Business of the House

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Thursday 9th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

The whole House will deplore any waste of funds. Of course, it is right that EU structural funds should be put to the use for which they are designed. I am happy to say that the UK has above average implementation of the structural and cohesion funds, and the UK programmes are on track to meet their targets. I cannot comment on the programmes of other member states, but I will draw the Foreign Secretary’s attention to my hon. Friend’s general point about the lack of accountability in part of the budget.

[Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)]

On 16 June, in his speech to the Hansard Society, the Leader of the House said that

“it has simply become too easy for the Government to sideline Parliament; to push Bills through without adequate scrutiny; and to see the House more as a rubber-stamp than a proper check on executive authority”.

He also said that his Government believe that a strong Parliament leads to a better Government. How does he square his belief in a strong Parliament with the Government’s shameful truncating of the debate on their proposals on tuition fees?

[Sir George Young]

I have to say to the hon. Lady, who was Deputy Leader of the House, that we could have done what the previous Government did and allocated five hours for tuition fees, including the business motion. Any time spent on the business motion would have come out of that five hours. The previous Government did that, but we have more respect for Parliament than to do that on this issue.