CORRECTED TRANSCRIPT

HOUSE OF COMMONS

REPRESENTATIONS

MADE BEFORE THE

BACKBENCH BUSINESS COMMITTEE

BACKBENCH DEBATES

TUESDAY 21 OCTOBER 2014

STEVE BAKER

ANNETTE BROOKE

JEREMY CORBYN and DR JULIAN LEWIS

USE OF THE TRANSCRIPT

Representations made before the

Backbench Business Committee

on Tuesday 21 October 2014

Members present:

Natascha Engel (Chair)

Mr David Amess

Mr David Anderson

Bob Blackman

Oliver Colvile

John Hemming

Ian Mearns

Steve Baker made representations.

Q1 Chair: We are going to try to go very quickly today, because most Members present are in between Bill Committee sittings. Steve, would you like to make your bid for three hours in the Chamber on money creation and society?

Steve Baker: Madam Chairman, thank you very much. I believe that the subject is important, topical and will command broad support. I would like to apologise that the lead Members have not been able to join me-I think they are all keenly interested in Member recall-but if I may, I would like to add David Davis’s name to the list of lead Members.

The subject is important because quantitative easing is widely understood to be the process of creating money. In a paper on the distributional effects of asset purchases, the Bank of England has explained that it has pushed up a range of asset prices, including equities. The report states: "In fact, the Bank’s assessment is that asset purchases have pushed up the price of equities by at least as much as they have pushed up the price of gilts."

Q2 Chair: Steve, all this will be explored in the debate. All we are really after is what it is that you want-do you have a votable motion? Does it have to be in the Chamber?

Steve Baker: I beg your pardon. I am just trying to put into context why it is important. I want to finish the point very briefly. If QE has pumped up the price of financial assets that are overwhelmingly in the hands of a small number of people, then it has widened wealth distribution unjustly. I could talk you through the normal process of credit creation, but I will simply say that the money supply increased threefold under the previous Government.

I believe that this is a problem that is absolutely at the heart of our society and what is wrong with our economy. The organisation Positive Money has helped me to campaign on this issue, and it believes that more than 20 MPs are prepared to talk about the issue. I would like a general debate on money creation and society, because there are a wide range of solutions to the problem, such that it is very difficult to get enough agreement to ask for a votable motion. I want it to be on money creation and society to flesh out both the problem and the range of possible solutions. I know, for example, that I am unlikely to agree with Caroline Lucas, who is a co-sponsor.

Q3 Chair: Great. As you know, we normally have Thursdays allocated to us; are there any days on which you would be unable to participate in such a debate?

Steve Baker: No; I would make whatever arrangements were necessary to speak in such a debate.

Chair: That’s great.

Q4 John Hemming: Would you refuse Westminster Hall?

Steve Baker: I think we would. The last time this subject was debated was in 1844 in connection with the Bank Charter Act. Since it is a subject that we believe goes to the heart of the way our society works, I think that the Chamber would be appropriate.

Q5 John Hemming: I am not denying the importance of it, I am just checking whether, if we have Westminster Hall, we should not offer it to you because you will not accept it.

Steve Baker: I would ask you not to.

Chair: That’s fantastic. Thank you very much. We will let you know as soon as we can. We schedule a week in advance, so we will let you know the week in which we do it.

Steve Baker: Thank you.

Annette Brooke made representations.

Q6 Chair: Annette, you have come back to us. We have had a debate on park homes before, so could you let us know what it is you are here with today?

Annette Brooke: The last time we had a Back-Bench park homes debate was a forerunner to our achieving legislation, so perhaps that debate was significant.

Most Members present will be familiar with the many problems faced by a very vulnerable group of people. I am here today because the park home owners have moved their campaign on further. They want the 10% commission that they have to pay on the sale of their properties to be reviewed. They put very strongly the viewpoint: who else in this world has to pay 10% to the leaseholder-the site owner, in this case? So there is an issue. I am calling for a review, not outright condemnation of this practice, because site owners must get a reasonable return on their capital and we want to encourage good site owners.

The other issue is that if the site owners do not get the money from the commission, they might put up the pitch fees, which would be a great hardship now. On the other hand, there is a real feeling of injustice.

Q7 Chair: That is great and all these things will be explored in the debate. In terms of your debate, you have got a votable motion and you are asking for 90 minutes. Do you think that that will be enough?

Annette Brooke: I think so. I am afraid that I have become nervous about whether sufficient MPs will stay behind on a Thursday. A large number of MPs have been approached by the campaign and they say that they do support it, that is true. But I feel that the main thing is to have a vote, because that would mean that this review would start now, in this Parliament, and then it could be implemented subsequently. If it is tossed off until the next Parliament, these poor park home owners will be left in limbo for ever.

Q8 Mr Anderson: Do you think you have got enough speakers? You said that people might not stay around and you have named only six people. Do you think that you have enough for a 90-minute debate?

Annette Brooke: I am fairly confident that the park home owners will be lobbying their MPs to attend. The debate that we had before on the Floor of the House was absolutely packed out, so I do not have a doubt about having sufficient speakers for 90 minutes, but I do worry for three hours.

Q9 Chair: To follow on from that, could you see whether you could rustle up a few more names of people who would participate? You have got a good number for 90 minutes, but it is possible that the interest will be greater.

Annette Brooke: I can certainly do that, because I am really looking for a debate in November. One of the issues was that a number of people who spoke in the last debate have become PPSs and so on and they did not seem to be prepared to sign up.

Q10 Bob Blackman: I freely confess that I knew nothing about park homes before I was elected, but, having done a detailed inquiry on them in the Communities and Local Government Committee, I consider myself to be a reasonable expert on the subject now. I have a slight concern about your motion, because you are talking about a review of the fees but then, quite rightly, you talk about pitch charges and so on. I wonder whether it should be recast to look at all the aspects so that the review is not limited just to the commission, but looks at all aspects of charges that site owners and individuals face. It would be helpful for us as a Committee to know that the motion was all-encompassing to start with, so that you do not potentially get to the position, which sometimes happens, where the motion is moved and then there are amendments and so on.

Annette Brooke: The 2013 legislation has introduced some transparency as far as the pitch fees are concerned: newcomers know what they are signing up to. It is a huge problem and there is great variation.

Bob Blackman: I know.

Annette Brooke: I think I would be happy to do that. That would probably be very off-putting for some of the site owners, but monthly pitch fees range from something like £40 to more than £300, which is incredible.

Q11 Bob Blackman: I understand the detail. What I am saying is, from our perspective, it is best to have a motion that is either all-encompassing or on the specific issue. If that is all you want to debate, that is fine, but if you want to go into the wider range of issues for a review, an all-encompassing motion should be considered. For example, you might want to throw in a review of the 2013 legislation and so on.

Annette Brooke: That is not appropriate at this point and that is why I was leaving the pitch fees out. We really want to bottom out exactly what this commission is charged for. I think that it would work, but inevitably during the debate the pitch fees will be mentioned, so I am in the hands of the Committee on that.

Q12 Chair: If we could give you Thursday 30 October-not this Thursday, but the Thursday after-in the Chamber, could you take that? I know you said you would rather have something in November, but could you take that?

Annette Brooke: I think I could, yes.

Chair: That is all we need to know. Thank you, Annette.

Jeremy Corbyn and Dr Julian Lewis made representations.

Q13 Chair: I have "Renewal of US-UK Mutual Defence Agreement" as a general debate in Westminster Hall or the Chamber for three hours.

Jeremy Corbyn: Briefly, the mutual defence agreement was set up in 1958 between Britain and the USA for sharing and exchanging nuclear information. It is renewed every 10 years. The US Congress and Senate debate it every 10 years and, indeed, have debated it recently and agreed to its renewal. The only time it was ever debated in the British Parliament was when our former colleague Alan Simpson, in those wonderful late-night Consolidated Fund Bill debates-this was before you came here, I think. They used to go on all night, and he got a debate on the mutual defence agreement at 2 o’clock in the morning or something like that-maybe even later. In 2004, there was no debate at all, and the agreement is now coming up for renewal. I have, as you know, raised it-

Q14 Chair: When does it come up for renewal?

Jeremy Corbyn: This year. It has to be endorsed by the end of the year. I have raised it in business questions. I have also had correspondence with the Minister about it. No time has been allocated for debate by Government, and there are no signs of the order being laid yet. My suspicion is that the order will be laid very late in the year and will expire without any proper parliamentary debate or scrutiny, so although Julian and I have slightly different views of the world and nuclear weapons-I think he wants them; I don’t. That is, roughly speaking, the situation. Is that right? Is that fair?

Dr Lewis: indicated assent.

Jeremy Corbyn: I think it’s a fair summary. Despite that, we absolutely agree on the importance of parliamentary scrutiny of something that is of fundamental importance. It goes beyond renewal of Trident or otherwise. This is about sharing nuclear information with another major country and it should be debated in Parliament. It is our job to scrutinise.

Q15 Ian Mearns: So do you think we should have a debate first about whether we should have a debate?

Jeremy Corbyn: We can always do that if you want to give me two bites of the cherry. We would never say no to a second cherry!

Chair: Julian, would you like to add something?

Dr Lewis: The importance of this is that the future of the British nuclear deterrent will now be decided early in the next Parliament and it depends on a number of components. One of them was having a base, and the Scottish referendum has decided that. Another is having the technology and co-operation of the United States, and that is what this agreement was signed in 1958 to provide for. Therefore, given that the issue itself is one that we both believe, from our opposite perspectives, is worthy of being debated because we both believe that the case needs to be made before such a momentous and expensive decision is taken as to renewal of the deterrent, we feel that it is in the interests of better informing the public about the issues at stake to ensure that this does not go through on the nod but is properly scrutinised. And there is no truth in the rumour that we are planning a parliamentary job share in the future!

Chair: That is a real pity.

Q16 Mr Amess: Jeremy, I think this is a really good idea. Obviously, when it started, the overwhelming majority of MPs were not in Parliament, so I think this would be a good exercise.

Jeremy Corbyn: In fact, no MPs currently in Parliament were here in 1958.

Q17 Chair: Not even Peter Tapsell?

Jeremy Corbyn: Peter Tapsell came in 1959.

Ian Mearns: There you go.

Q18 Mr Amess: Other than Julian, would any other Conservatives support this?

Jeremy Corbyn: Conservatives, so far, are not very keen on supporting the debate-apart from Julian. I suspect that a number of people with enormous defence and military interests, in a parliamentary sense, would want to take part when a debate appears. I have no worries about the all-party nature of contributions to the debate.

Q19 Mr Amess: I am sure there will be plenty but, to support the allocation of time, do you think that others will support it?

Jeremy Corbyn: Julian might know better than me, but I think they would.

Dr Lewis: I would be very surprised if there were not people who wanted to fly the flag proudly and say why they believe that this agreement is necessary, given the importance of the transatlantic link between our two countries.

Q20 Chair: We insist that we have a good cross-section of names, so could you bring us more of those Conservative names? We have had this issue before where people have not signed up because they are against the motion but are for the debate. It needs to be made clear that people are not signing up to the motion but to take part in the debate.

Jeremy Corbyn: That is a very good point. Some of the Conservatives I approached by e-mail probably thought that they were signing up to a motion, whereas they are signing up to debate a subject. Some of our colleagues need educating about the role of the Backbench Business Committee.

Q21 Chair: You can do so.

Jeremy Corbyn: You do a great job, but I do not think they understand that we come here to apply for a debate; we are not here to argue the case. I could stay here all day arguing with Julian, if you want a taster.

Chair: I look forward to hearing it.

Q22 Oliver Colvile: As the Member of Parliament who represents the one naval base that has a nuclear licence for the refitting and refuelling of the nuclear submarines, I am very willing to put my name down. Are you thinking of having a vote at the end of the debate? How long do you think the debate would go on for?

Jeremy Corbyn: We put in for three hours. Obviously, it is up to you to decide how long is appropriate. If we get the three hours, my feeling is that those who have already signed the motion-albeit mostly Opposition Members-would want to take part. I think Julian is right that if the motion is put down for debate, a considerable number more will want to take part-people such as yourself, who have a constituency interest in it. We have asked for three hours but it is up to you whether we get an hour and a half, three hours or none.

Dr Lewis: It is worth mentioning that Jeremy and I have secured debates in the past in the Chamber on the future of Trident and in Westminster Hall on the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. Both were pretty well attended and both sides of the argument were well represented.

Q23 Oliver Colvile: Anther point is that the Liberal Democrats have consistently been somewhat opposed to the nuclear deterrent. It will be very interesting to see whether that item is under discussion when the coalition discussions might or might not take place. I hope they will not.

Q24 Bob Blackman: Is your application for a general debate, not a votable motion?

Jeremy Corbyn: It is a general debate.

Q25 Chair: In which case, I think you will find it quite easy to find Tories who will take part in the debate. If you could get us names as quickly as possible, that would be really helpful.

Jeremy Corbyn: We have one.

Q26 Chair: Brilliant. We will let you know as soon as we have time available. We generally have the debates on Thursdays. Are there any Thursdays on which you would be unable to have the debate?

Dr Lewis: What time would they start on a Thursday? My Committee meet on Thursdays.

Q27 Chair: They normally start at either 11.30 am or 12.30 pm.

Jeremy Corbyn: The practice is normally 12.30 pm.

Q28 Chair: It depends whether it is the first or second debate.

Dr Lewis: Can I put in a bid for it to be the second debate, because of the Intelligence and Security Committee?

Chair: We normally put general debates at the end. Brilliant. Thank you for coming.