John Bercow
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John Bercow Excerpts(4 years, 11 months ago)
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Mr Speaker
The right hon. Member for New Forest West looks as though he is about to start to sprint. I think that he must be heard.
Sir Desmond Swayne
Thank you, Mr Speaker.
Outside this House, a right hon. Member is being called a liar, and inside this House, a number of Members have implied as much. Natural justice demands that the evidence be produced so that his reputation can be salvaged or utterly destroyed, doesn’t it?
Mr Speaker
I will take the points of order, on the assumption, which I would like to think is safe, that neither Member would seek to continue the debate we have just had. I feel sure that these are matters of order and that the Front-Bench Members will focus with a laser-like intensity on that.
Tom Watson
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. In his answer to me earlier, the Secretary of State said that the matter of investigating a criminal act is one for the police, not for Ministers. Can you assist me as to what remedy there is if I think he may have inadvertently misled the House on that? While we have been in the Chamber, the Metropolitan police have told “ITV News” that the matter to investigate is one for the Cabinet Office and if it shares the information with the police they will investigate, but they will not investigate unless the information is shared. Will the Deputy Prime Minister clear this matter up? Is there a way he can do that? Perhaps he could agree to share the information with the police from the Dispatch Box.
Mr Speaker
The hon. Gentleman has, as I think he knows, found his own salvation: by means of the attempted point of order he has registered his point. He has placed on the record information that may have been known to some Members but, for example, was certainly not known to me, because I have not been consulting electronic devices but have been merely attending to my duties in the Chair. If the Minister wishes to respond, he is free to do so, but there is, at this point, no sign of him uncoiling. However, the hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Tom Watson) is a dogged terrier, and I feel sure he and others will pursue these matters if they feel so inclined in the days ahead.
Mr Speaker
Well, I am not sure I see the appropriateness of the inclusion of the word “former”.
Stewart Malcolm McDonald
Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. In response to the right hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh), the Deputy Prime Minister said that the right hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Gavin Williamson) was not being
“accused of any criminal offence”.
However, in response to my question, he said that that was not for him to determine. Given the further information just shared by the Labour Front Bencher, both of those things do not stack up, so I wonder whether the Deputy Prime Minister felt that he should, if you would indulge him, come to the Dispatch Box to clear up these issues that have been raised by me and the hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Tom Watson).
Mr Speaker
I would if he did, but he doesn’t, so I won’t. But I rather fancy that these matters will be explored further in the days ahead. Realistically, it does not seem to me that there is obvious scope for the scrutiny of this matter further in the Chamber today, but who knows what subsequent days might bring. Let us leave it there for now.