewal strategy objective of bringing the outcomes achieved by core spending programmes in those areas up to the average standard of the rest.
Having considered the responses to the recent consultation paper on the neighbourhood renewal fund—most of which welcomed the new funding—I have decided to proceed with the arrangements proposed in the consultation paper and am today confirming the initial allocations to the 88 eligible authorities.
In addition to the sums that I propose to allocate to social services today, I can also tell the House that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health will shortly announce details of an additional £100 million for personal social services in 2001–02. It will support improved care and rehabilitation services for older people.
My right hon. Friend will also ensure that, as part of the service planning round for 2001–02, health authorities, primary care groups and trusts give local authorities a clear indication of the NHS funds that will be provided to support social and intermediate care services through pooled budgets and other joint initiatives in time to inform the final local government finance settlement.
My Department is today writing with details of the core proposals to every local authority in England. Copies of that material have been placed in the Vote Office and the Library, and are being made available over the internet.
The proposals are another step in the Government's modernising agenda. They provide a solid, substantial grant increase and a stable financial environment. Together with best value and our other reforms, they will enable councils to plan and deliver better services for their citizens. I commend them to the House.
Mr. Nigel Waterson: I thank the Minister for her usual courtesy in letting me see the statement in advance. I hope that she did not find the whole affair too tiring. It is unfortunate that the Deputy Prime Minister has left the Chamber when we are discussing a subject that is perhaps of even more immediate concern to many people in this country than global warming.
Will the Minister confirm that she originally intended to sneak the statement out last Friday through a written answer to a parliamentary question that the hon. Member

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for Stockton, South (Ms Taylor) tabled? Will she confirm that, in the past two years, the average council tax has increased by 6.8 per cent. and 6.1 per cent. respectively, and that over three years, council tax has increased by a staggering 23 per cent., or £150 for band D payers? Today's figures mean yet another sharp rise; in effect, another stealth tax. The average family will pay some £200 more in council tax by the time of the next election. What is the Minister's prediction for increases this year?
Was the right hon. Lady the senior Minister who was quoted extensively in The Sunday Times? Whether she was or not, does she agree with that Minister's comments? He or she said:
Publicly, ministers will claim that this is generous. In private they concede that the rise is not big enough to prevent an average council tax increase of more than twice the underlying inflation rate of 2 per cent.
He or she continues:
Council tax bills will go up by 5 per cent. on average and in some cases it will be double that.
Will the Minister also confirm that shire counties and London have already lost £650 million and £250 million respectively during the Parliament due to the Government's fiddling of the funding formula? Does she accept that ignoring up-to-date data in calculating the area cost adjustment would have had a massive effect on some councils in London and the south? Doing that would make nonsense of the right hon. Lady's pretence that there is currently a freeze on SSA methodology. Does the Minister realise that that could have cost East Sussex county council £3 million and Kent £8.7 million?
If the extra costs have been incurred, the grant should reflect them. What calculations has the Minister made of the effect of introducing floors and ceilings on grant increases? Will not that have a distorting effect on some councils, especially those in London and the south-east?
May I at least commend the Minister on changing her practice in previous years of refusing to have face-to-face meetings with local authorities? Does she agree with the NHS Confederation, which spoke of bed blocking due to cuts in social services funding in areas as diverse as East Sussex, Hertfordshire, west Surrey, west Kent, Cheshire and parts of the south-west? I wonder whether she agrees with its conclusion:
The NHS Confederation is concerned that the NHS is not seen as an alternative to properly funded local government.
Why did she not heed my warning on that issue a year ago? [Interruption.] I am sorry that the Minister finds this funny. We naturally welcome the additional £100 million that is said to be available for social services, but will that sum be genuinely new money, not re-announced old money? May it not already be too late to tackle the problems that I have described? Has she seen the survey by the Association of Directors of Social Services, which showed an average projected overspend on social services of £200 million, which is double the amount she announced today?
Is the Minister aware that some councils are already nervous about having to increase council tax to cover the costs of recent severe flooding, despite the Bellwin formula? Has she calculated the likely rise in council tax in affected areas that will be attributable solely to flooding?
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On education, can the Minister confirm that much of the so-called increase involves ring-fenced funding, includes the transfer of existing grants into SSA or is previously announced money for the new sixth form curriculum?
Many local authorities are reporting very high extra costs in implementing the best value regime. The Local Government Association recently asked for £175 million extra funding to cover so-called modernisation. Will the Minister today announce extra grants to cover that?
Finally, when can local government expect action on some of the less controversial aspects of the local government finance Green Paper, including the ability of councils to charge for the discretionary services they provide? Does the Minister accept the criticism that all the Green Paper does is kick into the long grass difficult long-term decisions on local government finance—in particular, whether we have a plan-based or a formula-based system and whether, in the long run, central Government should give more power back to local councils and the communities that they represent?
Ms Armstrong: Mr. Speaker, you must forgive my slight smile at the hon. Gentleman's speech.
There was never an intention to make the announcement in a written parliamentary answer last Friday. I do not know where the hon. Gentleman gets his leaks from, but they are not very reliable. As ever, he believes what he reads in the paper, which is clearly how he gets all his information, but it is never accurate.
I make no predictions about council tax, other than to say that I am confident that council tax rises for next year will be lower than in the current year; the rises in the current year are lower than they were last year. In other words, we are, in the words of the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mr. Norman), in a period of unprecedented prosperity. The Government are delivering a stable economy and, year on year, councils are bringing down council tax. [HON. MEMBERS: "What? Where?"] They are bringing down the increases in council tax; of course they are. Opposition Members seem to have had an exciting weekend, but they should get on with realities.
I may have disappointed the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Waterson), whose main point was that we are not implementing data changes by implementing an area cost adjustment. I hate to disappoint him—we have done that; we have done as we promised. We committed ourselves to data changes and we have upheld that promise, but we mitigated the excesses of that through the floors and ceilings mechanism. That mechanism is an advance on what previous Governments did to dampen the changes for some authorities year on year. We took that further by introducing ceilings as well as a floor. We introduced a floor that means that all authorities will get an increase above inflation, and they should be able to tackle the challenges that they inevitably face year on year.
I thank the hon. Gentleman for what he said about consultation. The Under-Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Ms Hughes), and I will be seeing authorities that are affected by the ceiling.

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The hon. Gentleman spoke about bed blocking. I hate to tell him this, but bed blocking is being reduced.
Hon. Members: Where?
Mr. Waterson: No, it is not.
Ms Armstrong: Yes, it is. The hon. Gentleman can have those arguments elsewhere. According to my information, bed blocking is being reduced over the current year.
We are committed to putting substantially increased amounts into social services. Nearly £400.43 million is already going in, and there is also the additional £100 million that I announced today. I believe that local authorities throughout the country—and, indeed, the ADSS—will welcome that.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned the Bellwin scheme, also introduced by the last Government. Perhaps he has not noticed that this Government have increased the payment under Bellwin to 100 per cent. We are also considering various other changes in flood defence policy, to ensure that we get the problems under control. The Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, my Department and the Treasury are undertaking a review, and will report next year. Moreover, we are consulting the LGA and the Environment Agency to ensure that local authorities, along with the agency, can play a full part in both increasing flood defences and properly addressing the problems that arise following floods.
I reject the hon. Gentleman's allegation that costs are soaring in best value. There are some soaring costs, but there are also some substantial savings. Authorities are already recording significant savings: I invite the hon. Gentleman to go and talk to them.
The hon. Gentleman had some interesting things to say about the local government Green Paper, and about when we would implement other aspects of it. As the consultation period has not yet ended, I am not in a position to say exactly how we will implement all aspects of the Green Paper. I like to think that we are engaged in more than just a technical consultation process, and that we will consider the responses seriously.
The hon. Gentleman asked me to put more money into the settlement. He seems to forget how much his party took out of the settlement year on year, and how much this Government have put into it since the general election. There have been substantial increases. Opposition Front Benchers really must make up their minds. Are they Portillo-ites who believe that there is currently a splurge in public spending and that there should be no more of it, or are they developing a new line—that there should be more public spending, and that they are prepared to go back to boom and bust and lose the good, prosperous, stable economy that this Government are delivering?
Mr. Brian Sedgemore: Bearing in mind that the current financial crisis in Hackney has been caused by a combination of political instability and the gross negligence of senior officers over the past five years—led by the former
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chief executive, Tony Elliston—will the Minister tell us what she can do to help? If she cannot tell us today, will she write to me?
Ms Armstrong: My hon. Friend knows that the Government have been in close contact with Hackney, where there are serious problems. It is, of course, up to the council to sort out its finances, and it is now getting on top of the problems caused by the amount that has been lost—the amount for which it was unable to account. I hope that, with the support that the council is now receiving, it will be able to turn things around, for it is in all our interests for the people of Hackney to be better served than they have been. I shall certainly keep in close touch with my hon. Friend about developments.
Mr. Adrian Sanders: I also thank the Minister for letting me have a copy of her statement in advance.
Is not the message of the statement that £8.3 billion of local government expenditure is now devoted to special and specific grants? Does that not mean greater centralisation? The decision about what those grants will be spent on rests with central Government, rather than with the local councils, which in the past have received the money in their normal block grant.
Does not the increase in special and specific grants heighten the unpredictability for local government? When local authorities wish to plan their budgets, they will be unsure about whether they will have access to those grants. Does not such a bidding process have a cost implication, with many council officers devoting much of their time to bidding on behalf of their authority, in the knowledge that they may not succeed and that their time will have been wasted if they do not?
Overall, will the statement meet the rising costs, some of which have been imposed by the Government? In particular, there is no mention in the statement of how local government will fund the bus concessionary fare scheme from next April. There is no mention of the increased costs from best value. No decision has yet been reached on the cost of nursing care and how that impacts on social services budgets throughout the country. There is no mention of the costs of climate change, the impact of which falls on local councils that suffer from flooding, coastal erosion and other natural disasters.
The Government talk a lot about giving local government more power over decision making. In effect, all they have done is allowed the dog out for more walks, but they have kept it on an ever tighter leash.
Ms Armstrong: I was waiting for another line from the hon. Gentleman. I think that this is the first time that he has ever spoken in a settlement debate without predicting a double-digit increase in council taxes—I was waiting for him to perform his normal role. He has got it wrong every year and I was looking forward to being able to point that out.
I referred to the issue of specific grants in the statement. This year, we will set out the three-year programme for local government. I think that local authorities will welcome that. They will be given information before they set their budgets, for example, they will know what they can expect from special grants. Therefore, the issue that the hon. Gentleman raises will not arise.

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There are some special grants that local government has asked us to set up: for example, revenue support for public finance initiative projects. It was not considered fair that that should be in the general settlement; it was felt that PFI should be the subject of a specific grant. Therefore, if an authority gets a specific PFI project, we specifically allocate the revenue support to it. I am sure that, as the hon. Gentleman looks at the detail, he will begin to see the logic of what I have announced in relation to special grants.
In formulating the overall amount, we have taken account of all the pressures on local government. The settlement reflects a substantial commitment to investment in public services because public services are so important.
On concessionary fares, clearly, the financial implications will vary widely from one local authority to another, according to whether a scheme is being operated and what that scheme provides. Our estimate of the total cost of the scheme nationally is £54 million, and we have provided for that sum in the settlement.
I am confident that, despite the hon. Gentleman's doom and gloom, the settlement is good news for local government. I look forward to working with him and with others to ensure that, next year, local government is able to perform the tasks that its citizens expect to be done.
Mr. Bill O'Brien: I welcome my right hon. Friend's statement on the commitment to public services, and I believe that she is genuine in that commitment. However, I must draw attention to the fact that the difference between actual local government spending and the standard spending assessment is about £4 billion. The gap began to emerge when service cuts were imposed by the previous Government, and it is still causing problems because it has to be compensated for in charges for services and in local taxes.
I draw my right hon. Friend's attention to the area cost adjustment, which is estimated to be equivalent to a £51 million reduction. With a data estimate of a reduction of £72 million, it is thought that the special interest group of municipal authorities—SIGOMA—will suffer a £123 million loss. As that loss is almost twice the sum that has been allocated to SIGOMA for neighbourhood renewal, some thought should be given to that problem.
Will my right hon. Friend also clarify how specific grants will work? Will the £219 million for care leavers or the —127 million for learning and skills councils count against SSAs?
Could we also have full details of all funding—
Mr. Speaker: Order. I think that the hon. Gentleman has given the Minister enough to go on with.
Mr. O'Brien: May I also just ask the Minister if she will give us a breakdown of all the special grants made to local government?
Mr. Speaker: Order. I must appeal for shorter questions and, of course, shorter replies. Many hon. Members are seeking to ask questions, but some will be disappointed.
Ms Armstrong: I am sure that my hon. Friend will welcome the fact that Wakefield is receiving a 3.2 per cent. increase. I can confirm that the money for adult
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education has been transferred out of the SSA settlement and into learning and skills councils. I can also assure him that special grant information will be presented to the House for approval.
Mr. David Curry: Does the Minister recall that, two years ago, she said that Labour would make the local authority settlement more simple? Now, however, the settlement is massively complicated by her floors and ceilings. Does she recall saying that she would make the settlement more fair? However, by abandoning the incorporation of objective data, the Government have made the settlement more unfair. Does she remember saying that the Government would make local government more independent? However, the increasing amount of direct grant has made local government more dependent. Does she agree that when the Labour Government talk about modernising local government, they mean making it more complex, more unfair and more dependent?
Ms Armstrong: No. I have not abandoned objective data, but used them. I also believe that the situation is now very simple: no authority will receive an increase of less than 3.2 per cent. or more than 6.5 per cent. I think that that is very simple and straightforward and that folk will understand it.
Mrs. Anne Campbell: I welcome my right hon. Friend's commitment to floors and ceilings, to dampen the percentage increases that are caused by data changes. However, has she considered the proposal made by the all-party fair funding group that there should be a floor on the education funding allocation per child?
Ms Armstrong: Of course we have considered that; I have met the group, and I frequently meet group members. Every authority has a different idea of what will be fair. The area cost adjustment, about which I know my hon. Friend is very concerned, has been an attempt—a flawed attempt, I think—to reflect differential costs across the country. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Employment is still pursuing a basic entitlement per pupil approach, as outlined in the local government Green Paper. I am not at this stage able to say where that will end up, but whatever system is adopted, we will still have to reflect need as well as the differing costs. That is always a problem. Simply dividing up the cake equally, as it appears, does not really end up being fair to anyone.
Sir Paul Beresford: As my right hon. Friend the Member for Skipton and Ripon (Mr. Curry) said, the Minister seems to have made a complicated system even more complicated and introduced the potential for political bias. We will certainly have to watch that. Is she aware that, for many local authorities, if their grant was set at average, about 25 or 50 per cent. of it, or, if it was set at floor, perhaps all of it, would go in the increased bureaucratic costs of the two systems of which she is, mistakenly, so proud—best value and the new scrutiny system? She should recognise that any competent authority—and there are some—could produce the savings that she talks about without those additional costs.
Ms Armstrong: The hon. Gentleman should know all about political bias in local government settlements.

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We are seeking to get rid of it. We believe that best value and modernising the political structures are a means of ensuring that councils can respond more effectively to the needs and aspirations of local people.
Mr. Barry Gardiner: My right hon. Friend and I have formed the habit of crossing swords at this time of year over the past three years. I welcome the announcement of a 4.4 per cent. increase this year and the inclusion of the data changes in this year's settlement. I would also welcome the floor of 3.2 per cent., were it not that, last year, my local authority, the London borough of Brent, found itself not on the floor but in the basement. I would welcome this year's announcement even more if she could assure me that this year Brent will be found closer to the ceiling, in which case she may have to scrape me off it.
Ms Armstrong: I am happy to tell my hon. Friend that Brent will receive a 4.5 per cent. increase this year. It will also benefit from the neighbourhood renewal fund allocation.
Mr. Michael Howard: What evidence does the Minister have that bed blocking is coming down in east Kent? What effect will the imposition of a ceiling on the formula have on the amount of grant made available to Kent county council to allow it to fund its social services department in a way that would put an end to bed blocking in Kent?
Ms Armstrong: Recent evidence submitted by the Department of Health to the Health Select Committee in the summer showed that bed blocking is coming down. We set further targets to reduce it in the national priorities guidance. Clearly, there are particular pressures in different parts of the country, and that is precisely why my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health is putting an additional £100 million into this year's settlement and is examining other national health service budgets. When the right hon. Gentleman was in charge, nothing like that happened.
Mr. David Watts: I welcome the overall statement, but many of us are bitterly disappointed that the system has not been completely reviewed after three years of a Labour Government. When does my right hon. Friend believe that the full review will have taken place, and when are the changes likely to be implemented?
Ms Armstrong: We are still in the middle of consultation on the local government finance Green Paper. I share my hon. Friend's frustration at its not having been possible to have a more root-and-branch reform. I have tried to move so as to take as many people with us as possible. There are sharply differing views on this matter from authority to authority, so trying to find a way forward that does not leave one authority feeling that it is being discriminated against is not easy. We are working with authorities to find an effective way forward. The Green Paper has been well received. I have yet to receive the written responses, but that is the impression
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that I get from talking to people. In the early months of the next Parliament, we ought to be able to make the full reform.
Mr. Steve Webb: My local authority of South Gloucestershire, as the Minister knows, fares badly under the existing standard spending assessment formula. Will the Minister confirm that the decision to take account of wage pressures in London and the south-east but not elsewhere in the country is particularly unfair on fast-growing authorities with tight labour markets such as South Gloucestershire?
Ms Armstrong: I know that the hon. Gentleman has an oral question on this tomorrow. I simply remind him, however, that all the Liberal Democrat authorities, as I understand it, asked us on Friday to implement the ACA changes. I understand that he may be making a separate point for South Gloucestershire. We have sought to be as fair as possible to everyone and that is the reason for the floors and the ceilings.
Ms Karen Buck: I welcome my right hon. Friend's decision not to make methodological changes this year that affect the area cost adjustment in respect of London authorities. Is she aware, none the less, of the extreme pressures on London local authorities because of factors such as population growth and homelessness, with some 40,000 families currently in temporary accommodation in London? I agree with the need to put a floor under authorities suffering the consequences of population loss, but will my right hon. Friend address sympathetically the needs of local authorities that have reached the ceiling through no fault of their own?
Ms Armstrong: Of course I understand the difficulties faced by authorities in London for the reasons outlined by my hon. Friend, and the problems faced by authorities in other parts of the country for other reasons. We are acutely aware of the costs of homelessness in London, and I understand the points made by the Association of London Government about that. The part of the settlement dealing with that is the best for many years, with a 1.8 per cent. real-terms increase in each year and 2.7 per cent. more in 2001–02. However, my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning and I are discussing how we will continue to keep a close eye on this and make sure that people do not suffer.
Mr. John Wilkinson: Is it not the case that residents of most London boroughs will face seriously increased council taxes next year and, of course, the supplemental charge of a precept for the Greater London Authority? Why has the Minister not mentioned the additional costs of refugees and asylum seekers for London boroughs? Is she not aware that my borough of Hillingdon, which covers Heathrow airport—through which a quarter of asylum seekers to the United Kingdom come—has submitted to the Minister of State, Department of Health, the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (Mr. Hutton), a memorandum pointing out that unaccompanied refugee children will cost the borough £3.15 billion a year above grant. [Interruption.] I mean £3.15 million—forgive me. I exaggerate. It is easy to get

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worked up because homelessness and the additional costs are serious burdens on local people, and they feel extremely strongly about it.
Ms Armstrong: I understand that. The costs of asylum seekers are not met through the settlement. That is the result of a special grant from the Home Office. I am in constant touch with my Home Office colleagues to discuss this and to ensure that we do whatever possible to alleviate the problem, not just in London, but particularly in London. We recognise that there are serious problems in London, but the dispersal programme means that other authorities are also involved.
Ms Claire Ward: I welcome my right hon. Friend's decision to include the new earnings survey. Hertfordshire will need to look at the ceilings and floors to see where we benefit.
May I take it from the Government's decision that they accept the principle that it is more costly for schools in Hertfordshire in particular and in the south-east in general to be able to do the job that they need to do, and that that must continue to be reflected in the finance that becomes available from central Government to local government?
Ms Armstrong: The House now knows why this statement is always difficult: some of my hon. Friends hold one view and others another. We recognise the need for some acknowledgement of costs. We are not convinced that the current ACA is the most effective method of achieving that, which is why the matter is under review. We recognise, and the alternative methods demonstrate, that this factor cannot be ignored.
Mr. Christopher Fraser: The Minister will be aware of a letter to the Secretary of State from Purbeck district council regarding statutory mandatory travel concessions. She will also be aware that, for a predominantly rural council such as Purbeck, even a prudent approach to the scheme, including essential cross-boundary travel, will, on the basis of the figures available so far, require an increase in council tax of £5, or 6.5 per cent.
The Minister's answers have been less than clear so far. Will she confirm that all additional costs faced by councils such as Purbeck will be completely covered by the Government when they introduce the scheme?
Ms Armstrong: The hon. Gentleman seems to want me to say that there will be no council tax increases. Of course, local authorities and local citizens will contribute through council tax. I do not know how he can tell us the exact amount of council tax that will be needed to cover whatever decisions are taken in future, given that he has not yet read the figures, and nor, I suspect, has the council. I am confident that councils will be able to implement reasonable council tax increases, lower than last year's, because the statement has covered all the pressures on local government, and there is a substantial increase this year in the amount that the Government are giving.
Mr. Jeff Ennis: I welcome my right hon. Friend's statement, especially on additional SSA help for the worst-funded local authorities, such as Barnsley and Doncaster, which serve my
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constituency. There is no doubt that, under this Government, the increases in block grant have been exponential compared with those introduced by the previous Government. Will the Minister also comment on the increase in the other services block grant for next year?
Ms Armstrong: I thank my hon. Friend. I have already said that the increase in that block grant is greater than it has been of late. I recognise that that grant has been starved for many years. Over the past couple of years, we have tried gradually to increase it, and it will increase further over the next three years. I understand that some local authorities have had real problems, and that is one of the reasons for implementing the floor.
Sir Teddy Taylor: The Minister said, and obviously believes, that spending for local councils had increased under this Government, but not under the previous one. Will she review the huge injustice done to Rochford council, to which the Government's allocation of money has been exactly £3.21 million for each of the past three years, with no increase for inflation. That compares with £4 million allocated by the previous Government. Is there not a case for a special procedure by which the Government could investigate cases of great injustice in relation to councils such as Rochford, which have obviously had a rotten deal and been unfairly treated, and whose special needs and demands have not been taken into account?
Ms Armstrong: I am sure that, when the hon. Gentleman looks at the figures for Rochford this year, he will be pleased to see that it has been given a reasonable increase for a district council, which does not have to bear the expense of major services such as education and social services. The Government's priorities—and local government's priorities—lie in those areas, and that is where the bulk of the investment has gone. However, the overall allocation for the other services block, from which shire districts largely benefit, has increased. I have also referred to the substantial increases that local government as a whole has received during this Parliament.
Mr. Jeremy Corbyn: Will the Minister comment on her discussions with my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning on the cost of homelessness, especially in London? She seemed to suggest that there would be an increase of 2.7 per cent. in the forthcoming year, which is rather less than the floor increases that she has announced for other services.
Will she also give an indication as to when the Government expect to make an announcement on future housing investment? Does she concede that the terrible housing crisis faced by many in inner London can be adequately solved only by a large public investment in good-quality homes for many of the poorest and most dispossessed people in this country?
Ms Armstrong: As I have already said, I am in discussion with my hon. Friend the Minister about homelessness costs in London so I shall not repeat my answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Regent's Park and Kensington, North (Ms Buck).
This year, in the spending review 2000, a substantial increase was announced by the Government in capital spending for housing. That is the largest increase for many

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years and builds on the £5 billion that the Government are spending as a result of the capital receipts initiative. We understand the particular problems in London; that is reflected in our handling of the settlement.
Mr. Paul Burstow: Can the Minister confirm that the introduction of floors and ceilings of the type announced today will mean that my authority, which would have benefited this year from an extra £1.5 million as a result of the data changes, will receive less than that? As a consequence, it will be faced with an even bigger funding gap, resulting in higher council tax increases but more cuts in local services.
Ms Armstrong: I have made it clear that, in order to ensure that some authorities do not suffer excessive loss in grant, every other authority must contribute. Although there is a small contribution from the hon. Gentleman's authority, it will none the less receive a 6.1 per cent. increase—even with the floors and ceilings. In any settlement, I suspect that there would have been a damping mechanism—so the overall amount allocated to his authority would have been less. The redistribution on which we are engaged means that those who do well from the settlement have to contribute a little to those who do not do so well.
Mr. David Kidney: I congratulate my right hon. Friend on her good sense in agreeing to set a funding floor and ceiling. Is that a recognition of the logic of the position taken by the Government in their Green Paper—to reduce disparities between local authority settlements? Is it also an acknowledgement that applying the existing formula untrammelled would have added further injustice to those who have suffered for the longest period?
My right hon. Friend said that she will hold consultations on a permanent system of floors and ceilings. I understand that, but is it her intention that floors and ceilings will continue temporarily until the new settlement is finalised?
Ms Armstrong: I have announced floors and ceilings for this year's settlement as a consultation exercise.
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I cannot predict what will happen in future years. Consultations on the Green Paper continue. Obviously, I think the proposals offer a sensible way forward, otherwise I should not have made them today, but that does not mean that I am pre-empting the long-term solutions, or indeed what we shall do next year.
Mr. Andrew Lansley: Does the Minister recall that the Leader of the then Opposition, just days before the last general election, told the Cambridge Evening News that a Labour Government would review the area cost adjustment with a view to implementation in 1998ဣ99? Will she therefore confirm that this is the fourth successive year in which the Government have failed to keep that promise? How much longer will the Government continue to do that? In this context, stability means continuing unfairness, especially for an authority such as South Cambridgeshire district council, whose labour costs and population are high and rising. The unfairness will grow if data are incorporated in the area cost adjustment for those authorities that benefit from it as compared to those that do not.
Ms Armstrong: The hon. Gentleman is somewhat disingenuous. He knows that we announced three-year stability in methodology changes and we are keeping our word. Perhaps he finds it unusual when a Government are prepared to keep their word.
Cambridgeshire county council is receiving a 3.9 per cent. increase this year. We have reviewed the ACA, but we are unable to achieve consensus on any of the 21 options proposed. Through the local government finance Green Paper, we are considering other changes. I look forward to the hon. Gentleman's constructive contributions.
Several hon. Members roseဤ
Mr. Speaker: Order. We must move on.

Orders of the Day

  Freedom of Information Bill and Countryside and Rights of Way Bill (Allocation Of Time)
  5.10 pm
  The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Jack Straw): I beg to move,
  That the following provisions shall apply to the remaining proceedings on the Freedom of Information Bill and the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill:—

  Lords Amendments
  1.—(1) Proceedings on Consideration of Lords Amendments to the Freedom of Information Bill shall be completed at today's sitting and shall, if not previously concluded, be brought to a conclusion at midnight.
  (2) Proceedings on Consideration of Lords Amendments to the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill shall be completed on the allotted day and shall, if not previously concluded, be brought to a conclusion at 10.00 p.m. on that day.
  2.—(1) This paragraph applies for the purpose of bringing proceedings on either of the Bills to a conclusion in accordance with paragraph 1.
  (2) The Speaker shall first put forthwith any Question which has been proposed from the Chair and not yet decided.
  (3) If that Question is for the amendment of a Lords Amendment, the Speaker shall then put forthwith—

  (a) a single Question on any further Amendments of the Lords Amendment moved by a Minister of the Crown, and

  (b) the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown that this House agrees or disagrees with the Lords in their Amendment or (as the case may be) in their Amendment as amended.

  (4) The Speaker shall then put forthwith—

  (a) a single Question on any Amendments moved by a Minister of the Crown to a Lords Amendment, and

  (b) the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown that this House agrees or disagrees with the Lords in their Amendment or (as the case may be) in their Amendment as amended.

  (5) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown that this House disagrees with the Lords in a Lords Amendment.
  (6) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question that this House agrees with the Lords in all the remaining Lords Amendments.
  (7) As soon as the House has—

  (a) agreed or disagreed with the Lords in any of their Amendments, or

  (b) disposed of an Amendment relevant to a Lords Amendment which has been disagreed to,

  the Speaker shall put forthwith a single Question on any Amendments moved by a Minister of the Crown relevant to the Lords Amendment.

  Subsequent stages
  3.—(1) The Speaker shall put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown for the consideration forthwith of any further Message from the Lords on either of the Bills.
  (2) The proceedings on any further Message from the Lords shall. if not previously concluded, be brought to a conclusion one hour after their commencement.
  4.—(1) This paragraph applies for the purpose of bringing proceedings to a conclusion in accordance with paragraph 3.
  (2) The Speaker shall first put forthwith any Question which has been proposed from the Chair and not yet decided.
  (3) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown which is related to the Question already proposed from the Chair.
  (4) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown on or relevant to any of the remaining items in the Lords Message.
  (5) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question that this House agrees with the Lords in all the remaining Lords Proposals.

  Reasons Committee
  5. The Speaker shall put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown for the appointment, nomination and quorum of a Committee to draw up Reasons and the appointment of its Chairman.
  6.—(1) The Committee shall report before the conclusion of the sitting at which it is appointed.
  (2) Proceedings in the Committee shall, if not previously concluded, be brought to a conclusion 30 minutes after their commencement.
  (3) For the purpose of bringing any proceedings to a conclusion in accordance with sub-paragraph (2), the Chairman shall—

  (a) first put forthwith any Question which has been proposed from the Chair and not yet decided, and

  (b) then put forthwith successively Questions on Motions which may be made by a Minister of the Crown for assigning a Reason for disagreeing with the Lords in any of their Amendments.

  (4) The proceedings of the Committee shall be reported without any further Question being put.

  Miscellaneous
  7.—(1) The following paragraphs apply to—

  (a) proceedings at today's sitting on Consideration of Lords Amendments to the Freedom of Information Bill,

  (b) proceedings on the allotted day on Consideration of Lords Amendments to the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill,

  (c) proceedings on any further message from the Lords on either of the Bills, and

  (d) proceedings at today's sitting or on the allotted day on the appointment, nomination and quorum of a Committee to draw up Reasons (and the appointment of its Chairman) and the Report of such a Committee.

  8. Standing Order No. 15(1) (Exempted business) shall apply to the proceedings.
  9. The proceedings shall not be interrupted under any Standing Order relating to the sittings of the House.
  10. No dilatory Motion with respect to, or in the course of, the proceedings shall be made except by a Minister of the Crown; and the Question on any such Motion shall be put forthwith.
  11.—(1) If on a day on which any of the proceedings take place a Motion for the Adjournment of the House under Standing Order No. 24 (Adjournment on specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration) would stand over to Seven o'clock—

  (a) that Motion stands over until the conclusion of any of the proceedings which are to be brought to a conclusion at or before that time, and

  (b) the bringing to a conclusion of any of the proceedings which are to be brought to a conclusion after that time is postponed for a period of time equal to the duration of the proceedings on that Motion.

  (2) If a Motion for the Adjournment of the House under Standing Order No. 24 stands over from an earlier day to such a day, the bringing to a conclusion of any of the proceedings on that day is postponed for a period of time equal to the duration of the proceedings on that Motion.
  12. If the House is adjourned, or the sitting is suspended, before the expiry of the period at the end of which any of the proceedings are to be brought to a conclusion under this Order, no notice shall be required of a Motion made at the next sitting by a Minister of the Crown for varying or supplementing the provisions of this Order.

  Interpretation
  13. In this Order, "allotted day" means any day on which the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill is put down on the main business as first Government Order of the Day.
  The House will know that this timetable motion, which was tabled by my right hon. Friends the Deputy Prime Minister and the President of the Council and myself, deals with the Freedom of Information Bill and the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill.
  Mr. Desmond Swayne: Disgraceful.
  Mr. Straw: I hear muttering from a sedentary position on the Opposition Benches that there is some objection to the motion. Of course that is the Opposition's traditional role, and I do not particularly criticise them for that. However, to save time, I remind Opposition Members that introducing a single guillotine motion to cover two Bills is not unusual. There are plenty of examples—if pressed, I will bring them to the attention of the House—of the previous Administration passing similar motions between 1979 and 1997. [Interruption.] If the right hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe) carries on twittering, I shall mention the many occasions on which she and many of her right hon. Friends, including the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth), voted for such timetable motions.
  None of us particularly likes having to use timetable motions. Sometimes they are necessary. [Interruption.] It does not lie well in the mouth of any Opposition Member, with the single exception of the hon. Member for Brownhills-Aldridge—
  Mr. John Bercow: Aldridge-Brownhills.
  Mr. Straw: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that correction.
  It does not lie well in the mouth of any right hon. or hon. Member who was a Conservative Member of Parliament at any time between 1979 and 1997 to complain about the use of guillotine motions, because they were sometimes used with gay abandon—for example, in 1988–89 and 1989–90.
  Mr. Eric Forth: Will the Home Secretary give way?
  Mr. Straw: I shall do so in a second.
  The right hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald will refer—in her speech, no doubt, as well as from a sedentary position—to the misuse of such motions.
  Miss Ann Widdecombe indicated assent.
  Mr. Straw: I think that she will say that Conservative Governments use such measures properly, but Labour Governments misuse them.
  Mr. Forth: Will the Home Secretary give way?
  Mr. Straw: Of course I shall give way to the right hon. Gentleman, as I always do.
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  The Freedom of Information Bill has been the subject of very extensive pre-legislative and legislative scrutiny, including two days of fine debate at the beginning of April, which happily was not guillotined. We are now drawing towards the end of the Session, so it is necessary for the House to have the opportunity to vote on a raft of Government Bills. Of course, the House may take a different view—it is for the House to dispose of matters; it is for the Government to propose them.
  There is a difference between any Conservative Government and any Labour Government: Conservative Governments always had a built-in majority in the other place, and they could always rely on that majority to ensure that debates were truncated and that they got their business—that has always been a fact of life, and it continues to this day—whereas Labour Governments do not have a built-in majority in the other place; they have a built-in minority.
  Mr. Forth: I am grateful to the Home Secretary for giving way, with his usual courtesy. He seems to have forgotten that the guillotines apply to the House, not to another place, and that it is the procedures here with which we are rightly concerned. Will he dig into his papers and provide some quotations from the speeches that he and his right hon. and hon. Friends made during the 1980s and 1990s on the similar occasions when the previous Government felt obliged to introduce timetable motions? He has made great play of the idea that because the Conservatives introduced such motions, it is all right for him to introduce them. Will he give us the other side of the coin and remind us of the outrage that he and his colleagues felt when confronted with the fact they had only one or two days to consider several hundred amendments to Bills to which I hope he will refer later?
  Mr. Straw: I will refer to those Bills if I am tempted to do so. Of course the then Opposition typically voted against guillotine motions. If the right hon. Gentleman is asking me whether I, as an Opposition Back Bencher or Front-Bench spokesman, protested against the Conservative Government's guillotine motions, the answer is yes. However, I draw his attention to the fact that towards the end of our time in opposition, we were serious about being an effective Opposition—[Interruption.] We were so serious that we are now in government. Because this Opposition are not even any good as an Opposition, and still less as an alternative Government, they continue to fail to make any sensible arrangements to secure the proper passage of Bills.
  Mr. Forth: Arrangements?
  Mr. Straw: Of course, there have to be arrangements through the usual channels. Our record in opposition between 1994 and 1997 was exemplary. In the Session 1994–95, the then Government introduced no guillotine motions, because we had reached accommodation with them through the usual channels. I say to the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst that there was a guillotine motion in 1995–96 on proceedings on the Prevention of Terrorism (Additional Powers) Bill. However, if my memory serves me right, that motion was unusual in that I supported it from the Opposition Front Bench. I was persuaded that the additional powers were necessary and that the matter had to come before the House to be dealt with before the end of the Session.

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  In 1996–97, I recall—my recollection is usually accurate—that the guillotine on the proceedings of the Firearms (Amendment) Bill was introduced not because of fire from the then Opposition, but because of friendly fire from those who did not wish there to be effective control of firearms. That fire came from the then Government's Back Benchers.
  Mr. Douglas Hogg: Will the Home Secretary give way?
  Mr. Straw: I shall give way, but will the right hon. and learned Gentleman oblige me by reminding me of his constituency? That will help.
  Mr. Hogg: The Home Secretary knows full well that I represent Sleaford and North Hykeham.
  Many of us are concerned about the practice of allowing the unelected second Chamber, in effect, to make legislation. Does the Home Secretary understand that 123 amendments are before us, and that inevitably, we shall not discuss them all? Many will not be reached and we shall simply be asked to accept many of them. That means that the peers, as an unelected body, will make law in this country. Does that make him content?
  Mr. Straw: There is always time for sinners to repent. If the right hon. and learned Gentleman's view these days is against an unelected Chamber, that is interesting.
  Mr. Hogg: I am for an elected Chamber.
  Mr. Straw: That is fine, and I accept that statement as accurate. However, that was not the view of the Conservative party when it was in government. It was perfectly happy to rely on a huge majority made up not only of unelected peers but of those who were in the other place for no other reason than that they were their fathers' sons or their grandfathers' grandsons.
  When the right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Mr. Hogg) was an adornment of the previous Government and they introduced the poll tax, they ensured that people who had never been seen in the other place, but who had a Conservative ticket there, were pulled out of the woodwork to vote for that legislation. If that had not been the case, the previous Administration would have been done a great favour.
  Mr. Dale Campbell-Savours: Perhaps my right hon. Friend will remind the right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Mr. Hogg) that the Conservative Government guillotined the consideration of Lords amendments on 34 separate occasions? In which Lobby did the right hon. and learned Gentleman vote then? Did he come into the Labour Lobby to vote against those guillotines?
  Mr. Straw: My hon. Friend is entirely right to raise that matter. The previous Administration used the guillotine not only at the end of the Session, when it is more justifiable, but at other times, such as on 14 December 1993, when they guillotined the Statutory Sick Pay Bill and the Social Security (Contributions) Bill just a few weeks into the Session.
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  I must tell the right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham and the rest of the House that although there are many amendments, a great many of them were passed in the other place in response to undertakings that I gave during two days of extensive debate on the Floor of the House—[HON. MEMBERS: "Not all of them."] No, not all of them, but many were, and they relate to those key debates. It is a fact of life that guillotines mean that some amendments go undebated. I regret that because I would prefer Bills to be timetabled properly. None the less, it is a timeless verity that never worried Opposition Members all that much before.
  Wherever possible we try, as we did on Report, to reach understandings through the usual channels so that there is proper time for debate. I would prefer that, but I hope that both sides of the House accept that Governments have the right to ensure that their legislation is put before Parliament for a proper conclusion before the end of a Session.
  Mr. David Winnick: If there were no guillotine motions, what possible chance would the controversial measures that are most opposed by the Conservative party, such as the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill, stand of getting through Parliament by the end of the Session?
  Mr. Straw: No chance at all.
  Mr. Bercow: Sit on a few more Fridays.
  Mr. Straw: I do not deal with the business of the House, but I would be happy to sit on a Friday.
  Miss Widdecombe: Sit for a few more hours.
  Mr. Straw: We have previously been charged with sitting for too many hours. As ever, the right hon. Lady wants it both ways. If we were to sit on a Friday, there would still be no guarantee that we could get these Bills through Parliament unless an undertaking were reached through the usual channels, which would have to maintain proper Back-Bench discipline. The eloquence of some hon. Members quickly fades and they become exceptionally prolix when they have an interest in keeping our proceedings going for ever and ever. They regard that as their task; I do not complain, but we have to take action as a result. Everyone knows that that is a fact of life.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick) is right to say that the Freedom of Information Bill and the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill would have no chance of being enacted without the guillotine motion. The Opposition did not oppose the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill, or, as far as I recall, the Freedom of Information Bill, on Second Reading, but they will not be bothered if those two measures are not enacted. We know their real view of the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill. As for the Freedom of Information Bill, we were famously told in the Conservatives' campaign guide at the general election that such a Bill was of interest only to "left-wing busybodies".
  Mr. Winnick: Is there one example of a controversial private Member's Bill being agreed to on a Friday? Is it not pretty obvious that if people are opposed to a Bill,

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  there is no possibility of it ever being agreed to, even if we sit on Saturday and Sunday? That was the case when I opposed certain measures. The essence of the argument is that unless there is a guillotine, as there is on this measure, some Bills will never be enacted.
  Mr. Straw: My hon. Friend is right. Not only have very few controversial Bills been passed on a Friday, but many non-controversial Bills, supported by a majority on both sides of the House, have also come to grief because of the lengthy contributions by certain hon. Members.
  Mr. Richard Shepherd: Is the remark attributed to the Home Secretary true—that freedom of information legislation is for Oppositions, not for Governments?
  Mr. Straw: No. If freedom of information legislation is for Governments, it certainly strengthens the hand of Oppositions—and opposition. I celebrate the fact that that is so, because I happen to believe that good government is made better when Ministers are accountable. For them to be accountable, more information is needed.
  Mr. Damian Green: I am grateful to the Home Secretary for giving way. To clear up a factual error that has crept into the debate, the controversial Warm Homes and Energy Conservation Bill, which was a private Member's Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Basildon earlier this Session—[Interruption.]i—was passed, despite extensive and exhaustive debate on Fridays. It is on the statute book and is an extremely good Act.
  Mr. Straw: There was some perplexity on our side about who the hon. Member for Basildon was. That constituency was the subject of a famous victory by my hon. Friend the Member for Basildon (Angela Smith). The hon. Gentleman to whom the hon. Member for Ashford (Mr. Green) referred went on the notorious chicken run and now has a safer seat in Southend-on-Sea, West. [HON. MEMBERS: "Southend, West".] Southend-on-Sea, West.
  Miss Widdecombe: No. Southend, West.
  Mr. Straw: I have spent more days in Southend than many other hon. Members—[Interruption.] It is not far from Brentwood, and we used to go down to Southend for pleasure.
  I shall put on record why we think that, although regrettable, the guillotine motion is justified. I remind the House that we published a White Paper in 1997 and a draft Bill consultation paper in 1999, which was subject to extensive pre-legislative scrutiny during the summer of 1999. Since then the Bill has been subject to substantial scrutiny—40 hours in Committee in this House and two full days on the Floor of the House at the beginning of April this year, as well as 28 hours in the other place.
  The House will recall that there were detailed debates on specific issues in the House on those two days. In the other House I sought to meet in full the commitments that 1 gave to this House on those occasions. There had been
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  concern about the Executive override, and I said that we would introduce changes to make it clear that it was no longer based on a discretionary element in the Bill, but that there would be a strong and enforceable duty to disclose information where the public interest required it. That has been put in.
  Yes, there remains the possibility that a Minister of the Crown will exercise what is called an Executive override, but when he does so—again, because of an amendment that we accepted in another place, which I do not believe will be controversial—that must be reported to this House.
  I have considered carefully whether we could introduce into the body of the legislation a duty for Ministers collectively to consult other Cabinet colleagues, or whether there should be a collective Cabinet decision. For reasons that we can debate when we come to the subject, that has not proved possible.
  Colleagues on both sides who have studied various constitutional texts will know that the Cabinet per se has no formal constitutional standing, but I will give undertakings that, save where it relates to a quasi-judicial decision, which by definition normally has to be taken by an individual Secretary of State, guidance will be given, which will be made public, requiring Ministers to consult their colleagues. In addition to that, anyone who has served in government knows that it would be a poor career move for any Minister to make such a decision without consulting his or her colleagues.
  Miss Widdecombe: I am having difficulty following the right hon. Gentleman's argument. He seems to be arguing that if proceedings on a previous stage of the Bill have been thorough, he can dispense with thoroughness at later stages. Given that every stage sees changes to a Bill, and given that 123 amendments affected the present stage of the Bill, will the right hon. Gentleman please justify not guillotines in general, but this guillotine on this stage of this Bill?
  Mr. Straw: I am seeking to do so. It is a fair bet that whatever I say, unless I withdraw the motion, the right hon. Lady will not be convinced by my argument—but sometimes she gets the point in the end, albeit a bit late.
  In this instance, the point is simple, and has been discussed at length. Many of the amendments relate to issues that were discussed at length in the House or in Committee. Amendments have been introduced to deliver undertakings made in the House. If the right hon. Lady wants to have an exchange about the number of occasions when the House has considered Lords amendments when the debate has been subject to a guillotine, I could go through the list—but I think we should take that as read.
  In addition to constraining the circumstances in which the so-called Executive override can be used, and the important related matter of removing the discretionary element in the public interest test, there are important Lords amendments that, if accepted by the House, will improve the Bill. They will do so by removing the powers to add to the list of exemptions by order and, importantly, by reversing the way in which the public interest balancing exercise is carried out. They will introduce a duty for Government Departments and other public authorities to assist those who are seeking information and to help them make their applications. They will introduce other improvements in the way in which both factual and statistical information is dealt with.

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  I refer the House to amendments Nos. 26 and 27 to clause 33, which we shall move on to. They go some way to meet concerns about the availability of statistical information—I accept that they do not go the whole way, but I hope to explain why not. The changes that will ensure a better supply and availability of factual and statistical information need to be seen alongside something that is not in the Bill but which represents a huge change—the reform that we as a Government have introduced to the national statistical service, together with the establishment of an independent statistical commission, to ensure that never again do we have the scandal of the 1980s, where in the face of mounting unemployment the then Government changed the definition of unemployment 18 times, to massage the figures downwards.
  Mr. Forth: The right hon. Gentleman has referred to the many important and substantial amendments on the amendment paper for the House to consider. Will he explain why the House is expected to give proper consideration to the amendments over a period that will almost certainly be less than four hours? I accept his point about the number of amendments and their importance, but will he tell us how we can do justice to them in the pathetic amount of time that he is allowing?
  Mr. Straw: I do not accept the right hon. Gentleman's description of the time available. We have from now until midnight to consider the amendments. Although there are many amendments, the right hon. Gentleman, as an experienced parliamentarian, knows that they are grouped by the Chair. There are nine groups of amendments, and of those—
  Mr. Shepherd: The amendments are grouped by the Minister in charge.
  Mr. Straw: Yes, even better. They are grouped by the Minister in charge of the Bill with a little guidance from the Clerks. In only three of the nine groups are there amendments to amendments, and I think that only three groups will prove controversial.
  Mr. Patrick McLoughlin: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Straw: I shall do so shortly. Then I want to talk briefly about the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill, and then other right hon. and hon. Members can contribute to the debate.
  Mr. McLoughlin: When the decision was made to move the timetable motion, did the Home Secretary know that two statements would also be made, which would eat into the time originally allocated?
  Mr. Straw: No. I think that the decision was made towards the end of last week. I knew that there would be a statement on revenue support grant and associated matters. I did not know until 12.50 pm that there would be a statement on climate change following the meeting at The Hague.
  I shall now make progress on the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill.
  Mr. Forth: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. In the light of the Home Secretary's comment,
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  would you at this stage accept a manuscript amendment to the motion to allow additional time for consideration—time in proportion, at least, to the time taken by the second statement, of which the Home Secretary was unaware when he judged how much time should be made available?
  Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Sylvia Heal): I am sorry to disappoint the right hon. Gentleman, but I am not in a position to do that.
  Mr. Straw: I shall now deal briefly with the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill, which will be addressed in greater detail by the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions, my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Mullin), who will wind up the debate.
  The Bill completed its passage through the Commons last June after 69 hours of debate; the other place completed its consideration after a further 102 hours of debate. As the House knows, there are 281 amendments to the Bill, dealing with 16 separate subjects. The Bill will make important provision to grant new rights of access on foot to mountains, moor, heath, down and common land in England and Wales. It will improve the complex law relating to rights of way, significantly strengthen the law on nature conservation and the protection of wildlife and enhance the protection of areas of outstanding natural beauty.
  In both Houses, provisions relating to the new right of access to open countryside have proved to be the most controversial aspect of the Bill, and we understand that. However, the principle is not controversial, and the Opposition did not vote against either Second or Third Reading in either House. At issue is the balance between the new access right, and the ability of owners and occupiers of access land to manage that land to best advantage. Those who are familiar with the measure will know that a great deal of effort has gone into determining where that balance should rest.
  Many of the amendments to the access provisions made in the other place address the concerns, often highly practical, of landowners and managers. We have listened carefully to those concerns; when we have been persuaded that they are justified, we have made the necessary changes. Some of those changes reflect concerns expressed in Committee and on Report in the House of Commons. The debate on the access provisions themselves did move forward in the Lords.
  Mr. Hogg: As the Home Secretary knows, the timetable for the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill requires debate to end at 10 o'clock on the allotted day. So that the House is better informed about how much time it will have to consider the 283 amendments, will he tell us whether we are to have any statements tomorrow, and if so, how many?
  Mr. Straw: I know of no statements due to be made tomorrow, but the truth is that I cannot guarantee that none will be made tomorrow.
  There has been plenty of consultation on all matters covered by the Bill. The statutory agencies—the Countryside Agency, English Nature and the Countryside Council for Wales—have been fully involved, as have

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  many non-governmental organisations such as the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, the Ramblers Association and the Country Landowners Association. Many useful ideas have emerged from the national countryside access forum, which brings together representatives of many of the key interests.
  The parliamentary process has worked openly and well in respect of the Bill, although it has taken time: 170 hours is at the top end of the amount of time given to such Bills, whether by the current Government or by previous ones. Everyone knows that there are only a few days left before Prorogation and it is the Government's submission that there are no issues in the Bill on which we need to disagree with the Lords.
  Mr. Peter Brooke: Will the Home Secretary give way?
  Mr. James Paice: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Straw: No. I am about to finish and I have already given way many times.
  I have acknowledged that guillotines are to be avoided whenever possible. They are regrettable, but I believe that the guillotine on the two Bills is entirely justified. We shall, no doubt, hear the Opposition express the usual protests, as is their right, but I ask the House to bear in mind the scores and scores of guillotine motions that were moved under the Conservative Government.
  Mr. Brooke: Will the Home Secretary tell the House whether there was a guillotine on the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981?
  Mr. Straw: I suspect that there was not, but I can easily find out and shall look it up for the right hon. Gentleman. Between 1980 and 1981, there was not a guillotine, but I shall not detain the House by reading from a long list.
  Mr. Campbell-Savours: Those are interesting years to pick. In just two years, between 1980 and 1982, the previous Conservative Government introduced a string of about 11 Bills, all of which they guillotined.
  Mr. Straw: Those years were light on legislation.
  Finally, much has been made of the statement on climate change made today by my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister. I understand that that statement was made in response to a request from the official Opposition, who cannot have it both ways, although they always seek to.
  5.41 pm
  Miss Ann Widdecombe: Here we are at the beginning of national guillotine week. The Government have imposed a guillotine, first because they are incompetent, and secondly, because they are arrogant. They are incompetent in hopelessly overloading the parliamentary timetable, which is why the forthcoming Queen's Speech is the latest in the year since the one in 1928. The Government have tried to pack far too much into little time, and as a result, they have to
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  choose between losing Bills altogether or brutally and cynically cutting parliamentary debate to achieve their timetable. That is the position to which the Government have brought themselves.
  It is not surprising that there is a Home Office Bill in the list of those be guillotined. The Home Secretary is almost historically incompetent. For the first time in our history, the Chair rejected a reasoned Government amendment because the right hon. Gentleman tabled it to the wrong Opposition motion. He has already lost one Bill—the Criminal Justice (Mode of Trial)(No.2) Bill—in the House of Lords. Indeed, that is the second time a mode of trial measure has been lost. Another Bill has been reduced to such complete nonsense that it makes no sense. That is the state of affairs to which the Government have brought their legislative timetable.
  This guillotine is an affront to democracy. In the summer of 1996, the Prime Minister said:
  It is time to sweep away the cobwebs of secrecy which hang over far too much government activity. If trust in the people means anything … there can be no argument against a Freedom of Information Act.
  It seems to have escaped the Home Secretary that there is considerable irony in curtailing debate on the Freedom of Information Bill. The measure will make more—not fewer—things secret and will give the Government more, not less, power to withhold information. The right hon. Gentleman has suffered embarrassment about that through the Bill's various stages, so I understand his desire to cut his embarrassment short tonight. However, doing that says a great deal about the Government's contempt for the House—indeed, for both Houses. They are unprepared, in failing to allow adequate time, to allow the House to discuss the amendments tabled in the other place. They are therefore utterly contemptuous of the democratic system.
  The guillotine means that there will be 27 minutes in which to debate each of the nine groups of amendments—[Interruption.] Labour Members may find that amusing, but that time does not even allow for Divisions. If there are Divisions, there will be even less time to debate serious amendments to a major Bill. [Interruption.] Labour Members think that funny. Of course they do, because they have used their enormous majority throughout the current Parliament simply to push through whatever measures they want, regardless of due process. They regard that as funny, but I do not think they will find it so funny when they have to justify their stewardship to the electorate.
  The guillotine does not come as a great surprise. The Government have a history of forcing their ill-thought-out legislation through Parliament. So far during the current Parliament—I remind the right hon. Gentleman, in case he needs reminding, that it has lasted only three and a half years—the Government have guillotined more than 18 Bills. That compares with the 17 Bills that were guillotined in twice the period, between 1991 and 1997.
  Mr. Straw: We were a good Opposition.
  Miss Widdecombe: The Opposition were obviously so utterly ineffective that they did not find much to set against us.
  Mr. Straw: The right hon. Lady makes my point for me. There were so few guillotines because we co-operated

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  with the Government[Interruption.] It is true. After some years of experience of being a poor Opposition—I promise that the Conservative party will enjoy a similar experience—we decided to make ourselves a decent Opposition and to concentrate on the things that mattered. If the right hon. Lady thinks that it was all so bad, she must explain why we were such a good Opposition that we won the general election in May 1997 with a huge majority.
  Miss Widdecombe: The right hon. Gentleman says that he co-operated. The opposite of co-operation is frustration and delay. Will he now assert that the Opposition have improperly delayed this important Bill at any stage of debate on it? I give way to him.
  Mr. Strawrose—
  Miss Widdecombe: Come on, come on. I thought the Home Secretary was going to speak, but he has changed his mind. His silence speaks for itself. Of course, we can assume that silence may now be interpreted as having a guilty motivation.
  Mr. Shepherd: I think that my right hon. Friend is understating the case, if that is possible. Including the Bills that we will discuss this evening, 40 Bills have been guillotined during the current Parliament. There has never been anything like that cascade of guillotines. I regret that Opposition Front Benchers agreed to 18 of them, but we are still left with an extraordinary record of the Labour Government imposing their will on the Chamber.
  Miss Widdecombe: This must be the first time I have ever understated a case, but I yield to the considerable expertise of my hon. Friend. However, neither he nor the Government will argue about the fact that more than 453 amendments were tabled to the Freedom of Information Bill in the other place. At Committee stage in the other place, 368 amendments were tabled. More than 150 of those amendments were tabled by the Government. They cannot say that the Bill is in such good order because of previous stages of its passage that we need not spend long discussing it, when they have seen fit at every single stage to table a raft of amendments to improve the Bill and to tidy it up.
  That is proof positive that we need as thorough a discussion during this stage of the Bill's passage as during previous stages. The other place agreed to 118 amendments. We want to consider them today. Within the available time, it is utterly impossible to do justice to so many amendments, even if they are grouped, as the Home Secretary pointed out rather unnecessarily. After all, the Government removed an entire clause and introduced a new one after clause 1. That is a significant change to the Bill's structure and alters its mechanism for ensuring that information is released. If something so central and significant has occurred, it is only right that the House should have the opportunity for a full and thorough discussion.
  There is another matter that we have not had a chance to debate: the deal between the Liberal Democrats and the Government. We all remember what the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) said during earlier stages of the Bill's passage. He argued that it was wholly inadequate and unsatisfactory and said that
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  the Liberal Democrats would alter it and stand up and be counted for true freedom of information. Then, lo and behold, in the other place, they meekly trotted along to the Government and did a deal to frustrate Opposition amendments that might have had a significant impact. Indeed, Maurice Frankel of the Campaign for Freedom of Information said:
  we find it incomprehensible that, in return for these modest concessions, the Liberal Democrats are proposing to abandon their support for essential amendments which would have given the public greater rights to safety information and denied ministers the right to veto decisions of the independent Information Commissioner.
  However, we will not have an opportunity properly to debate that today.
  The Government also plan to guillotine the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill, despite the fact that they have tabled nearly 300 amendments and introduced a entirely new section on—
  Mr. Straw: Will the right hon. Lady give way?
  Miss Widdecombe: Indeed. The right hon. Gentleman has obviously found his place in his brief.
  Mr. Straw: I am prompted to intervene by the right hon. Lady's late adoption of the Campaign for Freedom of Information. At the general election, the Conservative party campaign guide said:
  The only group in Britain who are seriously interested in a Freedom of Information Act are inquisitive left-wing busy bodies.
  What led her to change her mind about that?
  Miss Widdecombe: The stupid Bill that the Government introduced. I should have thought that even the right hon. Gentleman could work that one out. If his position has moved no further since the general election, all that I have to say is that he has not studied his own Bill, which reverses the significant improvements that we made through our code—it gave access to information, which he will deny. That is the background to our opposition to the Bill.
  To the shame of the Liberal Democrats, having made so much of their commitment to freedom of information, they have done a deal with their partner, the Labour party, to ensure that our amendments would not be agreed to in the other place. It is high time the right hon. Gentleman came clean. Arrogant and incompetent, the Government do not want freedom of information, and they do not even want freedom of debate.
  5.52 pm
  Mr. Paul Tyler: I find it extraordinary that we go through this performance whenever a guillotine is imposed. There are not many aspects of the political system in the United States that I admire, but we might emulate the arrangement under which, in the Senate, one can read into the record speeches that do not need to be heard by anyone else.
  On every such occasion, the Secretary of State rises to his feet and, by contrast with the usual protestation—which involves saying that the previous Government were an awful, anti-democratic shower, that they treated the House with disdain, and that they were totally devoid of respect for the procedures and democratic opportunities in

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  the House—argues that the fact that the previous Government used so many guillotines a year gives the present Government a good excuse for doing so. That is ridiculous. Rather than having to come to the House to make such a speech, the right hon. Gentleman would find it much easier if he could simply read his speech into the record.
  Equally, the speech of the right hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe)—the spokesman for the Conservatives, those repenting sinners—could be read into the record. That approach would also make life much easier for me: as I always argue on these occasions, would it not be better for the House to decide when and how it discussed such an issue, with an agreed programme motion so that we would give the proper moment—
  Mr. Hogg: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Tyler: No; I shall be speedy, unlike the right hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald.
  Such an approach would allow us to debate and vote on those issues that are important rather than having an all-embracing final vote and generating a lot of heat, but no light. That is precisely what the Conservative party wants—it does not want to vote on the individual issues. If it did so, the remarkable transfer of its allegiance to the freedom of information movement would become apparent.
  The hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd) could read into the record his usual sermon and his Old Testament denunciation of all Governments who did anything to try to get business through the House, even via programme motions and with agreed timetabling, and despite all Members having had an opportunity to put their point of view on a specific issue.
  Mr. Forth: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Tyler: No, I will not.
  The Government should respond to a specific issue: by using a timetable motion that is tied to an hour of the night, they have prevented us from having a proper debate. An indication was given to the House—I notice that Labour Members are nodding—that there would be sufficient time, through to midnight, for us to examine some of the issues. However, the fact that the format of the motion is tied to a specific time rather than to a number of minutes and hours means that we will not have the amount of time suggested. I understand that there is no technical reason whatever for denying us the appropriate time that we require—perhaps six and a half hours. If the debate lasted until midnight, there would be eight and a half hours—
  Mr. Bercow: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Tyler: No, I will not.
  The Government are obliged to explain why they opted to use a guillotine motion that effectively takes the time used by the statements out of today's debate. It has already been pointed out that there are more than 120 amendments to discuss. If the Government's business
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  manager calculated last week that eight and a half hours were required to debate the amendments, why have we been restricted by the format of the motion to a particular time?
  There are also problems with the arrangements for tomorrow. The Government appear to have taken exactly the same view, and have decided that the guillotine will come down at 10 pm. We do not know, but we are told that it is highly likely that there will be a statement on the rural White Paper—that was pointed out in an intervention. If that is true, it would be much better if tomorrow's guillotine motion provided a specific length of time, and did not bring down the shutters at a particular hour.
  I ask the Government, even at this stage, to consider whether it is possible to re-table tomorrow's timetable motion. After all, the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill is as complicated as the Freedom of Information Bill. In addition, more than 280 amendments cover, as I believe the Home Secretary said, 16 different subjects and three specific policy areas—access, rights of way and conservation—which, in normal circumstances, could have been dealt with in three separate Bills. To compress that debate into an even shorter time than tonight's debate shows, I am afraid, that the Government have lost control of their business.
  The motion is misguided in principle and even more misguided in practical detail. I hope that the Government will learn their lesson, not only about today's proceedings, but about what should happen tomorrow. They should re-table tomorrow's timetable motion and enable us to have a proper debate.
  Such debates have become something of a ritual, and the House does not perform well when we go through the motions ritualistically. I hope that we shall promptly get on to the substance of the debate, but I very much regret that there is a comparatively short time in which to debate some extremely important issues.
  5.58 pm
  Mr. Dale Campbell-Savours: I intend to speak for only about two minutes. I want to place on record what happened under the previous Government.
  The hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler) referred to a ritual. Perhaps we need some text to which all hon. Members could refer when they condemn our Government for introducing guillotines. The record is as follows: the previous Conservative Government guillotined 65 Bills.
  Mr. Shepherd: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Campbell-Savours: I want to complete my argument. I shall give way at the end.
  The previous Conservative Government guillotined 44 proceedings in Standing Committee and 34 sittings of the House dealing with Lords amendments. They guillotined 58 debates on Report, all on separate Bills, and 58 Third Readings of different Bills, but the Conservatives have the hypocrisy to condemn a Labour Government for introducing guillotines. [Interruption.] I have not even finished my list. The Conservative Government even guillotined, on two separate occasions, business dealt with by a Committee of the whole House. On four occasions, they guillotined Second Readings.

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  This should be on the record, and the public should know about it. The hon. Member for North Cornwall was right to talk of ritual, but I want to put that in context and give the background. Under the last Conservative Government, 201 separate proceedings were guillotined in the House of Commons.
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  Mr. Douglas Hogg: Once again, we are being asked to consider a timetable motion. We considered one last week. It is the business of those who are concerned with good government to protest about this practice, because it is profoundly wrong.
  I do not pretend that the fact that we are dealing with two Bills is exceptional, but it is at least unusual. We should remind ourselves that the two Bills that we are proposing to guillotine are by any stretch of the imagination important, and that many Lords amendments are attached to them. Nine groups of amendments—123 in all—have been tabled to the Freedom of Information Bill, but the debate will finish at midnight. We should also bear in mind the fact that when Members express their views by means of a Division, which they will from time to time, that Division will be included in the timetable.
  Tomorrow we shall debate the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill, to which 281 amendments have been tabled. I do not know how many groups of amendments there are, but I know, because it is in the timetable motion, that the debate will finish at 10 pm. It is very probable that a statement will be made on, for example, the rural White Paper, and that is bound to take some time because Mr. Speaker is bound to allow a decent period for discussion.
  Mr. Forth: My right hon. and learned Friend need not speculate. The Order Paper tells us, does it not, that tomorrow will feature a ten-minute Bill, which may be controversial and on which the House may divide. In that event, the first half hour of business after 3.30 pm will inevitably be taken up with the ten-minute Bill, notwithstanding the possibility of a statement as well. So the time available is diminishing before our very eyes.
  Mr. Hogg: Indeed. Moreover, it would only take another crisis engineered by, for instance, the Deputy Prime Minister to trigger a private notice question, which would eat away at the time allowed for tomorrow's extremely important debate.
  To make matters worse, there is another timetable motion on Wednesday, also applying to two Bills. That, no doubt, is why my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe) described this as national guillotine week—a phrase that resonates especially strongly from her lips.
  Mr. David Maclean: Would my right hon. and learned Friend care to comment on the information given by the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours)—for which the House is grateful —that the last Conservative Government guillotined an average of only three Bills per annum? This week we shall deal with three guillotines: that is three guillotines in one week, in one Session of Parliament.
  Mr. Hogg: My right hon. Friend makes a good point. I always enjoy listening to the speeches of the hon.
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  Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours), but he will forgive me for observing that he, like the Chancellor of the Exchequer, went in for double counting in a quite extraordinary manner—and, furthermore, took care that we were not reminded of the divider of 18. That was my right hon. Friend's point, and it brings us to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for AldridgeBrownhills (Mr. Shepherd), who reminded us that the guillotine had been applied to 40 separate measures since 1997. That puts the speech of the hon. Member for Workington in its proper context.
  I find it extraordinary that the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler) was not prepared to give way; but the Liberal Democrats, of course, have become a sub-set of the Labour Government. Let me tell the hon. Gentleman that I would certainly be prepared to agree to consensual timetable motions on occasion if, and only if, we were also consulted on the volume of legislation to be announced in the Queen's Speech. I am glad to see the hon. Gentleman nodding. If there were an agreement entitling us to a decisive say on the volume of legislation and other business, there might—I put it no higher than that—be a case for a consensual timetable motion.
  Mr. Bercow: Will my right hon. and learned Friend confirm, for the elucidation of the public, that even if there were no votes tonight—which is an unlikely contingency—and even if every amendment were debated, an average of less than two minutes would be allowed for consideration of each amendment? Does that not demonstrate the Government's contempt for the House of Commons?
  Mr. Hogg: My hon. Friend is entirely right. I shall come to the consequences of that in a moment, but I think that we need to remind ourselves of what the Home Secretary told us. I am sorry that he is not present now; he has left his two sidekicks to deal with the debate. He told us that a number of important amendments had been introduced in the other place, which, if we considered them at all, we would consider for the first time tonight.
  Let us focus on what is bad about this process. For one thing, when we are dealing with nine groups of amendments—when we are dealing with 123 amendments, or 283—the inevitable consequence of a timetable motion is that a substantial number of them will not be discussed. It is no good the Home Secretary saying that some amendments moved in the other place were moved in pursuance of undertakings that he had given here. That may be true, but we are not in a position to scrutinise the language he has used, or to ask ourselves whether those amendments meet the undertakings he has given. Such an assurance constitutes no justification whatever.
  As a result of these increasingly numerous timetable motions, elected representatives cannot scrutinise important legislation. That means that we cannot express our views on the amendments before us; it means that the interested parties who look to us to articulate their concerns will not have their concerns reflected in discussion; and it means that our constituents will not be able, through their elected Members, to express their views on legislation. All that is profoundly wrong.
  With these timetable motions, we are stripping out part of the democratic process. If that were not bad enough, we are also stripping out part of the legislative process,

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  and our ability to improve legislation is being greatly diminished. There is yet a third offensive element, which I put to the Home Secretary. All the amendments originated in the House of Lords, and many will not be discussed here. That means that the unelected other place is making law. What possible justification can there be for that, in the 21st century?
  Mr. Campbell-Savours: Ask Daddy.
  Mr. Hogg: That, I assume, is a reference to my right hon. and learned kinsman the former Lord Chancellor, who warned the country about an elective dictatorship. That is exactly the answer that he would give the hon. Gentleman. What he warned of is coming to pass: a tyrannical, dictatorial Government are using their Back Benchers to force through legislation. What is so bizarre is that the Government are using Labour Back Benchers to force through legislation emanating from the other place that has been voted on, or discussed only in the other place.
  That is a scandal. Were it not happening now, we would not believe that it were possible. It reinforces strongly the case for an elected second Chamber. I believe—I make no bones about it—that we should have a wholly elected second Chamber. That at least would give some legitimacy to the process that we are seeing thrust upon us.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord): Order. First, we are not here to discuss the other place in any depth. Secondly, I am starting to hear arguments that I have heard more than once this evening.
  Mr. Hogg: You, Mr. Deputy Speaker, have heard those arguments on other occasions, too. We are being told by Ministers to approve a timetable motion. Those of us who are against timetable motions come to this place whenever they are moved to debate them. Inevitably, the arguments are much the same; they go to democracy. It is an offence for us to be asked to approve such a timetable motion.
  I have already this evening and on previous occasions described how such a motion undermines the legislative process, but worse than that, it undermines democracy. The country looks to the House of Commons to ensure that legislation is properly scrutinised. It assumes that legislation is properly scrutinised. The fact that people are willing to acquiesce in a given law reflects their belief that their elected representatives can and do scrutinise the legislation.
  Mr. David Taylor: When the right hon. and learned Gentleman was a Minister in previous Administrations, was a guillotine ever used for legislation for which he or his Department was responsible?
  Mr. Campbell-Savours: And did the right hon. and learned Gentleman vote for it?
  Mr. Hogg: I am sure that I did: I make no bones about it. I was in government for 13 years and, as part of the process of collective responsibility, I supported many things publicly that I privately disagreed with. That is
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  thenature of collective responsibility. One of the joys of being with the Back Benchers is that I can say whatever I please without the slightest fear of committing either myself or those on the Front Bench.
  Mr. Forth: Regrettably, I was in government for only nine years, so I cannot speak with quite the same authority as my right hon. and learned Friend. Will he concede, though, that what is radically different now is that we have not only an arrogant Government with a huge Commons majority, who have proved themselves capable of trampling over all our traditions and conventions and changing our rules, but a House of Lords that has been radically changed? The combination of the changes in the two Chambers of Parliament, the changes to Standing Orders and, now, national guillotine week, has removed all possibility of true accountability of Government to Parliament.
  Mr. Hogg: I need to be careful about what I say about the other place, lest you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, call me to order, but my right hon. Friend has made an important point. The other place contains many fewer independent-minded people than it did. I have never tried to defend the hereditary composition of the other place. I have always favoured an elected one, but at least the hereditary composition provided for an independent number of Members, as opposed to the present nomination system, which, on the whole, does not. We have lost the independent Members.
  Mr. Nick Hawkins: Does my right hon. and learned Friend agree that, on the particular legislation on which the Government are putting forward their guillotine tonight, we have an extra lack of independence, in that there has been a squalid deal between Liberal Democrat peers and the Government, apparently to the enormous displeasure of the Liberal Democrat spokesman in this Chamber, the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes)—which is why he is not here? He is too embarrassed and has sent the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler) to try to defend the indefensible.
  Mr. Hogg: If there has been a squalid deal between the Liberal Democrats and Labour, that does not surprise me. After all, we now understand from the right hon. Member for Yeovil (Paddy Ashdown) that there was a secret deal to impose some form of coalition government on this country which was never disclosed to the electorate at the time of the general election, so I am not in the least surprised to hear that there has been a squalid deal between Liberal Democrat and Government Front Benchers.
  Let us go back to what really matters because, in the end, the Liberal Democrats do not. To have authority, legislation depends on the process being properly adhered to. I do not believe that one can go on indefinitely passing laws that have neither been discussed nor scrutinised, without the electorate waking up to the fact that the law-making process is breaking down. Once that happens, we get a disenchantment with the process so great that the foundations of democracy are undermined.
  The Government in that respect, as in many others, are undermining the foundations of democracy. Therefore the House—and those of us who are seriously concerned about representative government—needs to protest and go on protesting whenever such a motion is moved.
  6.16 pm
  Mr. David Winnick: I offer absolutely no apology for having opposed guillotine motions when sitting on the Opposition Benches. I opposed them for the simple reason that I opposed the Bills themselves. As I did not want the Bills to pass into law, obviously, I used every opportunity to oppose guillotine motions. I have no objections to Conservative Members who basically oppose the Freedom of Information Bill and the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill saying that they oppose the guillotine motion. Some Labour Members may be of the view that that is wrong. I am not at all of that view. I opposed guillotine motions when in opposition; it is understandable that Conservative Members are doing so now.
  As I said when I intervened on the Home Secretary, if there were no guillotine motion covering the two Bills, they could not pass into law in the current Session. If they do not pass into law in this Session, they are dead. There is no carry-over.
  It is nonsense for the Conservatives to claim that they are really in favour of the Freedom of Information Bill and the right to roam Bill. One previous attempt to introduce a freedom of information Bill was made by the hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd), but his Government opposed it. When my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Fisher) tried again to introduce such a measure, it was also opposed because the Conservatives did not want a freedom of information Bill. There may be certain new clauses and amendments that could strengthen the Bill. Some of are perhaps a little critical and believe that it could go further, but the Conservatives in office opposed any such measure. There would never have been a freedom of information Bill had the Tories been elected at the last election. That is a fact of life; it is no use pretending otherwise.
  Mr. Forth: The hon. Gentleman mentioned a time constraint. He seemed to imply that the motion was essential for the Government to complete their legislative programme against some deadline or other. Does he agree that the deadline is of the Government's making? Having set that completely arbitrary deadline—a Prorogation date; a Queen's Speech date—they must now introduce this motion, denying us the opportunity for debate. The motion is to meet their own self-imposed deadline.
  Mr. Winnick: It is a bit odd because the right hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe) criticised us for beginning the new Session later than usual. Conservative Members cannot have it both ways. No hon. Member—certainly no Conservative Member—could be more opposed to the Freedom of Information Bill and the right to roam Bill than the right hon. Gentleman, so let us be clear what we are debating.
  As we know, the right to roam Bill is strenuously opposed by many Conservative Members, especially in the other place. They do not like the Bill, and we know why: as they see it, their interests would be adversely affected by it. Can anyone imagine a Conservative Government introducing a right to roam Bill such as we shall be debating tomorrow? Of course not; Conservative Members are absolutely opposed to right to roam legislation.
  Mr. Paice: Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that Opposition Members did not vote against the Countryside
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  and Rights of Way Bill on either Second Reading or Third Reading? Will he also confirm that, in Committee, it was made abundantly clear that, although we would have preferred not to have the Bill, the Opposition's sole objective was to improve it? A testament to that fact is the vast number of Government amendments that have subsequently been tabled to the Bill.
  Mr. Winnick: The hon. Gentleman himself has just said it: Conservative Members would rather not have a right to roam Bill. Of course they did not oppose this Bill on Second Reading, but that was because of political opportunism. It would have been better and more honest if they had opposed it—as he has just done by saying that they would rather not have it.
  I simply repeat my belief that the two Bills are useful and necessary. Although the Freedom of Information Bill could certainly be strengthened as my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Dr. Clark) would like, I want the two Bills to be enacted. If there is not a guillotine motion, the Bills will die, and that will be the end of it. There is every justification for the Government to ensure that they do not die, but go on to the statute book by the end of this Session. I have no hesitation at all in supporting the Government's guillotine motion.
  6.21 pm
  Mr. James Paice: I am grateful to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for calling me to speak in this debate—which, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) said, is but the first of a series of debates in national guillotine week, in which the Government are seeking to curtail debate.
  I do not want to reiterate arguments that have already been made. I shall restrict my remarks entirely to the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill, in which I have taken a close interest. I shall also try to demonstrate that, in relation to that Bill, the timetable motion has nothing to do with events of this week or with the artificial timetable that my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst mentioned, but everything to do with Ministers' incompetence from the very first day on which they entered Government. Although the legislation was a manifesto item, it has taken Ministers until their third parliamentary Session to introduce it. One might have thought that Ministers would have wanted to introduce and implement it very quickly.
  Conservative Members have never made any bones about the fact that, as the hon. Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick) implied, we do not think that right to roam legislation is a sensible way of improving access to the countryside. However, such legislation was part and parcel of the Government's manifesto, as it had been part of Labour's manifesto for very many years. The fact that it has taken until the middle of the Government's third parliamentary Session to introduce a Bill defies the belief that Ministers are competent in managing their affairs.
  The Bill was not introduced until this calendar year, well into the Session. Moreover, Ministers themselves have delayed the Bill. Not only were they late in introducing it, but, while it was in Committee, they moved an amendment to delete one entire schedule and to replace it with another very long and complicated schedule. Indeed, the new schedule was so long and complicated

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  that the Government decided to cancel an entire day's consideration in Committee, so that Committee members could consider it. Although I do not belittle the Government's generosity in thinking that we needed extra time to consider the new schedule, if they had got the confounded thing right initially, we would not have had to lose that day and the subsequent time in considering it.
  In Committee, the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions, the hon. Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Mullin) and the Minister for the Environment—who seems rapidly to be assuming the title of Minister for hot air—consistently opposed sensible amendments moved by me and my right. hon. and hon. Friends. However, when the self-same amendments were moved in the other place, Ministers accepted them. Although I am pleased that Ministers have accepted them, and I am sure that my right hon. and hon. Friends will express their pleasure—if they have time tomorrow, given the vast number of amendments that we have to consider—that they have been accepted, the 100-plus hours to which the Home Secretary referred that were taken up considering them in the other place were unnecessary. The Government should have accepted the amendments when we moved them initially.
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary will no doubt reply, "All we are doing is considering points that were seriously made in Committee, and returning to them as we promised to do." There were some occasions—which Opposition Members will welcome tomorrow, if we have time—when Ministers quite properly agreed to consider an argument made in Committee and to return to it. Previous Ministers have done the same and, I hope, future Ministers will do so, too. However, as I shall explain in more detail shortly, in Committee, the Under-Secretary and the Minister vehemently opposed many amendments and gave them no quarter, but they accepted them in the other place.
  Mr. Hogg: Does my hon. Friend agree that there is a major matter of principle here? If one is going to move substantial amendments, it should be done in this place, not least because we represent the electorate who will be affected by the consequences of the legislative change? Although I willingly concede that the other place brings great expertise, it does not accurately reflect or represent those on whom the legislation will directly impact.
  Mr. Paice: My right hon. and learned Friend makes a case with which I cannot disagree. I was planning on addressing the issue later, in relation to areas of outstanding natural beauty, but, as he has touched on it, I shall do so now.
  AONBs are a major part of United Kingdom conservation legislation and, in Committee, my right. hon. and hon. Friends gently inquired why they were not included in the Bill. Ministers waited until the legislation was considered in the other place before moving copious amendments to establish not only the concept of AONBs, but conservation boards and all the paraphernalia that goes with them.
  As my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe) said, as those matters are dealt with in new clauses and could be considered, if at
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  all, only at the end of our consideration tomorrow, there is a risk that they will not be debated in the House. Before any hon. Member jumps up and seeks to intervene, let me make it clear that I hope that we consider those matters. I shall certainly not be responsible for preventing us from considering them.
  Although the Home Secretary seems to be ignorant of it, everyone else seems to know that, tomorrow, there will be a statement on the White Paper. Therefore, it is likely that we will not start considering the Bill until 5 o'clock, leaving us about five hours to consider 16 groups of amendments, in at least six of which there are also amendments to Lords amendments.
  Mr. Maclean: Although it is very important that we debate those provisions in part III, if we get to them, I hope that my hon. Friend, as a Front-Bench spokesman, is not suggesting that we skip over the vital amendments on improved or semi-improved grassland or the provisions touching on clause 13 and occupiers' liability, which would impose horrendous burdens on our constituents and which need to be dealt with properly in the House. That is to mention only a few amendments.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will not respond in too much detail on those amendments, because that is not what we are dealing with.
  Mr. Maclean: I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I was seeking a general, broad-brush response.
  Mr. Paice: I agree with my right hon. Friend. I was about to refer to the matters that we will need to deal with before we get on to areas of outstanding natural beauty. I referred to them only because my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Mr. Hogg) mentioned them.
  My right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean) mentioned some of the amendments. It is worth while considering Ministers' responses to points made in Committee. We had a considerable debate about the definition of curtilage. The Minister for the Environment said:
  Curtilage therefore has a meaning that can be flexibly applied to the facts of each case—
  Mr. Campbell-Savours: What has this to do with the motion?
  Mr. Paice: A lot.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I do not appreciate such sedentary interventions. The Chair will decide what is or is not in order.
  Mr. Paice: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I am seeking to demonstrate that the Bill has had to be timetabled because of the Government's own incompetence during earlier stages.
  The Minister for the Environment said:
  Curtilage has a meaning that can be flexibly applied to the facts of each case. There is no reason to suppose that a statutory definition of curtilage will be any more helpful than the court's interpretation.—[Official Report, Standing Committee B, 4 April 2000; c. 144.1

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  Despite all that, Lords amendment No. 153, a Government amendment, inserts
  Land within 20 metres of a dwelling
  as a definition of curtilage.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is now doing precisely what I asked him not to do. If he is not careful, he will attempt to have a debate today that we will probably have tomorrow.
  Mr. Paice: There is of course the argument that there will not be much time tomorrow. I seek not to rehash the arguments but to demonstrate the fact that, if the Government had not taken such a bull-headed approach in Committee and rejected the selfsame amendments that they agreed to in the other place, we would not need to be having this debate, because proceedings in the Lords could have been completed and the legislation enacted some weeks ago.
  Mr. Maclean: My hon. Friend is on a very important point of principle. In view of the principle established in Pepper v. Hart, whereby a Minister's words can be used in interpretation, is not it vital that the Minister for the Environment comes to the Dispatch Box tomorrow to reverse what he said? Otherwise, when a court is faced on judicial review with a question concerning the interpretation of legislation, it will be faced with a Commons Minister saying one thing—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. That is not relevant.
  Mr. Paice: I believe that my right hon. Friend is entirely right. I am sure that when Ministers consider what they said in the past and what they will almost certainly have to say tomorrow, they will want at least to show some shame-facedness.
  We also discussed in Committee the definition of mountain, moor, heath and down. We had a long debate on semi-improved and improved grassland. The Minister for the Environment said:
  let me be absolutely clear: the cultivated land exception is not intended to be the mechanism for excluding improved or semi-improved pastures and fields from a right of access.—[Official Report, Standing Committee B, 6 April 2000; c. 167.]
  Yet Lords amendment No. 2 says that mountain, moor, heath and down does not include land that consists of improved or semi-improved grassland. That is a complete and utter volte-face.
  I might be tempting providence if I read out countless more examples, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
  Mr. Hogg: One of the problems with the timetable is that we may not be able to probe Ministers about why they have changed their position so fundamentally. Does not that emphasise the injustice and lack of wisdom associated with a motion of this kind?
  Mr. Paice: My right hon. and learned Friend is entirely right. Part of the House's duty is to challenge the Government about their reasons for tabling certain amendments, just as, in earlier stages, we challenged them about their reasons for opposing certain amendments. If their two positions are completely contradictory, we have to ask why, and we should have time for that.
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  I would like to think that the change of mind was all down to the persuasiveness of our arguments or those of my noble Friends but, whatever the reasons, we have a right to know.
  Mr. Maclean: It is not only ourselves but the thousands of people out there who will be affected who have a right to know. If a case turning on the definition of improved grassland goes to court, the court would have a problem.— The European Court of Human Rights would have a problem—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The right hon. Gentleman is repeating a point that he made earlier.
  Mr. Paice: I apologise to my right hon. Friend if I did not answer his point adequately the first time. I agree with him, and his point is very important.
  I will give one more example and—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I think that the House has now heard enough examples. The arguments are getting rather repetitive. I hope that some new points will be made soon.
  Mr. Paice: If I may say so, these are all new points, because they concern different issues on which the Government themselves have caused time to be wasted. Had the Government agreed to the amendments in the first place, we would not have wasted all that time in the other place, which has led to the need for the timetable motion.
  The Hansard report will show that the Government clearly misled the Committee over occupiers' and owners' liability and then accepted that they had done so. The Minister for the Environment made a statement that proved to be entirely untrue, and he accepted that when he was challenged on it later. On liability and dry stone walls, he said
  Listening to hon. Members' comments on walls, one might think it remarkable that there are any walls left in Dartmoor, much of the lake district, Snowdonia or many other areas that already have statutory rights of access—[Official Report, Standing Comtnittee B, 18 April 2000; c. 398.]
  Surprise, surprise, Lords amendment No. 9 introduces an absolution for owners and occupiers from liability for
  a risk of that person suffering injury when passing over, under—
  believe it or not—
  or through any wall, fence or gate.
  There is a catalogue of examples of the Government's wasting the time of Parliament in its entirety: this Chamber and the other place. Had they introduced the Bill earlier and got it right, rather than doing it at the very last minute, and had they acceded in Committee to amendments to which they subsequently acceded in the other place, the motion would not be necessary.
  Despite what the hon. Member for Walsall, North said, the Opposition have never sought to delay the Bill. Hon. Members need not take my word for that. The Minister and the Government Whip in Committee both put on record the statement that the Opposition were not wasting time. It is the Government's fault that we are in this

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  position, and the Government should pay the price. I do not want the Bill to fail, but the Government should have allowed us time to complete the debate on it.
  Mr. David Taylor: You said that you did earlier.
  Mr. Paice: I did not. I have said quite clearly that I do not want the Bill to fail because it contains a number of measures that I support. Yes, there are aspects that I do not wish to see implemented, but I have accepted that they will become law. My sole intent is to make the legislation more practical and feasible for all those whom it affects.
  Mr. Taylor: Nineteen minutes is an awfully long time, particularly when it contains a large amount of tedium. Will the hon. Gentleman remind us whether he said at the start of his speech that he and his party, broadly speaking, did not want to see the Bill hit the statute book?
  Mr. Paice: If the hon. Gentleman had attended the earlier debates and listened to what I said, he would know that there has been no doubt in my mind—nor, I believe, in the minds of my colleagues—that we would rather not have had part I on the statute book. However, we have accepted that it will be law, and that simple bull-headed opposition will achieve nothing. We have thus concentrated all our efforts on trying to make part I more achievable, practicable, enforceable and understandable. Most of the arguments that we put forward earlier in the Bill's proceedings were rejected by the Government in Committee. They have subsequently seen the light, for which I rejoice, and have accepted many of those amendments in the other place.
  It is the Government's fault that we are in this position. They had the opportunity to get the Bill through the House earlier, more effectively and more cleanly. They could have ended up with a piece of legislation that the House would in general support, although perhaps not in every aspect. As it is, we can be clear that whatever happens tomorrow night and however quickly my right hon. and hon. Friends and I move through the list of amendments, not all will get discussed. For that reason, I oppose the motion.
  6.42 pm
  Mr. Desmond Swayne: I thought that I heard the hon. Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick) sighing, but he introduced a quite novel principle into the application of the guillotine. It was his submission, if I understood him correctly, that there should be no distinction in principle between the measure and the guillotine motion. He extended that principle to say that so long as the Conservative party was opposed to a measure, that was itself a proper reason for imposing a guillotine on it.
  At least the hon. Gentleman had the courtesy to give way during his speech, which is more than can be said for the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler), the Liberal Democrat Chief Whip. However, the hon. Gentleman had a very good reason for not giving way. I see the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) smiling; I am coming to him.
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  The hon. Member for North Cornwall said at the outset that he was in favour of a system whereby speeches could simply be read into the record without having to be delivered at all. As that option was not available to him, he nevertheless went for the next best thing by reading his speech into the record. It follows, therefore, that he could not take interventions, and, indeed, he refused to do so.
  The hon. Member for Workington made a very mischievous speech.
  Mr. Bercow: Will my hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Swayne: Yes, I will.
  Mr. Bercow: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way. He is right to object to the way in which the Government propose to truncate the debate. He is also right to upbraid the hon. Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick). [Interruption.] I am indeed addressing the Chair; 1 do not need lectures from a sedentary position from the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours). Does my hon. Friend agree that the rather tribal attitude that the hon. Member for Walsall, North habitually displays might be one of the reasons why the late Lord Wilson famously described him as the silliest man in Parliament?
  Mr. Winnickrose—
  Mr. Swayne: I will give way to the hon. Member for Walsall, North.
  Mr. Winnick: Leaving aside the rubbish of the hon. Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow), the hon. Member for New Forest, West (Mr. Swayne) misinterpreted what I said. I said that if the Opposition oppose a measure, it is understandable that they would oppose a guillotine to hasten the progress of that measure, such as the one that we are debating today.
  Mr. Swayne: I take the hon. Gentleman's correction. I entirely understand his desire to see a timetable motion used to get a Bill of which he approves on to the statute book. However, it has been our case all along that this would not have been necessary if the measure had been properly handled.
  The hon. Member for Workington drew attention to what he described as 201 separate pieces of business on which the previous Government imposed a timetable motion. He sat down before he could be interrogated about whether that was a record that he admired—because he seemed to imply that it was—and whether it was his intention that the Government should attempt to emulate it. The hon. Gentleman gives every impression of being prepared to support the Government in this timetable motion.
  Mr. Maclean: The hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) has done the House a marvellous service tonight. He is man of honour and integrity, as well as being my next-door neighbour. He has confirmed—and I do not think that anyone in the House will challenge

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  his word—that during the 18 years of the previous Tory Government we averaged only three guillotines a year. Now we are running at four a week.
  Mr. Swayne: It is clear that the hon. Member for Workington has done us a singular service.
  Mr. Campbell-Savours: Which school did my neighbour, the right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean), go to that taught that three times 18 equals 201?
  Mr. Swayne: It is not for me to intrude on this private matter.
  Mr. Macleanrose—
  Mr. Swayne: I dislike being the go-between but I will give way to my right hon. Friend once more.
  Mr. Maclean: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way. Perhaps I should make it clear, so that there is no misunderstanding, that one was referring to the number of Bills guillotined by the previous Government, not all the individual motions which the hon. Member for Workington double counted. [HON. MEMBERS: "Ah !"] However, he has confirmed that the previous Government guillotined, on average, slightly more than three Bills per annum.
  Mr. Swayne: The key principle is not how many, or by whom, but whether this brings us any further forward.
  Mr. Campbell-Savoursrose—
  Mr. Swayne: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will answer my question: is that a record of which he approves and does he support his Government's guillotine because it is an attempt to emulate that record?
  Mr. Campbell-Savours: I think that the hon. Gentleman should have listened to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary when he said that in the last five years when Labour was in opposition, we decided that we would take a more co-operative approach on these matters. We decided we would co-operate with the then Government whenever possible and, indeed, we did so. The hon. Gentleman may wish to pursue that.
  I was asked another question, something to do with 201 by 3. I have forgotten it now, but I will remember in a minute.
  Mr. Swayne: I will deal with that point shortly, but first I return to a phrase first used by my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe) when she referred to this as national guillotine week. I thought that although that is a very useful way of describing this week, it does not take sufficient account of the fact that last week was also national guillotine week. Indeed, there will be similar weeks to come—every week will be national guillotine week.
  In his opening speech, the Secretary of State complained that there was an occasion when the previous Conservative Government had guillotined two Bills not at the end of the parliamentary Session but at the beginning of it,
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  in December. Has the Secretary of State recognised that from now on all Bills will be, in effect, guillotined as a consequence of the decisions that were taken 10 days or so ago?
  That prompts me to wonder why we have so many guillotines this week. We have had a couple of weeks of fairly light whipping, and from next week we face the prospect of all Bills being programmed—that is, guillotined. It would not have been too much to expect if Members had been required to sit up late two or three nights this week, given the importance of the Bills under consideration. Is it the case that the guillotines before us are for the convenience of Members? I suspect so, but also that matters go further than that.
  If this evening's business is taken when we have only 27 minutes for each group of amendments, there will effectively be time only for the Front-Bench spokesmen to have their say. That will curtail any Back-Bench contribution, which is the purpose of programming. The hon. Member for Workington said that his party, when it was the Opposition, began to co-operate, which led to a diminution in the need for guillotines. He recommended that course to us, but co-operation—enforced co-operation will increasingly be the case under programme motions—will always be used to stifle dissent on the Back Benches.
  Anyone who sat through our debates on the Scotland Act 1998—programmed from beginning to end—will be aware that the person most disadvantaged was the hon. Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell). Time and again, debates were arranged by the hon. Gentleman's own Front Benchers in such a way as to exclude the contributions that he wished to make on key elements that went through without being discussed at all. That is the problem with all timetable motions. They can be used to ensure that Front Benchers have their say, and that dissent, whether from the Government or Opposition Benches, is silenced.
  6.52 pm
  Mr. Richard Shepherd: I am sorry that the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler) is not in his place. He advanced a deeply distasteful concept when he referred to these proceedings as a ritual. As a Conservative, I view rituals with caution and respect, and I must ask to what ritual he was referring. The rituals in question are freedom of speech and the right to represent those who sent us here. I am not dismissive of either concept. Both are important, but the hon. Gentleman thinks that they are not. He thinks that it is somehow denigratory to have freedom of speech and to be free to represent the views of those who sent us here.
  Last week, the hon. Gentleman voted against a guillotine. I take it from the burden of his remarks that he will do so again today on a motion affecting two Bills. Did he mean that the ritual had convinced him to vote against the guillotine? He said that he would like all Bills to be—in his grandiloquent word—programmed, and that even when they are, we do not necessarily fail to debate important areas of Bills. The Police (Northern Ireland) Bill was perhaps the most powerful demonstration against that, and I do not want to waste too much time on the triviality and deeply offensive ideas that the hon. Member for North Cornwall holds on representative democracy.
  The hon. Gentleman was supporting the Home Secretary's motion. I speak only in the context of the Freedom of Information Bill, as I do not have the

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  knowledge to speak on the second Bill. The Home Secretary said that there is, at the end of a parliamentary Session, an imperative to secure the Government's business. That business could be set off course by the shuttling between the other place and this one, and he therefore had to address that imperative.
  An assumption lay behind his words that has become a commonplace under the Government since 1997. They say that all Governments must get their business. That has never been a constitutional proposition in the United Kingdom. Governments propose, and, in one sense, the House of Commons disposes. Governments bring measures before the House. Those measures may have had the support of the electorate who made the Government, but no electorate have ever examined the detail of a Bill, know what is hidden in the clauses or sub-clauses or know in advance the weight of the criminal sanctions to be imposed in legislation. That is why the process of being able to examine and unpick legislation is something that all Governments seek. Our system secures authority by allowing those opposed to have their say. That is the most crucial element in asserting the rights of the people and the old Burkean concept of consent, not just allegiance.
  Mr. Forth: Does my hon. Friend agree that an even more sinister thought lies hidden behind the new principle that he has identified? It is that the Government of the day can be assumed to have a right to any number of Bills, because the programming mechanism that the Government have single-handedly imposed on the House implies that the Government may determine how little time can be given to each Bill and therefore how many Bills—an unlimited number—can be forced through in a Session. Does my hon. Friend agree that that is the implication of the arrangements that we face in the new Session?
  Mr. Shepherd: I do, indeed, and the hon. Member for North Cornwall was a handmaiden in that process.
  Mr. Hawkins: My hon. Friend makes, as always, an extremely powerful speech. Does he agree that what he is criticising the Government for doing was wisely encapsulated in the other place by Lord Archer of Sandwell, a Labour peer attacking his own side, who said:
  "I'll be judge, I'll be jury", said cunning old Fury;
  "I'll try the whole cause, and condemn you to death"?—[Official Report, House of Lords, 14 November 2000; Vol. 619, c. 214.1
  Mr. Shepherd: I have the greatest respect for Lord Archer of Sandwell, with whom I served in this House for many years. When he uses such strong words to castigate a Labour Government, his patience has indeed been tried on the content of what he was being asked to accept.
  Mr. Campbell-Savours: The hon. Gentleman makes a powerful case that Parliament exists to question the Executive. What would he do, however, if he were faced by an Opposition who, on many occasions, insisted on dragging out the process of legislation with a view to destroying it? Oppositions raise valid issues, but are there no circumstances in which the hon. Gentleman would have to come to terms with the use of some mechanism to ensure
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  that Oppositions should not be allowed to destroy Bills that the majority of the House of Commons feels are wanted by the wider public?
  Mr. Shepherd: I said that our system secures authority by allowing those opposed to have their say. The hon. Gentleman—who double and treble-counted to give us an extraordinary relationship on the number of guillotine motions used—[Interruption.]
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. We cannot have sedentary interventions from the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours).
  Mr. Shepherd: Under Mrs. Thatcher, 34 Bills were guillotined in the House. As the hon. Member for Workington said, 64 motions were required to guillotine 34 Bills. That took place over slightly more than 11 years. Let us contrast it to the conduct of the Labour Government, who in three and a half years—less than one Parliament—have already guillotined 40 Bills, requiring more than 50 motions. The hon. Gentleman's list would not even include the motion to guillotine the two Bills that we are discussing. Even if we allow for the agreement of Conservative Front-Bench Members and of the hon. Member for North Cornwall to such timetables, only 18 Bills could be deducted from the Government's total.
  This matter raises a point of principle. What makes us angry about the imposition of such guillotines is that Governments are disposing of the most essential process for giving legitimacy to the laws that they make. This procedure has become a system of management of the Commons. The hon. Member for North Cornwall applauds that as merely ritualistic, but in fact it is destructive of the House and of its standing with those who sent us here.
  I am fearful that guillotines such as this undermine the standing of Governments. Governments can talk directly to the electorate, but how do the electorate talk back to them? They can talk back only through us as the representatives that they sent to this place. If we are so marginal that a majority is mobilised to stop proper discussion of measures, we undermine our system of authority.
  I did not intend to speak for long, but the arguments adduced by the Home Secretary as to the need for the guillotine do not stand up to reasonable examination. The Government's assertion is deeply offensive when they tell those who are opposed to, or who want to examine or improve measures how they should go about their business of representing the arguments of those who sent them to this place. The guillotine should be rejected.
  7.2 pm
  Mr. Eric Forth: We have heard an interesting combination of arguments, ranging from the principled to the detailed. Those used by Government Members all seemed to start from several propositions that would, I suspect, be accepted by very few Opposition Members. As my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd) has just reminded the House, the first of those propositions is the completely new idea that has arisen—at least it is new to me, and, obviously, to my hon. Friend—that a Government have the divine right to push through any amount of legislation they choose, at a time of their choosing, in a given Session of Parliament.

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  I did not know that that was a principle of our constitution. I was not aware that that was the result of centuries of historical development of the relationship between Parliament and the Executive—but suddenly it has burst on to the political scene. We are told with great confidence, even by the Home Secretary, that apparently the Government of the day have a right to any amount of legislation, and also have the right so to structure the parliamentary timetable as to fit that legislation into a given amount of time. That is further reflected in the fact that during the debate, Labour Members told us repeatedly that there was to be a timetable on the consideration of other Bills due to come to us from another place this week. Given that time limit, we are told that we must truncate debate on this week's business.
  That argument poses some difficulties. The first is that the time limit is of the Government's making. They have decided, quite arbitrarily, that the Queen's Speech will be next week, so the House must prorogue before that. That time limit is only of the Government's making, because of their incompetence in managing their legislative programme for this year to date.
  Within that, there is another artificial time constraint. What is so magic about midnight? Do we all turn into pumpkins? Do we turn into something else? Do our shoes no longer fit? I do not understand why, according to the Government's timetable motion, deliberations on the Freedom of Information Bill must finish at midnight. Even more bizarrely, proceedings on the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill must finish at 10 o'clock tomorrow night.
  I realise that the Government have imposed on the House a new set of Standing Orders, under which it is decreed that in the next Session of Parliament, the House will not deliberate, or—more accurately—that it will not vote, after 10 pm. But we are still in the current Session, not the next one, so I am not aware that there is a requirement to end our consideration of Bills at 10 o'clock on a given night.
  I am aware that Labour Members are delicate flowers—especially the babes. I know that they want to go home, presumably not to their constituencies, although some of them are probably there already; indeed, they may not yet have arrived back—perhaps they will not arrive back at all. I understand all that, but, like many of my hon. Friends, I continue to cling to the belief that the primary duty of Members of this House is to be in the Chamber to hold the Government to account—not against an artificial time limit, but using the amount of time reasonably required to investigate properly what they are doing.
  Mr. Bercow: Does my right hon. Friend agree that, judging by previous debates, the Government did not need to be especially wise to anticipate that substantial debate would be needed—certainly on the Freedom of Information Bill? As they could have foreseen that some months ago, would it not have been judicious to consider a recall of Parliament in September to facilitate that proper debate for which my right hon. Friend rightly asks?
  Mr. Forth: As ever, I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I did not necessarily want to review the year to date in detail, but the Government passed up many opportunities to use the time of the House to examine legislation properly. Fridays have come and gone. Business has
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  finished early and prematurely. The three-month summer recess came and went. None of those opportunities were taken by the Government to allow us to examine legislation.
  My hon. Friend knows the answer to the question: the Government have so mismanaged their legislative programme this year that they have put themselves in the position of having to meet artificially imposed time deadlines. They passed up many opportunities—indeed, because of their mismanagement, many opportunities were not even available to them.
  Mr. Maclean: Surely one of the best examples of the Government's complete mismanagement of time was when they gave time to a private Member's Bill to outlaw the sale of hamburgers in the royal parks. They gave that Bill time in the Chamber and imposed a guillotine. Debate on the measure on the Floor of the House took about two days, which could better have been devoted to important measures such as the Freedom of Information Bill.
  Mr. Forth: My right hon. Friend and I could reminisce at some length about the Government's odd priorities. One of these days, someone will no doubt write a paper on the subject—examining this Session and musing about why the Government chose to spend inordinate amounts of parliamentary time on what can only be described as relatively minor matters, while having the gall and arrogance to tell the House that this week, which is artificially deemed to be the final week of the Session, only a certain amount of time will be allocated to deal with such major measures as the Freedom of Information Bill and the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill.
  Before I enter into the substance of my remarks, I shall consider briefly some of the provisions of the motion. No one has yet done so, and it would be worth spending a little time on them. My eye lit on paragraph 3, which is headed "Subsequent stages". Sub-paragraph 3(1) states:
  The Speaker shall put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown for the consideration forthwith of any further Message from the Lords on either of the Bills.
  However, sub-paragraph 3(2) states—crucially—
  The proceedings on any further Message from the Lords shall, if not previously concluded, be brought to a conclusion one hour after their commencement.
  The Government are thus imposing on us in the further stages of consideration—if measures go from this to another place and, perhaps, return—an arbitrary limit of one hour. So things are worse than we thought. Not only are we being limited to the magic hour of midnight tonight for the consideration of the Freedom of Information Bill, and to 10 o'clock tomorrow for the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill—on which, incidentally, we still do not know the groupings, the selection or anything else, which leaves us in a rather difficult position—but under paragraph 3(2), the Government tell us that there will be a limit of one hour on subsequent discussion.
  I regret to say many Members regard the Reasons Committee as a trivial, automatic mechanism contained in the motion, but it is nothing of the kind. The Reasons Committee is an important element of our deliberations and it requires, as the motion reminds us, a
  Motion made by a Minister of the Crown for the appointment, nomination and quorum of a Committee to draw up Reasons.

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  So far as I can see—subject to correction by any Member, or, indeed, any Minister—the motion states:
  The Speaker shall put forthwith the Question on any Motion.
  So the House will not even be given an opportunity to debate the Government's mandate for the appointment, nomination or quorum of the Reasons Committee. That is another matter that is being swept aside. We are supposed to assume that the Government—omniscient and omnipotent as they now regard themselves—can impose the Reasons Committee on the House without giving us an opportunity for debate, although there will be an opportunity to vote.
  Mr. Hawkins: Will my right hon. Friend consider whether one of the reasons why the Government are behaving in a draconian and anti-democratic way may be related to the fact that there was such a substantial rebellion on the Government Benches when the Freedom of Information Bill was first introduced, when about 37 Labour Members were unwilling to support the Minister?
  Mr. Forth: Tempted though I am, I do not want to intrude unnecessarily into the Government's grief, but it is true that they may be structuring such rigid timetables because they do not want to provide too much time for Labour Members to express their dissent. That is at least a possibility; I put it no stronger than that.
  To finish the point about the Reasons Committee, paragraph 6(2) of the motion states:
  Proceedings in the Committee shall, if not previously concluded, be brought to a conclusion 30 minutes after their commencement.
  That is yet another way in which, almost surreptitiously, the Government are assuming that all the normal mechanisms that have become available to the House over centuries, which we have developed to discharge our duties and responsibilities properly, are being swept aside with the casual arrogance that has become the hallmark of the Government.
  The Government are not content with their gigantic majority in the House, nor with destroying the independent element of another place and replacing it with what have become known, rather disrespectfully, as Tony's cronies. Never mind all that; hidden in paragraph 6(2), we find that in the discharge of its duties, the deliberations of the Reasons Committee—an important, if small part of our proceedings—will be timetabled to 30 minutes.
  The motion contains several smaller, but equally draconian, restrictions on the time that will be available for the House to discharge its duties properly. I shall now begin to consider the structure of the timetable for the Bills themselves. As has been said many times, there are about 120 Lords amendments to the Freedom of Information Bill. The way things are heading, by my calculation, the House will probably have only about three and a half hours in which to consider all the 120 amendments. That would be bad enough, even if it were not for the content of some of the groupings that the Government have made.
  I understand that at this stage in proceedings, rather unusually, it is Ministers who determine the grouping of amendments, not the Chairman of Ways and Means, as is
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  usual. That in itself makes the procedure somewhat unusual, because we normally look to the impartiality of the Chair to give us some protection, through the even-handed selection of amendments and their grouping. However, as if the Government did not have enough advantages, as if they were not taking enough powers to themselves, and as if they were not restricting Back Benchers on both sides of the House sufficiently, they can also group the amendments for their own convenience. Given that fact, and given what we know of the selection of amendments to the Freedom of Information Bill, we shall have completely inadequate time to debate some very important matters.
  The item that is lucky enough to appear early on the selection list—the subject of public interest and exemptions—may receive reasonable scrutiny and consideration. Knowing that there is rightly a great deal of interest in that matter on both sides of the House, I suspect that it will be debated at some length and considered properly, and I should not be surprised if the House were to divide as well. If that is the case, all subsequent business will be put at risk—and we should not imagine that any of it is trivial. I should have thought that some of the later items—fees for disclosure, special provisions, public interest and so on—in the Freedom of Information Bill will attract a great deal of attention, not just in the House but outside.
  Mr. Bercow: My right hon. Friend has helpfully explained the sort of subjects that we will be obliged to address in our truncated debates. Is he aware that our present understanding is that the Home Secretary intends to deal with the sixth and eighth categories of amendments? Does he not think it just conceivable that the right hon. Gentleman has opted to deal with categories six and eight in the fervent hope that the eloquence of the hon. Member for Cannock Chase (Tony Wright), among others, will prevent those matters from being reached? Would not that be an undemocratic disgrace of the first order?
  Mr. Forth: Much though I respect the Secretary of State, I am not anxious for us to engineer the business so that he makes some sort of dramatic appearance at a late stage to seek either to impress or to depress us—I am not sure which. I am much more interested in the implications of what my hon. Friend says. If we look at the groups of amendments to the Freedom of Information Bill as the Government have imposed them on us, we see that the first group is very important, and may rightly occupy some time in deliberation, and, no doubt, Division, but the others are by no means trivial.
  There are very important provisions on Wales and Northern Ireland and important matters bearing on the relationship between the parts of the United Kingdom and on the implications of the Bill for the very different Administrations that we now have in those different parts of the United Kingdom. I should have thought that there would, rightly, be a lot of interest in such matters among those with a knowledge of, and an interest in, the relative roles in our constitutional affairs of the Assemblies in Wales and Northern Ireland, as covered by that group of amendments.
  There is a group that catches my eye. As soon as I see the words "drafting and minor", I am almost certain that the amendments will cover important, controversial and

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  difficult matters that the Government wish to conceal. It is an old trick, but we understand it fully. I should not be surprised if we were to spend an unusual amount of time on that group, because we shall want to winkle out what the Government want to conceal by giving it that rather bland title.
  The phrase "Historical records and the Public Record Office" sounds innocuous, does it not? However, that group contains all sorts of implications that should be considered. Another group of amendments is entitled, "Advice and assistance to persons making requests for information". The Government probably think that we can rush through all those amendments and accept them on the nod, but I should have thought that that is far from the case. Although I have gone only halfway down the selection list, I need go no further, because I have not yet even begun to deal with the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill.
  It is clear, to me anyway, that substantial matters have to be dealt with, but there is a pathetically short time for the House to consider them properly. As if that were not difficult enough, when I came into the debate, I still did not know how the amendments to the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill would be grouped. The groupings may have been promulgated since—although I doubt it—but I do not know how many amendments the House will be able to consider tomorrow. Tomorrow's Order Paper already contains notice of a ten-minute Bill. Although the debate on such a Bill can take as little as 10 minutes, proceedings on it can take half an hour if there is opposition to it and a Division. That happened last week.
  One of my hon. Friends said that he had reason to believe that there would be a statement tomorrow on a rural White Paper. The Home Secretary was rather shy when he was asked about that earlier, but there is at least the possibility of such a statement.
  We already face the possibility that we may not commence our consideration of the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill until 5 o'clock tomorrow afternoon, yet in the motion, the Government tell us that they expect deliberations on it to be completed by 10 o'clock. We might have only five hours to debate 280 amendments. It does not take a mathematical genius or a rocket scientist to divide one figure by the other and to come up with the answer that the time that the Government suggest we should have for the debate is lamentably and scandalously small and inadequate.
  It could be argued that, as is our custom, the amendments will be divided into groups, but we do not know the groupings yet. In other words, the Government are asking us to sign a blank cheque by asking us to agree to the motion and the time limits in it. We know how many amendments to the Bill have come from another place, but we know nothing of how they will be grouped or the structure of the debate that will be suggested to us. That is entirely unsatisfactory.
  We can consider the motion from the perspective of an overview of the legislative year and try to fit it into that, or we can look at it upwards from our position as humble parliamentary ants on the Opposition Back Benches—mere cogs in the great machine of parliamentary consideration. However, from every angle, the motion before us is entirely unsatisfactory. It is typical of the Government's approach to the House of Commons.
  Mr. Maclean: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Forth: I shall give way for the last time.
  Mr. Maclean: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend, particularly as I think that he was going to try out other similes on us.
  Is the position not even worse than that described by my right hon. Friend? We shall have one minute to discuss each amendment tomorrow, and in that time, Ministers will have to try to explain why they said something totally different in Committee. Is it not imperative that we have time for the explanations to be given, so that we do not get into a legal quagmire later?
  Mr. Forth: I agree with my right hon. Friend. He has highlighted one of the difficulties that always exist. The theory of parliamentary scrutiny is that each measure is considered in a number of stages, and that there is a relationship between the stages. Issues considered on Second Reading, in Committee or on Report in this House, and in the different stages in another place, and all the issues that are sent from one House to the other, interrelate. That is inevitable, so we in this Chamber would want to take account of what a Minister might have said in Committee or on Report. We would also properly want to take into consideration what the Government and their representatives had said in the other place. Will we have time to do that? The answer is patently no.
  I do not dispute the fact that we may be able to consider one or two groups of amendments—but there are so many amendments in so many groups, and so little time, that the House will not be able to discharge its responsibilities properly. That is how serious the matter is. Unless I hear an argument that is much more persuasive than those that I have heard already, even from someone as eminent and distinguished as the Home Secretary, I will be unable to accept the motion. Unless my hon. Friends hear something much more persuasive, I invite them to join me in opposing it.
  7.24 pm
  Mr. Peter Brooke: It is a privilege to follow my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth). Mine will be a more modest speech.
  An argument often deployed in favour of timetabling is that it enables what truly needs discussing to be discussed. In moving the Modernisation Committee's proposals on the programming of Bills on 7 November this year, the Leader of the House referred to an encouraging experiment in the Committee stage of the Greater London Authority Bill. No Government member of that Committee is present tonight, but my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst was on the Committee. He will recall that, despite our discussing 270 clauses and 30 schedules, we scarcely had time under the timetable motion to discuss congestion charging or the car park levy.
  The Government say that the Opposition always have the ability to choose what they regard as significant.

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  Last week, in defending the guillotine on the Police (Northern Ireland) Bill, the Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office, said that, of the 140 amendments,
  some 40 are minor and miscellaneous.—[Official Report, 21 November 2000: Vol. 357, c. 182.]
  The hon. Member for Hull, North (Mr. McNamara) then took four-and-a-half columns, or 19 minutes, on amendments that the selection list described as minor and miscellaneous; Conservative and Unionist Members took just over a column; the hon. Member for South Down (Mr. McGrady), who supports the Government, took a little less than a column; and the hon. Member for Greenock and Inverclyde (Dr. Godman) took a little over a column. In all, Government Back Benchers ensured that the "minor and miscellaneous" element that the Minister had used to defend the guillotine motion took a whole hour of the five hours available for debate. I acknowledge that my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst might think that minor and miscellaneous amendments should receive massive attention. However, on that occasion, Government Back Benchers crowded out debate on issues that others wanted to discuss.
  The Unionist parties were particularly concerned to discuss flags and emblems. In that debate, the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) took a little over two columns; the hon. Member for North Antrim (Rev. Ian Paisley) took two columns; and the hon. and learned Member for North Down (Mr. McCartney) took a column and two thirds. I acknowledge that I spoke for half a column, but the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon), who also supports the Government, began his speech by saying:
  I rise reluctantly to make two points, which have not been given the prominence that they should receive in the debate.—[Official Report, 21 November 2000; Vol. 357, c. 238.]
  He then went on to speak for two-and-a-half columns, which was longer than anyone else in the debate. However, I acknowledge that the right hon. Member for Upper Bann devoted three columns to the issue of police recruitment.

  Earlier this afternoon, I intervened on the Home Secretary to ask whether consideration of the Wildlife and Countryside Bill in 1981—the parallel Bill to the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill—had been guillotined. He replied that it had not. The hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) then asked the Home Secretary about Bills that were guillotined in 1980-81 and effectively made my point for me. The 1981 Bill was framed in a manner that made it acceptable to the Opposition. I accept that the other place discussed it for 10 days—indeed, they did so knowledgeably—but the Bill did not require a guillotine.
  Some of us welcome the wildlife aspects of the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill but are concerned about the setting in which those aspects have been placed. People outside are also interested in the wildlife provisions and they wrote to us saying that they were concerned that the Government might not be able to carry the Bill, and the Government have proved that they will be able to carry it only with the use of a guillotine motion.
  I am an old-fashioned fellow. I never sign early-day motions except those of a memorial nature. I treat the others as a form of constitutional graffiti. I do not hurry
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  to vote on ten-minute rule Bills, a legislative mode that deludes and deceives the general public. The creation of more than 300 all-party groups likewise misleads our electors as to their significance. The fact that the one that took the number up to 300 was concerned with chocolate exemplifies their potential insubstantiality.
  I suppose that guillotine motions make the hair stand up on the back of my neck, but what is most disturbing is that campaigns that used to last a year—I think of the year of the tree, the year of the child and the year of literature—have now spawned campaigns that last a week, including, I learn from right hon. and hon. Friends, national guillotine week. However, I see nothing that will stop the Government, who are taking on the characteristics of Gadarene lemmings, from inventing the year of the lottery as well.
  Parliament has existed for more than seven centuries and, in that time, we have forged a remarkable array of legislative instruments from our collective wisdom and experience. It is sad that so destructive an instrument as the serial guillotine is being deployed so ruthlessly to cut us down to size.
  7.30 pm
  Mr. Nick St. Aubyn: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean) for allowing me to speak before him because he has sat more assiduously than I have through the debate.
  Like my right hon. and hon. Friends, I am becoming outraged by the Government's attitude, as exemplified by the guillotine motion. The Government seem to want to reduce Parliament to nothing more than an electoral college in which they have been put in power merely to bring the motions and Bills that they want rubber-stamped back to the House before they go on their way. That is this evening's approach, and the 40 Bills that have been guillotined in just three years are further evidence of it.
  We should remember that the House of Commons had a three-month break this summer. If we had used some of that time to examine the Bills that clogged up the other place, we would not find the legislative programme in such a poor condition. It is clear that the Government pushed us away on our holidays because they did not want and did not trust their Back Benchers to examine their legislative programme. The Government thought that they would be better off if the detailed amendments that they were obliged to table—such as any Government might be obliged to table to such highly complex Bills—were examined in the other place and not in the House of Commons, perhaps during an extended consideration on Report.
  No doubt the Government were also concerned about the threat of Back-Bench revolts. We know that such revolts are imminent today on aspects of the Government's programme. We wish Labour Members well in joining us to get some democratic accountability in the House for the Government's action.
  Mr. Forth: Is my hon. Friend suggesting that Labour Back Benchers are revolting?
  Mr. St. Aubyn: I would no more suggest that than I would describe my right hon. Friend, who said that we were the ants of the parliamentary system, as a drone.

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  Hon. Members on both sides of the House should revolt against the motion because it goes against the basis on which Parliament is elected. My constituents cannot understand why we do not have the power and the time to examine major pieces of Government legislation and why unelected Members of another place are given that time when it is denied to us.
  The truth is that the extended recess also played into the Government's hands by allowing Ministers to do their job without being properly called to account in the Chamber. They get a double gain at our expense: their legislative programme is rammed through because they have run out of time at the end of the parliamentary Session—that is their excuse today—and during the recess they can get on with the job of government without being made accountable for disasters such as the fuel crisis.
  Mr. Winnick: For reasons that I have never agreed with, we have always had long summer recesses. I have argued that we should return in September, but I have not noticed much enthusiasm for that from Conservative Members, and certainly not from those on either Front Bench. If the hon. Gentleman checks up on what happened in 1992, he will discover that we broke up—if my memory is correct—in the middle of July. We had two extra weeks and the recess was longer than it was this year.
  Mr. St. Aubyn: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for bringing us on to the historical record. Labour Members have told us what a well-behaved Opposition they were, but people who were in Parliament at the time have a different memory of how business was conducted. The fact is that from 1992 onwards there was a slimmer majority and there were other means of putting pressure on the Executive. The tried and tested method of putting pressure on an Executive with a large majority is that Opposition Members may scrutinise every detail of a Bill before it is allowed to pass through this place.
  Rev. Martin Smyth: The hon. Gentleman referred to how well the previous Opposition claimed to behave, but in 1992 they were so anaemic that they refused to vote against a guillotined Bill that a handful of Ulster Unionists and some Tory and Labour Members were scrutinising and that was being imposed on the people of Northern Ireland without their consent.
  Mr. St. Aubyn: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that example of the hopeless way in which Labour Members opposed the previous Government.
  I am concerned that the collective amnesia of Labour Members also extends to a collective amnesia among Ministers about affairs for which they are responsible. Ministers spend far too much time cocooned in their offices surrounded by civil servants who tell them what they want to hear. It is only when they come to the Chamber that they hear the blunt truth. If the Ministers who are on the Front Bench tonight were to listen for a minute, they would hear a few blunt truths.
  Just 12 days ago, I challenged the Prime Minister on the Labour party's conduct in putting the Freedom of Information Bill through another place and the way in which Labour Members there, with the support of Liberal peers, voted to give Ministers a right to deny access to
  704
  information instead of giving the people the right to freedom of information just the night before. The Prime Minister seemed to be affronted that any Conservative Member of the House could dare to challenge the Government's credentials on the issue of freedom of information, but it will go down in the annals of this place that on a Bill about freedom of information we are not allowed freedom of discussion. That is the scandal of tonight's debate. Many Conservative Members have a consistent record of promoting and defending the principle of freedom of information.
  I am even more alarmed by the Prime Minister's letter of 20 November in which he responded to detailed points that I raised to highlight the serious consequences of the Government's neutering of the Freedom of Information Bill. In the context of important information about the health hazards posed by building new incinerators, the Prime Minister said that the allegation that officials had hidden information on health and incinerator emissions was false. I was referring to an article in The Guardian on 10 November which began—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman did not hear me call another hon. Gentleman to order. There is a limit to how much time he can use to give his example. He has made his point and he needs to address his remarks to the motion.
  Mr. St. Aubyn: My point is that Ministers are so out of touch with what is going on in the real world with regard to the lack of freedom of information that they would greatly benefit from a proper debate on each group of amendments tonight so that they realise the full import of how they are neutering the Freedom of Information Bill.
  I was pointing out not only that the Prime Minister's statement was false but that the allegations were made by Labour Members, not Conservative Members.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is moving back to the subject that I asked him to move off. He should choose his words carefully and perhaps withdraw that last remark.
  Mr. St. Aubyn: I would be happy to withdraw any remarks if they are against the norms of the House, but it is difficult to reconcile a factual statement by the Prime Minister with evidence from both sides of the House and statements from Labour Members that directly contradict him.
  My point goes to the heart of the Government's problem. They are selling us assurance after assurance on Bill after Bill, and we are finding it harder and harder to accept a single word of what they say. When we examine the evidence and the facts behind what they are saying, we realise that the truth is often diametrically opposed to what they have told us.
  I shall spend a few minutes on the other Bill that is to be guillotined tonight—the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) said, we do not even know to which sets of amendments the guillotine will apply. The set of amendments dealing with vehicular rights of way greatly affects my constituents. I know that many Opposition Members and some on the Government

  705
  side are still not content with the extent to which the Government have revised the Bill in another place, and we want a full and proper debate on that important issue.
  By guillotining the Bill today, without knowing whether we will have even a minute to discuss those amendments tomorrow and to interrogate Ministers on the basis on which they have amended their Bill in respect of vehicular rights of way, we are denied a key opportunity to put right an injustice that affects home owners across the country as a result of a quirk in the law.
  I should be grateful if, in his response tonight, the Minister could give us an assurance about how that matter will be dealt with. I see him shaking his head, which exactly proves my point—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I suspect that the Minister is shaking his head because he does not want to respond to a question that I have already told the hon. Gentleman he should not be putting.
  Mr. St. Aubyn: That is most distressing, Mr. Deputy Speaker. We are being asked to vote blind on the guillotine motion. As my right hon. Friend said, we are being asked to give a blank cheque to the Government so that we cannot hold them to account at all.
  Yet again, we see how hon. Members are being neutered by guillotine motions. It is now only in another place that any change in the law takes place. Here, we are not allowed even to debate and interrogate Ministers. We are told by them that we must shut up and put up.
  I hope that in the course of the main debate on the amendments, Ministers will deal more fully with the points that I have raised. The allegations against Ministers could not be more serious. Unless there is time for them to answer those allegations fully and comprehensively tonight, we will have proved once more how these guillotine motions are depriving the British people of their right to hold the Government to account.
  7.42 pm
  Tony Wright: I intended firmly to say nothing during this part of the debate, and I am sorry to have relented, but I do so only under provocation and for less than a minute.
  Although I admire the shameless energy of some Opposition Members, the naive question persists: why on earth are we spending all this time talking about our inability to discuss matters, whereas if we took a little less time, that acre of space would open up—
  Mr. Paice rose—
  Tony Wright: I will not give way—and we could discuss all the matters which, we are told, are of extreme importance?
  When in government, the party now in opposition strenuously opposed everything to do with freedom of information. Despite Sir Richard Scott's report and the report of an all-party Select Committee with a Conservative majority, which recommended that we should move from a code to an Act in this area, that was opposed by the Conservatives when in government.
  706
  When suddenly they announce their conversion to that cause, against their history, and announce their deep desire to speak about all these important issues, yet spend all their time preventing the House from discussing all the important issues, it is difficult to take them seriously.
  It is true that Bills should not be guillotined. It is true that that is a democratic outrage. It is true that 120-odd amendments should not be presented for discussion in scarcely four hours. It is an outrage this time, and it was an outrage last time it happened. It is an outrage under the present Government, and it was an outrage under the previous Government. It has been an outrage for as long as anyone here can remember.
  The real indictment of this place is that nothing has been done about that, because on such occasions hon. Members would rather spend their time getting into a great froth about the absurdity of our procedures than reforming them. We have hour upon hour of debate, or of the depressing spectacle that passes for debate, going through the ritual whose words we all know by heart, to prevent us from discussing matters that we are supposed to discuss. The solution is a better legislative timetable so that that does not happen, and procedural reform to make sure that we discuss issues properly. Because I want to get on with that now, I shall sit down.
  7.45 pm
  Mr. Damian Green: I listened carefully to all the contributions to the debate from the Government side. I shall deal immediately with the point made by the hon. Member for Cannock Chase (Tony Wright). He is, of course, right. The time that we are spending discussing the guillotine motion is time that we will not be able to spend discussing the Freedom of Information Bill, unless our opposition to the guillotine is supported by enough honourable—I mean that both formally and non-formally—Members on the Government Back Benches. Given everything that the hon. Gentleman said in his short and pithy speech, I assume that he will join us in the Lobby this evening to oppose the guillotine motion.
  The other Government contributions to the debate have not made it clear whether the shambles into which the Government's legislative programme has fallen is a result of their contempt for Parliament or of their sheer incompetence. I conclude that, sadly, it is a pernicious mixture of the two. The result of that rather unsavoury cocktail of arrogance and incompetence, characteristic of the Government, is what we now face: national guillotine week, as it was rightly called by my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe).
  Every debate that we have this week will be guillotined. None of the important Bills that the House is to discuss this week will receive full scrutiny. The speech by the hon. Member for Cannock Chase gave me hope that there may be some residual feelings about the importance of parliamentary democracy among those on the Government Back Benches. If so, I hope that they feel a faint scintilla of shame about the proceedings this evening.
  There is a peculiar Noah's ark quality about the motion—the guillotines are being brought in two by two. I am surprised only that the Government have not given us what their business managers would no doubt regard as the ultimate package deal: four guillotines in one debate.

  707
  The Home Secretary made the extraordinary assertion that because the Freedom of Information Bill had been extensively amended at every stage as a result of the scrutiny that it had received, it might not need long debate this evening. Simple logic suggests that if parliamentary scrutiny improved the Bill to which he is putting his name, he should encourage more parliamentary scrutiny, not less. With that simple suggestion, the Home Secretary blew a hole in his basic argument.
  I was fascinated and appalled by the speech from the Liberal Democrat Benches by the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler), who said that, on guillotine debates, we should all read speeches into the record, no one should take interventions, as they might introduce an element of debate to our proceedings, and it was all very tiresome that we had to have parliamentary debate at all—
  Mr. Tyler rose—
  Mr. Green: Unlike the hon. Gentleman, I give way.
  Mr. Tyler: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. He is misrepresenting what I said. May I ask him whether the Conservatives were offered by the Government an agreed programme motion, so that we could have had a genuine debate on the issues that concerned us? That was never offered to me, and may never have been offered to the Conservatives. If so, the Government stand accused of hypocrisy, because they talk about better arrangement of our business, but are not prepared to offer it to us.
  Mr. Green: I can speak only for the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill, for which I am responsible. I am not aware of any such offer being made to us. I cannot speak about the Freedom of Information Bill—[Interruption]but I am assured from a sedentary position that no such offer was made. I am happy to agree with the hon. Member for North Cornwall that the Government stand accused and convicted of hypocrisy. I am grateful to him for pointing that out.
  The Home Secretary sought to evade the extraordinary nature of these guillotine motions, given the two statements that we had today and the possible statements tomorrow. The point has been well made by several of my right hon. and hon. Friends that it is possible to table a guillotine motion that provides a certain time for debate, so that anything that happens earlier in the parliamentary day does not eat into time under the guillotine. Instead, the Government have chosen to introduce a more pernicious guillotine motion that merely sets an end time. Statements that come earlier in the day, which are in the control of the Government, can be used to destroy the possibility of debate on important parts of the Freedom of Information Bill and the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill.
  Right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the House have said that it is expected that we shall receive a statement on the rural White Paper tomorrow. I do not think that I am breaking a state secret when I say that journalists have been calling us today about it. I know that the "Today" programme has made its dispositions for tomorrow morning. The Minister may want to clear up the ambiguity. Will he confirm that we shall have a statement on the rural White Paper tomorrow? I shall give way if he wishes to confirm that. Perhaps he might like
  708
  to do so when he replies. That would tell us how many hours of debate we shall have on the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill tomorrow. It is a shame—
  Mr. Forth: Does my hon. Friend agree that that would be a small item of freedom of information? It seems bizarre that Ministers are prepared to sit on the Treasury Bench during this debate on the Freedom of Information Bill and gratuitously withhold simple and basic information that is germane to the conduct of our business this evening and tomorrow.
  Mr. Green: My right hon. Friend is correct. Indeed, the situation is even worse. Information may be being withheld from the House, but it is not being withheld from anyone outside. The media know what is going on. It is only the House that is not allowed to be told what is happening.
  My right hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald comprehensively destroyed the case for a guillotine motion on the Freedom of Information Bill. That being so, I shall deal with why a guillotine motion is wrong and inappropriate for the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill. I shall do so by examining the various reasons why it might be necessary to curtail debate on the Bill, to ascertain whether any one of them holds water.
  Despite the hopes of Labour class warriors, especially those of the hon. Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick), the Opposition have been entirely constructive throughout on the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill. We oppose parts of it and support other parts. Its very name lets us know that it is rather uncomfortable portmanteau Bill that is designed to try to put together provisions on access to the countryside, which we oppose, with provisions to improve the rights-of-way network and wildlife protection, which we strongly support.
  The hon. Member for Walsall, North may not have participated in earlier debates, but I am happy to confirm that we have always thought that part I was badly thought out and wrong. We did not vote against it, however, on Second or Third Reading in either House, because we thought that other parts of the Bill were leading in the right direction. We have sought consistently to improve the Bill throughout its consideration in both Houses, and we have had some success in that regard.
  The first reason for a guillotine motion—an irreconcilable clash of principles—does not apply. The Opposition have not adopted that approach on Second or Third Reading. Secondly, the Government could argue that a guillotine motion should be introduced because of filibustering. No one has suggested that the Opposition have filibustered at any stage. Labour Members who appear sceptical should consider what the lead Minister, the Minister for the Environment, said in Committee:
  I am grateful to all members of the Committee, not least to the Opposition. I pay tribute to those on the Opposition Front Bench, who dealt with the Bill extremely well. They never filibustered and allocated time tightly and well, concentrating on the key points.— [Official Report, Standing Committee B, 23 May, c. 860.]
  Mr. Paice: Will my hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Green: I shall certainly give way to my hon. Friend, who was included in that compliment.
  Mr. Paice: Does my hon. Friend agree that, contrary to what the hon. Member for Cannock Chase

  709
  (Tony Wright) said, whatever happens during the debate on the motion, even if it were taken forthwith, will not add one moment to the debate on the Lords amendments on the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill?
  Mr. Green: That is an extremely good point. The Government cannot hide behind the filibustering argument.
  The third possible reason that the Government could bring forward for employing a guillotine motion is that the Bill did not need significant alteration. That argument would not withstand the most cursory scrutiny. The House will consider 281 Government Lords amendments tomorrow. That demonstrates the state of the Bill when it left the House. In addition, Opposition Front Benchers and Back Benchers have tabled amendments. There will be about 300 amendments in all.
  If the Minister will confirm what the world knows, which is that we shall have a statement tomorrow, we shall know that the House will be allowed about one minute to discuss each amendment. That is outrageous. To help my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth), the amendments will, be divided into 16 groups. We shall have less than half an hour per group. Throughout, the Bill has been badly drafted and impractical. It is better now than it was but it should be better still. It will not be, however, because the House will be denied proper debate tomorrow.
  Scrutiny of the Bill has brought about improvements. The amendments that we shall consider tomorrow will make that obvious. In Committee, the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions, who will reply to the debate, talked about the important issue of the control of dogs. He said:
  On balance, I am not convinced of the need to specify the length of the leads.—[Official Report, Standing Committee B, 11 April 2000; c. 268.]
  I was therefore moderately surprised to read the Government amendment, which states that a
  short lead means a lead of fixed length and of not more than 2 metres.
  That contradicts what the Minister said in Committee. There are many more examples, and I shall save some of them for tomorrow on the off chance that I shall have time to describe them. Scrutiny of the Bill at every stage has improved it.
  The fourth possible reason that the Government could advance for a guillotine motion is that nothing significant has been introduced into the Bill since it left the House. Nothing could be further from the truth. The section on areas of outstanding natural beauty was deliberately held back from the House and introduced in another place. We were asking for that section throughout. Labour Members tabled amendments in Committee, some of which we supported. At every stage the Minister said, "Hang on. The section is coming." Only when we debated Third Reading did he reveal that the section would be introduced in another place.
  The Bill was a manifesto commitment. Labour knew for two and a half years that it wanted to introduce it. It was disgraceful to wait to introduce a key part of it until it reached another place.
  Mr. John Redwood: In national guillotine week, has my hon. Friend any idea of how
  710
  many amendments may be guillotined? There will be more than 1,000. Could it be 2,000? Will he tell us how many will be guillotined on the Freedom of Information Bill and the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill?
  Mr. Green: There will be about 500 on the two Bills to which my right hon. Friend refers. That will happen during the first two days of this week. On that basis, more than 1,000 amendments will be subject to guillotine by the end of the week.
  There will be seven pages' worth of amendments on areas of outstanding natural beauty, which will be dealt with at the end of the Bill. It is possible that seven pages of the Bill will never be debated by a democratically elected House. That is a democratic disgrace.
  None of the possible reasons for a guillotine provides the slightest justification for today's motion, which is just another example of a Government who run scared of Parliament and run away from debate. Tonight's proceedings reflect badly on the Government, but more important is the fact that they reflect badly on the House. What the Government do to their own reputation is their own business; what they do to the reputation of the House matters to all of us and to everyone in the country. If a Government show contempt for Parliament, the British people will ultimately show their contempt for that Government, which they will deserve. The Government have not bothered to make any serious argument in favour of guillotining either Bill. Tonight, we shall take another step towards the elective dictatorship against which Lord Hailsham warned us. I urge the House to throw out this wretched motion.
  8 pm
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions (Mr. Chris Mullin): At the risk of upsetting the hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd), for whom I have the greatest respect, I have to say that there is something of a ritual about these occasions. There is always a certain amount of synthetic indignation, and we have seen a fair old barrel-load of that tonight. I exempt the hon. Gentleman from that observation; his indignation is entirely genuine and has the merit of having lasted throughout several Governments, whereas the indignation expressed by many of his right hon. and hon. Friends is entirely post-May 1997.
  Mr. Tyler: We have always opposed guillotines.
  Mr. Mullin: Of course, the Liberal Democrats' indignation stretches back through the mists of time. The hon. Gentleman's indignation therefore appears more credible than many of his colleagues'. However, I have to disagree with him. It has always seemed to me that timetable motions are inevitable if Parliament is to be anything more than a talking shop. As my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said, Labour Governments suffer the additional disadvantage of being permanently in a minority in the other place.
  I do not accept that effective scrutiny necessarily requires unlimited debate. It ought to be possible for any half-way decent Opposition to select the issues that they most want to highlight and ensure that they are debated. The hon. Member for New Forest, West (Mr. Swayne)

  711
  talked about having 27 minutes per group of amendments, and the hon. Member for Ashford (Mr. Green) spoke of having one minute per amendment, but when have we ever felt obliged to address every single amendment, many of which are consequential? It is also worth noting that many of the amendments flow from propositions that the Opposition invited us to take up and, being a listening Government, we have listened. The Opposition will find that they recognise quite a few of the amendments—
  Mr. Forth: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Mullin: The right hon. Gentleman will not recognise any of them, since, as far as I am aware, he has not been involved in any of the previous debates, but those hon. Members who have participated will recognise quite a few of the amendments. I shall not give way, because I have been left only 10 minutes in which to wind up—[HON. MEMBERS: "Ah!"] Yes, and then the guillotine will fall.
  I have never managed to work up much indignation about timetabling. However hard they search the Official Report, Opposition Members will not find one scintilla of indignation from me on the subject of guillotines during my years in Parliament. In my early days in opposition, I recall spending the best part of 150 hours considering the Bill that became the Water Act 1989, but covering barely 10 clauses. At the end of that, the Minister in charge, the right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard), announced a guillotine. At that point, the Opposition were all supposed to rise and say how outrageous it all was. Personally, I could have kissed him.
  Mr. Tyler: As the Minister is revealing secrets, will he reveal another and tell us why the Government have decided to close tomorrow's debate at 10 o'clock? Could it be that they anticipate a defeat at the other end of the Palace on National Air Traffic Services? If so, do they intend to bring that legislation back to the Commons tomorrow night at 10 o'clock?
  Mr. Mullin: Unfortunately, I am not a member of the secret society known as the usual channels, so it is not for me to comment on why 10 o'clock has been chosen. However, at this point, I shall deal with another matter that I have been asked about. I believe that it is the Government's intention, subject to the Speaker's permission, to make a statement on the rural White Paper tomorrow.
  The right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Mr. Hogg)—a man not given to self-doubt or embarrassment—spoke of the Government undermining the foundations of democracy. It requires a certain amount of restraint to reply rationally to such a comment, but I shall do my best. The right hon. and learned Gentleman is a chip off the old Hailsham block—a very distinguished one it is, too. His father did indeed write a book about an elective dictatorship; then he promptly joined the greatest elective dictatorship of the century, after which not another peep was heard from him on the subject.
  Should the day ever dawn when the right hon. and learned Gentleman finds himself back on Government Benches, I predict that he will be able to argue in favour
  712
  of guillotines with at least as much facility as he now argues against them. One of the most remarkable things I have observed during my years in Parliament is that there are certain hon. Members who are able to argue with equal facility the exact opposite of the case that they made brilliantly only a month or two previously. Most of them are lawyers, and the right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham is a case in point.
  Mr. Bercow: Will the Minister clarify whether his last couple of sentences constitute a vicious assault on his right hon. Friend the Prime Minister?
  Mr. Mullin: I think that my right hon. Friend's shoulders are broad enough to withstand the assault, vicious or otherwise—and it was otherwise.
  We have wasted a lot of time this evening. The hon. Member for South-East Cambridgeshire (Mr. Paice) spoke of bull-headed opposition and we have seen a fair amount of that. My hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase (Tony Wright) made the point that, if Opposition Members had really wanted time for debate on the Bill, they could have had at least two of the past three hours, but for reasons best known to themselves, they chose not to.
  Mr. St. Aubyn: Will the Minister give way?
  Mr. Mullin: No. I have only a minute or so left and, although I do not complain about that, I do not propose to give way.
  As my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said, timetable motions are a regrettable necessity, but the parliamentary process has to be managed. It had to be managed under Conservative Governments and it will have to be managed under Labour Governments. The parliamentary timetable means that, at this stage of the Session, a reasonable limit must be set on time for debating Bills, and that is what the motion is designed to do. Both Houses have had full opportunities to discuss these important Bills: Select Committees of both Houses studied the Freedom of Information Bill in some detail; the Standing Committee considering that Bill sat for 40 hours, and the Standing Committee considering the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill for almost 50 hours; and the House spent two full days on Report stage of each Bill. The Bills are important measures that deserve full debate and none of their main stages has been guillotined.
  Of course it is right that the House should examine the changes made in another place; the timetable motion allows ample time to do so. Both Bills are valuable measures and are popular in the country at large. The House has had long, valuable discussions on them, and there is no need for us to go over the same old ground again. The Government had a clear mandate for the measures, which must now be completed and implemented.
  It being three hours after the commencement of proceedings on the allocation of time motion, MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER put the Question, pursuant to the Standing Order.
  The House divided: Ayes 347, Noes 156.

  Division No.354]

  [8.10 pm

  AYES

  Abbott, Ms Diane

  Cook, Frank (Stockton N)

  Adams, Mrs Irene (Paisley N)

  Cooper, Yvette

  Ainger, Nick

  Corbett, Robin

  Alexander, Douglas

  Corbyn, Jeremy

  Allen, Graham

  Corston, Jean

  Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)

  Cousins, Jim

  Anderson, Janet (Rossendale)

  Crausby, David

  Armstrong, Rt Hon Ms Hilary

  Cryer, Mrs Ann (Keighley)

  Ashton, Joe

  Cummings, John

  Atherton, Ms Candy

  Cunningham, Rt Hon Dr Jack

  Atkins, Charlotte

  (Copeland)

  Austin, John

  Cunningham, Jim (Cov'try S)

  Banks, Tony

  Dalyell, Tam

  Barnes, Harry

  Darvill, Keith

  Barron, Kevin

  Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

  Battle, John

  Davidson, Ian

  Bayley, Hugh

  Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)

  Beard, Nigel

  Davies, Geraint (Croydon C)

  Begg, Miss Anne

  Davis, Rt Hon Terry

  Bell, Stuart (Middlesbrough)

  (B'ham Hodge H)

  Bennett; Andrew F

  Dawson, Hilton

  Benton, Joe

  Dean, Mrs Janet

  Bermingham, Gerald

  Denham, John

  Berry, Roger

  Dismore, Andrew

  Best, Harold

  Dobbin, Jim

  Blackman, Liz

  Dobson, Rt Hon Frank

  Blears, Ms Hazel

  Donohoe, Brian H

  Blizzard, Bob

  Doran, Frank

  Blunkett, Rt Hon David

  Dowd, Jim

  Boateng, Rt Hon Paul

  Drew, David

  Borrow, David

  Eagle, Angela (Wallasey)

  Bradley, Keith (Withington)

  Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

  Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

  Efford, Clive

  Bradshaw, Ben

  Ennis, Jeff

  Brinton, Mrs Helen

  Field, Rt Hon Frank

  Brown, Rt Hon Nick (Newcastle E)

  Fitzpatrick, Jim

  Brown, Russell (Dumfries)

  Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

  Browne, Desmond

  Flint, Caroline

  Buck, Ms Karen

  Flynn, Paul

  Burden, Richard

  Foster, Rt Hon Derek

  Burgon, Colin

  Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings)

  Butler, Mrs Christine

  Foster, Michael J (Worcester)

  Byers, Rt Hon Stephen

  Foulkes, George

  Caborn, Rt Hon Richard

  Galloway, George

  Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

  Gapes, Mike

  Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

  Gardiner, Barry

  Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

  Gerrard, Neil

  Campbell-Savours, Dale

  Gibson, Dr Ian

  Cann, Jamie

  Gilroy, Mrs Linda

  Caplin, Ivor

  Godsiff, Roger

  Casale, Roger

  Goggins, Paul

  Caton, Martin

  Golding, Mrs Llin

  Cawsey, Ian

  Gordon, Mrs Eileen

  Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

  Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

  Chaytor, David

  Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

  Clapham, Michael

  Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

  Clark, Rt Hon Dr David (S Shields)

  Grocott, Bruce

  Clark, Dr Lynda

  Grogan, John

  (Edinburgh Pentlands)

  Hall, Mike (Weaver vale)

  Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

  Hall, Patrick(Bedford)

  Clarke, Charles (Norwich S)

  Hamilton, Fabian (Leeds NE)

  Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)

  Hanson, David

  Clarke, Rt Hon Tom (Coatbridge)

  Harman, Rt Hon Ms Harriet

  Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

  Healey, John

  Clelland, David

  Henderson, Doug (Newcastle N)

  Clwyd, Ann

  Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

  Coaker, Vernon

  Hepburn, Stephen

  Coffey, Ms Ann

  Heppell, John

  Coleman, Iain

  Hesford, Stephen

  Colman, Tony

  Hewitt Ms Patricia

  Connarty, Michael

  Hill, Keith

  714

  Hinchliffe, David

  Michael, Rt Hon Alun

  Hodge, Ms Margaret

  Michie, Bill (Shef'ld Heeley)

  Home Robertson, John

  Milburn, Rt Hon Alan

  Hope, Phil

  Miller, Andrew

  Hopkins, Kelvin

  Mitchell, Austin

  Howarth, Rt Hon Alan (Newport E)

  Moffatt, Laura

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N)

  Moonie, Dr Lewis

  Howells, Dr Kim

  Moran, Ms Margaret

  Hoyle, Lindsay

  Morgan, Ms Julie (Cardiff N)

  Hughes, Ms Beverley (Stretford)

  Morley, Elliot

  Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

  Morris, Rt Hon Ms Estelle

  Humble, Mrs Joan

  (B'ham Yardley)

  Hurst, Alan

  Morris, Rt Hon Sir John

  Hutton, John

  (Aberavon)

  Iddon, Dr Brian

  Mudie, George

  Illsley, Eric

  Mullin, Chris

  Jackson, Ms Glenda (Hampstead)

  Murphy, Denis (Wansbeck)

  Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)

  Murphy, Rt Hon Paul (Torfaen)

  Jamieson, David

  Naysmith, Dr Doug

  Jenkins, Brian

  Norris,Dan

  Johnson, Miss Melanie

  O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

  (Welwyn Hatfield)

  O'Brien, Mike (N Warks)

  Jones, Mrs Fiona (Newark)

  O'Hara, Eddie

  Jones, Helen (Warrington N)

  Olner, Bill

  Jones, Ms Jenny

  O'Neill, Martin

  (Wolverh'ton SW)

  Organ, Mrs Diana

  Jones, Dr Lynne (Selly Oak)

  Osborne, Ms Sandra

  Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)

  Palmer, Dr Nick

  Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald

  Pearson, Ian

  Keeble, Ms Sally

  Pendry, Tom

  Keen, Alan (Feltham & Heston)

  Perham, Ms Linda

  Keen, Ann (Brentford & Isleworth)

  Pickthall, Colin

  Kemp, Fraser

  Plaskitt, James

  Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

  Pollard, Kerry

  Khabra, Piara S

  Pond, Chris

  Kidney, David

  Pope, Greg

  Kilfoyle, Peter

  Pound, Stephen

  King, Andy (Rugby & Kenilworth)

  Powell, Sir Raymond

  King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green)

  Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham E)

  Kumar, Dr Ashok

  Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

  Ladyman, Dr Stephen

  Prescott, Rt Hon John

  Lammy, David

  Primarolo, Dawn

  Laxton, Bob

  Prosser, Gwyn

  Lepper, David

  Purchase, Ken

  Leslie, Christopher

  Quin, Rt Hon Ms Joyce

  Levitt, Tom

  Quinn, Lawrie

  Lewis, Ivan (Bury S)

  Radice, Rt Hon Giles

  Lewis, Terry (Worsley)

  Rammell, Bill

  Linton, Martin

  Rapson, Syd

  Lloyd, Tony (Manchester C)

  Raynsford, Nick

  Lock, David

  Reid, Rt Hon Dr John (Hamilton N)

  Love, Andrew

  Robinson, Geoffrey (Cov'try NW)

  McAvoy, Thomas

  Roche, Mrs Barbara

  McCabe, Steve

  Rooker, Rt Hon Jeff

  McCafferty, Ms Chris

  Rooney, Terry

  McDonagh, Siobhain

  Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

  Macdonald, Calum

  Rowlands, Ted

  McDonnell, John

  Roy, Frank

  McFall, John

  Ruane, Chris

  McGuire, Mrs Anne

  Ruddock, Joan

  McIsaac, Shona

  Russell, Ms Christine (Chester)

  McKenna, Mrs Rosemary

  Ryan, Ms Joan

  McNulty, Tony

  Salter, Martin

  Mactaggart, Fiona

  Savidge, Malcolm

  McWalter, Tony

  Sawford, Phil

  Mahon, Mrs Alice

  Sedgemore, Brian

  Mallaber, Judy

  Shaw, Jonathan

  Marsden, Gordon (Blackpool S)

  Sheerman, Barry

  Marsden, Paul (Shrewsbury)

  Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert

  Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

  Short, Rt Hon Clare

  Marshall-Andrews, Robert

  Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

  Martlew, Eric

  Singh, Marsha

  Maxton, John

  Skinner, Dennis

  Meacher, Rt Hon Michael

  Smith, Rt Hon Andrew (Oxford E)

  Meale, Alan

  Merron, Gillian

  715

  Smith, Angela (Basildon)

  Trickett, Jon

  Smith, Miss Geraldine

  Truswell, Paul

  (Morecambe & Lunesdale)

  Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

  Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

  Turner, Dr Desmond (Kemptown)

  Smith, John (Glamorgan)

  Turner, Dr George (NW Norfolk)

  Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

  Turner, Neil (Wigan)

  Snape, Peter

  Twigg, Derek (Halton)

  Soley, Clive

  Twigg, Stephen (Enfield)

  Southworth, Ms Helen

  Tynan, Bill

  Spellar, John

  Vaz, Keith

  Squire, Ms Rachel

  Vis, Dr Rudi

  Starkey, Dr Phyllis

  Walley, Ms Joan

  Steinberg, Gerry

  Ward, Ms Claire

  Stevenson, George

  Wareing, Robert N

  Stewart, David (Inverness E)

  Watts, David

  Stewart, Ian (Eccles)

  White, Brian

  Stinchcombe, Paul

  Whitehead, Dr Alan

  Stoate, Dr Howard

  Wicks, Malcolm

  Strang, Rt Hon Dr Gavin

  Williams, Rt Hon Alan

  Straw, Rt Hon Jack

  (Swansea W)

  Stringer, Graham

  Williams, Alan W (E Carmarthen)

  Stuart, Ms Gisela

  Williams, Mrs Betty (Conwy)

  Wills, Michael

  Sutcliffe, Gerry

  Wilson, Brian

  Taylor, Rt Hon Mrs Ann

  Winnick, David

  (Dewsbury)

  Woolas, Phil

  Taylor, Ms Dari (Stockton S)

  Worthington, Tony

  Taylor, David (NW Leics)

  Wray, James

  Temple-Morris, Peter

  Wright, Anthony D (Gt Yarmouth)

  Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

  Wright, Tony (Cannock)

  Thomas, Gareth R (Harrow W)

  Wyatt, Derek

  Timms, Stephen

  Tipping, Paddy

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Todd, Mark

  Mr. Robert Ainsworth and

  Touhig, Don

  Mr. Clive Betts.

  NOES

  Ainsworth, Peter (E Surrey)

  Davey, Edward (Kingston)

  Allan, Richard

  Davis, Rt Hon David (Haltemprice)

  Amess, David

  Dorrell, Rt Hon Stephen

  Arbuthnot, Rt Hon James

  Duncan, Alan

  Ashdown, Rt Hon Paddy

  Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter

  Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

  Evans, Nigel

  Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)

  Faber, David

  Baldry, Tony

  Fabricant, Michael

  Ballard, Jackie

  Fallon, Michael

  Bell, Martin (Tatton)

  Fearn, Ronnie

  Bercow, John

  Forth, Rt Hon Eric

  Beresford, Sir Paul

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  Boswell, Tim

  Fraser, Christopher

  Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

  Gale, Roger

  Brady, Graham

  Gibb, Nick

  Brake, Tom

  Gidley, Sandra

  Brand, Dr Peter

  Gorman, Mrs Teresa

  Brazier, Julian

  Green, Damian

  Breed, Colin

  Greenway, John

  Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

  Gummer, Rt Hon John

  Browning, Mrs Angela

  Hammond, Philip

  Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)

  Hancock, Mike

  Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)

  Harvey, Nick

  Burnett, John

  Hawkins, Nick

  Burns, Simon

  Hayes, John

  Burstow, Paul

  Heald, Oliver

  Butterfill, John

  Heath, David (Somerton & Frome)

  Campbell, Rt Hon Menzies

  Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas

  (NE Fife)

  Horam, John

  Cash, William

  Howard, Rt Hon Michael

  Chapman, Sir Sydney

  Hughes, Simon (Southwark N)

  (Chipping Barnet)

  Jack, Rt Hon Michael

  Chidgey, David

  Johnson Smith

  Chope, Christopher

  Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey

  Collins, Tim

  Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

  Cormack, Sir Patrick

  Keetch, Paul

  Cotter, Brian

  Kennedy, Rt Hon Charles

  Cran, James

  (Ross Skye & Inverness W)

  Curry, Rt Hon David

  Kirkwood, Archy

  716

  Lait, Mrs Jacqui

  Shepherd, Richard

  Leigh, Edward

  Simpson, Keith (Mid-Norfolk)

  Lewis, Dr Julian (New Forest E)

  Smith, Sir Robert (W Ab'd'ns)

  Lidington, David

  Smyth, Rev Martin (Belfast S)

  Lilley, Rt Hon Peter

  Soames, Nicholas

  Livsey, Richard

  Spelman, Mrs Caroline

  Lloyd, Rt Hon Sir Peter (Fareham)

  Spicer, Sir Michael

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Spring, Richard

  Loughton, Tim

  Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

  Luff, Peter

  Steen, Anthony

  Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas

  Streeter, Gary

  McIntosh, Miss Anne

  Stunell, Andrew

  Maclean, Rt Hon David

  Swayne, Desmond

  McLoughlin, Patrick

  Syms, Robert

  Madel, Sir David

  Tapsell, Sir Peter

  Malins, Humfrey

  Taylor, Ian (Esher & Walton)

  Maples, John

  Taylor, John M (Solihull)

  Mawhinney, Rt Hon Sir Brian

  Taylor, Matthew (Truro)

  May, Mrs Theresa

  Taylor, Sir Teddy

  Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll & Bute)

  Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

  Moore, Michael

  Townend, John

  Morgan, Alasdair (Galloway)

  Tredinnick, David

  Moss, Malcolm

  Trend, Michael

  Nicholls, Patrick

  Tyler, Paul

  Norman, Archie

  Tyrie, Andrew

  Oaten, Mark

  Wardle, Charles

  O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

  Waterson, Nigel

  Page, Richard

  Webb, Steve

  Paice, James

  Wells, Bowen

  Pickles, Eric

  Whitney, Sir Raymond

  Prior, David

  Whittingdale, John

  Randall, John

  Widdecombe, Rt Hon Miss Ann

  Redwood, Rt Hon John

  Wigley, Rt Hon Dafydd

  Robathan, Andrew

  Wilkinson, John

  Robertson, Laurence (Tewk'b'ry)

  Willis, Phil

  Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)

  Wilshire, David

  Ross, William (E Lond'y)

  Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)

  Ruffley, David

  Winterton, Nicholas (Macclesfield)

  Russell, Bob (Colchester)

  Young, Rt Hon Sir George

  St Aubyn, Nick

  Sanders, Adrian

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Sayeed, Jonathan

  Mr. Stephen Day and

  Shephard, Rt Hon Mrs Gillian

  Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown.

  Question accordingly agreed to.
  Resolved,
  That the following provisions shall apply to the remaining proceedings on the Freedom of Information Bill and the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill:—

  Interpretation

    Lords Amendments
    1.—(1) Proceedings on Consideration of Lords Amendments to the Freedom of Information Bill shall be completed at today's sitting and shall, if not previously concluded, be brought to a conclusion at midnight.
    (2) Proceedings on Consideration of Lords Amendments to the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill shall be completed on the allotted day and shall, if not previously concluded, be brought to a conclusion at 10.00 p.m. on that day.
    2.—(1) This paragraph applies for the purpose of bringing proceedings on either of the Bills to a conclusion in accordance with paragraph 1.
    (2) The Speaker shall first put forthwith any Question which has been proposed from the Chair and not yet decided.
    (3) If that Question is for the amendment of a Lords Amendment, the Speaker shall then put forthwith—

    (a) a single Question on any further Amendments of the Lords Amendment moved by a Minister of the Crown, and

    (b) the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown that this House agrees or disagrees with the Lords in their Amendment or (as the case may be) in their Amendment as amended.

    (4) The Speaker shall then put forthwith—

    (a) a single Question on any Amendments moved by a Minister of the Crown to a Lords Amendment, and

    (b) the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown that this House agrees or disagrees with the Lords in their Amendment or (as the case may be) in their Amendment as amended.

    (5) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown that this House disagrees with the Lords in a Lords Amendment.
    (6) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question that this House agrees with the Lords in all the remaining Lords Amendments.
    (7) As soon as the House has—

    (a) agreed or disagreed with the Lords in any of their Amendments, or

    (b) disposed of an Amendment relevant to a Lords Amendment which has been disagreed to,

    the Speaker shall put forthwith a single Question on any Amendments moved by a Minister of the Crown relevant to the Lords Amendment.

    Subsequent stages
    3.—(l) The Speaker shall put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown for the consideration forthwith of any further Message from the Lords on either of the Bills.
    (2) The proceedings on any further Message from the Lords shall, if not previously concluded, be brought to a conclusion one hour after their commencement.
    4.—(1) This paragraph applies for the purpose of bringing proceedings to a conclusion in accordance with paragraph 3.
    (2) The Speaker shall first put forthwith any Question which has been proposed from the Chair and not yet decided.
    (3) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown which is related to the Question already proposed from the Chair.
    (4) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown on or relevant to any of the remaining items in the Lords Message.
    (5) The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question that this House agrees with the Lords in all the remaining Lords Proposals.

    Reasons Committee
    5. The Speaker shall put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown for the appointment, nomination and quorum of a Committee to draw up Reasons and the appointment of its Chairman.
    6.—(1) The Committee shall report before the conclusion of the sitting at which it is appointed.
    (2) Proceedings in the Committee shall, if not previously concluded, be brought to a conclusion 30 minutes after their commencement.
    (3) For the purpose of bringing any proceedings to a conclusion in accordance with sub-paragraph (2), the Chairman shall—

    (a) first put forthwith any Question which has been proposed from the Chair and not yet decided, and

    (b) then put forthwith successively Questions on Motions which may be made by a Minister of the Crown for assigning a Reason for disagreeing with the Lords in any of their Amendments.

    (4) The proceedings of the Committee shall be reported without any further Question being put.

    Miscellaneous
    7.—(1) The following paragraphs apply to—

    (a) proceedings at today's sitting on Consideration of Lords Amendments to the Freedom of Information Bill,

    718

    (b) proceedings on the allotted day on Consideration of Lords Amendments to the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill,

    (c) proceedings on any further message from the Lords on either of the Bills, and

    (d) proceedings at today's sitting or on the allotted day on the appointment, nomination and quorum of a Committee to draw up Reasons (and the appointment of its Chairman) and the Report of such a Committee.

    8. Standing Order No. 15(1) (Exempted business) shall apply to the proceedings.
    9. The proceedings shall not be interrupted under any Standing Order relating to the sittings of the House.
    10. No dilatory Motion with respect to, or in the course of, the proceedings shall be made except by a Minister of the Crown; and the Question on any such Motion shall be put forthwith.
    11.—(1) If on a day on which any of the proceedings take place a Motion for the Adjournment of the House under Standing Order No. 24 (Adjournment on specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration) would stand over to Seven o'clock—

    (a) that Motion stands over until the conclusion of any of the proceedings which are to be brought to a conclusion at or before that time, and

    (b) the bringing to a conclusion of any of the proceedings which are to be brought to a conclusion after that time is postponed for a period of time equal to the duration of the proceedings on that Motion.

    (2) If a Motion for the Adjournment of the House under Standing Order No. 24 stands over from an earlier day to such a day, the bringing to a conclusion of any of the proceedings on that day is postponed for a period of time equal to the duration of the proceedings on that Motion.
    12. If the House is adjourned, or the sitting is suspended, before the expiry of the period at the end of which any of the proceedings are to be brought to a conclusion under this Order, no notice shall be required of a Motion made at the next sitting by a Minister of the Crown for varying or supplementing the provisions of this Order.

    Interpretation
    13. In this Order, "allotted day" means any day on which the Countryside and Rights of Way Bill is put down on the main business as first Government Order of the Day.
  Freedom of Information Bill
  Lords amendments considered.
  Freedom of Information Bill
    Clause 1

      GENERAL RIGHT OF ACCESS TO INFORMATION HELD BY PUBLIC AUTHORITIES
      Lords amendment: No. 1, in page 1, line 14, after ("sections") insert
      ("(Effect of exemptions in Part II),")
      8.24 pm
      The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Mike O'Brien): I beg to move, That this House agrees with the Lords in the said amendment.
      Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Sylvia Heal): With this it will be convenient to discuss Lords amendments Nos. 2 and 3, Lords amendment No. 4, amendment (a) thereto and Lords amendments Nos. 12, 13, 18 to 21, 43 to 45, 56, 58, 64, 66, 67 and 76.
      Mr. O'Brien: Let me take my first opportunity to congratulate you, Madam Deputy Speaker, on taking up your current position. I am sure that you will have the support of the House in all that you do.

      719
      As a group, the amendments alter the way in which the public interest test functions in the Bill. The duty to disclose information in the public interest is one of the most important aspects of the Bill. It is the key to creating the new culture of openness in the public sector with which the Government intend to replace the secrecy that, as everyone accepts, permeates Whitehall and too much of the public sector. We are introducing the Bill because we want to change that. The question is how to achieve the necessary balance between opening up the public sector and recognising that openness does not always have a monopoly on righteousness. It needs to be balanced against the need for personal privacy, commercial confidentiality and effective government. We do not want a similar situation to that in America, where commercial companies make 60 per cent. of applications under freedom of information legislation. Nor do we want to remove the right to ensure that government operates effectively.
      The public interest test seeks to ensure that, even where there is an exemption from the duty to disclose information, in most cases a public authority is under a duty—I stress that it is a duty—to consider the public interest in disclosing that it holds information and in the disclosure of that information. Where the public interest requires the authority to confirm or deny that it holds the information, it must do so. Where the public interest requires that the information should be disclosed, the public authority must disclose it. Hon. Members will appreciate that those duties are powerful drivers towards openness. The amendments ensure that they are in place.
      Originally, the general right of access contained in clause 1 was separated from clause 13, which gave a right of access ensuring that the public interest in disclosure outweighed the public interest in maintaining the exemption. Amendment No. 4 brings the rights of access together at the head of the Bill and expresses more clearly the effect of the exemptions in terms of public interest disclosure. The amendment also reverses the way in which the test works, so that the public interest in disclosing the information must be outweighed by the public interest in maintaining an exemption before any information can be withheld.
      Amendment No. 18 deletes clause 13, which now becomes otiose. Amendment No. 21 makes an important change. The Bill provides that a public authority that is unable to reach a decision in respect of the public interest test within 20 working days must reach that decision within a reasonable period. That requirement was contained in clause 13(6) and is maintained by amendment No. 13. If the authority is unable to reach its decision on the public interest test within 20 working days, it must notify the applicant of that within that time. Again, that was the position when the Bill left the House and it is preserved by amendment No. 21.
      However, amendment No. 21 also further strengthens the position of the applicant by providing that the authority must provide to him an estimate of the time within which such a decision will be reached. Failure to provide an estimate will be a breach of statutory duty. We have also said that we will include reference to the desirability of complying with estimates in the code of practice, so that failure to comply will also render the authority liable to a practice recommendation.
      720
      Amendments Nos. 44, 45 and 56 ensure that decisions relating to the public interest will be appealed to the tribunal. The remaining amendments in the group are consequential to the principal amendments.
      I believe that the amendments are a significant move forward. They ensure that the Bill will be more easily understood and will result in more information being disclosed than would otherwise have been the case.
      Mr. John Greenway rose—
      Mr. O'Brien: I shall give way to the hon. Gentleman, who is helpful on many occasions. I have noticed, as he must have done, that now that the Opposition have suddenly found an interest in freedom of information, they have removed him from his former position—he who was in many ways far more expert than others in dealing with such matters.
      Mr. Greenway: I was not so much removed as sidetracked elsewhere, to a job that I much enjoy. In view of the Under-Secretary's ministerial responsibility for the Bill, he will have followed its progress in the other place a little more closely than I have. In response to his comments on appeals, I put a simple, straightforward question to him. Am I right to believe that, in the end, it will still be up to a Minister to decide whether information should be released?
      8.30 pm
      Mr. O'Brien: No, the hon. Gentleman is not right. A process is involved, rather than the decision of an individual or a Government. He will know from the Bill's structure that an application can be made and, if there is no exemption, in most circumstances there will be an obligation to provide the relevant information. However, if the public interest test applies, a decision would have to be made as to how it should apply, and that may involve a public authority that is controlled directly by a Minister. Normally, therefore, I suspect that the decision would have to be made by a Minister.
      However, if there were an objection to that interpretation of the public interest, an application could be made to the Information Commissioner, who may take a view on the matter. If the Minister disagreed with that view, the matter could be referred to a tribunal, which may also take a view. By that stage, the matter would no doubt become of considerable public interest. If the Minister sought to maintain an exemption, he would have to consult colleagues and would no doubt have to deal with a debate in the House or questions that might arise. He would have to defend the position before the House.
      The overall decision would involve not so much the decision reached by a Minister, but a process during which a debate about the nature of the public interest would take place.
      Mr. Greenway: I am grateful to the Minister for giving way once more, because I think that his answer is yes, rather than no. I understand his argument, but he said, in effect, that a recommendation or an observation from either the commissioner or the tribunal that the information should be released would not involve the compelling argument that they could require, or would have the power to require, the Minister to release the

      721
      information. For all the trumpeting of an agreement with the Liberal Democrats, the Bill is fundamentally the same as it was when it left Committee because the commissioner and the tribunal would have no power to compel release.
      Mr. O'Brien: In most respects, the hon. Gentleman is wrong. Wherever there is a public interest in knowing the information, the public will have a right to know it. The Bill contains safeguards lest any Minister seeks to determine the public interest in a way that is contrary to that interest.
      We have listened to the debate, and amended and developed the Bill so that it contains substantial safeguards against abuse by any Government, Minister or anyone else who might seek to use it in a way that is not intended. Our consideration of the Lords amendments should show that the Bill has been strengthened, not least by the change in the way in which the balance of the public interest test will be determined. It will be determined on the side of openness when there is a fine balance about where the public interest lies.
      The amendments have strengthened the Bill in many ways.
      Tony Wright rose—
      Mr. John Bercow: Will the Minister give way?
      Mr. O'Brien: I shall first deal with those amendments that I have not yet discussed. [Interruption.] I am afraid that I had not noticed my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase (Tony Wright) rising to intervene. I am happy to give way.
      Tony Wright: I assumed that it was due to sheer inattention, rather than to anything worse.
      I am finding it difficult to get my mind around Lords amendment No. 4, which would insert a new section 2, and I would like my hon. Friend to explain. The arrangement that I understand was made with Liberal Democrat peers is susceptible to contrary interpretations. They tell us that they have fundamentally transformed the Bill; they say that they have managed to insert what amounts to a prejudice test into the Bill as a whole. On the other hand, I have heard Government spokesmen in the other place say that what is proposed amounts to no more than the arrangements that operate in the event of a tie break-arrangements determining how the balance will be struck, in the public interest, between disclosure and withholding in the fine cases concerned.
      Are we talking about something marginal, or about something fundamental?
      Mr. O'Brien: We are talking about something which, as my hon. Friend suggests, has been stated by the Government in another place. In the case of a fine decision about the balance of the public interest and where it lies, the way in which the decision is reached errs on the side of openness. As far as I can see, that constitutes a strengthening of the Bill, although some might seek to claim that the strengthening was greater than it is. As far
      722

      as the Government are concerned, the proposal helps, and makes the Bill more open; but some in another place may well have felt a need to overstate their case a little in order to justify what they had decided to do.
      Mr. Bercow: Further to his answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway), will the Minister simply accept what we know to be a fact: that there are now more exemptions in the Bill than there were in either the draft Bill or the White Paper? Will he confirm that when he talks of strengthening the Bill-he has used the phrase twice in the last five minutes-he is referring to strengthening the power of the Executive, and most assuredly not to strengthening the power of the citizen?
      Mr. O'Brien: With respect to the hon. Gentleman, that is nonsense. What the Bill will do is strengthen the right of those who want more openness in government to secure more openness in government. The measure will change the culture not only in Whitehall, but in the public sector as a whole. It will open up that culture, and end the secrecy that the last Government accepted. Having promised a freedom of information Bill in its 1979 manifesto, the Conservative party simply dropped that, and made do with a code of practice that had no statutory effect whatever. As a result, there was a continuous culture of secrecy in Whitehall, which led to the BSE crisis and other problems. The hon. Gentleman may well laugh at those problems, but many people know that the Conservative party governed in a culture of secrecy and contempt for the public and the electorate.
      As I said, Lords amendment No. 4 makes a difference in "tie break" circumstances, but it also sends a powerful signal to the public in favour of openness. That is what this Government want to do. We promised to introduce a Bill dealing with freedom of information. We have done it. The previous Government promised to introduce one and failed singularly to do so.
      Sub-amendment (a), tabled by the Liberal Democrats and others, would provide that the public interest in disclosing information relating to accident investigations, or proceedings relating to health, safety or welfare of persons or the protection of the environment, would always outweigh the public interest in maintaining the exemption, unless to do so would result, or would be likely to result, in prejudice to any particular investigation or proceeding. The effect is to convert clause 28 into a prejudice-based exemption in relation to information collected for investigations or proceedings.
      I understand why the supporters of the amendment wish to be clear that information in that vital area will not be withheld lightly. I understand the concern. There is no real difference between our overall aim and theirs: openness, for example, in a BSE-type case. The problem in the BSE case was that information was incomplete. To some extent, Ministers at that time put themselves in a position where they were giving information selectively and massaging the type of information that was put in the public arena.
      What both the supporters of the amendment and I will agree on is that, had information been available in that case, it should have been in the public domain because the public have an interest in knowing about that. As drafted, our public interest test in the new clause after

      723
      clause 1, which Lords amendment No. 4 provides, is a strong protection against such refusal to disclose. On our provisions, I do not accept that there is any realistic risk that BSE-type information would be kept secret.
      Helen Jackson: Will my hon. Friend give way?
      Mr. O'Brien: I am conscious of the time, but I will give way once more and then make progress.
      Helen Jackson: My hon. Friend has mentioned the BSE example a couple of times. Will he explain a little more exactly why, given that the new amendments have gone through the other place, he is certain that the type of secrecy that prevented some of us getting straight answers to numerous parliamentary questions in the previous Parliament would not arise again—that we would not come up against the same barrage of defensiveness and secrecy?
      Mr. O'Brien: It is purely because, when there is an interest in the public knowing, the public will have a right to know. Where public health is seriously at risk and information is held by the Government, it is difficult to see, on any reading of the Bill, how it could be justified for a Minister to take the view that the public interest was in favour of secrecy, unless a criminal investigation were about to be undertaken, in which case the public interest would have to be weighed very carefully. In circumstances where there is a clear view that public health would be at risk—particularly in the sort of situation in which BSE arose—under the Bill, it would always be in the public interest for that information to be in the public domain. Therefore, it would be public and, under the Bill, it would not be possible for the concerns about secrecy that my hon. Friend mentioned to arise. Therefore, the measure would provide a protection.
      Helen Jackson: Will my hon. Friend give way?
      Mr. O'Brien: I shall not give way any more to my hon. Friend because I want to make progress.
      Clause 28 currently provides that there is a class exemption for information whose disclosure would seriously undermine the effectiveness of both the police and the prosecution services. The class exemption is restricted to criminal proceedings and investigations by authorities into matters that may lead to a decision being taken by that authority to institute criminal proceedings, even if no such proceedings were eventually taken. Information that is the subject of the amendment could fall within that latter category.
      Mr. Simon Hughes: Will the Minister give way?
      Mr. O'Brien: I will not give way at the moment.
      Any investigation is a serious matter. It makes no difference if a person is convicted of a serious offence such as manslaughter as a result of a criminal investigation—whether it be an investigation by the police, or by the Health and Safety Executive relating to a safety matter. The cause and effect are much the same. The result to the person involved is much the same. In many respects, the processes
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      are very similar. Therefore, we believe that it would be wrong to have a different procedure for one type of investigation as against another.
      8.45 pm
      Both the Director General of the Serious Fraud Office and the Director of Public Prosecutions, on behalf of the Crown Prosecution Service, have made it clear that they would have serious concerns if a public interest test were replaced by a test obliging them to disclose and provide information that might lead to frustration of the process of justice and a situation in which those who are responsible for criminal offences cannot be convicted. We are concerned that, if the amendment were accepted, it would interfere with that process.
      The Government believe that we cannot have less certainty in, or give less protection to, some proceedings simply because the prosecuting agency is one body rather than another, and that to do so would effectively be to say that one type of prosecution is more important than another. However, that is what the amendment seeks to achieve, by providing that certain information is subject to a different test because it has been collected as a result of a particular form of investigation. I have no doubt that the amendment was laudably intended. However, it would have the unintended consequence of making prosecution uncertain.
      As I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough (Helen Jackson), I believe that the public interest test will operate effectively to ensure that information cannot be withheld inappropriately. Clearly, the public interest in the disclosure of information on the discharge of dangerous waste into rivers and waterways or the results of traffic collisions will be high. Although it is right that public interest should be balanced against the need for a fair trial, the Government are satisfied that, in those types of circumstances, that is the correct test to apply.
      Of course, the commissioner will also have an important enforcement role, to ensure that public authorities do not seek to hide behind the exemption at clause 28 by misapplying that public interest test.
      I have some questions on the amendment for the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes). First, however, I shall give way, just once, to him.
      Mr. Simon Hughes: I appreciate the points that the Minister is making. However, does he accept the argument that the clause is so widely drawn that it allows application of a general harm test that could be indefinite not only in time, but in extent? One day, there might be a prosecution of someone, but when or by whom would not necessarily ever have to be disclosed. The information could remain exempt effectively for ever.
      Mr. O'Brien: No, I do not accept that. Each time an application is made, a judgment has to be made about where the public interest lies. If it eventually becomes clear that the information is not being used for the purposes of a prosecution and is unlikely to be so, at that point, the public interest clearly weighs in favour of disclosure. Therefore, I do not accept the hon. Gentleman's point.

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      My real concern is that amendment (a) takes us too far. I have some questions about how it would work. For example, how would it prevent a company that is the subject of an inquiry finding out the name of a whistleblower employee who communicated information confidentially to the inquiry? The amendment applies to all of clause 28 and would damage protection for whistleblowers. There is sometimes a public interest in not revealing the identity of a whistleblower for a time or in withholding some information provided by a whistleblower.
      On my reading of the prejudice test that the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey seeks to include in the Bill, it would not only allow a company, for example, to discover information about the identity of an informer or information given in confidence to an inquiry, but might enable a potential defendant who was the subject of an inquiry into a health and safety issue to force early disclosure of information before a decision on prosecution was taken, perhaps deliberately prejudicing the outcome of a prosecution. Like the hon. Gentleman, I am a lawyer. One can imagine ways in which such information might be used by some lawyers on behalf of potential defendants to ensure early disclosure of information, although disclosure might not be in the public interest.
      How would such a provision apply in relation to the Marchioness inquiry, for example? No prosecution is likely to be pending until the end of an inquiry, which could take a considerable time. Under a prejudice test, information could be made public before the conclusion of the inquiry, either in a selective way, to suggest that some people are more culpable than others, or so as to force disclosure that might, whether deliberately or inadvertently, prejudice a fair trial and prevent the conviction of a criminal who might otherwise be convicted.
      Under a prejudice test, an inquiry would not be obliged to consider the public interest in disclosing information, as we would advocate, but would have to disclose the information unless there was a pending prosecution that would there and then be prejudiced. That would produce uncertainty and might mean that evidence might not be disclosed to the inquiry for fear that it might be prematurely disclosed under FOI. In other words, it might lead to greater secrecy where we want greater openness. A prejudice test is not in the public interest, whereas a public interest test is.
      The hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Mr. Hawkins) asked whether there were more exemptions in the Bill than in the White Paper. There are, because we have extended the Bill's scope to include Parliament, which will, quite properly, want some matters, particularly privilege, to remain exempt. The number of exemptions is not greater in any other respect, but there are more clauses in the Bill because of the way in which the White Paper was worded. The hon. Gentleman's view is erroneous.
      Mr. Nick Hawkins: The official Opposition disagree with Lords amendments Nos. 12 and 13. We want to require that all requests for information be dealt with promptly, no later than 20 working days after they are made. The extended response times on "public interest" in clause 10(3) and (1) would be deleted.
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      In the earlier guillotine debate, reference was made to the squalid deal done by Liberal Democrat peers with the Labour Government. We understand that it was done behind the backs of Liberal Democrat Members in this Chamber. The hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) is well known for his sophistry, but he will have to excel himself to explain why his colleagues in another place stitched him up. They went behind not only his back but that of the right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Mr. Maclennan), who was described in the Financial Times as absolutely livid. I hear that the hon. Member for Portsmouth, South (Mr. Hancock) was also described as very angry.
      Conservative Members know that the Liberal Democrats have always said one thing in one constituency where they think it will please the electorate and diametrically the opposite in the seat next door, but this is a completely new departure: we have never previously had Liberal Democrats daring to say one thing in this House and diametrically the opposite in another place.
      Mr. Mike O'Brien: I am little concerned that the hon. Gentleman may be giving too much credit to the Liberal Democrats in saying that they have never said one thing in one place and another in another.
      Mr. Hawkins: It seems that the alliance did not last very long.
      I want to quote what my noble Friend Lord Mackay of Ardbrecknish said. He was referring to the way in which the gaff had been blown on this squalid deal in The Guardian, which had the headline:
      See the Lib-Dem approach: complaint, abject and half-baked …
      The article said that the progressive alliance which got the Bill this far is, however,
      turning into a conspiracy to gut true reform. From the Government, this has been signalled for a long time …
      Lord Mackay went on:
      I suppose that it was signalled the day that David Clark—
      the right hon. Member for South Shields—
      was sacked and the White Paper was watered down to form the Bill.
      Lord Mackay quoted The Guardian again:
      What is new and shocking is the willingness of the Liberal Democrat Peers to assist in the butchery …—[Official Report, House of Lords, 14 November 2000; Vol. 619, c. 141.]
      It is interesting that the phrase
      a conspiracy to gut true reform
      is used to describe what Liberal Democrat peers have done. My right hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe) referred to this as national guillotine week. However, given the somewhat unstatesmanlike remarks from the Deputy Prime Minister about how he was gutted on another issue, this seems to be national gutted week as well.
      I turn to the worthwhile work, to which tribute was paid on both sides when the Bill was last before the House, by the Campaign for Freedom of Information. Until the deal, the Government had been facing the prospect of being defeated in the Lords by an all-party alliance, including the Conservatives, which was ready to force through substantial improvements to the Bill. The agreement

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      with the Liberal Democrats, however, means that the Government are now safe from defeat. Mr. Maurice Frankel of the Campaign for Freedom of Information said:
      This means the weak Freedom of Information Bill—
      often described at earlier stages as a freedom from information Bill—
      will become law with all its serious defects intact.
      Mr. Frankel said:
      We cannot understand why anyone could believe that the limited changes represented by these amendments are the maximum that could be achieved … We find it incomprehensible that, in return for these modest concessions, the Liberal Democrats are proposing to abandon their support for essential amendments which would have given the public greater rights to safety information and denied Ministers the right to veto decisions of the independent Information Commissioner …
      This is the final collapse of any credibility that the Liberal Democrats have on the Bill.
      Mr. Simon Hughes: I will deal later with some of the other issues in the hon. Gentleman's remarks. First, can he give us two statistics? How many Conservative peers were there in pursuit of freedom of information, voting in the Lobby on the first day of the week two weeks ago when the Bill was in the Lords? How many were there the day before for the Sexual Offences (Amendment) Bill? Why did many more Tories oppose the age of consent than ever supported freedom of information?
      Mr. Hawkins: My hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow) rightly says from a sedentary position that the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey is digging himself ever deeper. That is the same argument that was used with no effect whatever when it was suggested by Liberal Democrat peers that they were somehow justified in this squalid deal because they did not think that the Conservative peers would be there in sufficient numbers. However, Lord Mackay of Ardbrecknish dealt comprehensively with that matter. He said that in future when a deal is suggested by combined Opposition forces to defeat the Government, when dealing with the Liberal Democrats, he will know to sup with an even longer spoon.
      There is no doubt that had the Liberal Democrats not done this squalid deal, the Government would have been defeated. The numbers were there, and the sophistry from the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey is already beginning, as we knew it would.
      As for the substantive matters that Liberal Democrat peers have raised since the deal was done, Liberal Democrat Members in the Commons have disowned them and that deal. The right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross has been quoted in the Financial Times as saying that his noble Friends were jumping the gun. He also said that there had been a failure of communication between Liberal Democrat Members and their peers. So Liberal Democrats really are in a terrible mess.
      Lords amendments Nos. 12 and 13 deal with the time limit within which authorities are required to make decisions on disclosure in the public interest.
      The first decision that authorities must make is whether the information requested is exempt. That decision must be made promptly, and, in any event, within 20 working days of the request. A second decision must then be made
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      on whether to disclose exempt information under the public interest test. There is no fixed time limit for that decision. It need merely be taken within
      such time as is reasonable in the circumstances.
      The authority must then give the applicant an estimate of what that time will be.
      9 pm
      The result is that decisions may be taken in two stages over two entirely different time frames and with no fixed end point. That could lead to substantial delays. Some authorities may use the lack of a time limit deliberately to delay giving a final reply. Others may simply take their foot off the pedal in the absence of an explicit time limit. Our suggestion that those amendments be deleted would apply the Bill's 20-day limit to the decision on public interest disclosure. There would then be a single time limit for both decisions.
      That would bring the Bill in line with freedom of information laws in other countries. No overseas equivalent Act provides extra time for decisions merely because a public interest test is involved. Nor, significantly, does the open government code of practice introduced by the Conservative Government of my right hon. Friend the Member for Huntingdon (Mr. Major). His code of practice is proving stronger in practice than the Government's watered down Bill, as the Campaign for Freedom of Information has repeatedly said. It is the Minister who has been guilty of sophistry on that point.
      In our code of practice, the target of 20 working days is set for all decisions. The Minister's own Department's report on the code's operation last year revealed that 92 per cent. of requests were dealt with either within that limit or within the shorter limit adopted by some Departments. Why do we need the extra, longer limit suggested by the Government? If some requests may require more than 20 days, the likely cause will be the high volume of records involved or the need to consult third parties. It will not normally be the result of a need to consider the "public interest" in disclosure.
      The lack of a fixed time limit for decision is not the only source of delay. Before an applicant can approach the commissioner, he or she will have to exhaust any internal complaints procedure that the authority involved has established. Guidance on providing such complaints procedures will have to be set out in the Secretary of State's code of practice, which will clearly add more delay.
      Before a person can even go to the Commission, he or she must be prepared to wait up to 20 working days for a decision on whether an exemption applies, suffer a further delay for a "reasonable" time while a decision is taken on whether it is in the public interest to disclose the information, and wait for a further, unspecified time for the relevant authority to consider the complaint that must be made under that authority's own complaints procedure. Requiring the first two of those three stages to be taken within the same 20 days would significantly reduce the potential for delays. That would return us to the situation that 92 per cent. of applicants already experience under the code of practice introduced by the previous Government.

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      Why can the Government not see that our code of practice is better for applicants? It provides quicker decisions, and there is no doubt that the Government and the Liberal Democrats have lost all credibility on these matters.
      Mr. Simon Hughes rose—
      Madam Deputy Speaker: I call the hon. Member for Cannock Chase (Tony Wright).
      Tony Wright: Thank you, Madam Speaker. I wanted to say but a word, and had expected to follow the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes). I shall instead precede him.
      Throughout consideration of the Bill, there has been much discussion of the famous clause 28—the class exemption for investigatory bodies. The climate in which we have discussed that matter has clearly changed. Until recently, it could have been said that freedom of information was a matter for the chattering classes. Indeed, I am told that a Cabinet Minister said just that at some point. Since BSE, though, freedom of information is a matter for the eating classes and for everyone. It has come out of the cloister and into people's daily lives. People need to be assured that anything to do with safety, health or welfare will be available.
      I listened carefully to the Minister's remarks. The point of tabling an amendment to the Lords amendment—to try to find a different way of dealing with the matter—is that there should not be a class exemption at this point, although there must be a prejudice test. That is the key issue—it always has been. However, the Minister seemed to say, in effect, "Ah, but there are implications for prosecutions. All kinds of problems would arise if this was allowed". I have heard that argument many times, but I cannot understand it. When the prejudice test is given in its proposed form, it is specifically to protect prosecutions. Those are precisely the matters that will not be caught by subjecting that matter to a prejudice test.
      The Minister tells us that all public authorities must be treated in the same way. Surely the whole point of freedom of information legislation is that we can treat different matters differently. If we decide that health and safety deserve a particular priority, we can build that into the measure—we have the ability to do that.
      The Select Committee on Public Administration took evidence on these matters from Jenny Bacon, the then director general of the Health and Safety Executive in July 1998. I take it that she knows what she is talking about. We asked her whether she needed a class exemption in her sphere. She noted that the provision was a class exemption and that the Health and Safety Commission felt that
      in respect of health and safety matters a prejudice tested exemption would provide sufficient protection for these matters.
      It has always seemed to me to be as simple as that.
      Jenny Bacon believed that a prejudice test was enough in that context. She did not think that health and safety required a class exemption. Having listened to the arguments this evening, I do not think that the case for including one has been made. I hope that, even now in a
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      different climate, the Government will be able to give the assurance and reassurance that are needed on this matter to ensure that there is a prejudice test for health and safety.
      Mr. Mike O'Brien: Will my hon. Friend confirm that Jenny Bacon made those comments before a public interest test had been inserted in the measure and thus that the situation to which she was responding was different from that which faces us at present?
      Tony Wright: The public interest test is the second stage test. Perhaps we will discuss later the exact nature of the operation of that test—who has the final say and so on. The point is that, at the first stage test—the exemption stage—when a freedom of information measure determines what is in or out, the question should be whether health and safety information should be excluded as a class or should be included, subject to a sensible test of prejudice that would protect those aspects that the Minister rightly says need protection. Our amendment would give the Minister the assurances he wants, while affording the protection to health and safety that we need.
      Mr. Simon Hughes: I speak to amendment (a) tabled in the names of my right hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Mr. Maclennan), the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr. Davis), other colleagues on both sides of the House and myself. I apologise to the House for the absence of my right hon. Friend, who is in bed trying to recover from bronchitis. He would have attended the debate had he been able to, and I am sure that everyone who has followed the Bill's proceedings in both Houses realises that he has been assiduous, during a long career in this place, in pursuing the issues with which the measure deals.
      Our amendment applies only to one of the Lords amendments in the group. We regard all the others also as improvements to the Bill—I think the House agrees. As we have only three hours' debate in total, this might seem to be a distraction, but on the argument about the Bill's improvement since first published, I pray in aid the summary that the Library produced after Report in the Lords the other day. It was not written by anyone with a party interest. It did not over-state or over-hype; it simply said:
      The Freedom of Information Bill has undergone significant amendments in its passage through both Houses.
      I have heard no one say that the amendments have made the Bill less good; they have all improved it.
      There have been four batches of amendments. These were tabled after Second Reading and on Report in the House and after Second Reading and on Report in the other place. I have only heard people say that all those amendments have gone in the right direction. Whatever any internal disputes about whether people have gone far enough, we are going in the right direction.
      The second part of the Library's elaboration sets out the five main changes to the Bill:
      A new wording of the public interest test which the Information Commissioner can review and enforce …
      A new Executive override … to be used when a Cabinet minister cannot accept the decision of the Commissioner.

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      Some relaxation of the restrictions on the release of factual and statistical information—
      we shall come to that matter later—
      The power to add new exemptions has been removed,
      which has been widely welcomed, and
      a new duty to assist as well as advise applicants,
      which has been generally welcomed.
      I hope to start in a constructive and straightforward way. In my view and in that of objective advisers, as well as the Campaign for the Freedom of Information and others, the Bill has been improved. We could discuss how much more improved it could have been and how much more improved we should like it to be. There is no secret that some hon. Members on both sides of the House would like the Bill to be improved and to go further. That is why we have tabled amendments today and why the debate became controversial in the other place; there was a view that things could have been pushed further. I completely understand that.
      I am conscious of the fact that we have only three hours left to deal with nine groups of amendments, so I shall focus on amendment (a) to Lords amendment No. 4—the important amendment to which the hon. Member for Cannock Chase (Tony Wright) has just spoken, which we tabled jointly. The Minister knows that I have a particular interest in the matter and that the public understand its importance. To put it bluntly, it is not so much about BSE—that relates more to the amendment on factual information, which is part of a later group—as about evidence given to an inquiry into a railway collision, for example, where a statutory authority inquires into what happened during a train crash in which people were killed or injured and how we can learn the lessons.
      Such matters are certainly relevant to investigations by the Health and Safety Executive, the headquarters of which happen to be based in my constituency. I have met and, when she was in post, held discussions with the previous director general, to whom the hon. Member for Cannock Chase referred. We all know from constituency work that the HSE investigates the cause of construction accidents. Tragically, there are still too many such accidents. The HSE will assemble information and may then decide to prosecute the company or individual involved. Such issues matter hugely to the public, especially the first category—transport collisions and their investigations.
      This is not a Scottish Bill, although the Scots are proceeding not quite in parallel—some might say that they are ahead of us—but they are taking action about the same time. If the Lockerbie crash had occurred in England, a public authority investigation would have governed that crash and similar ones. Such matters relate to the current inquiry into the Marchioness—I am closely involved in the subject of that inquiry, which is taking place over the road—and they certainly relate to the Southall rail crash, where a public authority has been charged with a duty to investigate and collect evidence, which might result in a criminal prosecution.
      9.15 pm
      I know that the Minister has heard the argument before, but the amendment proposes that we should be able to keep information exempt or secret only if it relates to particular proceedings or a particular individual. There
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      must be a particular reason for the exemption. We take that view because it would otherwise be possible for the Director of Public Prosecutions—the example given by the Minister—the Serious Fraud Office or others to say, with the best intentions, that information should be kept secret because, if it were not, it might lead to actions in the courts. Therefore, they could argue that it was in the public interest to keep the information secret.
      The hon. Member for Cannock Chase made the point very well. Like the former director general of the Health and Safety Executive, we argue that there should be a particular prejudice test. Our amendment is not accidental. We chose words that are in the Bill; we did not pluck them out of the air. Clause 29 of the Bill as it left this House—we are engaged in the bizarre process of considering amendments to the Bill as it left this House and not as it was when it came back—is on law enforcement. Clause 29(1) states:
      Information which is not exempt information by virtue of section 28 is exempt information if its disclosure under this Act would, or would be likely, to prejudice …
      There then follows a list of justifications, the first of which is
      the prevention or detection of crime.
      Subsection (2) then lists the purposes of relevant public authority investigations, and we have chosen some for our amendment. They include
      (e) the purpose of ascertaining the cause of an accident …
      (i) the purpose of securing the health, safety and welfare of persons at work, and
      (j) the purpose of protecting persons other than persons at work against risk to health and safety arising out of or in connection with the actions of persons at work.
      As the hon. Member for Cannock Chase said, we have been selective and chosen issues of public concern. They include health, safety and environmental matters and accident investigations. I always think that "accident" is an inadequate word, because incidents are not usually accidents. Once an investigation has taken place, it is normally found that they are the result of a mistake or fault.
      In the cases that we have chosen—and in those cases alone—there should have to be a specific prejudice test. Only if that test brings down the exemption would the information not go automatically into the public domain.
      Our amendment would cover issues that matter hugely to the public. For example, it would cover inquiries by the railway inspectorate, the nuclear installations inspectorate—the Sellafield debate is important and has gone for more than 20 years—and inquiries by fire authorities and the Environment Agency.
      In local government terms, our amendment would cover inquires by trading standard officers who could be investigating the inappropriate use of garages and it would cover cafes and shops that are prejudicial to public health. A whole range of issues would be covered. Perhaps the most obvious example is when the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food conducts its own inquiries and is then able to prosecute. In all those cases, the information that is collected should be made freely available to the public unless there is a particular prejudice.
      For a final time, I shall try to persuade the Minister. We have been trying, we are trying and, if we do not succeed tonight, we shall go on trying to ensure that we

      733
      win our argument. If he accepts our amendment, the public interest test will remain, so the balance of interests will be considered, but that balance of interests would weigh the particular risks of someone not giving evidence, of witnesses being intimidated or of prosecutions not being pursued rather than the generality of the issue.
      I want to give one final example of why this clause is worrying. There is a debate on whether we should get rid of the rule against double jeopardy. The Law Commission is considering the proposal and it has been debated in Westminster Hall. The double jeopardy rule precludes someone from bringing a prosecution when there has been an earlier prosecution. If that were changed, there might always be a chance of a case coming back to court and an open-ended prospect of further prosecution.
      Mr. Robin Corbett indicated dissent.
      Mr. Hughes: The hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Mr. Corbett) who chairs the Home Affairs Committee may think that that is not the case. I have read the Committee's report and accept that a second prosecution would have to cross certain thresholds, but some cases might never be closed. I am referring to the generality of the problem, and that consideration would add to the risk that the clause would prevent information from being revealed because someone might say, "This might come back one day. We can't risk this being opened up."
      From personal experience before I came to this place and having talked to people such as the relatives of those who died in the Marchioness disaster and who fought for a public inquiry into it, I do not think that it is in the public interest to hold back information because of an extremely remote possibility. There should be one hurdle, not two, and it ought to be based on specific prejudice, not general harm.
      If the amendment helps to remove that prejudice, we must ensure that in addition to allowing the criminal law to work, the guilty to be prosecuted and witnesses to give evidence, we must be able to provide that we have access to information. We think that this carefully drawn amendment will do that. I have not heard the argument that it is technically flawed, nor have the Conservatives argued against it. I hope that the House will agree to support it.
      On the Conservatives' desire to reject amendments Nos. 12 and 13, to which the hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Mr. Hawkins) referred, I understand the argument about whether there should be an absolute or a less than absolute test of the time scale within which information should be made available, but I want to give one example that I hope supports the argument for an exception to be made when further consultation is needed.
      Let us consider the families of children who may have died as a result of NHS failures in Bristol hospitals, which has concerned us all. Let us imagine that information is released from the inquiry that makes it easy to identify one particular family who are out of the country and cannot be contacted. Just as the police always try to alert families of a bereavement or if a crime has been committed, there might be a reason for the authorities to
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      say that it would be inappropriate to follow an absolute rule that the information must go to the public domain by a certain date because it would not be able to respect the family's confidentiality and their right to receive that information first. That would not be an absolute bar on disclosure.
      I do not pretend that there is no debate to be had on the matter but having thought about it, my colleagues in the other place and in this House believe that a little flexibility might sometimes be necessary in what otherwise would be a rule. That is why we should not accept the Conservatives' proposal to reject amendments Nos. 12 and 13. I understand that they are well intentioned, but they might not achieve the objective that the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues want to achieve.
      Mr. Peter Lilley: I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this debate on these amendments, although I did not contribute to the Bill's earlier stages. As a comparative newcomer, I am struck by how typical the Bill is of all that the Government do. Its title is the exact opposite of its content. It is called the Freedom of Information Bill, but it is largely a restriction of disclosure Bill.
      In my various ministerial roles, I have always been a believer in, and a practitioner of, open government. I insisted on making available to the courts the "smoking gun" document that revealed the minutes of the meeting between Alan Clark and Matrix Churchill. I insisted on the publication of every single licence for the export of equipment from this country to Iraq in the five years leading up to the invasion of Kuwait.
      I even had a useful experience that is highly relevant to the amendments. When we were preparing the Social Security (Incapacity for Work) Bill and I had a 40-page document that had to go to the Prime Minister for clearance before it went to Cabinet, my private secretary came and told me that although the intention had been to send the document to another part of the Department, it had accidentally been sent to the Press Association, whose telephone number was one digit different.
      I found that experience extremely helpful. It taught me, and I have frequently used it to teach others, that we have far too much secrecy and that disclosure is generally beneficial to Governments, rather than otherwise.
      I am not an opponent of disclosure, but nor am I an anorak. I have never believed that we should go to ludicrous lengths to force Governments to publish information that would inhibit sensible internal discussions. I accept that there must be some limits on disclosure. I always thought that a code of practice would suffice, and it would suffice if the Government accepted the convention that they had to adhere to codes of practice.

      Unfortunately, we have an extremely dangerous Government. They no longer abide by conventions. Above all, at the heart of this Government is the manipulation and control of information. That is what the Government are about, above all. They are a Government based on spin and the control of information. That is why they have sacked most Government information officers and replaced those independent public servants with party hacks. That is why it has been revealed that the Deputy Prime Minister called for a weekly inquest in Cabinet into

      735
      any lack of control over information. That is why the Chancellor, who did not even mention in his Budget speech substantial elements of—
      Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Sylvia Heal): Order. The right hon. Gentleman must confine his remarks to the amendments.
      Mr. Lilley: I shall certainly do that, Madam Deputy Speaker. I want to apply a specific test to the amendments before us. We were told this morning by the Home Secretary on the "Today" programme that the Government are already behaving as though the Bill were an Act. They are complying with it as though that were already a legal obligation, so we have a simple test at hand to tell how the amendments will work in practice. We simply have to look at how the Government respond to requests for information, and compare and contrast that with what would happen under each of the amendments.
      Ideally, we would submit requests from ordinary members of the public under each of the items covered by the amendments, and see how the Government responded to them. There has not been time to do that, so all I can do is present to the House evidence based on requests that I have made for the sort of information covered by the amendments. We know that if the Government are not forthcoming to Members of Parliament, they are likely to give short shrift to any request for information from the public.
      In general, when I table questions to the Government, who are purportedly already applying the obligations in the amendments, including those in amendment No. 21 relating to the public interest test, I find that they are slow to respond, evasive and often tricky. By "tricky" I mean that they answer a different question from the one that was asked. They give information about a different issue from the one about which information was requested. They do not seem to be applying with any rigour the public interest test set out in amendment No. 21.
      9.30 pm
      Mr. Bercow: My right hon. Friend has referred to the Government's pervasive characteristic of answering questions that we do not ask and not answering questions that we do ask. When he was developing that point, did my right hon. Friend hear the rather cynical utterance from a sedentary position of the Government Whip, the hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Mr. Jamieson)? He chuckled and said, "Ha, ha, we have learned some tricks."
      Mr. Lilley: I did not hear that remark. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for pointing it out to me and to the House, and putting it on the record. It is significant that the Government are proud of the fact that they behave in a tricky way and do not apply the public interest test as set out in the Bill and in amendment No. 21.
      The simplest test that I could apply was to observe how the Government are behaving in response to the latest batch of questions that I tabled for information. The House may remember a document that was sent to every Member from the Post Office, a public body. It told us how it would fill the massive gap in its finances that has been left by the Government's decision to make pensioners and others have their pensions paid into bank accounts rather than through the Post Office.
      736
      That is an important public issue. The viability of the Post Office network depends on it, as does the convenience of millions of people and huge sums of public money. Surely we have a right to know about the issue. A good test of the Government is whether they tell us about it or try to restrict us to information that is convenient to them, that sounds good and looks good in glossy brochures.
      The Post Office quantifies the amount of money that its programme will allegedly raise. It says that without the programme it would be losing £550 million, but with it, it will break even. So £550 million is at stake. The Post Office states in the document that its plans will fill the gap. It is clear that a significant part of the money will come from the taxpayer, so I thought it reasonable to ask how much will come from the taxpayer. I thought that in any public interest test, as suggested in amendment No. 21 or in the clauses, the question would have to be answered. Instead, the Government refused. They said that under section 2 of the code of practice, it was not their practice to answer such a question, and they referred particularly to commercial confidentiality.
      What is commercially confidential about a sum that may be given by the taxpayer to the Post Office? It may mean that it is better able to compete with other commercial organisations, and that may be worrying to the others. However, on any public interest test, it is not the sort of information that should be restricted. We should know how much of the money is to come from the taxpayer. If the Minister cares to intervene to defend the Government's position and say that this is how he intends amendment No. 21 to work, I shall be grateful. Is he saying that the House should be precluded from knowing about potential and planned subsidies to sub-post offices because it might be embarrassing to shelter under the excuse of commercial confidentiality?
      Mr. Hawkins: My right hon. Friend is raising an important point. Does he agree that what he is saying about the Government's trickiness and secrecy reinforces the point that we have made throughout—that the Government seek to restrict information that, as the Campaign for Freedom of Information has repeatedly said, would have been more freely available under the previous Conservative Government's code?
      Mr. Lilley: My hon. Friend makes a good point, and sets out the situation precisely. Under any previous code, under a strict interpretation of the present code, and under what we thought was the intention of the clause and the amendment before us, we would assume that such information would be made available.
      The Post Office document provides some numbers. That being so, it cannot be claimed that they are confidential. For example, it states:
      Over £80 million per year towards the Post Office network's fixed costs
      will come from the
      Government General Practitioner Services.
      That implies that that will somehow save the Government money elsewhere. I asked the Minister what the savings would be elsewhere, if there were any, or whether there would be a net cost to taxpayers.
      Again, the Department of Trade and Industry refused to answer the question. By no stretch of the imagination could the information be commercially confidential.

      737
      We know that the Post Office is to get £80 million. What we do not know is whether there is to be any offsetting saving in the public sector; the Government will not tell us that, on the grounds that the document containing the full business plan is commercially confidential. Again, I want the Minister to tell me whether that is how the legislation, as amended, is intended to operate. Is that how the Government intend the public interest test to be applied?
      The document goes on to say that the Post Office has submitted
      a clear and transparent formula to calculate a Social Network Payment—
      that is, the subsidy at taxpayers' expense—to support non-viable sub-post offices. I asked what the formula was. It has been submitted by one public body, the Post Office, to another, the Government, and each Member of Parliament has been informed of the existence of the formula—so what is it? The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry refused to publish it, on the grounds that the Post Office gave it to him "in confidence". Is that how the public interest test is to be applied? If it is inconvenient for the Government to reveal the cost of subsidising the Post Office following their foolish decision to remove the automatic payment of benefits through post offices, they will avoid answering questions on the grounds that the information is confidential between a nationalised industry and its sponsoring Minister.
      Mr. Roger Gale: I am interested in the thrust of my right hon. Friend's argument, and I merely offer another example that he might choose to use—one that I am sure will be of great interest to the Minister. The Home Office has made great play of the number of asylum seekers that the Government are dispersing from the south-east of England throughout the rest of the United Kingdom. Last week, I tabled a question asking how many had been dispersed from east Kent since April. The answer I have just received from the notice board is that the information requested is not available. Are the Government seriously saying that they cannot provide that sort of information—or is the truth that they will not?
      Mr. Lilley: I am pretty sure that my hon. Friend's suspicions are well founded, and that the Government do not want to answer his question, rather than that they cannot answer it, or that it would be too costly to do so. If it were too costly they would have said so, as that is one of the grounds for non-disclosure.
      Mr. Bercow: My right hon. Friend has made considerable play of the potential interaction between the requirement to disclose under the Bill and the manner of answering—or not answering—parliamentary questions. Is he aware that in the other place on 19 October, as is recorded in Hansard at column 1270, Lord Falconer helpfully pointed out that the terms of the Bill did not apply, and were not intended by the Government to apply, to the relationship between a Member of Parliament asking a question and a Minister answering it? Does not that prove our point conclusively—game, set and match?
      Mr. Lilley: My hon. Friend makes an extremely important point. I do not have his encyclopaedic
      738
      knowledge of the Hansard reports of both Houses, and I had not seen that reference. It is important that the Minister present today tells us whether the Government intend to give less information to Members of Parliament than they are required in law to give to members of the public. That is a clear question, and I shall be sitting here alert, waiting for an answer—although it would appear from the words of Lord Falconer that our fears are well founded.
      I have another example drawn from my latest batch of questions—it is random chance that those are the questions I am using; they simply followed on from the publication of the document. The document refers to the performance and innovation unit's study of post offices, and says that the PIU recognised that the proposed
      programme would mean merging outlets to ensure their … viability.
      I asked how many mergers the Government estimated would be required. The answer was significantly phrased: it was not that the PIU had not produced an estimate of the likely number of mergers, but that the report of the PIU
      did not contain such an estimate
      —a typically tricky side-stepping of the question. I tabled a further question, asking whether the Government had made an estimate. They told me that I would have to wait and see, so they were trying to think of a tricky answer to that question, too.
      The Home Secretary gave us a clear test of the way in which the Bill is intended to work, and said that the Government were already behaving according to that test. However, Members of Parliament know that the Government respond to requests for information slowly and trickily, and give the minimum, rather than the maximum, amount of information. They do not seem to apply the public interest test—which, allegedly, they have written into the Bill and amended and strengthened in amendment No. 21—as we were entitled to expect.
      In practice, the Government are not even applying the rules laid down by Lord Justice Scott in his report, or those laid down by the Prime Minister in his guidance to Ministers. In practice, the Government make a fetish of restricting and controlling information, and have introduced a Bill with 25 categories of information that can be restricted and controlled. That gives us little confidence that we will have better access to information if and when the Bill becomes law than we had under the old code of practice.
      Mr. Nick St. Aubyn: I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr. Lilley) on the passion with which he has supported the principle of open government, both in government and in opposition.
      Mr. Patrick Hall: Are you sure?
      Mr. St. Aubyn: I share my right hon. Friend's conviction, and as a Member who has been in the House only since 1997, I will not accept lessons from Government Members on commitment to freedom of information. In the past, a few Conservative Members did not see the light in relation to freedom of information. Surely, however, we should welcome a few sinners who repent, and reserve our contempt for the bunch of sanctimonious hypocrites on the Government Benches who preach freedom of information while practising a veto on information.

      739
      In his opening speech, the Minister used language typical of a barrister to assure us that he would replace the culture of secrecy with a culture of openness. Frankly, the only open thing about the Government is their open contempt for the House, which we have seen yet again in the guillotine motion under which we are debating the amendments. The Government have not acquired a culture of openness, but have been infected with a culture of delusion since the day they came to power with such an exaggerated majority.
      I shall give an example of how that delusion reaches to the very top of the Government. We have just heard that the Bill will not even apply to questions that we put to Ministers in the House. Only 12 days ago, I was the first Member to raise in the House the sordid deal that was struck between Liberal Democrat and Labour peers in another place to remove the Bill's teeth. During Prime Minister's questions, the Prime Minister graciously agreed to respond to an issue of concern to my constituents, and answer my question about how open officials in the Environment Agency, the Department of Health and the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions are about the health risks of incinerators. That case study is a prime example of why the Bill will fail in its purpose, and why the public interest disclosure that we are being asked to accept does not go far enough.
      Mr. Simon Hughes: I remember the hon. Gentleman's question. If he is so interested in ensuring that environmental health matters are in the public domain, I assume that he will support amendment (a) to amendment No. 4, which has cross-party support. Presumably he will accept that that would be a further improvement on what is already a positive change, and that no provision affecting that issue has worsened during the Bill's passage.
      9.45 pm
      Mr. St. Aubyn: I will not accept any amendment until I have received specific reassurances from the Minister in his response to the debate. I do not think that any hon. Member should do so, as so much about the Bill is murky and unclear. I have heard exaggerated claims from the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes). I am afraid that he, too, has been infected by the culture of delusion. Perhaps the Liberal Democrats started that culture and infected the Labour party.
      On 20 November, the Prime Minister gave me a reply that put me in something of a quandary, and which leaves an important question to be answered by the Under-Secretary. On the basis of a report in The Guardian on 10 November, I alleged that civil servants had been guilty of a cover-up on health issues connected with incinerators. In his reply, the Prime Minister stated:
      The allegation that officials have hidden information on health and incinerator emissions is false.
      Those allegations came originally from Labour Back Benchers. [Interruption.] Will the Minister clarify whether we should believe the Prime Minister, who asserted that the allegations were false, or the Labour Members quoted on page 12 of The Guardian on 20 November, who made the allegations in the first place?
      A Front Bencher, as well as the Back Benchers, joined in making the allegations. In the report in The Guardian, the Minister for the Environment commented on the
      740
      figures that the Environment Agency sought to hide, before, in circumstances that I shall describe shortly, it was forced to produce them in public. He said:
      I cannot recall seeing these figures … I shall be demanding an explanation from the environment agency.
      Was the Minister for the Environment telling the truth in his allegations that the information was withheld, or was the Prime Minister telling the truth in his recent letter to me? I hope that the Under-Secretary will reply in due course.
      Mr. Bercow: My hon. Friend has made an important point about the questions asked by Labour Back Benchers, and I am sure that we all respect the sincerity with which they asked them. Did my hon. Friend notice that, as he was developing that point and saying that Labour Members had raised the issues, the hon. Member for Ealing, North (Mr. Pound) said from a sedentary position that just because they said it, it did not make it true? Does that not open up a worrying new division? Should we not be concerned about the fact that the hon. Member for Ealing, North has cast aspersions on the integrity of those Labour Back Benchers?
      Mr. St. Aubyn rose—
      Mr. Speaker: Order. It occurred to me while listening to the hon. Member for Guildford (Mr. St. Aubyn) that although I know that he is keen to return to the Lords amendments, he has so far not referred to them. We must return to the Lords amendments.
      Mr. St. Aubyn: I shall try to do that, but we must set in context the contradiction that I have described between the Prime Minister and his Ministers.
      Mr. Gerald Bermingham: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Would you not think it appropriate that, after 12 generations in the House, the hon. Member for Guildford (Mr. St. Aubyn) could at least have learned the rules?
      Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Member for Guildford is not responsible for his ancestors, but I am responsible for ensuring that he keeps in order. He will return to the amendments.
      Mr. St. Aubyn: I am grateful to you, Mr. Speaker, for explaining that elementary point to the hon. Member for St. Helens, South (Mr. Bermingham). We are discussing a new principle in this country, which the Opposition are fighting to have implemented. The problem with the Government's proposals is that the public interest disclosure rules do not go far enough—and I must tell the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey that I am not satisfied that the amendments will do the trick. In the conflict between the Prime Minister, his Ministers and his Back Benchers, we see that when Ministers are given the opportunity to exercise their veto over the public interest requirement, they may not be properly informed by officials. They will be so cocooned in their own ministerial world that they will not be aware of what is happening.
      The public have a right to that information, but on that occasion we learned from evidence given to the Select Committee a few weeks ago that they could not obtain it,

      741
      and that it would not have been obtainable under the Bill. People could ask for the information from the Environment Agency only through the European Union's government code for environmental information. The Bill is less effective than an EU code. What does that say about the significance of the Bill, which is, we claim, neutered, and, frankly, has not been effectively changed by the Liberal Democrat amendments?
      Even worse, the amendments offer no protection against the Bill's operational failure. Civil servants simply mislead the public and fail to make them aware of their proper rights. I shall give an example from the Environment Committee, which it would be wise for Ministers to study carefully.
      Mr. Stephen Pound: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Could you advise us new Members whether it is entirely appropriate to make unsubstantiated attacks on civil servants without providing any supportive evidence? Is that appropriate behaviour for an hon. Member?
      Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member for Guildford (Mr. St. Aubyn) has not contravened the rules of the House, and he is responsible for his own actions. However, I say to him again that he must return to the Lords amendments before us. He is not discussing them; he is discussing the Bill. He must discuss the amendments.
      Mr. St. Aubyn: I am grateful to you, Mr. Speaker. However, the hon. Member for Ealing, North (Mr. Pound) made a serious allegation against me, saying that I was making unsubstantiated accusations against civil servants. I wish to make—
      Mr. Speaker: Order. I have dealt with the point made by the hon. Member for Ealing, North. The hon. Member for Guildford must discuss the amendments.
      Mr. St. Aubyn: I am worried about the amendments because they offer no protection against failure by civil servants, in an operational sense, to carry out the Bill's provisions.
      A witness to the Environment Committee was told by the Environment Agency that it would cost him £200 to have his request for information investigated. He was then told that the correspondence that he claimed existed between the agency and the Ministry did not exist. However, he was able to prove that it did exist, and finally the agency coughed up the information, which involved serious data about the health risks of incinerators in this country.
      I have a further key question for the Minister. How will members of the public, and Members of the House, be protected when civil servants are asked to provide information, but tell us that the information does not exist? In doing so, they may mislead us, not deliberately—although there are strong suspicions that we were deliberately misled in that case. What sanction in the Bill or the amendments will come down on civil servants who do such things?
      Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is struggling again. The debate is not about the Bill but about the amendments, which deal specifically with exemptions. That is the point.
      Mr. St. Aubyn: I am grateful, Mr. Speaker.
      Does amendment No. 21 encompass the Environment Agency? When the agency collects such significant data, is it carrying out a state function on behalf of the Crown? Will the Minister please clarify that? If by holding that information, it is carrying out a state function on behalf of the Crown, will he confirm whether I am right to think that such information would not be subject to the public interest disclosure test, and could be withheld from the public by the exercise of a ministerial veto under amendments that we shall discuss later tonight, if we get that far?
      If key health information can be withheld from the public after the enactment of the Bill, as such information has already been withheld, what is the point of amendment No. 21—or of having a Freedom of Information Bill at all? How can the public trust the judgment of important agencies such as the Environment Agency on issues such as the safety of incinerator plants in local communities if they know, after tonight's debate and the Minister's reply, that key information may still be withheld? The Government are treating the public like children, over an issue that affects people and their families.
      Mr. Richard Shepherd: I give a cheer for the commitment of my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Mr. St. Aubyn) to freedom of information, which I believe to be part of a greater change that is taking place.
      I have no difficulties with Lords amendments Nos. 12 and 13, although I note what the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) had to say. The substance, however, lies in Lords amendment No. 4. The House must feel strongly that what we are doing is trying to rescue a little more from the wreckage of the distinguished White Paper presented by a former Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster—the right hon. Member for South Shields (Dr. Clark), who I see is present.
      Clause 28 deals with authorities covered by the exemption. I shall deal with the Minister's words in a moment, but, as we see from the background to the clause, the authorities concerned include the police, the Serious Fraud Office, the Crown Prosecution Service, Customs and Excise, the Inland Revenue and the Department of Trade and Industry's investigations unit. As the hon. Members for Southwark, North and Bermondsey and for Cannock Chase (Tony Wright) pointed out, they also include the Health and Safety Executive. They include the railways, nuclear installations, mining, agriculture and other inspectorates. They include fire authorities, the drinking water inspectorate, the Environment Agency, trading standards officers, environmental health officers, the Director General of Water Services, the Civil Aviation Authority, the Maritime and Coastguard Agency and—in relation to functions involving farm animal welfare and BSE—the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food.

      743
      The Minister deemed an exemption necessary when the Bill was on Report in the Commons. At that time, he opposed the introduction of a prejudice test. He said:
      in areas of criminal activity and individual liberty, one needs to be very wary of being too quick to assume that no prejudice would be caused. Introducing a prejudice test would lead to a search for demonstrable prejudice, with a real risk of injustices being caused or criminal activity being facilitated where such prejudice cannot immediately be pointed to.
      Furthermore, it is right that the law enforcement agencies should not be subject to the commissioner's view of what would constitute prejudice in this field. The commissioner cannot be an expert in law and order and so must defer to the views of those agencies in this regard. Thus, to introduce a prejudice test would achieve little …
      It is essential that, for information held for the purposes of investigations or criminal proceedings, we retain the protection afforded by a class exemption. It is not appropriate to subject this category of information to a prejudice test, and the Government amendments to clause 13 will in any case ensure that, where there is an overriding public interest in the disclosure of the information, it will be released.—[Official Report, 5 April 2000; Vol. 347, c. 1067-68.]
      Let us consider the Lords amendment that the Government have accepted. This goes to the heart of what we all find difficult. The White Paper constituted a clear enunciation of principles, and seemed to suggest—there was not, on the face of it, a purpose clause in the Bill—that the Government wanted a liberal, wide-ranging Bill that would give our citizens access to information that was readily accessible in other countries.
      The Republic of Ireland, for instance, has just produced a Freedom of Information Bill. This, as we know, is a lesser Bill, and I therefore commend what the Liberal Democrats are trying to do. I stand back, and say that the provision was supposed to be clear. I am talking about the principle of the citizens' right of access to information that they fund, and about enabling us to enter into greater engagement with the formulation of policies. I am talking about enabling citizens to look over the shoulders of those charged with health and safety responsibilities. If we had ready access to the information, we might be cheered by the extent to which public servants tried to ensure public safety. Unfortunately, the run of events seems to indicate that there has been a slackness. Such things can go on, hidden behind clauses in what is a complicated Bill now—it is not an easy Bill. It is very difficult for the citizen to understand whether it is worth embarking on such a course.
      My purpose is not to delay the Bill; it is to commend the amendment to the Government. They should realise that, in the end, they have produced more a mouse than the Freedom of Information Bill that many hon. Members on both sides of the House loudly called for.
      10 pm
      Mr. Mike O'Brien: I have made most of the main points that I would wish to make, so I will reply briefly. I cannot accept the amendment of the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes). I am sure that it is not his intention, but the amendment would lead to attempts to widen the application to include investigations and proceedings that were not narrowly confined to accidents, health or safety and environmental matters, thus undermining the class exemption. We do not consider it acceptable to introduce such scope.
      The clear choice, in our view, is between a prejudice test that would leave uncertainty about outcomes and an exemption such as that which we want in the Bill,
      744
      which offers certainty, but which is conditional on a strong public interest test—it will ensure that, in all circumstances where information should be disclosed, it will be so disclosed. We think that relying on the public interest test and on the public interest is the best approach.
      The hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Mr. Hawkins) says that he disagrees with amendments Nos. 12 and 13. It is not possible to accept the 20 working days time limit as a statutory maximum for both the decision under the Bill as to whether an exemption applies and the public interest test. The latter will often be much more complicated than the former. It may involve consultation with third parties, something that the official Opposition supported in Committee, if I remember rightly. Now they seek to change their view and insist on a 20-day maximum. Clearly, where third parties are involved—they may be, of course, in the private sector—it is right that they should properly be consulted. I am sure that if he speaks to the business community, it will be concerned by his approach.
      There are clear protections against the abuses that concerned the hon. Gentleman. The Information Commissioner can indicate if a public authority is taking an unreasonable time to deal with an application and can issue an enforcement notice, so there are clear protections.
      During the debate, a rather bizarre approach was taken by some Members, particularly the right hon. Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr. Lilley). They urged that we kept the code of practice, but then complained that the Government and other public authorities did not comply with the code. However, they then attacked the Bill because, they said, there was no need to create a statutory right to know.
      Mr. Lilley: Will the Minister give way?
      Mr. O'Brien: I will not.
      The debate has revealed that the Tories are approaching the matter by objecting to the public having a statutory right to know.
      Mr. Lilley: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. When a Minister misrepresents a contribution to the debate and refuses to respond to questions, does a Member have any redress from the occupant of the Chair?
      Mr. Speaker: Those are matters for debate. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will find some opportunity to put the record straight.
      Mr. O'Brien: During the debate, we have heard references to a week of guillotines. All I have heard are the whines of the ancien regime, the old Bourbons worried that they hear the sound of the people's tumbrels coming as the date of the general election approaches. No wonder some of the old Tories are getting worried about the chop. It is not surprising, after we have heard what appears to be a lack of substance from the Opposition. A weak and waffly opposition is what we expect from them, and that is what we are likely to get in the next debate.
      Lords amendment agreed to.
      Lords amendments Nos. 2 and 3 agreed to.

    New Clause
    Lords amendment: No. 4, after clause 1, to insert the following new clause—Effect of exemptions in Part II—
    ".—(1) Where any provision of Part II states that the duty to confirm or deny does not arise in relation to any information, the effect of the provision is that where either—

    (a) the provision confers absolute exemption, or

    (b) in all the circumstances of the case, the public interest in maintaining the exclusion of the duty to confirm or deny outweighs the public interest in disclosing whether the public authority holds the information,

    section 1(1)(a) does not apply.
    (2) In respect of any information which is exempt information by virtue of any provision of Part II, section 1(1)(13) does not apply if or to the extent that—

    (a) the information is exempt information by virtue of a provision conferring absolute exemption, or

    (b) in all the circumstances of the case, the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information.

    (3) For the purposes of this section, the following provisions of Part II (and no others) are to be regarded as conferring absolute exemption—

    (a) section 19,

    (b) section 21,

    (c) section 30,

    (d) section 32,

    (e) section 34 so far as relating to information held by the House of Commons or the House of Lords,

    (f) in section 38—

    (i) subsection (1), and

    (ii) subsection (2) so far as relating to cases where the first condition referred to in that subsection is satisfied by virtue of subsection (3)(a)(i) or (b) of that section,

    (g) section 39, and

    (h) section 42."

    Amendment proposed to the Lords amendment: (a), in line 18, at end insert—
    '(2A) In making any determination under subsection (1)(b) or (2)(b) in respect of information which is exempt by virtue of section 28 and which has at any time been held by an authority for the purposes of ascertaining the cause of an accident or for any investigation or proceedings relating to any requirement relating to the health, safety or welfare of members of the public or of persons at work or the protection of the environment—

    (a) the public interest in disclosing whether the public authority holds the information shall be regarded as outweighing the public interest in maintaining the exclusion of the duty to confirm or deny; and

    (b) the public interest in disclosing the information shall be regarded as outweighing the public interest in maintaining the exemption

    unless, in either case, to do so would or would be likely to prejudice any particular investigations or proceedings of the kind referred to in that section.
    (2B) Where—

    (a) disclosing whether information referred to in subsection (2A) is held, or

    (b) disclosing information referred to in subsection (2A)

    would or would be likely to have either of the effects referred to in that subsection, nothing in that subsection shall prejudice the generality of subsection (1)(b) or (2)(b).'.—[Mr. Simon Hughes.]
    Question put, That the amendment to the Lords amendment be made:—
    The House divided: Ayes 56, Noes 343.

    Division No. 355]

    [10.5 pm

    AYES

    Allan, Richard

    Kennedy, Rt Hon Charles

    Ashdown, Rt Hon Paddy

    (Ross Skye & Inverness W)

    Ballard, Jackie

    Kirkwood, Archy

    Bell, Martin (Tatton)

    Livsey, Richard

    Brake, Tom

    Llwyd, Elfyn

    Brand, Dr Peter

    McDonnell, John

    Breed, Colin

    McNamara, Kevin

    Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)

    Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll & Bute)

    Burnett, John

    Mitchell, Austin

    Burstow, Paul

    Moore, Michael

    Campbell, Rt Hon Menzies

    Oaten, Mark

    (NE Fife)

    Ross, William (E Lond'y)

    Chidgey, David

    Russell, Bob (Colchester)

    Clark, Rt Hon Dr David (S Shields)

    Sanders, Adrian

    Corbett, Robin

    Shepherd, Richard

    Corbyn, Jeremy

    Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

    Cotter, Brian

    Skinner, Dennis

    Davey, Edward (Kingston)

    Smyth, Rev Martin (Belfast S)

    Fearn, Ronnie

    Stunell, Andrew

    Foster, Don (Bath)

    Taylor, Simon (Truro)

    Gidley, Sandra

    Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

    Hancock, Mike

    Tonge, Dr Jenny

    Harris, Dr Evan

    Tyler, Paul

    Harvey, Nick

    Vis, Dr Rudi

    Heath, David (Somerton & Frome)

    Webb, Steve

    Hughes, Simon (Southwark N)

    Wigley, Rt Hon Dafydd

    Jones, Ms Jenny

    Willis, Phil

    (Wolverh'ton SW)

    Wright, Tony (Cannock)

    Jones, Dr Lynne (Selly Oak)

    Tellers for the Ayes:

    Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

    Sir Robert Smith and

    Keetch, Paul

    Mr. Lembit Öpik.

    NOES

    Abbott, Ms Diane

    Browne, Desmond

    Adams, Mrs Irene (Paisley N)

    Buck, Ms Karen

    Ainger, Nick

    Burden, Richard

    Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)

    Burgon, Colin

    Alexander, Douglas

    Butler, Mrs Christine

    Allen, Graham

    Byers, Rt Hon Stephen

    Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)

    Caborn, Rt Hon Richard

    Anderson, Janet (Rossendale)

    Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

    Armstrong, Rt Hon Ms Hilary

    Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

    Ashton, Joe

    Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

    Atherton, Ms Candy

    Campbell-Savours, Dale

    Atkins, Charlotte

    Cann, Jamie

    Austin, John

    Caplin, Ivor

    Banks, Tony

    Casale, Roger

    Barnes, Harry

    Caton, Martin

    Barron, Kevin

    Cawsey, Ian

    Battle, John

    Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

    Bayley, Hugh

    Chaytor, David

    Beard, Nigel

    Clapham, Michael

    Begg, Miss Anne

    Clark, Dr Lynda

    Bell, Stuart (Middlesbrough)

    (Edinburgh Pentlands)

    Bennett, Andrew F

    Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

    Benton, Joe

    Clarke, Charles (Norwich S)

    Bermingham, Gerald

    Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)

    Berry, Roger

    Clarke, Rt Hon Tom (Coatbridge)

    Best, Harold

    Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

    Betts, Clive

    Clelland, David

    Blackman, Liz

    Clwyd, Ann

    Blears, Ms Hazel

    Coaker, Vernon

    Blizzard, Bob

    Coffey, Ms Ann

    Blunkett, Rt Hon David

    Coleman, Iain

    Boateng, Rt Hon Paul

    Colman, Tony

    Borrow, David

    Connarty, Michael

    Bradley, Keith (Withington)

    Cook, Frank (Stockton N)

    Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

    Cooper, Yvette

    Bradshaw, Ben

    Corston, Jean

    Brinton, Mrs Helen

    Cousins, Jim

    Brown, Rt Hon Nick (Newcastle E)

    Crausby, David

    Brown, Russell (Dumfries)

    Cryer, Mrs Ann (Keighley)

    747

    Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

    Hughes, Ms Beverley (Stretford)

    Cummings, John

    Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

    Cunningham, Jim (Cov'try S)

    Humble, Mrs Joan

    Dalyell, Tam

    Hurst, Alan

    Darling, Rt Hon Alistair

    Hutton, John

    Darvill, Keith

    Iddon, Dr Brian

    Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

    Illsley, Eric

    Davidson, Ian

    Jackson, Ms Glenda (Hampstead)

    Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)

    Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)

    Davies, Geraint (Croydon C)

    Jenkins, Brian

    Davis, Rt Hon Terry

    Johnson, Miss Melanie

    (B'ham Hodge H)

    (Welwyn Hatfield)

    Dawson, Hilton

    Jones, Mrs Fiona (Newark)

    Dean, Mrs Janet

    Jones, Helen (Warrington N)

    Denham, John

    Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)

    Dismore, Andrew

    Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald

    Dobbin, Jim

    Keeble, Ms Sally

    Dobson, Rt Hon Frank

    Keen, Alan (Feltham & Heston)

    Donohoe, Brian H

    Keen, Ann (Brentford & Isleworth)

    Doran, Frank

    Kemp, Fraser

    Dowd, Jim

    Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

    Drew, David

    Khabra, Piara S

    Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth

    Kidney, David

    Eagle, Angela (Wallasey)

    Kilfoyle, David

    Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

    King, Andy (Rugby & Kenilworth)

    Edwards, Huw

    King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green)

    Efford, Clive

    Kumar, Dr Ashok

    Ellman, Mrs Louise

    Ladyman, Dr Stephen

    Ennis, Jeff

    Lammy, David

    Field, Rt Hon Frank

    Laxton, Bob

    Fitzpatrick, Jim

    Lepper, David

    Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

    Leslie, Christopher

    Flint, Caroline

    Levitt, Tom

    Flynn, Paul

    Lewis, Ivan (Bury S)

    Foster, Rt Hon Derek

    Lewis, Terry (Worsley)

    Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings)

    Linton, Martin

    Foster, Michael J (Worcester)

    Lloyd, Tony (Manchester C)

    Foulkes, George

    Lock, David

    Galloway, George

    Love, Andrew

    Gapes, Mike

    McAvoy, Thomas

    Gardiner, Barry

    McCabe, Steve

    George, Bruce (Walsall S)

    McCafferty, Ms Chris

    Gerrard, Neil

    McCartney, Rt Hon Ian

    Gibson, Dr Ian

    (Makerfield)

    Gilroy, Mrs Linda

    McDonagh, Siobhain

    Godsiff, Roger

    Macdonald, Calum

    Goggins, Paul

    McFall, John

    Golding, Mrs Llin

    McIsaac, Shona

    Gordon, Mrs Eileen

    McKenna, Mrs Rosemary

    Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

    McNulty, Tony

    Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

    MacShane, Denis

    Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

    Mactaggart, Fiona

    Grocott, Bruce

    McWalter, Tony

    Grogan, John

    McWilliam, John

    Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

    Mahon, Mrs Alice

    Hamilton, Fabian (Leeds NE)

    Mallaber, Judy

    Hanson, David

    Marsden, Gordon (Blackpool S)

    Harman, Rt Hon Ms Harriet

    Marsden, Paul (Shrewsbury)

    Healey, John

    Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

    Henderson, Doug (Newcastle N)

    Marshall-Andrews, Robert

    Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

    Martlew, Eric

    Hepburn, Stephen

    Maxton, John

    Heppell, John

    Meacher, Rt Hon Michael

    Hesford, Stephen

    Meale, Alan

    Hewitt, Ms Patricia

    Merron, Gillian

    Hill, Keith

    Michael, Rt Hon Alun

    Hinchliffe, David

    Michie, Bill (Shef'ld Heeley)

    Hodge, Ms Margaret

    Milburn, Rt Hon Alan

    Home Robertson, John

    Miller, Andrew

    Hood, Jimmy

    Moffatt, Laura

    Hope, Phil

    Moonie, Dr Lewis

    Hopkins, Kelvin

    Moran, Ms Margaret

    Howarth, Rt Hon Alan (Newport E)

    Morgan, Ms Julie (Cardiff N)

    Howarth, George (Knowsley N)

    Morley, Elliot

    Howells, Dr Kim

    Hoyle, Lindsay

    748

    Morris, Rt Hon Ms Estelle

    Smith, Miss Geraldine

    (B'ham Yardley)

    (Morecambe & Lunesdale)

    Morris, Rt Hon Sir John

    Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

    (Aberavon)

    Smith, John (Glamorgan)

    Mudie, George

    Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

    Mullin, Chris

    Snape, Peter

    Murphy, Denis (Wansbeck)

    Southworth, Ms Helen

    Murphy, Jim (Eastwood)

    Spellar, John

    Murphy, Rt Hon Paul (Torfaen)

    Squire, Ms Rachel

    Naysmith, Dr Doug

    Strkey, Dr Phyllis

    Norris, Dan

    Steinberg, Gerry

    O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

    Stevenson, George

    O'Brien, Mike (N Warks)

    Stewart, David (Inverness E)

    Olner, Bill

    Stewart, Ian (Eccles)

    O'Neill, Martin

    Stinchcombe, Paul

    Organ, Mrs Diana

    Stoate, Dr Howard

    Osborne, Ms Sandra

    Straw, Rt Hon Jack

    Palmer, Dr Nick

    Stringer, Graham

    Pearson, Ian

    Stuart, Ms Gisela

    Pendry, Tom

    Sutcliffe, Gerry

    Perham, Ms Linda

    Taylor, Rt Hon Mrs Ann

    Pickthall, Colin

    (Dewsbury)

    Plaskitt, James

    Taylor, Ms Dari (Stockton S)

    Pollard, Kerry

    Taylor, David (NW Leics)

    Pond, Chris

    Temple-Morris, Peter

    Pope, Greg

    Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

    Pound, Stephen

    Thomas, Gareth R (Harrow W)

    Powell, Sir Raymond

    Timms, Stephen

    Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham E)

    Tipping, Paddy

    Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

    Todd, Mark

    Prescott, RI Hon John

    Touhig, Don

    Primarolo, Dawn

    Trickett, Jon

    Prosser, Gwyn

    Truswell, Paul

    Purchase, Ken

    Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

    Quin, Rt Hon Ms Joyce

    Turner, Dr Desmond (Kemptown)

    Quinn, Lawrie

    Turner, Dr George (NW Norfolk)

    Radice, Rt Hon Giles

    Turner, Neil(Wigan)

    Rammell, Bill

    Twigg, Derek (Halton)

    Rapson, Syd

    Twigg, Stephen (Enfield)

    Raynsford, Nick

    Tynan, Bill

    Reed, Andrew (Loughborough)

    Vaz, Keith

    Reid, Rt Hon Dr John (Hamilton N)

    Walley, Ms Joan

    Robinson, Geoffrey (Cov'try NW)

    Ward, Ms Claire

    Roche, Mrs Barbara

    Wareing, Robert N

    Rooker, Rt Hon Jeff

    Watts, David

    Rooney, Terry

    White, Brian

    Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

    Whitehead, Dr Alan

    Rowlands, Ted

    Wicks, Malcolm

    Roy, Frank

    Williams, Rt Hon Alan

    Ruane, Chris

    (Swansea W)

    Ruddock, Joan

    Williams, Alan W (E Carmarthen)

    Russell, Ms Christine (Chester)

    Williams, Mrs Betty (Conwy)

    Ryan, Ms Joan

    Wills, Michael

    Salter, Martin

    Wilson, Brian

    Savidge, Malcolm

    Winnick, David

    Sawford, Phil

    Woolas, Phil

    Sedgemore, Brian

    Worthington, Tony

    Shaw, Jonathan

    Wray, James

    Sheerman, Barry

    Wright, Anthony D (Gt Yarmouth)

    Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert

    Wyatt, Derek

    Short, Rt Hon Clare

    Singh, Marsha

    Tellers for the Noes:

    Smith, Rt Hon Andrew (Oxford E)

    Mr. David Jamieson and

    Smith, Angela (Basildon)

    Mrs. Anne McGuire.

    Question accordingly negatived.
    Lords amendment agreed to.
    Mr. Paul Tyler: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Have you received any indication that the Government intend to make a business statement? The House will be aware that the other place has voted against the Government by a majority of seven on National Air Traffic Services. Earlier, I asked the Minister whether the

    749
    Government intended to bring that matter back to the House tomorrow at 10 pm if the Government were defeated in the other place. Notwithstanding the fact that only 32 per cent. of Tory peers turned out, compared with 77 per cent. of Liberal Democrats, the Government have been defeated. The Minister was not able to answer my question earlier. Have you had any indication that the Government intend to make a statement?
    Mr. Speaker: I think that the House will have got the gist of the message that the hon. Gentleman is trying to put across. That matter has nothing to do with me. No one has approached me about any statement.

Clause 3

  AMENDMENT OF SCHEDULE 1
  Lords amendment: No. 5, in page 2, line 35, leave out ("or by a government department") and insert
  ("by a government department or by the National Assembly for Wales")
  Mr. Mike O'Brien: I beg to move, That this House agrees with the Lords in the said amendment.
  Mr. Speaker: With this it will be convenient to discuss Lords amendments Nos. 6 to 10, 25, 28 to 34, 36 to 38, 68, 69, 74, 77, 78 and 82.
  Mr. O'Brien: The amendments ensure that the Bill takes full account of devolved arrangements in Wales and Northern Ireland, and ensure appropriate consultation. I shall deal with any questions later.
  Mr. Hawkins: Although the Minister has moved the amendments briefly, the House should spend some time on them. My right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) and others may have some points to make. The swift dismissal on a matter as crucial as freedom of information of all the amendments tabled by the Government themselves on matters relating to the National Assembly for Wales and the Northern Ireland Assembly displays a worrying approach to the new, devolved institutions that the Government set up. We have repeatedly made clear our concern about the brief time left to us by the Government's guillotine, and it is surely incumbent on the Minister to justify the many changes that the Government want to make to their own Bill.
  The Government created the new, devolved institutions. Surely when they were producing the Freedom of Information Bill, in the curious manner in which they have approached it throughout, they should have got all the parts relating to Wales and Northern Ireland right first time around rather than having to table a raft of consequential amendments now. We shall wait to hear the important points that my right hon. and hon. Friends will make, and, as the Minister spoke so briefly, I reserve my right to intervene on him when he responds to them. He has not given the House the courtesy of an opening statement in moving important amendments, and we must have an opportunity to intervene on him later.
  Mr. Forth: My hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Mr. Hawkins) is correct.
  750
  I want to dwell for a few moments on Lords amendments Nos. 5, 10, 29, 31, 68 and 74, on which several important questions arise. For example, amendment No. 5 proposes to amend clause 3 subsection (2)(b) to bracket together
  a Minister of the Crown in his capacity as Minister
  and "a government department" and the National Assembly for Wales. As my hon. Friend pointed out, that immediately raises some important points which heighten our disappointment that the Minister felt it unnecessary to speak to the House on such an important group—dealing as they do with vital relationships between the National Assembly for Wales, in particular, and Departments. I hope that there will be no attempt to skip lightly over these matters, as they are of considerable importance.
  Is the Minister satisfied that the amendment, in bringing together a Department and the National Assembly, is correct in its assumption that the powers exercisable by a Department on the one hand and the National Assembly on the other—two extremely different political entities—have validity? Can we be content with that provision simply on the basis on which it is offered?
  When we consider amendment No. 10 to clause 6, matters become more difficult. It states:
  Before making an order under subsection (3), the Secretary of State shall … if the order relates to the National Assembly for Wales or a Welsh public authority, consult the National Assembly for Wales.
  For some time, I have been worried about the extent to which that word "consult" has slipped into statute or into Bills, because I am not sure whether any of us has a clear idea of what it means in practice, or to what it commits the Government or—in this case—the Secretary of State.
  Let us suppose that the Secretary of State goes through that process of consultation—as yet undefined. What do we suppose will happen if the Secretary of State consults the National Assembly and there is disagreement during that process? Whose word will be final? We can take a pretty good guess. I would hazard a guess that it would be the Secretary of State—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh no".] If that were so—and I am only guessing—where does that leave the National Assembly? Is it a mere consultee? Are the views of the Assembly simply to be brushed aside by the Secretary of State of the day? Can the Minister offer us any reassurance that the Assembly will be taken seriously?
  Mr. John Redwood rose—
  Mr. Forth: I give way to my right hon. Friend, who has considerable experience in these matters—on both sides.
  Mr. Redwood: The original draft of the Bill states that
  "government department" includes the National Assembly for Wales.
  Has my right hon. Friend noticed that? However, we are being invited to insert that idea in several places before it is mentioned in the original text, and to include provisions on consultations.
  Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Government have been rapped over the knuckles by the National Assembly for presuming that the Secretary of State can act on behalf of the Assembly without asking it? As a result, the Government are introducing a consultation process in a lukewarm way to try to cover up their deep embarrassment.

  751
  It also looks as though the drafting was extremely sloppy, which is why this idea that a Department is the same as the National Assembly for these purposes has to be inserted in various parts of the Bill. Once again, the Government have placed incompetent legislation before the House.
  Mr. Forth: I share my right hon. Friend's view, but when the Minister winds up the debate he will have an opportunity to answer those points. He declined to do so at the beginning, when he might have saved himself and us a lot of time if he had taken the trouble to explain these matters to us. However, I hope he will cover the points made by my right hon. Friend in due course.
  Mr. John Gummer: I am rather concerned about what would happen if the provision were not included. Was the intention not to consult the National Assembly? Is the provision being included to make sure that such consultation takes place? Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is odd that the whole Bill should have been published as though the National Assembly did not exist? At the last moment, we have to draw up all these provisions in case someone complains. Should not the House demand that, in future, the Government get Bills right in the first place?
  10.30 pm
  Mr. Forth: Of course that would be ideal. My right hon. Friend is right; we are beginning to see the possibility of the Government being devoured by their own children. I can certainly believe what both my right hon. Friends have suggested.
  We will hear from the Minister shortly, when he will exercise that freedom of information concept with which we are all so absorbed. He will share with us exactly what is the background of the matter and tell us whether or not there has been a row behind the scenes between the Government and the National Assembly for Wales because the Government ignored the Assembly when drafting the Bill and have been forced to include a specific undertaking.
  Mr. Hawkins rose—
  Mr. Forth: I shall first give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow); he has been waiting for some time, but I then want to make progress, as I am in danger of getting bogged down. I want to say a lot of other things, so my hon. Friend will not delay me, will he?
  Mr. Bercow: I would not dream of delaying my right hon. Friend for longer than necessary, but does he not agree that his anxiety about tokens and fig leaves is further reinforced by the fact that the Labour party has in the past distinguished between consultative referendums on the one hand and binding referendums on the other?
  Mr. Forth: That is true, but I fear that if I were to explore that matter too fully I might incur your wrath, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and it is bit early in my speech to do that—no doubt it will happen later.
  Mr. Dafydd Wigley: Does the right hon. Gentleman accept that we in the National Assembly for
  752
  Wales would find it very off-putting to be described simply as a Government Department? The National Assembly for Wales is a Government in its own right, not a Department. The proposed wording seems as though it has been added on at a late stage. The Government need to do more than move the motion formally; they need to explain how the Bill has developed at this late stage into a model that hardly gives us confidence that the Assembly's views will be taken on board.
  Mr. Forth: I sympathise with the right hon. Gentleman because I can see, now that he points it out to me, that the proposal looks like an afterthought. If we and the people of Wales were to think that their Assembly was little more an afterthought in the eyes of the Labour Government, I should not like to be in the shoes of either the Minister or, more particularly, the Secretary of State for Wales when he next visits Wales, because he would have a lot of explaining to do. I hope that the Minister will give us an initial explanation, and then we shall see what happens.
  Mr. Hawkins rose—
  Mr. Forth: I shall give way to my hon. Friend, but then I want to make progress.
  Mr. Hawkins: I am most grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way. Does he not agree that this is but the latest example of the Government's embarrassment over matters connected with Wales? He will recall that the Prime Minister suffered the enormous embarrassment of the person whom he sought to impose as First Minister being thrown out.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord): Order. That intervention is too wide of the mark.
  Mr. Forth: I agree, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I certainly will not be tempted by my hon. Friend on this occasion. I want to move on swiftly to consider proposed paragraph (b) in Lords amendment No. 10, because that gets us into even deeper water.
  Mr. Lilley: The National Assembly for Wales is clearly not a Department. The right hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley) suggested that it was a Department in its own right, but surely it is not really a Department.
  Mr. Forth: A Government.
  Mr. Lilley: Surely it is not really a Government in its own right either; it is an Assembly. Is it suggested therefore that information held by Members of that Assembly should be covered by the Bill? If so, is there not a dangerous analogy, in that, subsequently, information held by Members of Parliament would be covered by it? Why is my right hon. Friend so worried about Wales and the Welsh Assembly, and why does he expect to receive any answer from the Minister, when he has not answered the far more important question asked by me and my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow) about whether the House will have less entitlement to information than members of the public? That is the supreme aspect of parliamentary privilege

  753
  raised by the Bill, but the Minister failed to respond because of his tawdry political attempts to misrepresent people.
  Mr. Forth: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend. He raises another question—as to whether anywhere in the Bill or the amendments there is a commitment that the Government should consult the House of Commons. On this occasion, is the National Assembly for Wales being placed above the House of Commons in terms of the obligation to consult? I was hoping to leave this subject but, while I am on it, I have a final thought. Will the consultation process with the National Assembly for Wales include the possibility of a vote by the Assembly on whether it is satisfied with the Secretary of State, or will the consultation process take another form?
  That leads me directly to proposed paragraph (b) in amendment No. 10. It states that
  if the order relates to the Northern Ireland Assembly,
  the consultation will take place with
  the Presiding Officer of the Assembly.
  A different principle is being introduced here. Under proposed paragraph (a), the National Assembly for Wales will be consulted in a way that is still mysterious to us, but paragraph (b) is much more specific. The commitment is to consult the Presiding Officer only.
  I do not know whether we are supposed to assume that the Presiding Officer will make arrangements to consult Members of the Northern Ireland Assembly. The only obligation in the amendment is to consult the Presiding Officer, which will give that individual an enormous degree of influence and the power to speak on behalf of the Assembly.
  Mr. Gummer: I do not know whether my right hon. Friend agrees, but I still think it difficult to understand how one consults the National Assembly for Wales. Clearly, it has been decided that it is impossible to consult the Northern Ireland Assembly and that one has to discuss the matter with the Presiding Officer only, but what is the mechanism for consulting the National Assembly for Wales? Will there be a meeting which its Members all attend, or does one harangue them? What does the Bill suggest one can do to consult the National Assembly for Wales? I can understand how one can consult the Presiding Officer of the Northern Ireland Assembly, but not how one can consult the National Assembly for Wales.
  Mr. Forth: As my right hon. Friend points out, although paragraph (b) of the amendment specifically refers to the Presiding Officer of the Northern Ireland Assembly—it is helpful in that regard—in a sense, it undermines the consultation concept because it is directed solely at one individual. Although paragraph (a) refers to a wider group of people—namely, the National Assembly for Wales—as my right hon. Friend points out, it leaves us completely in the dark as to how one adequately and satisfactorily consults under the terms of the amendment. The Minister has much explaining to do before we move on.
  Rev. Martin Smyth: The right hon. Gentleman is following an interesting line of argument.
  754
  I have considered the issue in detail and I thought that the different provisions might result from the fact that the Presiding Officer of the Northern Ireland Assembly has a seat in the other place: but I then realised that the Presiding Officer of the National Assembly for Wales has a seat in the other place, too. Could the aim therefore be to consult one parliamentarian at the expense of the other, while ignoring the Northern Ireland Assembly by saying that the Presiding Officer there would do the job adequately?
  Mr. Forth: As far as I can see, it is all very tidy: jobs for the cronies. All these people are multi-tasking and shuttling between Assemblies, Parliaments and the House of peers. How they can do justice to their posts is beyond me. The hon. Gentleman is right, and we will want to hear more from the Minister about that.
  Mr. David Wilshire: My right hon. Friend is agonising over why only the Presiding Officer of the Northern Ireland Assembly will be consulted. However, might not the answer be that the only way to obtain a single coherent opinion from the Northern Ireland Assembly is to ask one person? In that way, one would obtain a coherent view.
  My right hon. Friend also might like to consider why the Government chose to consult only the Presiding Officer in Northern Ireland. If Ministers consulted Sinn Fein-IRA and refused to agree with them, they might get shot.
  Mr. Forth: I hope that would not be the case, and I doubt whether that point was at the forefront of Ministers' minds when they considered the wording of the Bill. However, the issue shows the extent to which they have got themselves into difficulty.
  Moving swiftly on to the next amendment in this group which has caught my eye—amendment No. 29—we see that the plot definitely thickens. The amendment explicitly refers to communications taking place, first, between Ministers of the Crown. We understand that concept because two of them are sitting here, eager to answer our questions. It refers also to communications between Northern Ireland Ministers, including Northern Ireland junior Ministers, which may or may not be a satisfactory definition—that remains to be seen. It then refers to communications
  between Assembly Secretaries, including the Assembly First Secretary.
  The amendment introduces a rather odd matrix of different persons. I assume that the term "Ministers of the Crown" subsumes Secretaries of State, Ministers of State and Parliamentary Under-Secretaries, but the Minister might want to confirm that. A different nomenclature is used to refer to Northern Ireland Ministers, including junior Ministers, which could be confusing. The amendment then refers to Assembly Secretaries. More explanation is required, because it is not clear how all-embracing those descriptions are, or whether they are meant to be, to use the current jargon, inclusive.
  I move on to amendment No. 31, which, intriguingly, mentions for the first time the proceedings of the executive committee of the National Assembly for Wales.
  Mr. Wigley: What is that?
  Mr. Forth: The right hon. Gentleman may ask what it is, but amendment No. 31 says,
  at end insert ("and proceedings of the executive committee of the National Assembly for Wales").
  Mr. Wigley: I have never heard it called that.
  Mr. Forth: The right hon. Gentleman implies that there is no such thing. If that is true and if he can catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker, he may want to make his own contribution. The amendment, which we are being asked to agree to, clearly refers to the proceedings of the executive committee of the National Assembly for Wales, and that may be not only confusing but downright inaccurate and dangerous. How does it relate to the references to different Ministers, Presiding Officers and the Assembly for Wales as a whole? The amendment introduces a new entity into the Bill, and I should like to know more about how the Minister thinks that it will operate, if indeed such an executive committee exists.
  Amendment No. 68 gives rise to possible confusion. If I read it out, that will be sufficient to demonstrate the extent to which it is unclear to me, and perhaps then the Minister will elaborate and explain. It says:
  leave out subsection (1) and insert—
  ("(1) For the purposes of this Act each government department is to be treated as a person separate from any other government department.
  That strikes me as stating the extremely obvious, and we must ask why the Minister believes it necessary to insert it in the Bill.
  Unhelpfully, the amendment continues:
  Subsection (1) does not enable—
  (a) a government department which is not a Northern Ireland department to claim for the purposes of section 39(1)(b) that the disclosure of any information by it—
  that, presumably, is the Government Department, and not a Northern Ireland department—
  would constitute a breach of confidence actionable by any other government department (not being a Northern Ireland department).
  I am not sure where that is leading us. It is unhelpful that, at this stage in our proceedings, we are being asked to introduce wording that is possibly confusing. That merits explanation from the Minister, and I regret that he did not give us an explanation at the beginning of the debate, because that might have saved everybody a lot of time.
  Mr. Gummer: Surely my right hon. Friend can see what a disaster it would be if the new paragraph were not included in the Bill. If it were possible for
  a government department which is not a Northern Ireland department to claim for the purposes of section 39(1)(b) that the disclosure of any information by it would constitute a breach of confidence actionable by any other government department (not being a Northern Ireland department),
  that would obviously be a serious disaster. I entirely understand why the Government felt, even at this very late stage, that that provision needs to be included. However, I should like to understand from the Government, as I am sure would my right hon. Friend, quite what sort of disaster that would be.
  10.45 pm
  Mr. Forth: I think that that was a helpful intervention. The Minister will no doubt be able to assure me whether that is the case when he replies to my simple question and to the rather more sophisticated question characteristically asked by my right hon. Friend.
  Rev. Martin Smyth: I appreciate the right hon. Gentleman's giving way. He makes a serious point, which relates to the concept of confidences and, for example, the requirement by the Saville inquiry that the minutes of a Cabinet meeting be produced; or that a former Prime Minister should give evidence; or the announcement on the radio this morning in Northern Ireland that a junior Minister had dictated to the Army Board that two guardsmen should be retained. That is surely exempt information. Perhaps the Minister will give us guidance on that when he winds up.
  Mr. Forth: That is a useful point, although I shall not explore it at this stage. It touches on the conceptual similarity or difference between a leak and freedom of information—a matter that no doubt interests all hon. Members. With respect to my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, South (Rev. Martin Smyth), however, I do not think that we should dwell on it now.
  From this short analysis of amendment No. 68, we can already see that we are all at a loss to understand why it is included, and at even more of a loss to understand what it means and how it will strengthen the Bill.
  Mr. Redwood rose—
  Mr. Forth: Perhaps my right hon. Friend will help me.
  Mr. Redwood: Like my right hon. Friend, I think I welcome the amendment, but the Minister should be drawn into the debate, because the amendment is couched in extremely abstruse language. As I understand it, there is a good principle involved, as well as a damaging principle.
  The good principle is that we all know that Government Departments disagree with one another, and sometimes the disagreements are of great interest to the press, the public and the Opposition. We would like the opportunity to find out more about those disagreements. The problem for the Government is that they are meant to believe in collective responsibility. The advantage of the amendment is that it will enable us and the public to learn a little more about the disagreements. The disadvantage for the Government is that it makes collective responsibility more difficult.
  Mr. Forth: I should like to believe that, but I do not have quite the same faith as my right hon. Friend that the provision will reveal anything of the kind. We have seen right from the beginning of the sorry saga of the so-called Freedom of Information Bill that it is nothing of the kind. It will reveal very little, or only what the Government want to reveal, which undermines its entire purpose. For that reason, I have severe doubts as to whether the process that my right hon. Friend described will take place.

  757
  I conclude my brief remarks, as I said I would, with a quick look at amendment No. 74. Although it helpfully describes itself as
  Meaning of "Welsh public authority",
  which one would have thought should make it helpful, it goes on, rather disappointingly, to list
  any public authority which is listed in Part II, III, IV or VI of Schedule 1 and whose functions are exercisable only or mainly in or as regards Wales, other than an excluded authority.
  Surely that complicates matters unnecessarily. When I see the word "mainly" written into a Bill and potentially a statute, that worries me considerably. What does "mainly" mean in the present context? Who will define "mainly"? What is
  mainly in or as regards Wales?

  I find that phrase distinctly unhelpful and potentially confusing. One can foresee any number of disputes arising over it.
  One would almost have thought that the provision was designed to help the lawyers. As there are two lawyers sitting on the Treasury Bench right now, I am not totally surprised at that, but I should have thought that the Government might not be so blatant in recommending to us, presumably, that we accept such amendments. I can see Members of another place, stuffed as it is with eminent lawyers, being rather keen on this form of words. I cannot imagine the citizenry and taxpayer being so keen. Much more explanation is needed.
  The same issue arises in subsection (2), which reads:
  "excluded authority" means a public authority which is designated by the Secretary of State by order as an excluded authority for the purposes of that paragraph.
  That is almost the opposite of what I have been saying. We are supposed to trust implicitly in "mainly" as guiding us in the right direction. I doubt that it does. Yet we have something that is all too explicit. The provision states in a rather brutal way that the excluded authority is whatever the Secretary of State says it is. Is there to be any flexibility? Will there be any appeal? Will the Secretary of State act by fiat? Will the declaration that the Secretary of State is giving an order be the definition?
  Mr. Bercow: Somewhat uncharacteristically, my right hon. Friend has understated his case. He referred to the presence of two lawyers on the Treasury Bench, one of whom services the Lord Chancellor's Department. Is my right hon. Friend aware that within the Home Office team of six Ministers, no fewer than four—that is two thirds—are lawyers? Is that not a reason to cry?
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I do not understand what that intervention has to do with the amendment.
  Mr. Bercow: The fiat.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: I am grateful. Mr. Eric Forth.
  Mr. Forth: As ever, I am grateful to my hon. Friend for clarifying the matter. My concern was the nature of the role of the Secretary of State in terms of amendment No. 74(2), the explanation of "mainly", and how the
  758
  Minister believes that that word will bear upon the interpretation of this important provision when it comes to reality, if it ever does.
  I wanted to illustrate only one brief point, which by now must be self-evident. Ministers should have learned by now that if they did the House the courtesy of giving us a brief and elegant explanation of why they think that each amendment should or should not be supported by the House, we could probably obviate much debate. I have not had time thoroughly to analyse these matters, because the time for our consideration has been brutally truncated, which in turn means that none of us has had an opportunity properly to examine them. However, having skimmed over them, it is clear to me that many questions arise.
  I hope that the Minister will do us the courtesy, when this short debate comes to an end, and my right hon. and hon. Friends have had the chance to engage in their much more penetrating analysis of the matter, of providing us with many more explanations. I hope that we can then move on.
  Mr. Gummer: I had hoped not to intervene in the debate, but I feel bound to do so because of the shortness of the Minister's statement. I hope to confine my remarks as much as possible.
  The first question that the House should ask about the amendments is how we came to be in the position of considering a Bill that is so poorly drafted that neither the proper rights of the National Assembly for Wales nor those of Northern Ireland were included in it. I should have thought that the Minister would have felt it necessary to start the debate by saying how sorry he was that, for doubtless extremely good reasons, those rights had not been included in the Bill initially.
  I cannot remember having proposed a National Assembly for Wales, nor one for Northern Ireland. However, the Government did. They brought forward the proposals and created the constitutional position in which they find themselves. They must have known that such rights mattered to the Assemblies. Now that we have the Assemblies, I believe that we should respect them, their responsibilities and their authorities. I cannot understand how the Government got themselves into such a position. I had hoped that I would not have to raise the issue. I had thought that the Government would explain it as a necessary beginning to a debate that will now have to be extended, as we ask the questions that could well have been answered at the outset.
  Mr. Wilshire: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that he said that he was surprised that the Government did not start by saying sorry? If he was, will he tell the House why he was surprised, because it is a bit of a mystery, given that no one here can remember the Government ever saying sorry for anything?
  Mr. Gummer: I always believe the best of people before I find the worst. I remain surprised that the Government have not said sorry.
  I hope that the House will not mind if I return to the lead amendment, No. 5, which suggests that we leave out the words "a government department" and insert
  by a government department or by the National Assembly for Wales.

  759
  My right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) has explained how the two things were regarded in the same light and how the National Assembly for Wales was originally perceived as being a Government Department, which must have been the case. However, I wish to raise a second problem, which is that it does not strike me as entirely helpful to speak of the National Assembly for Wales as though it can be treated as a Government Department.
  With a Government Department, one at least knows to whom one must refer if one wishes to consult—or do anything. One naturally goes to the head of the Department, either the ministerial head or the bureaucratic head. However, the problem with the National Assembly for Wales is that it specifically excludes approaching the person whom one might have approached in a Department, and whom one does approach in Northern Ireland; instead, one approaches a thing called the National Assembly for Wales. I can understand that as an institution, but I do not understand it as a corporate consultative person, which it seems to me one has to create if the amendment is to be carried through.
  Mr. Redwood: My right hon. Friend makes powerful points. He will agree that the proposed amendment offers a slight improvement on the obviously wrong text. We are faced with a Government in blunderland—an incompetent Government presenting more than 1,000 amendments this week. However, has my right hon. Friend noticed that the Government do not propose to excise the phrase
  "government department" includes … the National Assembly for Wales
  which appears in part VIII, page 41, lines 2 and 9. The Government blunder continues: they will end up with a hybrid piece of legislation, which, in one place, treats the National Assembly for Wales as a Government Department and, in another, does not.
  Mr. Gummer: My right hon. Friend raises a matter of considerable importance, not least because it begins to open up better than any Freedom of Information Bill could the inner workings of the Government's mind. The Government did not intend that the National Assembly for Wales should play a part; they had not thought about that, but had instead thought about treating everybody in the same way as they intend to treat Government Departments. They have got themselves in their current position only as an afterthought and, as my right hon. Friend says, the afterthought has not been completed. The Government have not trawled through the Bill successfully. Perhaps they should have typed into their Microsoft software the phrase "National Assembly for Wales" and so ensured that every example came up and they did not miss any; but they did not, and someone clearly turned over two pages at once.
  That means that we must look carefully at the amendments before us. Amendments Nos. 5 and 6 are extremely similar and the same problems arise in connection with both. It is important to look again at amendment No. 8, which states:
  Before making an order under subsection (1), the Secretary of State shall—
  (a) if the order adds to Part II, III, IV or VI of Schedule 1 a reference to—
  (i) a body whose functions are exercisable only or mainly in or as regards Wales.
  760
  I have read that on several occasions and find it extremely opaque. No doubt, from time to time, the Royal Horticultural Society makes decisions "as regards Wales". However, what does that phrase mean? In what other piece of legislation is "as regards" used as a term of art? It is difficult to believe that many people will be able to handle that phrase, except with reference to the courts. I hesitate to tread on hallowed ground, but my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst raised the matter of lawyers. I am one of the few members of my generation at Cambridge who did not read law, so I may be prejudiced in believing that we have too many lawyers who always seem to be protected by the way in which we legislate. If ever there was an opportunity for lawyers, the phrase "as regards Wales" provides it, as it opens up every possible argument about almost every element of government that can be characterised "as regards Wales".
  11 pm
  It is unacceptable for part of the Bill to refer to
  functions exercisable … as regards Wales.
  That phrase is not grammatical and means nothing, so I do not know why it has been proposed. If, Mr. Deputy Speaker, you can imagine an example of a function that is not exercisable only or mainly in something, but as regards it, you are a better man than I am. I cannot imagine any circumstance that is covered, not by "only" or "mainly", but by "as regards", unless that means everything. I am sure that the Minister did not choose that phrase of his own volition. He has been dumped in it, as he has by much more that he will have to explain this evening.
  Proposed paragraph (a)(ii) states:
  the holder of an office whose functions are exercisable only or mainly in or as regards Wales.
  What office in the United Kingdom could do that? Perhaps a member of the Government or one of my colleagues from Wales can give me an example of a function that is exercisable not only or mainly in Wales, but only as regards Wales. Is there such an office and, if so, should it be covered by the Bill? Unless we know that, I do not see how we can accept the amendment.
  I am afraid that that applies to almost every amendment in the group. I shall look quickly at amendment No. 10, to which my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst referred. It, too, contains a series of parallels in paragraphs (a),(b) and (c). Paragraph (a) refers to
  the National Assembly for Wales or a Welsh public authority.
  The suggestion is that the Secretary of State should consult the National Assembly for Wales. Although my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst is a distinguished investigator of the rules, he failed to raise an important matter. Why will the Secretary of State consult only the National Assembly for Wales when he wishes to deal with an order that relates to a Welsh public authority? Would it not be reasonable for the changes to include the public authority itself, even if consultation with it is only peripheral? Is it reasonable to exclude that public authority from consultation?
  The necessity to include a new provision in the Bill to enable the Secretary of State to consult the National Assembly for Wales means that, without it, he cannot or

  761
  may choose not to do that. In that case, the House must ask a simple question: would the Secretary of State ignore the Welsh public authority because the Bill did not state that he must consult it? Can the Welsh public authority go to blazes as far as the Secretary of State is concerned for want of a word or two? Perhaps with a word or two, the Secretary of State could get it right. Why does not the Welsh public authority have at least some say in the circumstances that we are discussing?
  It is impossible to understand why amendment No. 10(b) would provide for consulting the Presiding Officer of the Northern Ireland Assembly but not the Presiding Officer of the National Assembly for Wales. I assumed that the National Assembly for Wales did not have a Presiding Officer; I thought that the Government knew something that I did not. However, I checked and discovered that there is a Presiding Officer in both Assemblies. Indeed, their functions are parallel in almost every way. What do the Government know about the Presiding Officer of the National Assembly for Wales that makes him an unsuitable consultee?
  Mr. Wigley: Shame!
  Mr. Gummer: Well, the alternative is that the Government know something about the Presiding Officer of the Northern Ireland Assembly that makes him a suitable consultee. There is something to be discovered. It would be the ultimate irony—
  Mr. Bercow: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Gummer: First, I want to talk about the ultimate irony. It would be ironic if, in discussing Lords amendments to the Freedom of Information Bill, we discovered something about the National Assembly for Wales and its parity with the Northern Ireland Assembly that we would not otherwise have known. The Under-Secretary must explain why one Presiding Officer is suitable for consultation when the other is not. We need to know; without an explanation, the amendments should not be accepted.
  Mr. Bercow: My right hon. Friend casts the National Assembly for Wales in the role of hapless victim on the basis that its Presiding Officer will not be consulted, whereas the equivalent public servant in the Northern Ireland Assembly will be consulted under amendment No. 10. Does my right hon. Friend accept that the alternative view of the matter is that the Northern Ireland Assembly has reason to be aggrieved because only its Presiding Officer will be consulted, whereas the terms of the amendment give the impression that a bigger entity—the National Assembly for Wales—will be consulted if the Government get their way? Either way, someone has good reason to be aggrieved.
  Mr. Gummer: My hon. Friend is right to say that the amendment can be interpreted in both ways. Why is that the case? That is the fundamental question. Why has division been introduced into an otherwise innocuous matter? On one hand, the Government have failed to consider Northern Ireland or Wales and have had to make up for that hastily. On the other hand, they have included
  762
  changes to some aspects but, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst said, failed to incorporate others.
  Now we discover that the Government's changes have created a difference that is difficult to understand and leads many of us to be suspicious of their purposes and reasons. They may be due to incompetence—perish the thought. Perhaps the Government have simply got it wrong. Perhaps, accidentally, nobody read the provision straight or thought about the parallel, but I cannot believe that the Government, who put great emphasis on joined-up government, could possibly have made so elementary a mistake. Therefore, there must be something behind the provision, but what we do not know. We must ask, very clearly, what it is.
  I do not like to criticise my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst in any way, but he passed over the matter with too much alacrity. Amendment No. 10 says that
  if the order relates to a Northern Ireland department or a Northern Ireland public authority, consult the First Minister and deputy First Minister in Northern Ireland.
  Well, that is an interesting situation indeed. If an order relates to a Welsh public authority, the Secretary of State will consult the National Assembly for Wales, but how he will do that is not explained. Will he stand before all its Members and declaim? Will he listen to them or take any notice of what they say? None of that is made clear.
  We all know that the word "consult" is used most widely, but when the Secretary of State is dealing with a Northern Ireland Department it appears that he will consult not the Northern Ireland Assembly, but the First Minister and Deputy First Minister. That would be perfectly reasonable, but I understand that, after a great deal of difficulty and arm twisting, which was unsuccessful, there is a First Secretary in Wales—a person of that kind, though not the person that the Labour party wanted. Why will he not be consulted? Must he sit among all the other Assembly Members and wait for the Secretary of State to consult the lot of them? Why will he be excluded from the consultation? Why will he not be offered the pride of place given to the First Minister and Deputy First Minister in Northern Ireland?
  If the provision has been included by choice, not by accident, the First Secretary in Wales has a reason to complain. Why is he not considered to be the representative of the Welsh nation, whereas the First Minister and Deputy First Minister are considered to be the representatives of Ulster? That is an extremely difficult issue to follow and I should be happy to leave the case there but for the difficult situation and issues raised by other amendments. Therefore, I ask hon. Members to turn to amendment No. 74, not because there is little to say about the other measures, but because they can easily be included in these remarks.
  Amendment No. 74 explains what a Welsh public authority is. I remember a phrase of GK Chesterton that complained about the sentence, "Alone withouten any company," as translated by an American to, "Alone without any company." Chesterton said, "If there can be any person who does not understand that withouten means without—he must be alone withouten any company at all." Can there be anybody who does not understand what a Welsh public authority is, save those who have read the Bill's explanation?

  763
  Of all the things that have worried me in my life, the definition of a Welsh public authority is not high on the list. I come of a Welsh-speaking father. I am very fond of the Principality and yield to no one in my love of its history, but that definition has not kept me awake on any night in the past 61 years. That is the reality, because one understands the definition: a Welsh public authority is a public authority in Wales.
  Mr. Lilley: Or as regards Wales.
  Mr. Gummer: That is the point. A Welsh public authority must be in Wales or may be part of Wales. Now we have this definition, which is important because the definition of Welsh public authority is as understood under clause 80.
  11.15 pm
  I hope that the House has read that clause carefully, because it is very important. It states:
  In this Act "Welsh public authority" means—
  (a) any public authority which is listed in Part II, III, IV or VI of Schedule I
  —happily, there are none in part V—
  and whose functions are exercisable only or mainly in or
  —I have to say it again—

  as regards Wales, other than an excluded authority.
  Well, that does make us happy. The amendment includes any authority that has anything whatever to do with Wales, in any circumstances to which one could possibly get a lawyer to agree, except authorities that are excluded.
  I thought, "If the provision includes everything, I had better find out what it excludes." Now, this is a freedom of information Bill: it is a Bill stating how the Government will open their doors so that we can all understand what is happening—so that nothing will be hidden from public view. And what is stated in subsection (2) of the new clause provided by Lords amendment No. 74?
  In paragraph (a) of subsection (1) "excluded authority" means a public authority which is designated by the Secretary of State by order as an excluded authority for the purposes of that paragraph.
  You can forget your "as regards". Any authority that the Government do not want to be included becomes an excluded authority, although it may have functions
  exercisable only or mainly or as regards Wales.
  How can it be excluded? It can be excluded by fiat. This is a good mediaeval operation: promise everyone everything, but exclude anything that matters. That is what the amendment means.
  Of course this Government—and particularly this Minister—are not like that at all. I know that the Minister would not want to do any of this. So why has he given himself the powers to do it? He is opening the door to future Ministers without his probity, his legal training, his charm, and his ability to explain.
  I have tried to get inside the Minister's prejudices. Has he not thought what a Conservative Government might do with this framework? Has he thought what—perish the thought—a Liberal Government might do with it?
  764
  The Liberals would find it very hard, of course, because they include and exclude at the same time; but that is how they would respond.
  Has the Minister not thought about what he is doing? First he produces a definition so wide as to be meaningless; then he produces powers enabling him to exclude everyone whom he happens not to want to be included. This is a freedom of information Bill. How does the Minister justify leaving out the provision in the first place, returning it partially, and now producing it in a form that is utterly intolerable?
  People may wonder why we are still discussing this at 11.18 pm. We are still discussing it because it is not a meaningless issue, but a fundamental issue. It concerns freedom of information for the public, and the definition of those from whom the information may properly be demanded. It seems to me that the Government have failed to produce an answer that is credible, acceptable, or indeed decent.
  I have not finished, because there is more to the amendment. As I have said, proposed subsection (2) states:
  In paragraph (a) of subsection (1) "excluded authority" means
  a public authority excluded by the Secretary of State. Proposed subsection (3), however, states:
  Before making an order under subsection (2)
  —that is, before excluding anyone—
  the Secretary of State shall consult the National Assembly for Wales.
  Thanks a lot. He goes to the National Assembly for Wales and says, "Hello, National Assembly for Wales. I have arrived. I wish to exclude the following authorities." The National Assembly says, "We do not think that that is a good idea." Then he goes home and says, "I have consulted the National Assembly for Wales and I have decided that it is wrong, so I am excluding those authorities." Nothing in the amendment means that anyone can do anything about that, even if it is an authority
  "whose functions are exercisable … as regards Wales".
  I am terribly sorry, but I still have great difficulty with the grammar of that. I know that I am one of the last remaining people who were educated in the classics, but I do not know how to parse that sentence. It is extremely difficult. I wonder whether the Minister will be kind enough to explain what Hillard and Botting would have explained about "as regards". It seems an issue that should not be missed. [Interruption.] It is no good the Minister asking the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department, who Hillard and Botting are. That is the problem. If a few more people had read Hillard and Botting, we would not have "as regards" at all.
  The House deserves at least a parsable sentence and "as regards" is not parsable—it is not even quocumque. There is no Latin or Greek equivalent. Why? Because it does not mean anything. One of the great things about the classical language is that one has to mean something to be able to say something. There could not have been a Labour party in either Greece or Rome because there was a connection between statement and meaning, which is, of course, extremely embarrassing.

  765
  I do not think that one can finish there. We need to turn to amendment No. 77, which so far has not been discussed. It says—it is very interesting:
  'executive committee', in relation to the National Assembly for Wales, has the same meaning as in the Government of Wales Act 1998.
  I do not wish to quote the right hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley) because he spoke from a seated position, but he gave me to understand that the precise nature of the "executive committee" as defined in the Government of Wales Act 1998, or not as defined, was somewhat difficult to express—he did not believe that it existed. If it does not exist, it is difficult to consult it. If it does exist under another name, we should have the other name.
  I am sure that executive committee, with a small E and small C, cannot be something that one consults. Either it is an Executive Committee, with a capital E and capital C, or it is an equivalent, which I understand is called Cabinet, but are Ministers afraid of consulting the Cabinet of the National Assembly For Wales? Are they frightened of that child that they have borne? Do they not want it to grow up and become the proper representative of the Welsh people? Do they want to keep it down, with a small E executive and a small C committee? Is not that what this is about—the humiliation of the people of Wales, not in a big sense, but in the small sense of using the language to make people small? That is what it is about. Amendment No. 77 is one of those amendments. No. 78 is just as bad.
  Amendment No. 78 is a genuine miracle. It says:
  'Northern Ireland public authority' means any public authority, other than the Northern Ireland Assembly or a Northern Ireland department, whose functions are exercisable only or mainly in or as regards Northern Ireland and relate only or mainly to transferred matters.
  Members will notice that, in that phrase, there is a difference. Why did it not mention transferred matters in the Welsh bit? Why does it have to mention transferred matters in this bit? What is so special about the north of Ireland? I am one of those odd persons who is a Catholic Unionist, so I have a pretty sinuous mind when it comes to considering Northern Ireland. However, I cannot understand what that means. What does it mean? What difference is made by the addition of
  or mainly to transferred matters?
  Let us imagine for a moment a public authority whose functions are not exercisable only in Northern Ireland or mainly in Northern Ireland, but only "as regards" Northern Ireland. So, we have an immediate picture of the type of public authority of which we speak. However, we would have to say that the authority is not really covered by the provision because its functions as regards Northern Ireland are not related mainly to transferred matters. I think that we immediately see which authorities the Government seek to exclude.
  I must ask the Minister to attend on this. Why does the second half of the provision not say, "relate only or mainly or as regards transferred matters"? What have transferred matters done to have "as regards" excluded from them in the second part of the phrase? It is nonsense, and it is unacceptable nonsense.
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  Lords amendment No. 82 is another very revealing amendment. It states:
  at end insert
  (""Welsh public authority" has the meaning given by section (Meaning of "Welsh public authority").")
  What does that add to our understanding? It is in double inverted commas for some reason. I do not know what it means. I have criticised the Government for their grammar, but, now, I have to criticise them for their punctuation. There are two sets of brackets and four sets of inverted commas, none of which add anything to our understanding of the actual phrase. Do we know anything more after the amendment than we did to start with?
  I think that we should oppose these appalling amendments very simply because, first, if they are necessary, they should have been in the Bill initially, and the fact that they were not showed that the Minister cared nothing at all about either Wales or Northern Ireland. Secondly, if they are important, why are they incomprehensible? Thirdly, they contain within them such internal inconsistencies that no sane person would have allowed them to reach the House in such terms. Fourthly, it is inconceivable that they will not provide meat—and very good meat, too; of the sirloin-steak type—for large numbers of lawyers.
  Fifthly, they are—if not otiose—not only incomprehensible, but probably bad. I cannot say that they are certainly bad because they are incomprehensible—which, of course, is the problem with the Government. They have presented us with a list of amendments that we are supposed to pass because we cannot understand any of them. However, those that we have begun to understand are clearly dangerous. The exclusion clause is utterly unacceptable.
  I do wish that the Minister had explained all this to us at the beginning. However, I now know why he did not—because he could not explain it. He has not a clue, and rightly not. What a boring collection of things for him to spend time thinking about. He left it to his civil servants and they have let him down. We look to him for an explanation because, whether he likes it or not, the buck stops there.
  11.30 pm
  Mr. Wigley: I hesitate to follow the right hon. Member for Suffolk, Coastal (Mr. Gummer) who, as a Catholic Unionist—with a Welsh-speaking father, I believe—spoke about Northern Ireland. I am likely to be out of my depth. We also heard from the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr. Redwood), who is a former Secretary of State for Wales, not to mention the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) who on a clear day could see Wales from his former Worcestershire constituency.
  Important questions have been raised. We support freedom of information as a principle, but we want an Act that works effectively for the National Assembly for Wales—one that is understandable, operable and clear, not only to the Assembly and its Ministers but to the people of Wales.
  Frankly, it is difficult to understand where we stand. On page 3, the Bill says:
  "government department" includes the National Assembly for Wales.

  767
  On page 19, it says the same again, but on page 41 it says:
  "government department" … does not include … the National Assembly for Wales.
  Mr. Redwood: Perhaps, from his experience in the National Assembly, the right hon. Gentleman can help me. Was the Assembly consulted about the amendments? Did it say that it was an insult to be called a "government department" when it is something different? Have the Government given any ground to it?
  Mr. Wigley: The right hon. Gentleman goes to the heart of the question of who is to be consulted when one consults the National Assembly for Wales. The Government never consulted me, certainly. I do not know whether they consulted the Presiding Officer. I do not suppose that they consulted the First Minister—we are allowed to use that term, it seems, because on page 19 the Bill refers to "Ministerial communications" and Lords amendments Nos. 31 and 32 would extend that to include Wales. "Ministerial" will now include the Ministers of the National Assembly for Wales, so they are not Secretaries but Ministers.
  I hope, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that henceforward, when reference is made to "Ministers" in Wales, it will be in order to include all the Secretaries, by virtue of what we are now enacting. Mr. Speaker said last week that that was out of order, but we seem to be changing it now.
  Mr. Richard Livsey: Does not the right hon. Gentleman think that one of the reasons why the First Minister has on occasions been excluded in the amendments is that he is a strong believer in freedom of information, and has said that he wants to publish the Cabinet minutes in the National Assembly?
  Mr. Wigley: The Cabinet minutes—not "executive committee" minutes; I do not know where that legalese came from—are indeed being published. The hon. Gentleman may have mistaken the reason why we are being a little circumspect about what the First Minister is allowed to do. If the First Minister was ill, the Deputy First Minister, who is a Liberal Democrat, would take over. The Government are probably exercising a certain amount of care.
  The points raised by the right hon. Member for Suffolk, Coastal and others underline the basic problem with the devolution model that has been enacted in these islands. We have four tiers of devolved government—one in Scotland, one in Northern Ireland, one in London and one in Wales—and they are all different. When one tries to reconcile these, one gets into all sorts of problems, as we are finding with the wording and the verbiage in the Bill.
  The logic of the situation, if we are to have devolved government—as I passionately hope we will, otherwise I will be out of a job—is that it must be coherent. The challenge to the Government, after an election, if not before, or to an alternative Government, is to get some form of devolved government that has a coherence running through it. That does not exist at the moment, which means that when cases come before the courts, bearing in mind the fact that Wales has the same legal structure as England, there will be considerable difficulty in interpreting parts of the legislation.
  The executive committee exists as far as legislation is concerned, but in Wales we deal with a Cabinet. The National Assembly is a body corporate. Therefore,
  768
  reference to the body as a whole does not spell out who is meant but implies that if communication or consultation is with the First Minister or the Presiding Officer it may be with the body as a whole.
  Mr. Simon Thomas: Is my right hon. Friend aware of the fiasco of the census form in Wales for next year, and that in the consultation concerning that form, the National Assembly for Wales was listed as a Government Department? Does he believe that following that fiasco, the Government have had second thoughts as to whether the National Assembly for Wales could be described as a Government Department, and that that is the reason for these amendments?
  Mr. Wigley: Patently, the National Assembly for Wales is not a Government Department. It is a body that includes a Government of Wales, with restricted powers, within the terms of the Government of Wales Act 1998. If some pieces of legislation refer to it as a Government Department and other pieces do not, we have nothing short of a pig's ear. The Government need to have a consistent approach to the National Assembly for Wales, not least with regard to the nomenclature used. I suggest that such consistency of treatment should also apply to the Northern Ireland Assembly, the Scottish Parliament and any other devolved bodies.
  Mr. Bercow: For the avoidance of doubt, will the right hon. Gentleman confirm that the Government did not suddenly see the light and decide to stop describing the National Assembly for Wales as a Government Department? Rather, it is my understanding—which I hope the right hon. Gentleman will confirm is also his—that it was specifically at the request of the First Secretary that the Government conceded, and agreed that they would no longer subsume the National Assembly for Wales within the definition of a Government Department.
  Mr. Wigley: The First Secretary would most certainly have reflected the feeling in the Assembly, and fair play to him. He would have spoken in a way that reflected the aspirations of all of us—to be a body in our own right. If we exist, we exist in our own right. If we are simply a Government Department, that hardly justifies our existence at all. If we exist, let us be able to do things—or let us not exist at all. The same is true about how the First Secretary, or the First Minister, is described. If we believe in devolution, we must allow people to do things for themselves.
  The Minister has not tried to justify any of the amendments before us. When so many aspects of these issues have not been properly thought through—aspects that in the original Bill were contradictory at best, if not totally opaque and impossible to comprehend—the Minister owes the House, at the very least, a duty to explain what the Government are doing and why they got into such a tangle in the first place. Ultimately, I hope that there will be legislation to provide freedom of information and the maximum possible transparency for the National Assembly for Wales and for other bodies, whether they cover Wales, parts of Wales or Wales only by implication.

  769
  We want open government, and to that extent I support what the Government are doing with the legislation—but my goodness, let us do it in a better way than we have done in the Bill.
  Mr. Hawkins: I want to reinforce several excellent points made in the debate, and to say that, as I suspected when I spoke for only one minute to set out the weaknesses in the amendments and express my regret that the Minister had not sought to put them forward other than in an almost formal way, we feel that they contain so many flaws that we propose to divide the House.
  Mr. David Heath: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I believe that the hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Mr. Hawkins) has spoken twice in this debate, without the leave of the House. Several of my hon. Friends have waited some time to contribute to the debate.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. It is up to the Chair to decide who shall be called. I believe that the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Mr. Livsey) sought to catch my eye.
  Mr. Livsey: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I shall not take too much time.
  The key to this debate is the definition of a public authority, as outlined in amendment No. 74. The debate has been revealing, particularly in the skilful near-filibuster of the right hon. Member for Suffolk, Coastal (Mr. Gummer), whose Welsh ancestors should be proud of the non-conformist zeal with which he pursued his exposé of the amendments. Amendment No. 74 reveals that the Secretary of State has too much power, in that he is able to exclude various public authorities in relation to Wales. If the First Minister is not to be consulted, there will be a major problem, and the drafting of the amendments has produced a mess.
  Amendment No. 10 also raises problems over consultation with the National Assembly and with the Presiding Officer in Northern Ireland. Wales also has a Presiding Officer. I agree with the right hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley) that the Bill is not right for the devolution settlement in Wales, which is less effective than those for Northern Ireland and, especially, for Scotland. The fact that the Government have treated the National Assembly as a Department tends to expose the way in which they treated Wales in the Government of Wales Act 1998. Many amendments were tabled when that Bill went through the House, but the National Assembly was refused the right to make primary legislation. If that had been allowed, we should have had far less trouble in tonight's debate.
  Mr. LembitÖpik: Does my hon. Friend agree that all the issues raised will have to be resolved? The problem is that they will be resolved by precedent, and probably as a result of friction arising from the testing of the arrangements. It would be much better if the Government would clarify the issues raised so that we might understand the process of consultation, and how far the National Assembly can be confident that consultation will be taken seriously.
  Mr. Livsey: I thank my hon. Friend for his objective comments. We do need answers from the Government.
  770
  Lords amendment No. 74 displays the power of the Secretary of State over the National Assembly, in its references to excluded authorities. Subsection (1)(a) of the proposed new clause within it refers to functions

  exercisable only or mainly in or as regards Wales.
  Will the Minister explain whether that would apply to a body such as the Environment Agency, which has dual powers in England and Wales?
  11.45 pm
  When we consider the word "mainly", we might recall the song about the rain in Spain falling "mainly in the plain". The provision is broadly drawn and it is extremely difficult to work out what it means.
  The measure is especially disappointing given that, when freedom of information legislation was being drawn up in Scotland, its architect was the Deputy First Minister of the Scottish Parliament, my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Wallace). That was because the Scottish Parliament has primary powers. Indeed, as a result of that legislation, there will be more disclosure of information powers in Scotland than in Wales or England. Legislation for Wales falls short in that regard.
  Mr. David Heath: My hon. Friend refers to the differences between arrangements for Scotland, for Wales and for Northern Ireland. Is not one illustration of that difference the fact that the draft of the Scottish legislation is so superior in both form and content to the legislation for England and Wales, which we are considering?
  Mr. Livsey: My hon. Friend's question underlines the fact that the Deputy First Minister is a skilled Scottish lawyer and has, with the legal authorities in Scotland, drafted freedom of information legislation for Scotland that is far superior to that for England and Wales. It is difficult to divine how many of the amendments, and many aspects of the Bill, will apply to freedom of information in Wales. That certainly points to the need for reform of the legislation for Wales.
  We are considering a maze of amendments with different meanings. Wales needs a settlement identical to that for Scotland, and we need a new freedom of information Bill to clarify the points that I, and other Members, have been making.
  Mr. Mike O'Brien: When I opened this debate on what I thought was a relatively uncontroversial set of amendments, I little realised how many questions I should be faced with. During my closing speech on the previous group of amendments, I referred to a week of Tory waffle. When I saw the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) rise to speak, I knew what I was in for. No one admires more than I do the right hon. Gentleman's ability to think up detailed questions on minutiae while remaining in order and taking up time. He appears before us like a verbal magician to delay matters.
  Mr. Redwood: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. O'Brien: No, I shall not give way.

  771
  I sigh when I hear the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst say that he intends to make brief comments, for I know that brief they will not be—[HON. MEMBERS: "Give way."] As we found out, they were not brief; he spoke for 29 minutes.
  Mr. Redwood rose—
  Mr. O'Brien: The right hon. Member for Suffolk, Coastal (Mr. Gummer) spoke for more than 37 minutes. It was like a wonderful parliamentary version of the BBC Radio 4 programme "Just a Minute", except that the right hon. Gentleman was required to speak in order for as long as he could, without repetition, deviation or hesitation. I award him the points. I also award him Hillard and Botting points.
  The Opposition's use of time is a matter for them. I do not criticise them; they choose to focus on minutiae rather than substance—that is a matter for them. Let Hansard record my suspicion—it is merely a suspicion—that the Conservative Opposition are making use of pedantry to make a point about the guillotine.
  Mr. Redwood rose—
  Mr. O'Brien: I want to make a few closing points. The right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst asked me what "consult" means—a penetrating question. "Consult" means just that. The Secretary of State will listen carefully to the views of the Assembly and the others that are put to him. The right hon. Gentleman then asked whether I was satisfied that the effect of the powers of a Department and the National Assembly for Wales was valid. Well yes, I am.
  The right hon. Member for Suffolk, Coastal made a vexed speech about Wales. As he did nothing to create an Assembly for Wales—no doubt he also opposed the devolution that the Government proposed—and as there are no Tory Members in Wales, forgive me if I find his concerns heartening; perhaps they represent the Tory party's Damascus-like conversion to Wales. The Government care about Wales. That is why we are responding to the concerns of the people of Wales, specifically by consulting them and ensuring that their views are taken into consideration.
  Opposition Members, specifically those on the Tory Benches, have ignored Wales all too often, but the Government have responded to the concerns of Wales. We have consulted, where appropriate. We have ensured that the devolved Assemblies and the other organisations that need to be consulted are properly consulted, because the Government care about them; others do not.
  Mr. Redwood: The Minister has just shown his contempt for the House by his failure to answer a series of detailed and important questions on this disgracefully badly drafted Bill.
  Mr. Öpik rose—
  Mr. Redwood: The Minister is trying to redeem the Bill even at this late hour with some cobbled-together amendments that are not worthy of the Government.
  Mr. Denis MacShane: Give way.
  Mr. Redwood: I have no intention of giving way unless an hon. Member wishes to intervene. I am making
  772
  a speech; the Minister has finished. [Interruption.] I am happy to give way to the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Mr. Öpik).
  Mr. Öpik: We need to understand explicitly what the consultation process will involve and what assurance the Welsh Assembly will have that the consultation process will be taken seriously and that their views will be listened to. Is it not a matter of concern that those points are not clear?
  Mr. Redwood: The hon. Gentleman makes a powerful point—one of many that the Minister could not be bothered to deal with. The original draft of the Bill was an insult to the National Assembly for Wales, which was treated as a Department.
  Mr. David Taylor: Will the right hon. Gentleman way?
  Mr. Redwood: I shall give way in a moment, when I have made some progress. There is very little time because of the ridiculous guillotine on this important devolution and freedom of information legislation.
  The Assembly was insulted. Although the Minister will not clarify this, we believe from the debate that the First Secretary—who is of the Minister's own political party, we thought—had to object strongly to the insult and the Bill's inaccurate drafting. So the Minister has belatedly, at this late hour, moved the amendments which will strike out most of those provisions that state that the National Assembly is a Department and should be treated as such, instead inserting the phrase
  by a government department or by the National Assembly for Wales.
  The Minister has not answered the question that I had to ask in an intervention: why have the Government not proposed striking out those words in clause 81 on page 41? That clause contains the overall definitions, but the Government are still keeping that reference to the Assembly being a Department. My understanding is that even if these Lords amendments are approved, the Bill will be nonsense because of that reference.
  Mr. Mike O'Brien: The right hon. Gentleman is wrong; he should read Lords amendment No. 9.
  Mr. Redwood: It is a great pity that the Minister was not a little more vocal at the beginning. I think that he will still find that the Bill is extremely badly drafted because it does not make clear the difference between the National Assembly for Wales and a Department. He has not explained the point that many Opposition Members have made—it is almost impossible to consult an elected Assembly.
  Mr. Gummer: Has my right hon. Friend noticed that the Minister was prepared to answer that question, but none of the other detailed questions that we have asked? Is that not an abuse of the House? The purpose of asking such questions is to get serious answers, but the Minister has not given a single serious answer.
  Mr. Redwood: My right hon. Friend is right, and the Minister has just mislead the House again. [Interruption.] I shall explain my allegation. Lords amendment No. 9 refers to:
  Page 3, leave out line 12.
  It does not refer to page 41.
  I am much more interested in the bigger debating point that has come out tonight. How does the Minister propose that he and his colleagues should consult the National Assembly for Wales? Will he consult every Member in turn, will he consult just the ruling coalition, or will he consult just the Presiding Officer even though the Bill makes it explicit that the Presiding Officer is to be consulted in Northern Ireland, but not in Wales?
  The Minister is clearly all at sea over an extremely scruffily amended Bill. Even now he is reading cobbled-together notes from officials, who know the Bill better than he does. It is pathetic that he is responsible for the Bill but does not know what is in his own amendments. He then tries to mislead the House by saying that he is amending something that amendment No. 9 does not amend.
  Mr. O'Brien: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for allowing me to deal with his concern that I have misled the House. I certainly had no intention of doing so. Page 41 excludes the National Assembly for Wales from the definition. If he looks at the Bill, he will see that that is the position. The public who read Hansard will be able to judge the seriousness with which some Conservative Members have made their points.
  Mr. Redwood: That intervention shows just how important this examination is. In contrast to what he said originally, the Minister has now said that amendment No. 9 does not make the change that I am seeking. Amendment No. 9 clearly does not do that. The Minister remains in a sedentary position, so he confirms that I am right and that the amendment has nothing to do with it.
  I ask the Minister to read page 41, because he has not read that very well, either. Page 41 says clearly that the definition of "government department" includes—we go down to line 9 and paragraph (c)—
  the National Assembly for Wales.
  Is the Minister going to strike out that provision or not? Why has he not tabled an amendment to try to make sense of his cobbled-together and useless Bill? This is a week of more than 1,000 amendments—national guillotine week—and what a mess he is making of the first Bill this week to come before us under a guillotine.
  We still await a response on how the Minister intends to go ahead and consult a complete National Assembly. Why is the United Kingdom Parliament not treated in the same way? Why is the Northern Ireland body treated differently from the Welsh body? It looks as though strong and special representations were made by the First Secretary, who realised what an insult to Wales the whole procedure was. The Government have made a half-hearted and bodged attempt to deal with the matter.
  Mr. David Taylor rose—
  Mr. Redwood: I will give way to the hon. Gentleman, although it is a bit rich his asking to intervene because he has not been here for this important debate.
  Mr. Taylor: The right hon. Gentleman describes the drafting and content of the Bill as an insult to the Welsh Assembly and to the people of Wales. Does he agree that what is more of an insult to the Welsh Assembly and the people of Wales is the way in which Conservative Members have dealt with Lords amendments this evening? They have done that in such a way that the 12 o'clock closure means that seven groups of amendments have received no debate. That has occurred because of the way in which the Conservative party has approached this debate.
  Mr. Redwood: If the guillotine had not been imposed, we would have had three more hours to discuss the Bill's substance. If Ministers had come to the Dispatch Box and tried to explain the amendments and win the House over at the beginning of the debate, we might have saved a lot of time.
  My right hon. and hon. Friends, as well as Liberal Democrat and Welsh nationalist Members, have asked serious, detailed and important questions as is befitting of proceedings at this stage of a Bill. If the Minister had had the wit, the gumption, the wisdom and the information to have provided explanations at the beginning of the debate, some of those questions might not have been necessary.
  Mr. Lilley: Can my right hon. Friend confirm that, on this Bill on the freedom of information, the Minister has not only not replied to most of the questions put to him but has not, as is customary, promised to do so in writing subsequently? Will my right hon. Friend seek to elicit such a response from the Minister in the dying moments of this truncated debate?
  Mr. Redwood: It has not even been a question of a mute Minister, which, as my right hon. Friend implies, is normal in this Parliament. The Minister does not know his own Bill and then seeks to give wrong information to the House when he is put on the spot.
  Mr. O'Brien: The right hon. Gentleman keeps referring to page 41 and accusing me of not knowing the Bill. Perhaps he should read the Bill. It uses the words "but does not include"—
  It being Twelve midnight, MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER put the Question required to be put at that hour, pursuant to Order [this day].
  Question put, That this House agrees with the Lords in the said amendment:—
  The House divided: Ayes 368, Noes 115.

  Division No. 356]

  [12 midnight

  AYES

  Abbott, Ms Diane

  Anderson, Janet (Rossendale)

  Ainger, Nick

  Armstrong, Rt Hon Ms Hilary

  Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)

  Ashdown, Rt Hon Paddy

  Allan, Richard

  Ashton, Joe

  Allen, Graham

  Atherton, Ms Candy

  Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)

  Atkins, Charlotte

  775

  Austin, John

  Cunningham, Jim (Cov'try S)

  Ballard, Jackie

  Dalyell, Tam

  Banks, Tony

  Darling, Rt Hon Alistair

  Barnes, Harry

  Darvill, Keith

  Barron, Kevin

  Davey, Edward (Kingston)

  Battle, John

  Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

  Bayley, Hugh

  Davidson, Ian

  Beard, Nigel

  Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)

  Begg, Miss Anne

  Davis, Rt Hon Terry

  Bennett, Andrew F

  (B'ham Hodge H)

  Benton, Joe

  Dawson, Hilton

  Berry, Roger

  Dean, Mrs Janet

  Best, Harold

  Dismore, Andrew

  Betts, Clive

  Dobbin, Jim

  Blackman, Liz

  Dobson, Rt Hon Frank

  Blears, Ms Hazel

  Donohoe, Brian H

  Boateng, Rt Hon Paul

  Doran, Frank

  Borrow, David

  Dowd, Jim

  Bradley, Keith (Withington)

  Drew, David

  Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

  Eagle, Angela (Wallasey)

  Bradshaw, Ben

  Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

  Brake, Tom

  Edwards, Huw

  Brand, Dr Peter

  Efford, Clive

  Breed, Colin

  Ennis, Jeff

  Brinton, Mrs Helen

  Fearn, Ronnie

  Brown, Rt Hon Nick (Newcastle E)

  Field, Rt Hon Frank

  Brown, Russell (Dumfries)

  Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

  Browne, Desmond

  Flint, Caroline

  Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)

  Flynn, Paul

  Buck, Ms Karen

  Foster, Rt Hon Derek

  Burden, Richard

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  Burgon, Colin

  Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings)

  Burnett, John

  Foster, Michael J (Worcester)

  Burstow, Paul

  Foulkes, George

  Butler, Mrs Christine

  Galloway, George

  Caborn, Rt Hon Richard

  Gapes, Mike

  Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

  George, Andrew (St Ives)

  Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

  George, Bruce (Walsall S)

  Campbell, Rt Hon Menzies

  Gerrard, Neil

  (NE Fife)

  Gibson, Dr Ian

  Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

  Gidley, Sandra

  Campbell-Savours, Dale

  Gilroy, Mrs Linda

  Cann, Jamie

  Godsiff, Roger

  Casale, Roger

  Goggins, Paul

  Caton, Martin

  Golding, Mrs Llin

  Cawsey, Ian

  Gordon, Mrs Eileen

  Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

  Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

  Chaytor, David

  Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

  Chidgey, David

  Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

  Clapham, Michael

  Grocott, Bruce

  Clark, Rt Hon Dr David (S Shields)

  Grogan, John

  Clark, Dr Lynda

  Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

  (Edinburgh Pentlands)

  Hall, Patrick (Bedford)

  Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

  Hamilton, Fabian (Leeds NE)

  Clarke, Charles (Norwich S)

  Hancock, Mike

  Clarke, Rt Hon Tom (Coatbridge)

  Hanson, David

  Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

  Harman, Rt Hon Ms Harriet

  Clelland, David

  Harris, Dr Evan

  Clwyd, Ann

  Harvey, Nick

  Coaker, Vernon

  Healey, John

  Coffey, Ms Ann

  Heath, David (Somerton & Frome)

  Coleman, Iain

  Henderson, Doug (Newcastle N)

  Colman, Tony

  Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

  Connarty, Michael

  Hepburn, Stephen

  Cook, Frank (Stockton N)

  Heppell, John

  Corbett, Robin

  Hesford, Stephen

  Corbyn, Jeremy

  Hewitt, Ms Patricia

  Corston, Jean

  Hill, Keith

  Cotter, Brian

  Hinchliffe, David

  Cousins, Jim

  Hodge, Ms Margaret

  Crausby, David

  Home Robertson, John

  Cryer, Mrs Ann (Keighley)

  Hood, Jimmy

  Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

  Hope, Phil

  Cummings, John

  Hopkins, Kelvin

  Cunningham, Rt Hon Dr Jack

  Howarth, Rt Hon Alan (Newport E)

  (Copeland)

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N)

  776

  Howells, Dr Kim

  Merron, Gillian

  Hoyle, Lindsay

  Michael, Rt Hon Alun

  Hughes, Ms Beverley (Stretford)

  Michie, Bill (Shef'ld Heeley)

  Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

  Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll & Bute)

  Hughes, Simon (Southwark N)

  Milbum, Rt Hon Alan

  Humble, Mrs Joan

  Miller, Andrew

  Hurst, Alan

  Mitchell, Austin

  Hutton, John

  Moffatt, Laura

  Iddon, Dr Brian

  Moonie, Dr Lewis

  Illsley, Eric

  Moore, Michael

  Jackson, Ms Glenda (Hampstead)

  Moran, Ms Margaret

  Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)

  Morgan, Ms Julie (Cardiff N)

  Jamieson, David

  Morris, Rt Hon Sir John

  Jenkins, Brian

  (Aberavon)

  Johnson, Miss Melanie

  Mudie, George

  (Welwyn Hatfield)

  Mullin, Chris

  Jones, Mrs Fiona (Newark)

  Murphy, Denis (Wansbeck)

  Jones, Helen (Warrington N)

  Murphy, Jim (Eastwood)

  Jones, Ms Jenny

  Murphy, Rt Hon Paul (Torfaen)

  (Wolverh'ton SW)

  Naysmith, Dr Doug

  Jones, Dr Lynne (Selly Oak)

  Norris, Dan

  Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)

  Oaten, Mark

  Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

  O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

  Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald

  O'Brien, Mike (N Warks)

  Keeble, Ms Sally

  Olner, Bill

  Keen, Alan (Feltham & Heston)

  O'Neill, Martin

  Keen, Ann (Brentford & Isleworth)

  Öpik, Lembit

  Keetch, Paul

  Organ, Mrs Diana

  Kemp, Fraser

  Palmer, Dr Nick

  Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

  Pearson, Ian

  Khabra, Piara S

  Pendry, Tom

  Kidney, David

  Perham, Ms Linda

  Kilfoyle, Peter

  Pickthall, Colin

  King, Andy (Rugby & Kenilworth)

  Plaskitt, James

  King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green)

  Pollard, Kerry

  Kirkwood, Archy

  Pond, Chris

  Kumar, Dr Ashok

  Pope, Greg

  Ladyman, Dr Stephen

  Pound, Stephen

  Laxton, Bob

  Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham E)

  Lepper, David

  Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

  Leslie, Christopher

  Primarolo, Dawn

  Levitt, Tom

  Prosser, Gwyn

  Lewis, Ivan (Bury S)

  Purchase, Ken

  Lewis, Terry (Worsley)

  Quinn, Lawrie

  Linton, Martin

  Rammell, Bill

  Livsey, Richard

  Rapson, Syd

  Lloyd, Tony (Manchester C)

  Raynsford, Nick

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Reed, Andrew (Loughborough)

  Lock, David

  Roche, Mrs Barbara

  Love, Andrew

  Rooker, Rt Hon Jeff

  McAvoy, Thomas

  Rooney, Terry

  McCabe, Steve

  Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

  McCafferty, Ms Chris

  Rowlands, Ted

  McCartney, Rt Hon Ian

  Roy, Frank

  (Makerfield)

  Ruane, Chris

  McDonagh, Siobhain

  Ruddock, Joan

  Macdonald, Calum

  Russell, Bob (Colchester)

  McDonnell, John

  Russell, Ms Christine (Chester)

  McFall, John

  Ryan, Ms Joan

  McGuire, Mrs Anne

  Salter, Martin

  McIsaac, Shona

  Sanders, Adrian

  McNamara, Kevin

  Savidge, Malcolm

  McNulty, Tony

  Sawford, Phil

  MacShane, Denis

  Sedgemore, Brian

  Mactaggart, Fiona

  Shaw, Jonathan

  McWalter, Tony

  Sheerman, Barry

  McWilliam, John

  Short, Rt Hon Clare

  Mahon, Mrs Alice

  Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

  Mallaber, Judy

  Singh, Marsha

  Marsden, Paul (Shrewsbury)

  Skinner, Dennis

  Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

  Smith, Rt Hon Andrew (Oxford E)

  Marshall-Andrews, Robert

  Smith, Angela (Basildon)

  Martlew, Eric

  Smith, Miss Geraldine

  Maxton, John

  (Morecambe & Lunesdale)

  Meacher, Rt Hon Michael

  Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

  Meale, Alan

  Smith, John (Glamorgan)

  777

  Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

  Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

  Smith, Sir Robert (W Ab'd'ns)

  Turner, Dr Desmond (Kemptown)

  Snape, Peter

  Turner, Dr George (NW Norfolk)

  Soley, Clive

  Turner, Neil (Wigan)

  Southworth, Ms Helen

  Twigg, Derek (Halton)

  Squire, Ms Rachel

  Twigg, Stephen (Enfield)

  Starkey, Dr Phyllis

  Tyler, Paul

  Steinberg, Gerry

  Tynan, Bill

  Stevenson, George

  Vis, Dr Rudi

  Stewart, David (Inverness E)

  Walley, Ms Joan

  Stewart, Ian (Eccles)

  Ward, Ms Claire

  Stinchcombe, Paul

  Wareing, Robert N

  Stoate, Dr Howard

  Watts, David

  Strang, Rt Hon Dr Gavin

  Webb, Steve

  Straw, Rt Hon Jack

  White, Brian

  Stringer, Graham

  Whitehead, Dr Alan

  Stuart, Ms Gisela

  Wicks, Malcolm

  Stunell, Andrew

  Wigley, Rt Hon Dafydd

  Taylor, Rt Hon Mrs Ann

  Williams, Rt Hon Alan

  (Dewsbury)

  (Swansea W)

  Taylor, Ms Dair (Stockton S)

  Williams, Alan W (E Carmarthen)

  Taylor, David (NW Leics)

  Williams, Mrs Betty (Conwy)

  Taylor, Matthew (Truro)

  Willis, Phil

  Temple-Morris, Peter

  Winnick, David

  Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

  Woolas, Phil

  Thomas, Gareth R (Harrow W)

  Worthington, Tony

  Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

  Wray, James

  Timms, Stephen

  Wright, Anthony D (Gt Yarmouth)

  Tipping, Paddy

  Wright, Tony (Cannock)

  Todd, Mark

  Wyatt, Derek

  Tonge, Dr Jenny

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Trickett, Jon

  Mr. Don Touhig and

  Truswell, Paul

  Mr. Gerry Sutcliffe.

  NOES

  Ainsworth, Peter (E Surrey)

  Greenway, John

  Amess, David

  Grieve, Dominic

  Arbuthnot, Rt Hon James

  Gummer, Rt Hon John

  Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

  Hammond, Philip

  Baldry, Tony

  Hawkins, Nick

  Bercow, John

  Hayes, John

  Beresford, Sir Paul

  Heald, Oliver

  Blunt, Crispin

  Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas

  Boswell, Tim

  Horam, John

  Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

  Howarth, Gerald (Aldershot)

  Brady, Graham

  Jack, Rt Hon Michael

  Brazier, Julian

  Jackson, Robert (Wantage)

  Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

  Lait, Mrs Jacqui

  Browning, Mrs Angela

  Lansley, Andrew

  Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)

  Leigh, Edward

  Burns, Simon

  Lewis Dr Julian (New Forest E)

  Butterfill, John

  Lidington, David

  Cash, William

  Lilley, Rt Hon Peter

  Chapman, Sir Sydney

  Lloyd, Rt Hon Sir Peter (Fareham)

  (Chipping Barnet)

  Luff, Peter

  Chope, Christopher

  Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas

  Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth

  McIntosh, Miss Anne

  (Rushcliffe)

  Maclean, Rt Hon David

  Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey

  McLoughlin, Patrick

  Collins, Tim

  Madel, Sir David

  Gran, James

  Malins, Humfrey

  Curry, Rt Hon David

  Maples, John

  Dorrell, Rt Hon Stephen

  Maude, Rt Hon Francis

  Duncan, Alan

  Mawhinney, Rt Hon Sir Brian

  Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter

  May, Mrs Theresa

  Evans, Nigel

  Nicholls, Patrick

  Fabricant, Michael

  O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

  Fallon, Michael

  Page, Richard

  Flight, Howard

  Paice, James

  Forth, Rt Hon Eric

  Pickles, Eric

  Fraser, Christopher

  Prior, David

  Gale, Roger

  Randall, John

  Gibb, Nick

  Redwood, Rt Hon John

  Gorman, Mrs Teresa

  Robathan, Andrew

  Green, Damian

  Robertson, Laurence (Tewk'b'ry)

  778

  Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)

  Taylor, Sir Teddy

  Ross, William (E Lond'y)

  Townend, John

  Ruffley, David

  Tredinnick, David

  St Aubyn, Nick

  Trend, Michael

  Sayeed, Jonathan

  Tyrie, Andrew

  Shephard, Rt Hon Mrs Gillian

  Waterson, Nigel

  Simpson, Keith (Mid-Norfolk)

  Wells, Bowen

  Smyth, Rev Martin (Belfast S)

  Whitney, Sir Raymond

  Soames, Nicholas

  Whittingdale, John

  Spelman, Mrs Caroline

  Widdecombe, Rt Hon Miss Ann

  Spicer, Sir Michael

  Wilkinson, John

  Spring, Richard

  Willetts, David

  Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

  Wilshire, David

  Steen, Anthony

  Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)

  Streeter, Gary

  Winterton, Nicholas (Macclesfield)

  Swayne, Desmond

  Yeo, Tim

  Syms, Robert

  Young, Rt Hon Sir George

  Tapsell, Sir Peter

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Taylor, Ian (Esher & Walton)

  Mr. Peter Atkinson and

  Taylor, John M (Solihull)

  Mr. Stephen Day.

  Question accordingly agreed to.
  Lords amendment agreed to.
  MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER then put the remaining Questions required to be put at that hour.
  Question put, That this House agrees with the Lords in the remaining Lords amendments:—
  The House divided: Ayes 364, Noes 116.

  Division No. 357]

  [12.13 am

  AYES

  Abbott, Ms Diane

  Brown, Rt Hon Nick (Newcastle E)

  Ainger, Nick

  Brown, Russell (Dumfries)

  Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)

  Browne, Desmond

  Allan, Richard

  Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)

  Allen, Graham

  Buck, Ms Karen

  Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)

  Burden, Richard

  Anderson, Janet (Rossendale)

  Burgon, Colin

  Armstrong, Rt Hon Ms Hilary

  Burnett, John

  Ashdown, Rt Hon Paddy

  Burstow, Paul

  Ashton, Joe

  Butler, Mrs Christine

  Atherton, Ms Candy

  Caborn, Rt Hon Richard

  Atkins, Charlotte

  Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

  Austin, John

  Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

  Ballard, Jackie

  Campbell, Rt Hon Menzies

  Banks, Tony

  (NE Fife)

  Barnes, Harry

  Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

  Barron, Kevin

  Campbell-Savours, Dale

  Battle, John

  Cann, Jamie

  Bayley, Hugh

  Casale, Roger

  Beard, Nigel

  Caton, Martin

  Beckett, Rt Hon Mrs Margaret

  Cawsey, Ian

  Begg, Miss Anne

  Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

  Bennett, Andrew F

  Chaytor, David

  Benton, Joe

  Chidgey, David

  Berry, Roger

  Clapham, Michael

  Best, Harold

  Clark, Rt Hon Dr David (S Shields)

  Betts, Clive

  Clark, Dr Lynda

  Blackman, Liz

  (Edinburgh Pentlands)

  Blears, Ms Hazel

  Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

  Boateng, Rt Hon Paul

  Clarke, Charles (Norwich S)

  Borrow, David

  Clarke, Rt Hon Tom (Coatbridge)

  Bradley, Keith (Withington)

  Clarke, Tony (Northampton S

  Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

  Clelland, David

  Bradshaw, Ben

  Clwyd, Ann

  Brake, Tom

  Coaker, Vernon

  Brand, Dr Peter

  Coffey, Ms Ann

  Breed, Colin

  Coleman, Iain

  Brinton, Mrs Helen

  Colman, Tony

  Connarty, Michael

  Cook, Frank (Stockton N)

  Corbett, Robin

  779

  Corbyn, Jeremy

  Hinchliffe, David

  Corston, Jean

  Hodge, Ms Margaret

  Cotter, Brian

  Home Robertson, John

  Cousins, Jim

  Hood, Jimmy

  Crausby, David

  Hope, Phil

  Cryer, Mrs Ann (Keighley)

  Hopkins, Kelvin

  Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

  Howarth, Rt Hon Alan (Newport E)

  Cummings, John

  Howarth, George (Knowsely N)

  Cunningham, Rt Hon Dr Jack

  Howells, Dr Kim

  (Copeland)

  Hoyle, Lindsay

  Cunningham, Jim (Cov'try S)

  Hughes, Ms Beverly (Stretford)

  Dalyell, Tam

  Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

  Darling, Rt Hon Alistair

  Hughes, Simon (Southwark N)

  Darvill, Keith

  Humble, Mrs Joan

  Davey, Edward (Kingston)

  Hurst, Alan

  Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

  Hutton, John

  Davidson, Ian

  Iddon, Dr Brian

  Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)

  Illsley, Eric

  Davis, Rt Hon Terry

  Jackson, Ms Glenda (Hampstead)

  (B'ham Hodge H)

  Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)

  Dawson, Hilton

  Jamieson, David

  Dean, Mrs Janet

  Jenkins, Brian

  Dismore, Andrew

  Johnson, Miss Melanie

  Dobbin, Jim

  (Welwyn Hatfield)

  Donohoe, Brian H

  Jones, Mrs Fiona (Newark)

  Doran, Frank

  Jones, Helen, (Warrington N)

  Dowd, Jim

  Jones, Dr Lynne (Selly Oak)

  Drew, David

  Jones, Martyn, (Clwyd S)

  Eagle, Angela (Wallasey)

  Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

  Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

  Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald

  Edwards, Huw

  Keeble, Ms Sally

  Efford, Clive

  Keen, Alan (Feltham & Heston)

  Ennis, Jeff

  Keen, Ann (Brentford & Isleworth)

  Feam, Ronnie

  Keetch, Paul

  Field, Rt Hon Frank

  Kemp, Fraser

  Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

  Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

  Flint, Caroline

  Khabra, Piara S

  Flynn, Paul

  Kidney, David

  Foster, Rt Hon Derek

  Kilfoyle, Peter

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  King, Andy (Rugby & Kenilworth)

  Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings)

  King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green)

  Foster, Michael J (Worcester)

  Kirkwood, Archy

  Foulkes, George

  Kumar, Dr Ashok

  Galloway, George

  Ladyman, Dr Stephen

  Gapes, Mike

  Laxton, Bob

  George, Andrew (St Ives)

  Lepper, David

  George, Bruce (Walsall S)

  Leslie, Christopher

  Gerrard, Neil

  Lewis, Ivan, (Bury S)

  Gibson, Dr Ian

  Lewis, Terry, (Worsley)

  Gidley, Sandra

  Linton, Martin

  Gilroy, Mrs Linda

  Livsey, Richard

  Godsiff, Roger

  Lloyd, Tony (Manchester C)

  Goggins, Paul

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Golding, Mrs Llin

  Lock, David

  Gordon, Mrs Eileen

  Love, David

  Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

  McAvoy, Thomas

  Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

  McCabe, Steve

  Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

  McCafferty, Ms Chris

  Grocott, Bruce

  McCartney, Rt Hon Ian

  Grogan, John

  (Makerfield)

  Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

  McDonagh, Siobhain

  Hall, Patrick (Bedford)

  Macdonald, Calum

  Hamilton, Fabian (Leeds NE)

  McDonnell, John

  Hanson, David

  Mcfall, John

  Harman, Rt Hon Ms Harriet

  McGurie, Mrs Anne

  Harris, Dr Evan

  McIssac, Shona

  Harvey, Nick

  McNamara, Kevin

  Healey, John

  McNulty, Tony

  Heath, David (Somerton & Frome)

  MacShane, Denis

  Henderson, Doug (Newcastle N)

  Mactaggart, Fiona

  Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

  McWalter, Tony

  Hepburn, Stephen

  McWilliam, John

  Heppell, John

  Mahon, Mrs Alice

  Hesford, Stephen

  Mallaber, Judy

  Hewitt, Ms Patricia

  Marsden, Paul (Shrewsbury)

  Hill, Keith

  Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

  780

  Martlew, Eric

  Smith, Rt Hon Andrew (Oxford E)

  Maxton, John

  Smith, Angela (Basildon)

  Meacher, Rt Hon Michael

  Smith, Miss Geraldine

  Meale, Alan

  (Morecambe & Lunesdale)

  Merron, Gillian

  Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

  Michael, Rt Hon Alun

  Smith, John (Glamorgan)

  Michie, Bill (Shef'ld Heeley)

  Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

  Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll & Bute)

  Smith, Sir Robert(W Ab'd'ns)

  Milburn, Rt Hon Alan

  Snape, Peter

  Miller, Andrew

  Soley, Clive

  Mitchell, Austin

  Southworth, Ms Helen

  Moffatt, Laura

  Squire, Ms Rachel

  Moonie, Dr Lewis

  Starkey, Dr Phyllis

  Moore, Michael

  Steinburg, Gerry

  Moran, Ms Margaret

  Stevenson, George

  Morgan, Ms Julie (Cardiff N)

  Stewart, David (Inverness E)

  Morris, Rt Hon Sir John

  Stewart, Ian (Eccles)

  (Aberavon)

  Stinchcombe, Paul

  Mudie, George

  Stoate, Dr Howard

  Mullin, Chris

  Strang, Rt Hon Dr Gavin

  Murphy, Denis (Wansbeck)

  Straw, Rt Hon Jack

  Murphy, Jim (Eastwood)

  Stringer, Graham

  Murphy, Rt Hon Paul (Torfaen)

  Stuart, Ms Gisela

  Naysmith, Dr Doug

  Stunell, Andrew

  Norris, Dan

  Taylor, Rt Hon Mrs Ann

  Oaten, Mark

  (Dewsbury)

  O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

  Taylor, Ms Dari (Stockton S)

  O'Brien, Mike (N Warks)

  Taylor, David (NW Leics)

  Olner, Bill

  Taylor, Matthew (Truro)

  O'Neill, Martin

  Temple-Morris, Peter

  Öpik, Lembit

  Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

  Organ, Mrs Diana

  Thomas, Gareth R (Harrow W)

  Palmer, Dr Nick

  Thomas, Simon, (Ceredigion)

  Pearson, Ian

  Timms, Stephen

  Pendry, Tom

  Tipping, Paddy

  Perham, Ms Linda

  Todd, Mark

  Pickthall, Colin

  Tonge, Dr Jenny

  Plaskitt, James

  Trickett, Jon

  Pollard, Kerry

  Truswell, Paul

  Pond, Chris

  Turner, Dennis (Wolverhton SE)

  Pope, Greg

  Turner, Dr Desmond (Kemptown)

  Pound, Stephen

  Turner, Dr George (NW Norfolk)

  Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham E)

  Turner, Neil (Wigan)

  Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

  Twigg, Derek (Halton)

  Primarolo, Dawn

  Twigg, Stephen (Enfield)

  Prosser, Gwyn

  Tyler, Paul

  Purchase, Ken

  Tynar, Bill

  Quinn, Lawrie

  Vis, Dr Rudi

  Radice, Rt Hon Giles

  Walley, Ms Joan

  Rammell, Bill

  Ward, Ms Claire

  Rapson, Syd

  Wareing, Robert N

  Raynsford, Nick

  Watts, David

  Reed, Andrew (Loughborough)

  Webb, Steve

  Rooker, Rt Hon Jeff

  White, Brian

  Rooney, Terry

  Whitehead, Dr Alan

  Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

  Wicks, Malcolm

  Rowlands, Ted

  Wigley, Rt Hon Dafydd

  Roy, Frank

  Williams, Rt Hon Alan

  Ruane, Chris

  (Swansea W)

  Ruddock, Joan

  Williams, Alan W (E Carmarthen)

  Russell, Bob (Colchester)

  Williams, Mrs Betty (Conwy)

  Russell, Ms Christine (Chester)

  Willis Phil

  Ryan, Ms Joan

  Winnick, David

  Salter, Martin

  Woolas, Phil

  Sanders, Adrian

  Worthington, Tony

  Savidge, Malcolm

  Wray, James

  Sawford, Phil

  Wright, Anthony D (Gt Yarmouth)

  Sedgemore, Brian

  Wright, Tony (Cannock)

  Shaw, Jonathan

  Wyatt, Derek

  Sheerman, Barry

  Short, Rt Hon Clare

  Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Singh, Marsha

  Mr. Gerry Sutcliffe and

  Skinner, Dennis

  Mr. Don Touhig.

  781

  NOES

  Ainsworth, Peter (E Surrey)

  Luff, Peter

  Amess, David

  Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas

  Arbuthnot, Rt Hon James

  McIntosh, Miss Anne

  Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

  Maclean, Rt Hon David

  Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)

  McLoughlin, Patrick

  Baldry, Tony

  Madel, Sir David

  Bercow, John

  Malins, Humfrey

  Beresford, Sir Paul

  Maples, John

  Blunt, Crispin

  Maude, Rt Hon Francis

  Boswell, Tim

  Mawhinney, Rt Hon Sir Brian

  Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

  May, Mrs Theresa

  Brady, Graham

  Nicholls, Patrick

  Brazier, Julian

  O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

  Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

  Page, Richard

  Browning, Mrs Angela

  Paice, James

  Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)

  Pickles, Eric

  Burns, Simon

  Prior, David

  Butterfill, John

  Randall, John

  Cash, William

  Redwood, Rt Hon John

  Chapman, Sir Sydney

  Robathan, Andrew

  (Chipping Barnet)

  Robertson, Laurence (Tewk'b'ry)

  Chope, Christopher

  Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)

  Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth

  Ross, William (E Lond'y)

  (Rushcliffe)

  Ruffley, David

  Collins, Tim

  St Aubyn, Nick

  Cran, James

  Sayeed, Jonathan

  Curry, Rt Hon David

  Shephard, Rt Hon Mrs Gillian

  Dorrell, Rt Hon Stephen

  Simpson, Keith (Mid-Norfolk)

  Duncan, Alan

  Smyth, Rev Martin (Belfast S)

  Duncan Smith, Iain

  Soames, Nicholas

  Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter

  Spelmam, Mrs Caroline

  Evans, Nigel

  Spring, Richard

  Fabricant, Michael

  Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

  Fallon, Michael

  Steen, Antony

  Flight, Howard

  Streeter, Gary

  Forth, Rt Hon Eric

  Swayne, Desmond

  Fraser, Christopher

  Syms, Robert

  Gale, Roger

  Tapsell, Sir Peter

  Gibb, Nick

  Taylor, Ian (Esher & Walton)

  Gorman, Mrs Teresa

  Taylor, John M (Solihull)

  Green, Damian

  Taylor, Sir Teddy

  Greenway, John

  Townend, John

  Grieve, Dominic

  Tredinnick, David

  Gummer, Rt Hon John

  Trend, Michael

  Hammond, Philip

  Tyrie, Andrew

  Hancock, Mike

  Waterson, Nigel

  Hawkins, Nick

  Wells, Bowen

  Hayes, John

  Whitney,Sir Raymond

  Heald, Oliver

  Whittingdale, John

  Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas

  Widdecombe, Rt Hon Miss Ann

  Horam, John

  Wilkinson, John

  Howarth, Gerald (Aldershot)

  Willetts, David

  Jack, Rt Hon Michael

  Wilshire, David

  Jackson, Robert (Wantage)

  Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)

  Lait, Mrs Jacqui

  Winterton, Nicholas (Macclesfield)

  Lansley, Andrew

  Yeo, Tim

  Leigh, Edward

  Young, Rt Hon Sir George

  Lewis, Dr Julian (New Forest E)

  Lidington, David

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Lilley, Rt Hon Peter

  Mr. Stephen Day and

  Lloyd, Rt Hon Sir Peter (Fareham)

  Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown.

  Question accordingly agreed to.
  Lords amendments agreed to.
  Mr. Simon Hughes: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. We are about to consider a motion on the business of the House, which may not be taken tonight if it is opposed. It would provide that the House could sit and wait for messages from the Lords, as we did last
  782
  Thursday. Given that Mr. Speaker made it clear from the Chair that he supported a more modernised procedure, can you do anything to ensure that when the House is sitting—
  Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Sylvia Heal): Order. I must inform the hon. Gentleman that that motion is not debatable.
  Mr. Hughes: I accept that; I said that it stated that on the Order Paper.
  Madam Deputy Speaker: I believe that I have already given the hon. Gentleman an explanation.
  Mr. Hughes: Last Thursday, before we returned late at night, there was a period when the House was sitting but we were doing nothing. Tonight, we have discussed two groups of amendments in three hours while seven groups, containing 119 amendments, have not been considered. Can we please use our time to better effect?
  Madam Deputy Speaker: I must inform the hon. Gentleman that the points that he is raising are matters for debate. The House has proceeded in a way that is fully in order, as the House agreed earlier today.

  DELEGATED LEGISLATION
  Madam Deputy Speaker: With permission, I shall put together the motions relating to delegated legislation.
  Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 118(6) (Standing Committees on Delegated Legislation)

  DELEGATED LEGISLATION

    INCOME TAX
    That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the Double Taxation Relief (Shipping Transport) (Hong Kong) Order 2000 be made in the form of the draft laid before the House on 2nd November.
    That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the Double Taxation Relief (Taxation on Income) (Norway) Order 2000 be made in the form of the draft laid before the House on 2nd November.—[Mrs. McGuire.]
    Question agreed to.

    BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
    Motion made,
    That, at the sittings on Thursday 30th November and Friday 1st December—

    (i) the Speaker shall not adjourn the House until any Messages from the Lords shall have been received, and

    (ii) if the House has completed its consideration of any Messages received from the Lords and the Lords have adjourned their sitting, the Speaker shall adjourn the House without Question put.—[Mrs. McGuire.]

    Hon. Members: Object.

    Madam Deputy Speaker: With permission, I shall put together the motions relating to Committees.
    Ordered,

    COMMITTEES
      ACCOMMODATION AND WORKS
      That Mr. Colin Burgon be discharged from the Accommodation and Works Committee and Mr. Tony Banks be added to the Committee.
      HEALTH
      That Siobhain McDonagh be added to the Committee.—[Mr. John Mc William, on behalf of the Committee of Selection.]

    Devon Fire and Rescue Service
    Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mrs. McGuire.]
    12.29 am
    Mrs. Angela Browning rose—[Interruption.]
    Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Sylvia Heal): Would Members please leave the Chamber quickly and quietly?
    Mrs. Browning: Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I introduce to the House a debate that is of great concern to many of us in the county of Devon. The headquarters of the Devon fire and rescue service is at Clyst St. George in my constituency of Tiverton and Honiton.
    Mr. Anthony Steen: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. It is impossible to hear my hon. Friend, even though I am sitting close to her. Can she begin again so that we can hear what she is saying?
    Madam Deputy Speaker: That is a matter for the hon. Lady. I have asked Members to leave quickly and quietly, and most have left the Chamber.
    Mrs. Browning: On behalf of the Devon fire and rescue service, whose headquarters are at Clyst St. George in the Tiverton and Honiton constituency, I shall raise with the Minister concerns that have been felt for some time. We are in such a position that the Government must consider a problem that faces the county of Devon: the future of the fire and rescue service.
    As long ago as 9 May, I tabled a written question to the Home Office in respect of the representations received from the emergency services on the cost to them of the changes to radio channels. On 10 May, I received a reply from the Minister of State, Home Office, the hon. Member for Norwich, South (Mr. Clarke):
    The spectrum currently used by the police and fire services for radio communications has serious limitations and is the key reason why we arranged for the provision of new spectrum … We are achieving this by the introduction of the new Public Safety Radio Communications Service. We are doing so in accordance with an internationally agreed harmonized plan for use of Public Safety radio spectrum.
    Both the Association of Chief Police Officers and the Association of Police Authorities have concluded that the Public Safety Radio Communications Project (PSRCP) meets technical requirements and offers value for money at a national level.
    I have also received various representations from the Fire Service about future radio communications and control room requirements, including views on costs and on their participation in the PSRC Service.—[Official Report, 10 May 2000;Vol.349,c.404-05W.]
    It was known earlier this year that the change to the radio frequency required by the replacement scheme affected all emergency services nationally, but I want to draw particular attention to the impact on the Devon fire and rescue service.
    There is a national Home Office requirement to vacate existing radio frequencies used by the emergency services by 2005 at the latest. As a result, Devon fire and rescue service, along with all other fire authorities in England and Wales, will be required to replace its wide area radio scheme. The police service has a single framework

    785
    agreement to purchase the Airwave service, formerly PSRCS, which is supplied by Quadrant—a consortium led by BT. That framework agreement was negotiated by the Police Information Technology Organisation and was the subject of a referral by the European Commission to the European Court of Justice. I am afraid that my speech contains a lot of acronyms, so I shall spell them out.
    Devon fire and rescue service currently shares radio transmission sites with Devon and Cornwall constabulary. Similar arrangements exist with a number of other fire authorities. Devon county council, and therefore the police, will move to a replacement radio scheme in December 2002. It is likely that many shared facilities will no longer be available to the fire service after that date. Devon county council police authority has given formal notice that current partners in shared radio facilities must make their own arrangements for future wide-area radio provision after that date.
    I emphasise to the Minister that the service in Devon must not only have procured the new system but put it in place—not by 2005, but by the end of 2002. That means that it is required to replace its scheme much earlier than many other services in the country. It is currently under notice from the police that that is the time scale under which they are working, and we have every reason to believe that the police project is on time. Indeed, the police annual report confirms that it is.
    Other pressures for change in the radio scheme include the increasing need for data to be sent to front-line fire appliances to meet health and safety requirements with regard to the provision of operation and tactical information. Those are not available under the current radio arrangements. If any existing shared sites remain available for fire service use, for a sole user the costs would be prohibitive. There is also concern that the communications industry will not be able to meet the demands of all emergency services' replacement needs in the time frame available. There is great anxiety in the Devon fire and rescue service about the possibility of procurement in such a short time.
    In a "Dear Chief Fire Officer" letter dated February 1999, the Home Office set out the fire service strategy for radio replacement. The strategy did not propose or establish a single framework procurement option that PITO adopted, but the Home Office recommended local rather than national procurement, provision by the Home Office of procurement guidance, the adoption of an output as opposed to a technical specification, and collaboration between brigades. It also suggested that PSRCS (Airwave) should be considered as an option. According to current guidance, the strategy is still valid.
    Since the publication of that advice, the Minister has commissioned two studies—one to look at options for the provision of fire control rooms, and the other to provide guidance on radio replacement options. Devon in particular would have been pleased if the second study could have been produced much earlier, given the short time frame within which it is now obliged to work. There are significant lead times for both tender and implementation, not least—as the Minister will know—because of public-sector regulations relating to tenders and contracts.
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    While I accept that two alternative strategies for radio replacement have been adopted by the police and the fire service, there are still a number of inequitable anomalies supported by central Government. The Minister of State, Home Office, has found that PSRCS represents an important part of the Government's commitment to ensuring that the police have access to modern communications facilities. I particularly want this Minister to focus on that tonight.
    Over three years, the police will receive an extra £1.24 billion of central Government funding so that they can introduce the new system that they will use. Annual charges for PSRCP will be reduced by £50 million, obtained from the capital modernisation fund. The financial pressures on police forces will be taken into account in the overall level of resources to be provided for the police service in future years as part of the 2000 spending review. Today's announcement on local government expenditure clearly identified the on-going revenue costs of the scheme in figures relating to the police.
    I make no complaint about the money that the Government have allocated-—one might almost say "ring-fenced" for the police. However, what is extraordinary is that one emergency service has been treated in that way, yet the Government do not seem to have recognised the important role that another emergency service, the fire and rescue service, plays, particularly in a county such as Devon, or the short time available.
    Mr. Steen: Let us forget all the abbreviations and technical details, which I realise my hon. Friend knows much more about than me. Is she saying two things? Will the whole of Devon be covered in even more aerials? All the high-technical aerials and the mobile phone aerials are going up like mushrooms. Now we will have a double lot of aerials: the fire station and police station aerials. At the same time, is it right that the smaller fire stations will probably have to go, which will put villages in rural areas at far greater risk?
    Mrs. Browning: I am not sure that my hon. Friend is correct to say that there will necessarily be more masts throughout the county, but his point about where the money will come from is important. Clearly, there are huge pressures on the fire service budget and on its capital expenditure in providing for that new service in such a short time. The fire service clearly requires modern communication facilities to play its part in community safety, but by contrast with the funding support to the police, it has been allocated no additional funding.
    Approximately 18 months ago, the Home Office provided individual brigades with indicative costings with regard to capital and revenue. Costs supplied by the Home Office for Devon were as follows: minimum capital costs of £1.3 million, to a maximum of £4.4 million; minimum revenue costs of £0.31 million, to a maximum of £1.02 million. More recent costings by Devon fire and rescue service anticipate capital costs of about £1.3 million and revenue costs of about £0.46 million.
    If the Devon costings of £1.3 million and £0.46 million are considered a benchmark for other fire authorities, fire service radio replacement nationally is likely to cost about £75 million in capital costs and £27 million in on-going revenue costs—hence my pointing out that, in today's

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    announcement, we noticed that on-going revenue costs were allocated to the police because of their change, but there was apparently nothing for the fire service. That comes against a background of many fire authorities spending significant amounts in excess of standard spending assessment to maintain current provision of services.
    The widening gap between SSA provision and what authorities are spending to maintain current service is well documented, the most recent case being outlined in the report of the Home Office's service expenditure forecasting group (fire) on 2001–02 to 2003–04. Devon will spend approximately 17.9 per cent. above SSA in 2001–02, with a projected pensions deficit of 14.3 per cent.
    It is a critical period. As the Minister will be aware, the peaks and troughs in retirement of personnel show that the move could not have come at a worse time. Retirements are due to peak at the same time as the fire service is having to make the new provisions.
    The increases in SSA and the basic credit approvals recently announced are welcome, but the SSA increase of 5 per cent. for 2001-02 and 4 per cent. for the following two years will not provide for the closing of the gap between the SSA and actual budget spending. Again, the basic credit approvals increases need to be viewed against the poor property profile of many fire authorities, including Devon; the increasing need to seek capital solutions in other areas of budget need—for example, information technology; and an authority's ability to make additional revenue implications of capital spend.
    I hope that the Minister appreciates that this is not a case of Devon fire and rescue saying that they want more money simply because they need a new system. Even without that challenge, the service is struggling to maintain its current revenue and capital commitments. So although the announcements on SSA and basic credit approvals are welcome, they will not provide funding for radio replacement options.
    In his reply, the Minister of State said that various representations had been made from the fire services. He also implied that best-value reviews and guidance in the joint control study report and the future radio replacement report would provide a way forward for the fire service. However, as Devon fire and rescue has told me, the control room study report does not address the issue of radio replacement. Although joint or shared control rooms may offer longer-term savings, they do not offer solutions to short-term funding requirements for radio replacement.
    Practical implementation of a move to joint or shared control room facilities will take some years. However, radio replacement is required now. Although best-value reviews into control rooms and communications are encouraging authorities to seek collaborative solutions to radio replacement and to analyse joint or shared control room operations, they will not provide funding.
    In May, the Minister of State said that the second Home Office report would provide guidance on radio replacement to help fire services. However, although some of that information is now available, it does not solve the immediate problem. On 19 July 2000, at a central fire brigades advisory council, it was made clear that pressures on fire authorities for radio replacement were not compatible with the time scales for reviewing
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    joint control rooms. That acknowledgement was recently reinforced with the Fire Brigades Union's publication of its opposition to the joint control study report.
    We accept that communications are a vital aspect of providing a modern fire service that is able to contribute to community safety, and that Devon fire and rescue service, with other authorities, will have to replace its radio scheme by December 2002. Devon and Cornwall police, who provide the service with a radio facility, have given notice that the facility will have to be replaced by that date. Although options of joint or shared controls and the results of best-value reviews may produce savings in the long term, they do not help to meet the challenge initially facing Devon fire and rescue.
    There is an inequity in recognising the implementation costs and continuing revenue implications for police, while making no additional funding provision for the fire service. Communications are a vital element of both services. The discrepancy is even more incongruous given the windfall that the Government have received from the sale of the frequency spectrum. The auction has raised a huge sum far exceeding what the Chancellor could ever have imagined he would receive.
    The Government have encouraged fire authorities to seek collaboration and joint procurement options. I hope that the Minister is aware that the Devon fire authority has been very willing to seek such options. Indeed, it is working with Avon, Somerset and Dorset counties on reducing procurement costs and taking advantage of economies of scale.
    I am, however, very concerned that, even as recently as the beginning of this month, on 9 November, in a letter to the hon. Member for Exeter (Mr. Bradshaw)—the letter is now in the public domain, and I have given notice to the hon. Gentleman that I would be mentioning it—the Minister himself seemed to demonstrate that he was not aware of the time constraints facing the Devon fire and rescue service. Quite clearly, he seemed to be under the impression—I hope that he will reassure us today that he has taken this point on board—that there were five years in which to address the issue.
    The Minister is pointing at the time. I am very willing to let him reply now, because I hope that he will be able to give us some reassurance that the Home Office will sympathetically consider the predicament of the Devon fire and rescue service.
    12.50 am
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Mike O'Brien): I congratulate the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Mrs. Browning) on securing this debate. I would have hoped to have had a longer opportunity to deal in more detail with the concerns that she expressed, but she took up 20 minutes of this 30-minute debate—although I fully understand the importance that she and her constituents attach to the quality of the fire service in Devon, as well as the issues relating to radio replacement.
    We have good reason to be proud of our fire service. Its high level of performance in response to emergency calls has been confirmed year after year by the Audit Commission. On the latest figures published by the commission, the fire service nationally in 1998–99 met attendance standards in responding to fire calls on

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    96 per cent. of occasions. In Devon, even that excellent performance was bettered, with attendance standards being met on 97.1 per cent. of occasions.
    I will take no lessons from the hon. Lady on the subject of funding support for the fire service. The real-terms increases provided by this Government, both revenue and capital, are significantly better than those provided in the last years of the Conservative Administration in which she served. She may complain about fire service funding now, but she supported the starving of the fire service.
    Mr. John Burnett: The fire service in London is a separate precepting authority, as are the police. Does the Minister agree that it would be a good idea for crucial services such as the Devon fire and rescue service to have the same arrangement, so that it can plan for changes in communications and such in the long term?
    Mr. O'Brien: That is an interesting issue. The Government are currently holding consultations on local government funding, and no doubt the Devon service could make submissions.
    Under the central-local partnership arrangements we work closely with fire service interests to assess future funding pressures and we have taken those into account in both spending reviews. The outcome of spending review 2000 is that fire authorities in England will get an overall increase in the fire service element of standard spending assessment of £189.2 million over the next three years, including £69.1 million—that is 5 per cent. more—for 2001–02, followed by an increase of 4 per cent. in each of the two subsequent years.
    We announced earlier today that, for 2001–02, the fire standard spending assessment for Devon will provisionally be increased by 4.4 per cent., following the 4.5 per cent. that was received this year. As part of spending review 2000, we are also significantly boosting our support for fire service capital. Planned credit approvals for the service in England and Wales will be increased by 67 per cent. from their present level of £35.7 million, to £59.7 million in 2001–02. The provision will be sustained at that level in 2002–03 and increased by a further £2 million to £61.7 million in 2003–04. I have announced that a significant proportion—10 million of the provision for 2001-02—will be issued as a supplementary credit approval specifically for the promotion of equality and diversity in the service.
    Spending review 2000 represents overall, I believe, a very satisfactory outcome for the fire service. It will help to deliver the outcomes that really matter, reducing the number of fires and fire deaths in the home through a greater emphasis on fire safety and prevention. At the same time, it rightly sets challenging efficiency targets. The spending totals are based on an assumption that a 2 per cent. improvement in efficiency will be achieved each year. The best value process that the Government have introduced from 1 April will play a key role in helping fire authorities to identify and achieve those efficiencies.
    I am well aware of the concerns that Devon fire and rescue service has about funding issues. In July I met a delegation representing those fire authorities, including
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    Devon, which serve large rural areas. I took careful note of the problems they identified, particularly in relation to the current arrangements for distributing funding.
    The cause of the problem is the standard spending assessment formula that we inherited, and it needs to change. The Home Office has been involved in a fundamental review of local government finance, in particular the perverse funding incentives, which we inherited in relation to the fire funding formula. The incentives have caused a lot of problems not only in Devon but in many other parts of the country. For example, funding is reduced if the number of fire calls are reduced. Such decisions need to be changed and we are committed to doing that.
    On radio communications, we understand and acknowledge the need for fire authorities to replace their wide-area radio schemes in the period up to 2005. Indeed, we took account of this in the previous spending review.
    The hon. Lady referred to the arrangements for the police. The police service has a national strategy in place and a public safety radio communication service known as Airwave is in the process of being introduced. We are convinced that the police will draw considerable benefit from that cohesive approach, which is supported by appropriate funding arrangements.
    Mrs. Browning: Will the Minister give way?
    Mr. O'Brien: I have some points that I wish to make. I am sure that the hon. Lady would wish me to do that, and then if we have time left, I will happily give way to her. It is important that I make these points so that those in the fire and rescue service know the Government's position.
    Devon and Cornwall constabulary will receive an allocation of Airwave grant of £4,755,000 in capital for 2001–02 and £2,470,000 in revenue. The spectrum, which is used by the fire service, will be withdrawn from its current use at the end of 2005, although some fire services, including Devon, may wish to make changes earlier than that date.
    There are no plans to auction the use of those frequencies. They will be retained by the Home Office for other purposes. The Wireless Telegraphy Act 1998 provided a mechanism for promoting the efficient use of radio frequencies by introducing licence fees reflecting the commercial value of the spectrum. The charge for the fire service would increase from £197,000 to £746,000 a year. The new charging regime is being phased in over a five-year period from April 1999. The method of apportionment between brigades was agreed with fire service representatives. The increase in costs was one of the funding pressures identified and taken into account in the comprehensive spending review.
    The challenge for the fire service is to secure benefits that are similar to those of the police in their method of procurement. The hon. Lady referred to the urgency of the matter. That is why we have asked, this year, for all fire authorities in England and Wales to undertake best value reviews of their future communications and control

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    arrangements. Given the statutory responsibilities of local fire authorities, both for the efficiency of their brigades and for securing best value, it would be quite wrong to set aside the local consideration. However, a sensible outcome will, I believe, depend on local decisions being made and local government being willing to work with central Government to secure systems that will meet certain key criteria. In particular, radio bearer systems procured by fire authorities must meet the service's national operational requirements for voice communications and status and data message transfer. They must support effective interworking between neighbouring brigades. They must, as Airwave would, provide an effective and continuing interface with communications systems of other emergency services.
    These are national requirements; so is the need to secure value for money. There will have to be competition, but it would be nonsense if each fire authority mounted its own competition for a replacement radio bearer system. The waste in administrative effort, the loss of economies of scale and the unreasonable requirement on suppliers to interface with a large number of different systems would be unacceptable.
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    If fire authorities want to control the process, I want them to be able to demonstrate a real commitment to collaborative procurement in order to deliver an outcome that makes sense both locally in Devon and nationally across the country.
    Mrs. Browning: The Minister said that fire authorities may, if they wish, change their radio communication systems earlier than 2005. Will he take on board that for Devon, that is not an optional extra? The fire service has been required by the police, whose facilities it shares at present, to end its contract with them by the end of 2002.
    Mr. O'Brien: I had hoped to reply at greater length about the issues relating to the radio communication system, but we are obviously very pressed for time. I will soon be meeting Local Government Association representatives and others. We are ready and willing to—
    The motion having been made after Ten o'clock, and the debate having continued for half an hour, MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.
    Adjourned accordingly at One o'clock.