Sittings of the House (22 March)

Debate between John Spellar and Jacob Rees-Mogg

Wednesday 6th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

His party was socialist, his Government were socialist and his successor was a socialist; I think that there is a lot of socialist still left in the Labour party.

We will have that Friday, a day of jubilee, to come in and praise the Government for what they have done and for their wisdom and foresight. We are being kindly and charitable—nice, really—to the Opposition by not inflicting upon them the terrible experience they must have every week. None the less, I must confess that I admire the nobility of the hon. Member for Wallasey in bringing forward her amendment. For the Labour party to take this on puts one in mind of the charge of the Light Brigade. How does it go?

“Cannon to right of them,

Cannon to left of them,

Cannon behind them”

[Mr Spellar]

rose—

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will volley and thunder.

[Mr Spellar]

Does the hon. Gentleman not care about the employment prospects of the fact checkers for Channel 4 and various journals who are regularly employed every Wednesday, including today, when the Prime Minister claimed that the bedroom tax did not apply to those with disabled children? Does he not feel for them in that they will have less work to do because the Prime Minister—I would never accuse him in this Chamber of misrepresenting the position—does not understand his own policies?

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I believe it is orderly, Mr Speaker, to say that the right hon. Gentleman is guilty of terminological inexactitude. The Prime Minister said nothing about a bedroom tax, for there is no bedroom tax. The Prime Minister is somebody who deals in truth, right and justice, and therefore does not talk about things that do not exist.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Spellar]

My hon. Friend rightly draws me back to the immediate topic, tempting, interesting and attractive though it is to discuss the broader issues of parliamentary sovereignty and procedure. He is right that most of the factors, including the date of the Budget, were well known when the motion was laid. The number of days that we traditionally take for the Budget debate was known, as too was the date of Easter. In fact, the date of Easter could have been known several decades, if not centuries, ago. The procedure for calculating Easter was decided at the Council of Nicaea in 325. At that time, they could probably have calculated when this Easter would be.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

Was it not St Wilfrid and the Synod of Whitby that settled the date of Easter in England?

[Mr Spellar]

The date of Easter is the first Sunday after the full moon following the March equinox. I thought the hon. Gentleman was going to ask me whether this was under the Julian or Gregorian calendar, but he did not.