Business of the House

Paul Farrelly Excerpts

Thursday 12th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lansley]

I recall that in the later stages of the previous Session, there was a debate on community hospitals and I am pleased to see that Simon Stevens, the new chief executive of NHS England, has taken the matter up. When we took office, it was very important to us to have a greater focus on delivering care close to people’s homes, to improve people’s ability to step out of the high-cost acute hospitals so that they could concentrate on their job, and to give a focus to local commissioners. Often, it is the new local clinical commissioning groups that best understand how community hospitals can serve the people they look after.

[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

May we have a debate on compensation for losses caused by the passport fiasco? In my office over the past few weeks, we have been trying to help people left in a desperate situation by the chaos, and it will not have escaped the country’s notice that the word “sorry” did not once pass the Home Secretary’s lips. She did not address the issue of compensation, either. Is it not only fair for people who apply for passports in good faith and in good time and who suffer losses—for example, by having to cancel their holidays—to be compensated? May we have a debate on that?

[Mr Lansley]

I think that the Home Secretary fully responded to the questions raised just before business questions. I am sure that in future we will be able to look after our constituents much better, in the way that she described, by being able to raise urgent cases. In my experience as a constituency Member of Parliament, when we have had to raise cases we have been able to get through on the MPs’ helpline and resolve them rapidly.

Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Bill

Paul Farrelly Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Jenny Chapman]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that point. Moreover, it seems that it will not apply only to the run-up to general elections. Elections currently seem to be taking place nearly all the time: European elections, police and crime commissioner elections and local elections. Will the Bill apply to all those elections? If so, it will surely have a constant chilling effect on the activities of some charities.

[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

The Bill appears to be a reaction to undercover newspaper reporting alleging rule-breaking at Westminster, but does my hon. Friend agree that it does not address the issue at all? Is it not in reality an opportunistic attack on the ability of groups in civil society, including trade unions, to deliver a message that might be unwelcome to the Government? Is it not also deeply disappointing that Liberal Democrat members of the coalition have signed up to the Bill, given their historic emphasis on civil liberties?

[Jenny Chapman]

That is a disappointment, but I have to say that it is not surprising that Liberal Democrat Members may wish to avoid the scrutiny to which such groups might want to subject their record come the next election.

I speak as a trustee of a charity and as someone who is deeply careful about the way in which the money is spent. I make sure, as it is a trustee’s job to do, that we do not take decisions that may land the charity in any kind of difficulty. We want to be sure that the money that we have worked hard to raise and that it is our job to look after is not misspent on having to buy legal advice or defend ourselves in court.

I am very concerned about what may happen if there is a charity campaigning on, perhaps, the closure of a hospital and an election candidate decides to support that cause. The charity may not have made the decision to align itself with a political party or candidate, but they somehow become entwined. There will be a loser in that election, as there always is, and what might happen then? Can the other parties who have not been successful in the election mount a challenge? Who would be responsible for paying for the defence of that charity as a result of the outcome of such an election?

There are very great concerns, therefore, and my sense is that the Leader of the House was not properly cognisant of them before leading this debate today. I can only hope that he becomes more alive to them during the course of the Committee stage, although I have to say that I am a bit doubtful of that based on my experience of serving on Committees.

It would have been far preferable to have had some form of pre-legislative scrutiny, but that is not where we are. I must commend my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) on, in effect, creating a process for trying to inject further scrutiny of this Bill.

There are very real concerns—they are not invented concerns—and I look forward to hearing the Minister trying to deal with some of them when he sums up.

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[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

It is a great shame that the hon. Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) is no longer in the Chamber, because I think that not only did he let his voters and the House down, but—worst of all—he let himself down. He is the arch- patriot, but lobbying is one of the things that Britain gave the world. The only reason it is called lobbying is because of the lobby outside St Stephen’s chapel, where the House of Commons used to sit. That is why when Paris lost the bid to host the 2012 Olympic games, Bertrand Delanoë complained passionately in French that the British had engaged outrageously in lobbying—“doing the lobby,” as he put it.

A fundamental part of our history, and of the way we have grown up as a democracy, has been the right to turn up at the door of Parliament, or a little further away since this ghastly building was built in the 1850s, and ensure that one’s voice is heard. The age of consent in this country is now 16, but it had been 13 until the late 19th century, because the only thing Josephine Butler could do was come and stand at the door of the House of Commons to lobby, grabbing hold of MPs as they came in to try to persuade them of her point of view, and eventually she won the argument.

It has been that way for centuries. In 1432 the Brewers’ Company wanted a new licence and a new company charter, so they tried to persuade Parliament. They failed, but then they paid the Lord Chancellor £40 and miraculously got their piece of legislation. In 1455 John Whittocksmead was paid a noble to be a friend for another honourable company in parliament. In 1485 the longstanding battle between the canons and the Poor Knights of Windsor was resolved when the Clerk of the House was given a very sumptuous breakfast to persuade him to get a Bill through. The Doorkeeper was given tuppence, the Serjeant at Arms was given a noble, the Speaker was given six pounds, six shillings and eightpence, and the King was given £100.

Quite rightly, as the Chair of the Standards and Privileges Committee said earlier, we have outlawed receiving money in return for putting forward a case in this House, but that is not the case in the other House. I suggest that many of the problems relating to lobbying and to corruption in our parliamentary system stem from the other end of the Corridor, because many people pursue their commercial interests through how they vote in that Chamber, which I think is inappropriate.

My personal experience is twofold. First, I was the BBC’s lobbyist in Brussels. That must make me the Daily Mail’s arch-hateperson—the BBC, Brussels and lobbying all in one—but I was proud of the fact that, by persuading MEPs and Commission members, we managed to see off Rupert Murdoch’s attempt, ironically enough, to make Brussels determine that the BBC’s licence fee was unfair state aid. Murdoch using Brussels to try to make that case was slightly odd. I am delighted that we won that battle by convincing people through legitimate lobbying.

[Paul Farrelly]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the Bill would tilt even further an already unlevel playing field? At the next election the vast majority of the press, including the Daily Mail, will support the Conservative party, yet the Bill will seek to restrain, for example, the National Union of Students and the education unions from reminding the Government of their record on university tuition fees.

Electoral Registration and Administration Bill

Paul Farrelly Excerpts

Tuesday 29th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Sadiq Khan]

It is a bit rich for a Conservative Member to lecture us on equality and fairness. I will come to those issues later in my speech.

The amendment will also similarly delay the reduction in the number of MPs by 50 to 600, as a result of which the next general election will take place on the current boundaries with the number of MPs at 650.

[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that this is not about having fairer constituencies—that can be accomplished by a periodic redistribution—nor about saving money? It is a highly political Bill aimed at the Labour party and at the Liberal Democrats who were naive to support it in the first place.

[Sadiq Khan]

The House has heard what my hon. Friend has said.

Should the amendment be supported, it would mean having more time to address the deficiencies in the current electoral register, particularly against the backdrop of the move towards individual electoral registration. The reason why that is so important is that the electoral register is the very basis on which boundaries are drawn and redrawn. It is the raw material from which the Boundary Commission constructs parliamentary constituencies. If that raw material is of poor quality, the subsequent output from the Boundary Commission will also be of questionable quality.

It is not necessary to take just my word for it or that of the House of Lords. The Electoral Reform Society said last year:

“A depleted register has major implications for political boundaries. A substantial fall off in registered voters, weighted towards urban areas, would require the Boundary Commission to reduce the number of inner-city seats. This will create thousands of ‘invisible’ citizens who will not be accounted for or considered in many key decisions that affect their lives, yet will still look to MPs to serve them as local constituents.”

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[Penny Mordaunt]

My hon. Friend makes a good and amusing point.

[Paul Farrelly]

Does the hon. Lady agree that, as the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso)—the hon. Member for three and a bit counties—explained, the Liberals are only following the very wise maxim, “When the facts change, I change my mind”? It is a maxim that her Chancellor might also follow.

[Penny Mordaunt]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. This comes to the heart of the matter. When the Division bell goes today, the 54 Liberals who voted in favour last time must ask themselves why a boundary review is a less valid measure now than it was in 2010 or will be in 2018. They must have a care for their consciences, do what is right for the country and their constituents, and do the honourable thing.

Oral Answers to Questions

Paul Farrelly Excerpts

Thursday 13th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Maria Miller]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The reason we commissioned a report was to listen to what Lord Justice Leveson puts forward. We very much have an open mind and I would not want to pre-empt the inquiry by trying to second-guess its conclusions. Whatever we do in future, we need to ensure that we maintain freedom of expression, that we have a press that is suitably independent of government and politicians and that there are sufficient teeth in the sanctions that empower the system. It must command the confidence and respect of the public and the industry alike. We need to adhere to those important principles, but first and foremost we must receive the report.

[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

Should Lord Justice Leveson call time on the last chance saloon and recommend a statutory underpinning for press self-regulation and a co-regulation model, what preparatory work have the Government done to prepare for such an option?

[Maria Miller]

The hon. Gentleman outlines some of the options that may be taken forward. What we have to do at this stage is ensure that the inquiry runs its course. Those both within and outside the House have noted in great detail the evidence that has been given, and we will need to look at the report in detail.

Privilege

Paul Farrelly Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd May 2012 Commons Chamber

[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

I congratulate the Chair of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for Maldon (Mr Whittingdale), on his excellent introduction. I agree very strongly with the hon. Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey), who has just left the Chamber. Not a single member of the legal profession—not a single legal adviser to News International—has resigned their services when they knew that evidence that was being given to the Committee was false and misleading, and that is an issue for the legal profession to consider.

I will be brief, because I believe our report’s conclusions are clear and speak for themselves. Our Committee has pursued the issue of phone hacking and how it reflects on press standards for five long years and, sadly, because of the forthcoming criminal trials, this might not be the final word. As the House has already heard, so as not to prejudice any prosecutions, we have taken great care in what we have said.

The report is not just about phone hacking per se; it is about the integrity of the Select Committee system in Parliament. Two years ago, in our report on “Press standards, privacy and libel”, on the evidence we found it “inconceivable” that News International’s “one rogue reporter” defence could possibly be true. Yet on the same evidence, the Press Complaints Commission cleared the News of the World of wider wrongdoing and shot the messenger—The Guardian—instead. The PCC is, of course, now on the scrap heap, a busted flush, waiting for Lord Leveson to pronounce and the Government—possibly—to act on the future shape of regulation.

After revelation upon revelation from the civil cases, last summer the then chair of the PCC, Baroness Buscombe, put her hands up. At long last, she was scathing about News International’s conduct and its so-called co-operation with PCC inquiries.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I remind the House that the motion for debate is the question of whether to refer the Select Committee’s conclusions to the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges. As has already been indicated, it is perfectly legitimate to record and, in a sense, almost to report to the House the basic findings of the Committee and to offer to the House, as the Chair of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee did, the background to and context for our debate. That seems eminently reasonable, but this is not an occasion to rehearse all the issues, the evidence and the chronology of events that have led to where we are today. Although I do not in any sense seek to prescribe what people should say, there could be advantage in recalling the pithy observations of the hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Mr Watson).

[Paul Farrelly]

Thank you, Mr Speaker, and the background has been rehearsed well enough by the Chair of the Select Committee. I will now move on to what the Committee did about the lies to us, which the Press Complaints Commission’s chairman admitted when she said that there was only so much that the commission could do when people were lying to it.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I just want to be clear that the hon. Gentleman has understood what I have said and intends to be guided by it. I presume that he is adducing this material in support of the proposition that the report should be considered by the Standards and Privileges Committee.

[Paul Farrelly]

You are right, as always, Mr Speaker.

On the conclusions of the report that we are asking the House to note, if “collective amnesia” was the one phrase from our 2010 report that echoed long afterwards, I hope that our “wilful blindness” conclusion will be one of those that resounds with the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges this time. That is the wilful turning of a blind eye to wrongdoing, not just phone hacking, over a period of time as long as any repercussions could be contained through the exercise, if need be, of raw press political power.

We were invited to lay most, if not all, of the blame for the cover-up on just two executives through News International’s damage-limitation exercise—Tom Crone, the company’s long-time in-house lawyer, and Colin Myler, the new and final editor of the News of the World. In our report, after months of deliberation and very patient amendment, with very skilful chairing, we declined that very unappealing invitation. As we navigated the issue of possible prosecutions, we asked whether it could be right to find wanting just a few executives who had so far not been arrested. We wondered whether it would be right, based on the evidence, to limit a critical verdict in our report if not just to one rogue reporter or one rogue newspaper, to just one rogue subsidiary, News International. After careful deliberation, we decided that it would not be right.

During that time, the group’s founder, Rupert Murdoch, and his son James were directors both of the parent company, News Corporation, and of News International. At the same time, News International misrepresented the investigations it had actually undertaken and attacked the Select Committee remorselessly, and its executives authorised surveillance on certain members of the Committee. So, we found that it was important that the report, based on the evidence, drew a strong corporate conclusion about a culture that was set right from the top. I conclude by drawing the House’s attention to the final sentence of paragraph 275 on page 84 of the report:

“In failing to investigate properly, and by ignoring evidence of widespread wrongdoing, News International and its parent News Corporation exhibited wilful blindness, for which the companies’ directors—including Rupert Murdoch and James Murdoch—should ultimately be prepared to take responsibility”.

I commend the motion to the House.

Oral Answers to Questions

Paul Farrelly Excerpts

Thursday 9th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Hugh Robertson]

Yes.

[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

We will have the opportunity to debate the Culture, Media and Sport Committee’s report on football governance this afternoon in Westminster Hall, although, ideally, we would have wanted to have debated the report after the FA had responded. The Minister says that he still expects the FA to respond by the end of February, but that is not our understanding, so when does he really expect a response from the football authorities?

[Hugh Robertson]

I absolutely do expect the football authorities to respond by the end of February. That is the deadline to which we are working.

Business of the House (Thursday)

Paul Farrelly Excerpts

Wednesday 8th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I am going to make a bit more progress.

[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Sir George Young]

No, I am going to make a bit more progress.

[Paul Farrelly]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. It is simply not the case that no concerns have been raised about this procedure. I raised them in a point of order last week, if you remember, and they have been highlighted by the hon. Member for Leeds North West (Greg Mulholland) in an early-day motion. How can the House correct the record?

[Mr Speaker]

May I say to the hon. Gentleman, first, that as far as he is concerned, he has just done so. Secondly, I do indeed recall his point of order, which was in fact on Monday night. I would have serious problems with my short-term memory if I did not recall it, but I do.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Farrelly]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that there could not be a greater contrast between the way in which the coalition Government are handling this and the way in which the Labour Government handled it seven years ago, no matter on what side of the argument one stands? Then the 105-page White Paper was published a whole year before the debate and the changes were introduced only after a general election, so the British public had the opportunity to vote on them.

[Hilary Benn]

My hon. Friend anticipates the very point that I will come to a little later in my speech.

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[Hilary Benn]

I am sure that the occupant of the Chair will have noticed that advance bid, but I fear that tomorrow many Members will end up disappointed because not enough time has been allocated for the debate.

[Paul Farrelly]

Is my right hon. Friend aware of all the details of the business due to come forth tomorrow? Can he satisfy himself that we will actually get five hours and not fewer?

[Hilary Benn]

That is the point I advanced a moment ago, because whether we get the full five hours depends very much on what happens before the debate. I fear that we might not, which shows just how inadequate the motion is.

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[Hilary Benn]

It certainly will not.

[Paul Farrelly]

Is my right hon. Friend aware that there are now only 21 hours, give or take a minute, from now until the moment of interruption tomorrow? Depending on how long the debate goes on tonight, Members may need some time to recover so that they are in full possession of their wits for tomorrow’s debate. Would it not be better to delay tomorrow’s debate until next week at least?

[Hilary Benn]

A very powerful case has been made this evening for providing more time, and given where we are now, the only way in which more time could be provided would indeed be for the matter to be put off until another occasion.

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[Hilary Benn]

Indeed. Given the number of things that the Deputy Prime Minister has had to say about the tuition fee increase that he intends to vote for tomorrow, the very least he could do is to come into the debate. I hope that he might be able to participate, because many people would like to hear how he explains the change in attitude—the 180° turn—that he has performed in a very short space of time.

[Paul Farrelly]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the ground keeps shifting from day to day? The coalition Government have now admitted that deterrence because of debt is an issue, and they have announced a national scholarship fund. Does he consider five hours to be sufficient time in which to debate all the details of the proposals and to examine whether the Government are, in effect, just making policy up on the hoof?

[Hilary Benn]

It is clearly not sufficient time to debate those matters, which brings me to the second reason why more time needs to be found, which is the nature of the change that the Government wish to make. The proposals on fees that we are being asked to consider tomorrow cannot really be seen in isolation from the wider Browne proposals or the Government’s spending review. The truth is that they are intimately bound up, one with another, which is why the House needs proper time to consider both. As we know, the huge fee increase is a result of the Government’s decision in the spending review to impose on universities not the average cut that they have been applying—a cut of 11%—but an unprecedented 80% reduction in university teaching budgets.

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[Mr Speaker]

Order. Two hon. Members have submitted manuscript amendments which I myself saw a matter of a few minutes ago, and which, to my certain knowledge, have been submitted within the last hour or so. It is right that I give the House a verdict on the matter. I have not selected either of the amendments. There was plenty of time in which manuscript amendments could have been submitted: they could have been submitted much earlier in the day, but that did not happen.

It may also be helpful if I point out that the House is having—I emphasise the words “is having”—a very full debate on all the relevant issues relating to time. There has been, and continues to be for as long as the debate continues, a very good opportunity for Members who wish to argue for particular allocations of time to do so. That is the situation, and we must now move on.

[Paul Farrelly]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Can you tell us whether you have received any amendments to tomorrow’s motion other than from the Opposition Front-Bench team, and in particular whether you have received a cross-party amendment to the motion?

[Mr Speaker]

I was slightly perplexed and taken aback by that attempted point of order for the simple reason that we are not discussing tomorrow’s motion, and I am not going to get into the subject of amendments thereto. I was focusing simply on manuscript amendments tabled tonight by, I believe, the hon. Members for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan) and for Glasgow South (Mr Harris). It is with that, and that alone, that I was, and am, concerned.

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[Mr Jones]

I would always agree with that. My right hon. Friend is a very good friend and he has done an excellent job in defending the rights of Back Benchers and the House.

Later, I will remind some Members on the Government Front Bench how eager they were in opposition to argue, on the subject of programme motions, that we needed to have more debate. That is especially true of the Deputy Leader of the House, although he is not in his place. I remember having to listen to hours of his droning on about why—

[Paul Farrelly]

Have you got a list?

[Mr Jones]

I will have later on.

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[Mr Jones]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point. When the Leader of the House opened the debate, he gave an assurance that the Government would not make any statements tomorrow that would eat into the time. My hon. Friend makes a good point, though: issues might arise overnight to do with the weather in Scotland and other parts of the country, or to do with the demonstration tomorrow, or with something else. An urgent question might be sought and Mr Speaker might allow it. A statement might have to be brought forward. If that happens, that will eat into the five hours that we have been allocated.

[Paul Farrelly]

Given the number of applications to make a speech—there has been a running total throughout the debate—may I tempt my hon. Friend to inquire of Mr Speaker whether he has decided that there will be a time limit on speeches?

[Mr Jones]

I am sorry, but I would not dream of telling Mr Speaker how to do his job. It will be up to Mr Speaker to decide the allocation of time and who is called. Given the numbers who have expressed an interest in the debate, I think a time limit might well be introduced.

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[Mr Jones]

The hon. Lady makes a very good point. My right hon. Friend’s central message was that tomorrow we need to discuss, and will discuss, those complex financial implications. There are implications not just for universities and individual students, but, as the hon. Lady quite rightly says, for the Northern Ireland Assembly.

[Paul Farrelly]

I am listening to my hon. Friend with great interest, but I fear from the smile on the Government Chief Whip’s face that he is considering when to cut my hon. Friend off in his prime. If a closure motion is called, would it be remiss of Liberal Democrats to vote to curtail the debate?

[Mr Jones]

I am sorry, but it is entirely up to the Chair to decide whether to allow a closure motion.

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[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

I have a great deal of affection for the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, the right hon. Member for Twickenham (Vince Cable)—and the stadium in his constituency. He is usually a reasonable man, but in this case he is in an unreasonable hurry.

While the focus has been on the Liberal Democrat position, I fear that five hours will not give us enough time to look at the more interesting views of some influential Conservatives. For example, I would like to have more time to consider this view:

“Some people will, apparently, be put off applying to our elite institutions by the prospect of taking on a debt of this size. Which, as far as I’m concerned, is all to the good. The first point that needs to be made about the so-called deterrent effect of a…loan is that anyone put off from attending a good university by fear of that debt doesn’t deserve to be at any university…if you’re such a fool that you don’t want to accept that deal, then you’re too big a fool to benefit from the university education I’m currently subsidising for you.”

Those words were written by the Secretary of State for Education, when he was a columnist on The Times in 2003. Of course, the level of debt will be double or more if these proposals go through.

The Government have admitted that debt deterrence is a factor, but as the ground shifts I am not sure that we will have time tomorrow—in five hours—to debate the new national scholarship fund that the coalition are introducing. Very sketchy details have been given to the House about that. We need time to debate that fund and the evidence on which it is based.

[Steve McCabe]

As well as discussing the reasoning behind the piece of writing my hon. Friend mentions, could we not also ask the Minister for Universities and Science, to explore what has happened to his thinking? He wrote a book called “The Pinch,” which describes how our generation is robbing today’s teenagers. He is now setting out to do the exact opposite to his book’s conclusions.

[Paul Farrelly]

I agree with my hon. Friend. The views of the Secretary of the Secretary of State for Education can perhaps be described as ultra logical. The Minister for Universities and Science is himself a logical man, but clearly when one admits that the fear of debt, however illogical, is a factor, we must have the time to inquire further into such policies.

[Kevin Brennan]

Is the point that my hon. Friend is making about the vagueness of some of the detail of the proposal not absolutely vital to the issue of having only five hours for the debate tomorrow? A debate in this House should not simply consist of the Government putting forward their proposals and ramming the measure through on a majority; it should consist of sufficient time for opposition and other Members to scrutinise and ask questions of the Government. That simply will not be able to happen tomorrow.

[Paul Farrelly]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Evidence shows—I hope to come on to some of the evidence—that in constructing any higher education package, it is important that the whole is taken together. The reality of politics means that if the fee levels are set in a five-hour debate tomorrow, those people who are concerned about student support and other elements of the package that may or may not count as deterrents will lose their leverage in future negotiations. My hon. Friend is absolutely correct.

[Mrs Moon]

One of the problems with a five-hour limit is that the legislation is complex and many young people may arrive here tomorrow wishing to clarify the terms and conditions under which their future education will depend. They will need to spend time talking to their Members of Parliament, but they will not have time to do so in that five hours. In particular, I know that young people have been unable to access their Liberal Democrat MPs because of notices on their office doors that say the office is closed.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. First, that intervention was too long and, secondly, the issue is not how much time visitors to the House have to raise matters with Members who might or might not be taking part in a debate; the issue is the allocation of time for Members of Parliament to debate the issues.

[Paul Farrelly]

My hon. Friend makes a pertinent point. What young people will take away from just five hours of debate tomorrow is the fact that going for a degree will cost them much more. They will not have any details on how they will be supported. Such information would allow them to form a considered view. Some of the evidence that I fear the House will not have time to consider tomorrow shows that, where variable fees have been introduced overseas, there is a deterrent effect. That is clear from the Ivy League in the United States. Again we will simply run out of time tomorrow to give proper consideration to the US experience.

[Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham, Ladywood) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the deterrent effect is particularly keenly felt by students who will be the first in their families to go to university? That is the case for many students in my constituency who are, frankly, put off by the terrifying prospect of £30,000 or £40,000 of debt.

[Paul Farrelly]

I was the first in my family ever to go to university. It is certainly a challenge for the Government to ensure that students who do not come from a background where higher education is the norm are not put off. I fear that that will be the starting point if we are allowed to debate the matter for only five hours tomorrow.

[Robert Flello]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Paul Farrelly]

I will certainly give way to my hon. Friend and next-door neighbour.

[Robert Flello]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend and next-door neighbour. My constituency covers a third of Stoke-on-Trent, a very challenged area, where one of the best ways forward for young people is to go either to the fine university of Keele or to the fine university of Stafford. How will they be able to do so if we do not have the time tomorrow to debate the full intricacies of the issues, so that they can be reassured?

[Paul Farrelly]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising the situation in north Staffordshire, where we live, which is a situation that will be replicated across the country. The danger is that we will not have the time to debate, area by area, the risk to the entirety of an institution that will follow—or may follow—the teaching cuts and the fees combined.

[Julie Hilling]

Does my hon. Friend agree that people studying courses such as youth and community work will be disadvantaged? It is mainly poorer and older people who go into the profession, and they are people who spend their lives in the service of young people and their communities, but who will never earn the salaries—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The hon. Lady is very much focusing on the substance of the issue, but we must get back to the allocation of time.

[Paul Farrelly]

I am acutely aware, as my hon. Friend is, that the Government are saying on the one hand that they want the best and brightest to go into teaching, for example, yet on the other hand they are making it more difficult, and that we will not have enough time tomorrow to debate all those intricacies or how the Government plan to tackle the issue.

[John Robertson]

People outside this place will be affected by what will happen and what will be discussed tomorrow, but how much time from those five hours does my hon. Friend think will be devoted to the problems in the devolved areas?

[Paul Farrelly]

Mr Speaker has graciously allowed a wide-ranging debate tomorrow, but inevitably—this is at the Speaker’s discretion—there will be limits. It will be difficult for Members, if they are called, to expand fully on the arguments in the time available. The international evidence is vital. Good, sound policy should be based on evidence. Frankly, we need the time, as an intelligent House, to debate it.

[Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend share my concern and that of million+, the think-tank, that we do not have sufficient time to deliberate on the impact of some of the Government’s proposals on women’s participation in university? Some of the assumptions are false. Women will take longer to pay back the fees and will therefore end up paying more in the long run.

[Paul Farrelly]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend; the effect on women is also something that the House should be given time to consider. Million+ is a great institution that has put forward many practical alternatives. It disputes some of the Government’s assertions about who will bear the greatest burden, which is something that we have now heard the Institute for Fiscal Studies doing too. We will simply not have time in five hours to get to what is fact and what is fiction in the Government’s position.

The market system is most fully developed in the United States, and we should be given time to look at the effects there.

[Mr Ben Wallace (Wyre and Preston North) (Con)]

Obviously this debate is focused on the opportunity to debate the subject tomorrow, but on Monday the Opposition had their eighth allotted Opposition day debate. They chose to discuss not tuition fees but local government funding. Perhaps when they are complaining about a lack of time, they could remind the House that when they had the opportunity on Monday, they did not take it.

[Paul Farrelly]

I do not know where the hon. Gentleman has been for the past few days, but we have just had an Opposition day debate on that very subject.

If we had the time, one of the things that we should look at is the experience in the US. Some 34% of young white people in the United States earn an honours degree, compared with only 19% of African-Americans and 10% of Hispanics. Again, we will not have time to look at the international experience. In Canada, when fees for medical schools went up from roughly the same level as ours are now—the equivalent of £3,000 in their currency—to $15,000, which is much the same as £9,000, participation among children from lower income backgrounds dropped by a third. We simply will not have the time—[Hon. Members: “Hooray!”] We will not have the time to rehearse all that evidence.

[Robert Flello]

My hon. Friend is making some extremely important points about having the time—[Laughter.] He is talking about having the time tomorrow to debate these important issues, yet all that we can hear from across the Chamber is hysterics. Is it really that funny to prevent young people from going to university because of these fee increases, and not having time to discuss it?

[Paul Farrelly]

Most Members of the House are very well behaved and listen politely when other Members are on their feet. Mr Speaker, I will not try your patience by going through every fee level, which we will not have time to debate, in Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the United States, institution by institution and region by region. The fact is, however, that if the motion goes through tomorrow, we will have the highest levels of fees across the board outside the United States. The implication of that—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I think that the hon. Gentleman is in danger of catching North Durham disease. The hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) was fond of saying what he would not talk about before proceeding to talk about it, and I hope that the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Paul Farrelly) is not going to follow suit.

[Paul Farrelly]

I apologise if I have given that impression, Mr Speaker. I take it that North Durham disease is a mining affliction; I come from a mining area myself.

[Mr Tom Harris]

It has been announced tonight that the latest YouGov poll puts the Liberal Democrats on only 8%. Would it not be to their benefit to have more time to debate these matters tomorrow, in order for them to persuade the country that they have actually stuck to their principles? Or does my hon. Friend believe that, if they were given more time, that 8% might look quite optimistic in a couple of weeks time?

[Paul Farrelly]

I hope that it will not take 5% of five hours to persuade the Liberal Democrats to join us in asking for more time tomorrow.

The evidence from the UK needs to be properly considered as well, including the evidence on price sensitivity. And the Government have not explained the evidential base on which their policy is based. We need time to fathom that.

[Helen Goodman]

I would not wish to make a political point, but does my hon. Friend agree that the Leader of the House might have been influenced by the fact that the statistics for applications from UK-domiciled students for undergraduate courses at the colleges of Oxford university show that 10 times as many come from Hampshire as come from County Durham?

[Paul Farrelly]

My hon. Friend has put her point firmly on the record, and I hope she will get the opportunity to expand on it if she is called to speak later in the debate.

There are a great many documents from institutions in the UK that have been looking at the effect of fees on participation, and we really need the opportunity to debate them. One such document, an interim impact assessment on higher education funding, shows that, according to the evidence on price sensitivity, a £1,000 increase in fees reduces participation by about 4.4 percentage points, yet here we are, facing a £6,000 rise, which would imply a reduction in participation by a quarter. We need time to look at all that evidence, which the Government have not been forthcoming in producing to back up their plans.

The Deputy Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr Clegg) has placed great emphasis on social mobility. He has even stated that these proposals will increase social mobility, and we need time to be able to cross-examine that view and to see the evidence for it. We also need time to give an airing to all the views of the young people that have come to us from across the country, e-mail by e-mail. We need more than five hours to do that.

[Catherine McKinnell]

On social mobility, another issue that I am sure we will not have time to debate properly tomorrow is the removal of the education maintenance allowance. That, as well as the issue of tuition fees, is relevant to social mobility and the two issues will have a cumulative effect, preventing people from accessing universities or even from getting into a position to think about going to university in the first place.

[Paul Farrelly]

My hon. Friend will have heard me mention the Secretary of State for Education—a lovely man, although he has some energetic views. What we really need is time to see whether the Government are engaging in joined-up policy. How does the abolition of the EMA affect participation and how will it increase mobility? The same applies to the abolition of the Aimhigher programme. We simply have not had the time and I do not think we will have the time in five hours to debate that.

[Mr David]

As already noted, the statutory instrument applies only to England, but a number of Welsh colleagues have been in active dialogue with our friends in the Welsh Assembly. A different regime, of course, will be implemented there. Does my hon. Friend agree that it would be good for debate if we had ample time to bring forward the Welsh experience so that we could compare it with what is going to happen in England?

[Paul Farrelly]

Indeed. I think that the Leader of the House should find time—separate time—to look at Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

[Barbara Keeley]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way; he is being generous with his time. As for understanding how the abolition of the EMA will affect different groups, I hope we will get enough time to discuss the impact on young carers. I recently spoke to someone who worked in a young carers’ project in Salford who told me that all but one of the young carers, aged 16 to 18, were on the EMA. She was very worried that they would lose out on the end of their education. Maintaining an education alongside a big caring work load is a very difficult thing. Let us hope that we will have enough time to discuss that issue.

[Paul Farrelly]

Indeed. People who have to take a break from work—women raising a family, for example—will lose out in terms of their ability to repay because they become carers. Again, we need more time to look at the impact of the changes on such people.

[Albert Owen]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Can you help me? Have you had any indication from the Leader of the House whether he intends to wind up the debate on behalf of the Government? He has been sitting there motionless throughout the evening and has not taken the opportunity to explain why he has imposed the 5.30 pm deadline and why he has not answered the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) about the increase from three to five hours.

[Mr Speaker]

I have received no such indication. I did not invite it and it has not been proffered. That is the situation. I think it is fair to say that the hon. Gentleman’s point is not a point of order but a point of inquiry, which is not quite the same thing.

[Paul Farrelly]

Just to conclude my response to the intervention made by my hon. Friend the Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley), we need that vital time to assess the implications for all those people in those situations.

[Sheila Gilmore]

My hon. Friend appeared to say that separate and additional time would be required to deal with Wales and Scotland. I ask him to consider the fact that once the motion has been passed, if it is passed tomorrow, decisions will have been taken that will have impacted on those areas and that this is a major change from what went before. We therefore need time within the debate before a decision is made on the level of fees.

[Paul Farrelly]

Unfortunately, I am not responsible for scheduling the business of the House, but I think that the Leader of the House should be as generous as possible in allocating time to debate these issues. For instance, we need time to examine the views of young people. Let us think of the Youth Parliament—an institution that we have encouraged. We have invited it here to debate and its members have sent e-mails to Members of Parliament. We need time to debate the views of Ahmed Siddiqui, a 16-year-old who asked us not to give up on helping his generation to become everything they can be.

[Steve McCabe]

Is my hon. Friend rapidly coming to the same conclusion as I am—that, having heard from only four speakers in this rather short debate so far this evening, we have nevertheless heard a large number of issues raised and concerns expressed, so it is now time for the Leader of the House to realise that he should do justice to this debate, which requires not five hours but two days?

[Paul Farrelly]

You will be glad to hear, Mr Speaker, that I plan to conclude very shortly, to give more Members—including, I hope, Government Members—an opportunity to contribute to the debate.

[Kevin Brennan]

My hon. Friend mentioned that the Youth Parliament came here to debate the very same issue. Would it not be ironic if we spent less time in the House debating the subject than the Youth Parliament, because of the inadequacy of the motion?

[Paul Farrelly]

It would be not only ironic, but tragic and a dereliction of the House’s duty—and a bad example to the UK Youth Parliament.

As my hon. Friend encourages me to talk more about the UK Youth Parliament, I should say that we need time to consider the views of Sam Hatzigeorgiou, a 16-year-old, who says:

“I am seriously considering giving up any hope of university education. Please think about that before you vote.”

Why can we not have time to consider what Chloe Shaw, who is just 15 years old, says? She says:

“I will be 18 when the policy comes into action. I am so worried about the rise in tuition fees. I am only going to be applying for the cheapest universities. Shouldn’t I be making the most of my abilities, rather than going for the cheaper options?”

[Mr George Howarth]

Will my hon. Friend add to his list the views of the students of All Saints school in my constituency? A couple of weeks ago, they told me that they see themselves facing a triple whammy: the loss, for many of them, of the EMA; the scrapping of Aimhigher; and the removal of the opportunity to go into higher education.

[Paul Farrelly]

My right hon. Friend’s point is well made. Traditional industrial areas, such as his and mine, are in need of all those schemes to encourage people and give them a fair chance to go to university. We need time to discuss that.

We need time to discuss other matters of which young people may not be fully aware. At the moment, they are just aware that it will cost them more to go to university, but perhaps they are not aware that some universities might not exist in future because they are threatened by teaching cuts. Without being parochial, I should like to discuss my university, Keele, where there will be an estimated 46% cut in the teaching grant, from £29 million to £13.5 million.

[Robert Flello]

I am most grateful to my hon. Friend for his generosity with his time—

[Robert Flello]

My apologies. It is good to see the hon. Gentleman in his place; he has been a little bit on and off over the past few hours. [Interruption.] I hope he is saving himself for my speech later as well.

My point, of course, relates to the motion before us this evening. Would my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Paul Farrelly) care to comment on the fact that there are a huge number of organisations on which the House relies for information, support and knowledge that wish their views to be represented through their Members of Parliament, but that under the motion we will not have time to discuss properly the issues that they have raised with us?

[Paul Farrelly]

My hon. Friend is correct. There are wider issues involved in the contribution that higher education makes to local economies. For instance, in our area, Staffordshire university may face cuts across the board that will damage the great job it does in regeneration and teaching new ceramics skills and design.

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend think that the motion will give the House sufficient time to discuss all the implications of the fact that the hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) has announced tonight that he will not vote for the tuition fee increases?

[Paul Farrelly]

I fear that there will not be time to discuss everything that has been said on the issue, or even to fathom whether Members have the courage to turn up in the Chamber and abstain in person, rather than simply stay away.

--- Later in debate ---

[Helen Goodman]

Another consideration is the impact on universities of excluding able young people who simply cannot afford to go to the best universities. Does my hon. Friend agree that that is not just bad for the young people but bad for the universities? Will there be time for us to discuss it?

[Paul Farrelly]

I do agree, and I have already said that we will not have time to discuss the ins and outs and the evidence base of the national scholarship fund. We are told that 18,000 to 20,000 students might be helped, but we have not been told where those figures come from.

[Thomas Docherty]

I do not know whether Members have had a chance to read the House of Commons Information Office’s excellent publication on statutory instruments, but I had a chance to pick up a copy yesterday. We will be discussing a statutory instrument tomorrow. My hon. Friend may be interested to know that in the House of Lords, determination of the time to be allocated to debate on statutory instruments is based on the number of speakers who have indicated that they wish to take part. Does my hon. Friend agree that, given that we will not have enough time tomorrow, the Procedure Committee of the House of Commons should consider again whether the system works for the purpose for which it is intended?

[Paul Farrelly]

rose—

[The Comptroller of Her Majesty's Household (Mr Alistair Carmichael)]

claimed to move the closure (Standing Order No. 36).

Question put forthwith, That the Question be now put.

The House proceeded to a Division.

Privilege

Paul Farrelly Excerpts

Thursday 9th September 2010 Commons Chamber

[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

The issue, which I hope the House will refer to the Standards and Privileges Committee, is about not just crimes committed several years ago but about cover-ups that, to all appearances, are still going on today. I was a member of the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport that looked into the affair previously. I drafted many of the conclusions of its report. We tried to penetrate the veil of secrecy over the affair, but we generally met with a wall of silence, with evasion and with collective amnesia. In trying to complete a much larger report before the election, we also had limited practical powers of compulsion. That issue relates to the modernisation of the House, which, if the resolution is passed today, I hope that the Standards and Privileges Committee will also consider. The powers of Select Committees need to be strengthened, and we need look no further than the United States Congress for good examples of how to do that.

Before the House votes, I want to deal with a couple of matters in the report, as well as two matters that keep being repeated, including in the past few days, on which the House might appreciate some clarity. First, regarding the police, the former Assistant Commissioner Andy Hayman has repeatedly told the news that as far as the Met was concerned, it left no stone unturned and interviewed everyone who was relevant at the time. I am afraid that that is simply not true. The police interviewed only Mr Mulcaire and Mr Goodman, despite evidence in their hands that implicated others in the activity, which has clearly affected the confidence with which MPs can go about their business. Mr Mulcaire and Mr Goodman also maintained their right to silence, before entering a guilty plea, so no cross-examination was made. Our report was highly critical of the extent of the police investigation. Frankly, had Mr Hayman been in charge of the Watergate inquiry, President Nixon would have safely served a full term. His line is one that his successor, Assistant Commissioner John Yates, is finding it increasingly difficult to maintain, as new people emerge out of the woodwork, day in, day out, in the press.

Our report was very critical of the evasive display by Mr Yates in giving evidence for the police, and I hope that if the motion is passed, the Standards and Privileges Committee will not allow the police to get away with such evasiveness. As the hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) has pointed out, nor is the Crown Prosecution Service blameless in the affair. When we asked it to justify how the investigation and prosecution had been carried out previously, it repeated verbatim, to a great extent, the police statements, which were highly misleading.

Secondly, I want to address the claim that our Committee—this has been repeated in the news in the past few days, often for libel balance—found no evidence that the then editor of the News of the World, Andy Coulson, knew about the hacking. That has been taken to mean that we effectively cleared Mr Coulson of knowing what his staff and Mr Mulcaire were up to. Nothing could be further from the truth—this is not a political point but a matter of fact. Frankly, we were incredulous that such a hands-on editor would not have had the slightest inkling about what his staff and private investigators employed by the paper were up to. That activity has clearly interfered with the activities of Members of Parliament. Faced with Mr Coulson’s denial, however, we simply could go no further. As my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich East (Mr Watson) has said, others simply declined to be interviewed. To the list that he has had, I would add Mr Neville Thurlbeck, the chief reporter of the News of the World, who offered only to give evidence in private, which we considered unsatisfactory. Would compulsion have been productive? No, because it would have delayed the publication of a report. That is also an issue for the Standards and Privileges Committee to consider. Another reporter who was implicated was on a round-the-world trip at the time.

[Mr Adrian Sanders (Torbay) (LD)]

Some of the issues that the hon. Gentleman raises rather reinforce the view that there might be a justification not just for a Standards and Privileges Committee inquiry but a full judicial inquiry, especially to consider the police’s non-use of powers, which is in itself an abuse of power.

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

Order. We are not debating a judicial inquiry.

[Paul Farrelly]

I will refer to the police and other inquiries, which will no doubt go on in parallel, in a few moments, if I may.

Only now are more people coming out of the woodwork to naysay what Mr Coulson told us. Clearly, that is a matter that the Committee on Standards and Privileges will want to look into in order to get to the bottom of it.

Finally, I want to touch on two loose ends from our report, of which the Standards and Privileges Committee might find it useful to be advised. First, the whole affair was reactivated by the case of Gordon Taylor, the chief executive of the Professional Footballers Association, whose phone was hacked by Mr Mulcaire. The News of the World was in pursuit of sex stories in football. It sent its chief reporter, Mr Thurlbeck, to knock on Mr Taylor’s door, on a Saturday afternoon, in the north of England, presumably with the intention of publishing the next day. However, after Mr Taylor’s lawyers denied the story that he was having an affair and made legal threats, the story was spiked personally by Mr Coulson, as we established. We followed the trail as far as a conversation he had with his legal manager, Tom Crone, before spiking it. All Mr Coulson told us was that he had not read a story. We were unable to fathom details of the discussions that he had with Mr Crone before spiking it because, he said, he was unable to remember them. We thought it would be highly unusual for an editor to accept a denial at face value. From my experience in journalism, an editor would be expected to ask, “How can we stand this story up?” The answer, we thought, would inevitably involve some discussions of the source of the story. We suspected, although we could not prove it, that the story was spiked in part, at least, because any libel suit would have exposed the phone hacking that was going on.

In case it is of help to the Standards and Privileges Committee, let me say that Mr Crone is also a very interesting character, who is legendary at the News of the World. On two occasions he misled our Select Committee. He denied admitting a pay-off to Mr Clive Goodman after he got out of jail. He also misled our Committee on the identity of the junior reporter who was involved in transcribing phone-hacked messages.

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

Order. We cannot rehearse the work of the Committee by providing it with evidence. We have to stick to the subject of the debate.

[Paul Farrelly]

I am about to end my speech, Mr Deputy Speaker. However, as Mr Crone is a key player, I urge the Committee to interview him as well.

What is happening is unacceptable. It is unacceptable that the police have not fully notified people whose telephone PINs were retrieved during the investigation, and who clearly include many Members of Parliament; it is unacceptable for the police to say that there are just “a “handful of victims”, given that the number is growing by the day; and it is unacceptable for the police to say that they conducted a full and rigorous inquiry. They did not, the News of the World did not, and the Press Complaints Commission did not. It is time that the position was rectified, and a referral of the issue to the Committee on Standards and Privileges will go a long way towards doing that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Paul Farrelly Excerpts

Monday 26th July 2010 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport was asked—

[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

1. What representations he has received on broadcasting rules on political impartiality in television news.

[The Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

Absolutely none.

[Paul Farrelly]

I thank the Secretary of State for that precise and illuminating reply. He will know that the British public value the political neutrality of TV news in this country, so will he confirm that the Government have no plans to change the rules governing political impartiality on TV news, and that they will expect broadcasters on digital terrestrial television to conform to those rules in the future?

[Mr Hunt]

I can confirm that we have no plans to change the impartiality rules, but we will take no lessons on impartiality from the Opposition. There are two people responsible for impartiality in British broadcasting: the head of Ofcom and the head of the BBC Trust. One is a former Labour councillor and the other is a former Labour special adviser.

Oral Answers to Questions

Paul Farrelly Excerpts

Monday 21st June 2010 Commons Chamber

[John Penrose]

Indeed, I can. As a result of the change in shares that will be introduced over the next two years, there will be £50 million more per year for each of the major groups of good causes—the arts, heritage and sport—from 2012.

[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

In his answer, the new Minister did not mention the Big Lottery Fund. It has contributed to many good causes across the country, including the Peter Pan special needs nursery in my constituency, which takes profoundly disabled children from birth. Will he give the House some comfort that that sort of cause will continue to be supported as he conducts his review?

[John Penrose]

I am delighted to make that commitment, although I cannot make promises for individual good causes, as that is rightly a question for individual lottery distributors. However, as a result of the share changes and tailing-off of the Olympic top slice from the lottery funders, the total available to voluntary and community sector organisations of the kind he mentions, within the Big Lottery Fund, should increase over the next two to three years in cash terms.