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10.45 pm
The President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mrs. Margaret Beckett): In view not only of the lack of progress on the Bill, but of the Opposition's unwillingness even to discuss the time required for it, tomorrow's business will now be an allocation of time motion, followed by the remaining stages of the Local Government Bill. The business previously announced for tomorrow will now be taken at a later date.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord): Order. The question before the House is debatable and I assume that the Leader of the House has made that statement as part of the debate.
Mr. Jenkin: A large number of amendments have yet to be discussed which raise serious matters about the Bill.
We have yet to discuss the principle of capping and council tax benefit subsidy limitation; the application of best value duty to police authorities; the definition of the general duty of best value; the limiting of the Secretary of State's powers, requiring him to take independent advice; the widening of the duty to consult to include non-commercial organisation; and such vital matters as whether the Henry VIII clause should be limited in duration, as such clauses should be.
Serious constitutional issues are embodied in the Bill, it being the most draconian local government Bill that the House has ever seen. We are prepared to put in the time tonight to discuss these matters. [Interruption.] The question is why the Government would prefer to go home rather than do the work that they were elected to do.
We know what the Government want. They want a soft life. They want to go early to bed with their teddy bears and hot milk instead of doing the job for which they were elected. The Government will get the Bill through by guillotining further consideration of these matters. Many important issues that we wish to discuss may not be discussed. No doubt the Government's sittings motion will put the remaining Government business first in the order of consideration and there will be no further discussion of the matters that we regard as important. The Government will then regard that as sufficient consideration of the Bill.
There is time tonight to discuss these matters, but the Government would prefer to go to bed. That is a dereliction of their duty and an arrogant stifling of democratic debate in the House. I therefore oppose the motion.
Mr. Frank Field (Birkenhead):
Some of us, as the hon. Member for North Essex (Mr. Jenkin) said, may be going home to our teddy bears tonight, but British troops may be in the air to carry out Government policy and may die in the process. Surely it is inappropriate that the House of Commons should continue with this sort of saga during the night when important issues are at stake.
The plain fact is, as I say to my right hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk, Coastal (Mr. Gummer), that if the Government want the Bill they will get it. They have the majority to do so. No amount of sitting here tonight will make any difference to that.
Surely, as the country approaches war, it would wrong of the House to be giving such a display of party politics.
Mr. John Gummer (Suffolk, Coastal):
Our next discussion would have been about democracy in local government and how local people might have decided what they wanted to do with their own local authority. It is very serious that so many Labour Members shouted when it was suggested that we should discuss these serious matters one after another. It is all very well for the Leader of the House, who never answered a question seriously when she was the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, either because she could not or--
Mrs. Beckett:
Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Gummer:
No, I am not giving way. The right hon. Lady never answered a question.
Mrs. Beckett:
I thought that I should correct the right hon. Gentleman. My hon. Friends were saying, "You have not been here all evening, so why are you concerned?"
Mr. Gummer:
The right hon. Lady showed so much courtesy to the House that she did not even allow any
We are discussing a serious matter and we wish to go on to discuss democracy in local authorities. Year after year after year, the right hon. Lady complained in the House if anyone suggested that any decision should be made that was contrary to the wishes of Labour-controlled local authorities. I suggest that Labour Members want to introduce the various draconian measures that are before the House because they know that they will not control many local authorities in the future. They will therefore not come into conflict with Labour local authorities in the coming months and years.
I say to the right hon. Lady, if she is listening, that there is no need for draconian rules when local authorities are run by Conservatives because we are, by nature, careful with ratepayers' money. She and her hon. Friends are making a great mistake: they believe that they have to make such decisions, because otherwise they will be faced with recalcitrant authorities over which they do not have control.
We have given Labour Members a way out, but it is worrying that they will not take it. That way out is giving local people the right to decide for themselves whether they want an increase above that which the Government are willing to give them. That is what we would have discussed. The proposed Adjournment--
Mr. Deputy Speaker:
Order. The question before us is narrowly drawn. [Hon. Members: "Hear, hear."] Order. I do not want the right hon. Gentleman to widen it too far. Would he please return to discussing the question before us?
Mr. Gummer:
The motion before the House stops us discussing democracy in local government. This House is supposed to be the guardian of democracy.
Mr. Michael Fabricant (Lichfield):
Does not my right hon. Friend agree that the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field) has affronted the House by saying that we should not be discussing democracy because of what might be happening over Kosovo? Are not we entering into a dispute in Kosovo for the sake of democracy? During the second world war, did not such discussions continue? The House did not go into abeyance for five years. The House of Commons--
Mr. Deputy Speaker:
Order. This intervention is far too long.
Mr. Gummer:
I will not follow that line because of what you have said, Mr. Deputy Speaker, but it is all very well for Labour Members to believe that this is a convenient time at which to point out that, because of their majority, they can make such decisions. I say to my right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field)--who is my pair and who kindly described me in such terms--that it is true that the Government could carry through any measure they liked. However,
The Leader of the House would do her side much more good if, instead of smiling away on the Front Bench, she seriously asked herself whether local authorities were not important enough for the debate to continue, if necessary, in government time tomorrow and the day after. If she would give us that open-ended commitment, we would be happy to go home now and to continue tomorrow and the day after. In the meantime, she must accept that the House is the place where those issues should and need to be debated, because that is what democracy is about.
Mr. Douglas Hogg (Sleaford and North Hykeham):
Will my right hon. Friend emphasise that the position of Leader of the House is more than that of a Minister? The Leader of the House has an obligation to the House as a whole.
Mr. Gummer:
I could emphasise that, but the present Leader of the House has rarely displayed that part of her role. I would like her to do so, but I have not so far seen it. Therefore, rather than appeal to that part of her role, I appeal to something that should be deep in her heart: a commitment to democracy. This is about local government. As, I think, the longest-serving local government Minister in the House, I do not remember not being willing to listen to her on democracy in local government. I sat through her speeches time and again.
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