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30 Jan 2003 : Column 1010—continued

Mr. Forth: I am, as ever, grateful to the Leader of the House for giving us the business.

Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Treasury Select Committee said in its report of 16 January:

"It would be helpful for the Chancellor to announce the date of the Budget as far in advance as possible (at least two months)"?

That has not happened yet. I rather hope that the Leader of the House may tell us something today about the date of the Budget. What is going wrong? Why have we not been told about the Budget? Is it because the Chancellor is worried that the economy is running into rather choppy waters and is not happy about what he might say? Can the Leader of the House please help us in this matter? If the Treasury Select Committee says that it believes that we should receive proper notice of the Budget, I hope that the Government will pay some attention. Time is already effectively running out.

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In the context of the Budget, can the Leader of the House give the Deputy Prime Minister an opportunity to come to the House again to clarify what he said the other day:

"On the cost of the dispute, I told the Select Committee that I thought that it was about £5 million, although there are other estimates. However, it is probably something like £1 million a day, but we have to pay more if we are using troops during the dispute, so it may well be £2 million a day. There are negotiations between different Departments, and various costs are involved, so I hope that the right hon. Gentleman accepts that I cannot be precise. However, I have said that the net cost to the Department is £70 million; if other Departments are included, it is about £100 million, which is a considerable sum"? [Official Report, 28 January 2003; Vol. 398, c. 723.]

I am sure that the Deputy Prime Minister was trying to be helpful to the House, but it would be even more helpful if he were properly briefed and then returned to the House to tell us what the devil that all meant.

You have just stated yet again, Mr. Speaker, your firmly held views on Ministers allowing information to get out into the public domain before Ministers come to the House. Yet again it has happened today. I heard on my radio this morning in some detail what was going to happen about the aircraft carrier statement this afternoon. I heard talk of 2,000 jobs. I heard talk of 10,000 jobs being saved. I heard specific references to shipyards. I heard that this very important contract would be divided between BAE and Thales.

I suppose that the Leader of the House will tell me that that is all idle speculation, and that somehow it was nothing to do with Ministers. But the sad truth is, Mr. Speaker, that in spite of what you have said repeatedly, this is happening over and over again, and it is the Ministry of Defence that is doing it on nearly every occasion. I hope that the Leader of the House will tell us what on earth he or the Prime Minister, or both of them, will do to the Secretary of State for Defence about his disrespect for the House. He is now a recidivist and a serial offender, and it is time something pretty drastic was done about it.

There is a business motion on the Order Paper today which seeks to limit the debate on 4 February in order to allow the House to start voting at 5 pm. I am not sure that I see the point of that. I do not see why we cannot vote at the end of business at 7 pm. We used to do it after 10 pm, after all, so I am not sure why we cannot have our Divisions after 7 pm. We need additional time even more now to clarify just what is going on on the vital issue of the reform of the House of Lords at the highest level of Government.

Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire): Common sense has prevailed.

Mr. Forth: On 23 January, at column 441, the Leader of the House said that

"finding common ground with others on where the best compromise can be found with the largest support for the form of the Chamber"

is a priority. He went on to say:

"I would be surprised if that compromise did not require some form of mixed membership."

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He went on to say:

"It is not my impression that that White Paper was unpopular because it proposed 20 per cent. elected members; the difficulty with public opinion was in relation to the 80 per cent. appointed. I am doubtful about whether we will remove these anxieties on the part of public opinion by going for 100 per cent. appointed."—[Official Report, 23 January 2003; Vol. 398, c. 441.]

You can imagine my surprise when just yesterday, at column 877, the Prime Minister said:

"Do we want an elected House, or do we want an appointed House? I personally think that a hybrid between the two is wrong and will not work."—[Official Report, 29 January 2003; Vol. 398, c. 877.]

Hold on a minute—I thought that the Leader of the House said that some form of mixed membership was the most desirable outcome. I am worried about the way in which that matter is progressing—or not. At the highest level of government the Prime Minister is saying one thing—[Interruption.] Before Government Members get too excited about the free vote—I am grateful that we are to have such a vote—I remind them that the Labour manifesto in 2001 said:

"We are committed to completing House of Lords reform . . . to make it more representative and democratic".

I believe that we need more time for next week's debate and that a business motion should not truncate the debate at 5 o'clock because I want to hear the Prime Minister explain how his manifesto commitment to a democratic upper House can be fulfilled by his obvious desire for an appointed upper House—that seems rather difficult to explain. Perhaps the Leader of the House will tell us who is more true to the manifesto—the Prime Minister or him. Finally, to whom should Labour Members now look for guidance on the issue—to the Prime Minister, the Leader of the House or their conscience?

Mr. Cook: I anticipate that the House will be interested in the last passage quoted by the right hon. Gentleman so, if he will forgive me, I will canter quickly through his other points, which were merely the preamble to that point.

Mr. John Bercow (Buckingham): Eat it slower.

Mr. Cook: The hon. Gentleman's advice is always welcome but, on this occasion, I shall disregard it.

On the date of the Budget, nothing has gone wrong. It would be unusual if it had been announced in January. Indeed, may I tell the right hon. Gentleman that so well has the Chancellor of the Exchequer done in managing a sound economy in Britain that we look forward with anticipation to him having a further opportunity to remind the Opposition that we have the lowest unemployment in Europe, the lowest inflation for 40 years and the highest growth rate of the G7 countries.

On the comments about the cost of the fire dispute, I would not have thought that there would be a dispute between the two Front Benches about the fact that the fire dispute necessarily costs a considerable sum of money. I myself have repeatedly heard the Deputy Prime Minister refer to a sum of about £100 million so far. All Members should bear in mind the fact that that £100 million is coming out of other parts of the Deputy Prime Minister's budget, at the expense of regeneration

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budgets, expenditure in deprived communities and people who are not well-placed to pay in return for the continuation of the dispute. I therefore hope that the Opposition agree with us that it is best to resolve the matter as quickly as possible and get a solution to the dispute.

On the issue of ministerial statements, I remind the right hon. Gentleman that we live in a free country and that this is the real world. In a procurement decision, there will be lots of people, including those in industry, not just in the Department, who know what is going on. There is sometimes humbug from members of the press who complain that they are being leaked to, as they themselves tour Britain, breaking legs if necessary, to get advance notice of an announcement. I fully understand the importance of Ministers making the announcement of policy first in the House. I welcome the fact that in his statement Mr. Speaker has just said that he believes that Ministers should seek to comply with that, and I assure the House that I shall do all that I can to reinforce that message.

On the last matter that the right hon. Gentleman raised—which, I must confess, I had anticipated would come higher in his order of priorities in the questions that he put to me—my understanding is that the Prime Minister will not be able to join us on Tuesday. That is no doubt a matter of great disappointment to the Opposition as it is to me, but as the Prime Minister said yesterday, it is a free vote. As he correctly identified yesterday, there are a range of views on the matter. The right hon. Gentleman is correct: my own view is that what went wrong with the last White Paper was that the figure of 20 per cent. elected did not command public confidence, nor, as far as I could see, would it have commanded a majority in the House of Commons.

It is my personal and very humble opinion that by removing the 20 per cent. elected element and substituting zero, we will not restore the public confidence that was missing the first time round. I fully agree with the Prime Minister that we do not want a second Chamber that is a rival to this place. We want a second Chamber that is a partner to this place in restoring respect for Parliament and making sure that we command the nation's attention when we speak. To have a partner who can assist us in the task of restoring the standing of Parliament, we need a second Chamber that is legitimate, and as our manifesto correctly identified, to be legitimate in the modern era, it needs to be democratic. To be democratic, some, at least, of its Members need to be elected.

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