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Mr. George Osborne (Tatton): Cannot the Minister see that his golden thread of cruelty and utility has completely unravelled, and that his hard work in trying to produce a compromise Bill has failed? Last night, his Bill was lost and if he honoured his job, the Minister would simply resign.
Alun Michael: The hon. Gentleman merely repeats a few lines that he has tried already. I urge him to keep on practising, and he might get somewhere with them. I have made clear the purpose of a procedural resolution to deal with promises given to the House last night about how we would respect the motion decided by the House.
Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Cotswold): The right hon. Gentleman will recall that as long ago as last July I took a very high-powered delegation [Hon. Members: "Ooh"] to see him about the Bill. He gave an absolute assurance then that he would produce a Bill based on the principles of scientific evidence, cruelty and utility. He went through the process of hearings at Portcullis
House, Second Reading, then six weeks in Committee in an attempt to produce a Bill on that basis. He now proposes under the programme motion tonight—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I do not see much connection between what the hon. Member is saying and the motion before us. If he is about to come on to it, it has been a very long preface.
Mr. Clifton-Brown: Having gone through all that procedure, the Minister now expects a totally different Bill to pass through Committee in just one day, or is he expecting members of the Committee to sit throughout the weekend? Is that reasonable under the circumstances?
Alun Michael: Yes, it is reasonable. Indeed, I compliment the hon. Gentleman for tracing through the integrity of the process that led to the Bill being put before this House and then considered in Committee. Last night, the House voted overwhelmingly in favour of an amendment, and I respect the decision that was taken, so I am proposing procedure that will allow the Committee and the House to amend the Bill to make it consistent with last night's decision.
Mr. Soames: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Last night the right hon. Gentleman told the House that the Bill was now defective and required to be submitted to Committee to consolidate the Bill and reinstate it. Is it not therefore in order for the Committee to have the equivalent or same amount of time to examine what is effectively a new Bill, rather than have it railroaded through in an unjust and corrupt parliamentary manner?
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. There is no real point of order in what the hon. Gentleman says. The House took a decision on recommital and we now have a motion before us. There may be different opinions about it, but it is a matter for debate, not a point of order for the Chair.
Mr. Luff: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Is it in order for a Minister of the Crown to prejudge the work of the Programming Sub-Committee tomorrow by effectively instructing that Committee to complete its work in one day?
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I have heard many things ascribed to Ministers of the Crown in my time in this House. I do not believe that any attempt can be made to presume, in effect, what the Committee itself will decide to do.
Alun Michael: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. In response to the hon. Member for Mid-Sussex, I should say that I did say that there were defects in the Bill as a result of the passing of new clause 11 last night. That is why we undertook recommittal. That is why I propose a process that will enable us to deal expeditiously with all those defects and bring back to the House, in short order, as promised yesterday, a Bill that is coherent and which deals with all the outstanding issues.
Mr. Soames: The right hon. Gentleman made play during the Committee stage of his promise that this
would be a fair and open process. He was defeated last night and he now intends to railroad through in a day what we took 100 hours to do. Will he reconsider and allow the Committee a minimum of two days?
Alun Michael: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his contribution as a fine thespian. I can be certain that he asks for another 100 hours in Committee in the sure knowledge that he will not be granted them.There are clear reasons for tidying up the Bill. We respect the will of the House. The process before us will allow that to be done, and that is the beginning and end of the matter.
Bob Spink (Castle Point): Will the Minister remove all invective from the debate and instead consider coldly and clearly that we are talking about a Bill that will criminalise a group of people? How can we do that in one day in Committee, given the complete Horlicks that he has presented to us?
Alun Michael: I have always thought it unwise to say "criminalise" in that way. Someone becomes a criminal only when he breaks the law. We keep being told that these are law-abiding people; they will have the opportunity to show it.
Dr. Nick Palmer (Broxtowe): A constituent has been pressing me for some time with extreme scepticism about the Government's intentions, and I have always told him that he can rely on the Government to follow the will of the House. He apologised to me today when he heard that the Minister intended tonight to present a new programme motion, and he asked me to tell my right hon. Friend that his faith in democracy had been restored.
Alun Michael: I am delighted to hear that.
Alun Michael: I give way to the hon. Member for St. Ives (Andrew George).
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. May I point out to the Minister that this is not Question Time, and we hope that there may be some other contributions to the debate? I call Mr. George.
Andrew George (St. Ives): Does the Minister agree that many people have repeated many points in our debates and doubtless will want to rehearse them once again? Does he agree that it will be important in the Committee to take a raft of amendments and not to reopen individual issues? I have to say that I did not agree with what we did last night, but we must face the prospect of making sure that we have a watertight Bill that has internal integrity, and that is what we are trying to achieve.
Alun Michael: The hon. Gentleman has played a significant part in debating the issues properly in Committee, which Conservative Members have singularly failed to do. He is right: there will be limited amendments along the lines proposed by the House, and they will respect the will of the House.
I have responded as generously as I thought appropriate to many Members of the House because I wanted to respect and deal with any points that they wished to raise. However, in view of what you have said, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I think it would be sensible of me to urge the House to support the programme motion and leave my remarks at that.
10.54 pm
Mr. David Lidington (Aylesbury): The Minister described the events of last night in terms of the House of Commons having made a choice between the Government's proposal, which had been through all parliamentary stages, and the option presented by the hon. Member for West Ham (Mr. Banks). In presenting his case in that way, the Minister elided reality; he seemed almost to be trying to tell the House that, all along, we had been presented with two options between which we could come to a cool and rational decision. That was something like the process that the Government adopted in the last Parliament over the so-called options Bill, when the House made its choice, after a debate, from the three options offered by the Government, and proceeded to detailed scrutiny in Committee and on Report of the single option that it preferred.
By contrast, after last night's shambles, we are left with a situation in which the House has given some detailed scrutiny to the Government's proposals, embodied in their original Bill, but has been given no opportunity to apply comparable scrutiny to the proposal made by the hon. Member for West Ham, which now forms the kernel of the Bill, as amended by the Commons last night. We have before us a programme motion that is draconian, even by the standards of this Administration. We are told that Committee proceedings must finish by next Monday, 7 July. The wording of paragraph 1 of the motion implies that the Committee will commence its sittings on an earlier date.
That gives rise immediately to an issue on the selection of amendments which I ask you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, to bring to the attention of Mr. Speaker. If the Standing Committee were to sit for the first time on Thursday, any amendments would need to be tabled tonight in order to be unstarred for selection by the day after tomorrow. I hope that, in view of paragraph 1, Mr. Speaker and the Committee Chairman will use their discretion to protect the rights not only of Opposition parties but also of Back-Bench members of the Committee on both sides of the House.
Mr. Garnier: There is a further problem. As the Committee is being reformed at short notice, a number of us—[Interruption.] Quite apart from the intellectual deficiencies of Labour Members, a number of us will be attending other Standing Committees, which may preclude our attending the Committee—[Interruption.]
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