John Bercow
Main Page: John Bercow (Speaker - Buckingham)Department Debates - View all John Bercow's debates with the Home Office
(6 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
Each Urgent Question requires a Government Minister to give a response on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Mr Speaker
Order. This is an extremely important matter, which I judged rightly, I think, warranted the urgent attention of the House. However, progress has been disappointingly slow. As we have another urgent question and then substantial business thereafter, it would be greatly to our advantage if questions and answers could be a tad pithier.
Victoria Atkins
I apologise, Mr Speaker, but I am just so full of enthusiasm for this subject.
Let me answer the hon. Lady’s questions. On the issue of the private sector employers who have yet to report, it has been the responsibility of the EHRC to tackle them since the deadline. It has a programme of action. It wrote to every single employer who did not report on Monday 9 April, and it is considering each and every company that falls within the boundaries that has not yet reported. I should say that 100% of public sector organisations have reported, so they are to be commended for that.
Let me turn now to the issue of the EHRC—I apologise because someone mentioned this earlier. The EHRC will receive £17.4 million in the next financial year. I have spoken to the chief executive and I am not aware that resources are an issue, but of course I will listen to her if she says otherwise. On the very important point about the pipeline, I have to say that that is why the Hampton-Alexander review is so important. At the moment, 27.7% of FTSE 100 companies have women in senior executive positions. We want that to be 33% by 2020, which is a challenge for business, because that will mean that they have to start recruiting one woman for every two places that come through. It is a challenge and I hope that the business community will live up to it.
Victoria Atkins
I thank the hon. Lady for her question. The EHRC is to receive £17.4 million in 2019-20. I have spoken to the chief executive about the gender pay gap compliance issue. Of course we will keep in mind the EHRC’s responsibilities, but at the moment we are clear that that sum of money should be sufficient to enable it to do the work necessary to help with compliance.
Mr Speaker
Thank you. Before I call the next urgent question, could I exhort colleagues to stick to the time limits that are prescribed in relation to these mechanisms and encourage people to be as pithy as they can be? We have a very important matter now of which to treat—I cannot guarantee that everybody who wants to contribute will have the chance to do so—but there is also substantial business afterwards, and I am sure everyone will want to be considerate not only of their own interests but of others’.