"Clearly, as a member of the Committee I support the findings and I support the motion. I do not want to go through the report, but I just want to raise an issue that comes from it. The commissioner’s inquiry was in two parts. The first included a measure of …..." Paul Beresford - View Speech
"I shall be antipodeanly succinct; I shall be minutes.
I merely want to thank my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House. There has been discussion in the Standards and Privileges Committee, and between the Committee and him, following which some positive changes have been made. In particular, we …..." Paul Beresford - View Speech
"May we think about a recent case that the Committee considered? A Member might have had a private meeting, perhaps with another family member who was a businessman, and in which there was a discussion about funding and payment. During that meeting, the Member might have utilised his position as …..." Paul Beresford - View Speech
"My hon. Friend said he wanted an example. I did give him one, but he has not responded to it. It is a financial, not a lurid, example, and I would like him to consider it...." Paul Beresford - View Speech
"The hon. Gentleman said that announcements were not time-sensitive, but they may be time-appropriate; in fact they may be regionally appropriate. I am thinking of local government announcements. It would be much more appropriate to make those at a certain time, and outside the House...." Paul Beresford - View Speech
"I was tempted to rise because the previous intervention was made by an hon. Friend who was a political adviser to me when I was a local government Minister. He assisted us in deciding whether it was appropriate, with regional issues, to make announcements in the areas to which they …..." Paul Beresford - View Speech
"I am not the only member of the Standards and Privileges Committee present, but I am probably the only one who is going to speak—and I note a nod from the Chairman, the right hon. Member for Rother Valley (Mr Barron), sitting on the Opposition Benches. I am not going …..." Paul Beresford - View Speech
"The hon. Gentleman knows that I, of all people, would not follow that tendency of the previous Government. I absolutely disagree with him, and today’s examples, whether from this Government, the previous Government or the one before, have been of substantial leakages on substantial statements. The majority are not substantial, …..." Paul Beresford - View Speech
"Does my hon. Friend not agree—from his vast experience in this place, and perhaps also looking from the outside—that although a considerable number of statements are of little or no interest to the House because they are regional, specific or small, perhaps involving one or two MPs, and so on, …..." Paul Beresford - View Speech