Business of the House

John Bercow Excerpts

Thursday 2nd February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

May I first associate myself with the hon. Lady’s words about World Cancer day? It is probably the case that there is no Member in any party of this House who has not been touched in some way by the case of a relative or a dear friend who has had to fight —sometimes successfully and sometimes sadly not—against this scourge. Like her, I would celebrate the advances of medical science, the skills of oncologists and others who diagnose and treat cancer, and the courage of cancer survivors and their relatives who give them such critical support. Let us keep in our thoughts and prayers those who have been bereaved as a consequence of cancer, and give thanks to those staff in the NHS, and in the voluntary and charitable sector, who work to provide specialist nursing care, including hospice treatment, to people who are having to face the end of their lives.

I turn to the other points raised by the hon. Lady. I want to be able to give the House some news, as soon as possible, on the summer recess and on the restoration and renewal programme, but I am not able to do so today. My understanding is that the Committee to consider the Bill of the hon. Member for North West Durham (Pat Glass) has now been appointed, but has not yet met.

The hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) mentioned the European Union. I really do think that the line of questioning she pursued this morning was something of a distraction therapy to try to divert attention from the blatant divisions within her party, with different members of the shadow Cabinet and the Front Bench dropping off the perch with every news bulletin. For a two-clause Bill, the second clause of which is simply the short title of the Bill, two full days on Second Reading, including going to midnight on Tuesday, and up to three days in a Committee of the whole House, seems to me a perfectly reasonable allocation of time.

Let me turn to the hon. Lady’s points about school funding. The money to which she referred was allocated by the Treasury to the Department for Education explicitly for the purpose of supporting the full shift of all schools to academy status. The Government, having reconsidered that policy in light of public representations and representations in this place, altered their policy. Therefore, that money was not needed, since those schools were not going to transfer to academy status.

The hon. Lady’s point about Burma is well made. I shall make sure that it is passed back to the Foreign Secretary, but I can give her an unqualified assurance that this Government will continue, through the Foreign Office and the Department for International Development, to work to support the cause of building democracy, human rights and community reconciliation inside that country.

Finally, the hon. Lady rightly paid tribute to the stupendous achievement of Roger Federer. It is not only tennis aficionados such as you, Mr Speaker, who will have cheered at his success. Somebody in professional tennis who is in their mid-30s is at quite an advanced age, and there is perhaps a message of hope to all of us that age is just a number and that we can strive for greater achievement whatever age we reach.

[Mr Speaker]

What a splendid note on which to finish. The man is an inspiration.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Lidington or Federer?

[Mr Speaker]

I do not wish to be discourteous to the Leader of the House, but I actually had Federer in mind.

[Sir Greg Knight (East Yorkshire) (Con)]

May we have a debate on the power of clinical commissioning groups in the NHS and the fact that they are unaccountable to the public? Is the Leader of the House aware that a clinical commissioning group covering part of my constituency plans to withdraw services from Bridlington hospital and Driffield hospital? That is not on account of cost, but the clinical commissioning group seems hell-bent on doing it, despite overwhelming public opposition. Does he accept that these plans are totally unacceptable? If we cannot have a debate, will he draw my concerns to the attention of the Secretary of State for Health?