(12 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
17:05 - The House divided: - Ayes: 277 / Noes: 183 - Question accordingly agreed to.
TABLE | |
|---|---|
Proceedings | Time for conclusion of proceedings |
First day | |
New Clauses and New Schedules; amendments to Clauses 1 to 3; amendments to Schedule 1; amendments to Clause 4; amendments to Schedule 2; amendments to Clause 5; amendments to Schedule 3 | 10.00 pm |
Second day | |
Remaining proceedings on Consideration | Three hours after commencement of proceedings on Consideration on the second day. |
Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
I am surprised that the Minister has moved the programme motion formally, given that today—day one of what is supposedly two days for Report and the remaining stages of this Bill—we have five hours of debate in which to cover 59 amendments. Even if there are no Divisions in the House, that leaves barely five minutes for each item.
This Bill is an extremely important piece of legislation. It reforms some of the most important financial institutions in this country, including the Bank of England, creating new financial regulators and dealing with consumer finance, business finance and all those key issues. It has 103 clauses and 21 schedules, yet this programme motion gives us a derisory amount of time. We supposedly have two days, but we will in fact have one and a half days on Report. The second day is not a full day, but a half day, with three hours for the remaining proceedings. Do not let us forget that today we have five clauses to cover in the space of five hours, and we will have 97 clauses to consider in three hours on day two, whenever that is scheduled. That is barely even paying lip service to proper scrutiny. When the Bill gets to the other place, their noble Lordships will have to look seriously at whether there has been proper accountability for the provisions that are before us.
We also had insufficient time upstairs in Committee, where 20 clauses went undebated. That is because the Government have consistently allocated insufficient time for this legislation. When the previous Administration took the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 through the House in 1999-2000, 35 sittings were given in Committee. However, less than half that number were given to scrutinise this Bill in Committee upstairs—we had only 16 sittings in total—so it is no wonder that clauses went undebated.
This is a parody of a programme motion. It leaves massively insufficient time. I do not wish to waste any more of it, but this motion has to be opposed. I hope that my hon. Friends will join me in protesting against this lack of accountability, call on their noble Lords to spend more time scrutinising the Bill properly and vote against this programme motion.
The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr Mark Hoban)
The hon. Member for Nottingham East (Chris Leslie) protests too much about this matter. Those of us who are veterans of the Bill and those who occasionally came to watch our proceedings will know why 20 clauses went undebated, as is clear from the Committee Hansard. The Opposition agreed on the programme motion and the number of sittings—there was no Division on the programme motion after Second Reading—and ample time was given. However, on one occasion the hon. Gentleman spent an hour debating a set of minor and technical amendments, during which he discussed the correct terminology for people from Gibraltar and whether any Committee members had ever had the pleasure of visiting Gibraltar, questioned the drafting conventions relating to the insertion of amendments into a lettered list, and speculated as to the bedtime of my officials. He did not strike me as a man who was keen to press forward with scrutiny of the Bill.
This Bill has received proper scrutiny. It has been discussed by the Treasury Committee—we have a number of its reports before us today, which will enable us to discuss the issue—and has received pre-legislative scrutiny by a Joint Committee chaired by my right hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr Lilley). We listened carefully to the arguments made by both Committees, which have been reflected in the Bill that we have debated. I believe that there was adequate time in Committee to deal with the matter. The fact that we ran out of time was not down to the way in which the Bill was debated by the Government; it was down to the way in which the Opposition handled it.
It is also the case, as my hon. Friend the Deputy Leader of the House has said, that in the last Session of the previous Government, no Bill was given more than one day on Report. Having a two-day Report Stage is important, as this Bill requires scrutiny, and I believe that a great deal of scrutiny is taking place. It is now time for us to get on with the debate, and I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman is seeking to divide the House on the motion, because the time spent on the Division could be spent discussing the Bill and getting our points across.
Question put.