Business of the House

Will the Leader of the House give us the forthcoming business?

The business for the week commencing 24 February includes:

Monday 24 February—Remaining stages of the Crown Estate Bill [Lords].

Tuesday 25 February—Second Reading of the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (Transfer of Functions etc) Bill [Lords].

Wednesday 26 February—Opposition day (5th allotted day). Debate on a motion in the name of the official Opposition, subject to be announced.

Thursday 27 February—General debate on the third anniversary of the war in Ukraine, followed by a general debate on St David’s day. The subjects for these debates were determined by the Backbench Business Committee.

Friday 28 February—The House will not be sitting.

The provisional business for the week commencing 3 March will include:

Monday 3 March—Remaining stages of the Finance Bill.

Tuesday 4 March—All stages of the Church of Scotland (Lord High Commissioner) Bill.

Wednesday 5 March—Estimates day (1st allotted day). At 7 pm the House will be asked to agree all outstanding estimates.

Thursday 6 March—Business to be determined by the Backbench Business Committee.

Friday 7 March—Private Members’ Bills.

Like some of our leading podcasters, we love a storm cloud or two in business questions. Sure enough, the poor Government have been desperately hoping that recent events in America would drive the storm clouds away from the UK economy. Even though the news from Washington DC has been startling, to say the least, it has not been enough to dispel yet another week of adverse economic headlines. Both the Office for Budget Responsibility and the Bank of England have reportedly downgraded their growth forecasts, the latter cutting its by half, to a measly 0.75% for the year. So much for the Chancellor’s much-vaunted dash for growth.

Meanwhile, the National Institute of Economic and Social Research has reported that “zero fiscal headroom remains” to deal with any shocks, in the same week that President Trump has announced 25% tariffs on steel. It is easy to see what has happened here: Labour never expected President Trump to win. It sent a team over to campaign for his opponent. The Government passed an anti-growth Budget, and they did not build enough leeway into their financial planning. Indeed, the Chancellor promised no new taxes or spending. Now we are having to live with the consequences.

It was also hard to miss the continuing controversy that the Attorney General is creating, and harder still not to notice the extremely critical words of his Labour colleague, Lord Glasman. I do not propose to repeat those words here, but they point to two issues that demand this House’s full and proper attention. In both cases, the concern is not over the legal positions taken by the Attorney General as such, but the contradictions that they offer to the rest of Government policy. People can agree or disagree about the policy, but the contradictions cannot be fudged. They cannot be blamed on others, and they require explanation.

The first contradiction is in relation to international law. On 3 February, the Attorney General told the Council of Europe that the Government would

May I first update the House on the work of the Modernisation Committee, which I chair? We established the Committee to rebuild trust in politics, raise standards, improve culture and make Parliament more effective. In recent years, the role of an MP has changed significantly, with many more demands and expectations in the constituency. The make-up of the Commons has changed a great deal too; many more parties are represented and Members better reflect the country we serve. So how we do things needs to change, too. I thank all of those who contributed to our wide-ranging call for views.

Work is already under way, with the Standards Committee’s inquiry on Members’ outside employment and the Procedure Committee’s inquiry on proxy votes and call lists. Today, we have set out three further areas for consideration: improving accessibility; ensuring that the Chamber remains the crucible of national debate; and how we can provide more certainty on parliamentary business.

The right hon. Gentleman raised a number of points and gave a list of economic statistics. I might give him some alternative ones, if I may. Inflation is down, mortgage rates are coming down, wages are growing at their fastest rate in three years, business investment is at the highest level for 19 years, and the International Monetary Fund and the OECD are both saying that Britain will be Europe’s fastest growing major economy in coming years. He supported the former Prime Minister —not the right hon. Member for Richmond and Northallerton (Rishi Sunak), who is in his place, but the one who crashed the economy and sent mortgage rates flying and inflation to record highs—so I will not take lectures from him.

Yet again, the right hon. Gentleman raised the Attorney General. Quite honestly, the way in which the Conservatives and their friends in the right-wing media are trying to undermine the Attorney General is pathetic. They were once the party of law and order, and now they seek to undermine law and order at every turn. As someone who works closely with the Attorney General, I can tell the right hon. Gentleman that he is an asset to the Government and a formidable partner in our attempts to restore integrity to how we make and implement laws in this country. The Conservatives’ laws did not fit that remit, and that is why in many cases they never got off the ground. They were challenged time and again in the courts, wasting everyone’s time and money and not delivering the outcomes that they wanted. We will not take lectures from them on that.

Women’s centres provide vital support for women facing issues including isolation, domestic abuse, health problems and navigating the social security system, among a wide range of other support. I recently visited Stockport Women’s Centre and want to place on the record my thanks to all the staff and volunteers there who support women from across Stockport. Can we have a debate in Government time on the enormous contribution of organisations that support women in our society, in particular women’s centres across England, and on how to secure the essential funding they need to continue their important work?

I join my hon. Friend in congratulating the women’s refuge in Stockport on the work it does. He will know that this Government are committed to tackling violence against women and girls and that we want to halve those statistics over the next 10 years. That is a huge ambition and will take detailed and committed work, which I know he will join us in doing.

As we now know, local government is being reorganised, and the Labour Government have cancelled local elections while affected councils work out how on earth they will reorganise themselves. Like many residents in these areas, I would have hoped that that plan would have been in place before the elections were cancelled; many issues are very much up in the air, and the public deserve to know what they are in for.

In Woking, for example, successive Conservative administrations at the council racked up £2 billion of debt with absolutely no plan for how to pay it off. In Greater Essex, Conservative-run Thurrock ran up debts of around £1.5 billion largely due to investments in a solar farm that did not exist. With both Essex and Surrey now on the fast track for local government reorganisation, what will happen to those debts?

Last week, the Minister for Local Government and English Devolution, the hon. Member for Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton (Jim McMahon), wrote a letter to all the leaders of the two-tier councils and unitary authorities in Essex, in which he said:

“there is no proposal for council debt to be addressed centrally or written off as part of reorganisation…proposals should reflect the extent to which the implications of this can be managed locally.”

Will the Leader of the House ask the Minister to come forward with a statement to confirm that what he really means is that residents across places such as Essex and Surrey will be forced to pay for the incompetence of previous Tory administrations of other councils, and that they are likely to see reduced services and higher council tax bills simply because this Labour Government are determined to press ahead with local government reorganisation but not prepared to offer any financial support to alleviate that?

The hon. Lady raises the important issue of local government finances, and she is right to identify the mess those finances were left in by the previous Government. Many councils had to spend their reserves on statutory services, which is not what they are intended for. We saw council after council going bust month after month under the previous Government, and many more were left in severe debt, like the ones she has described.

We have given local government a significant settlement this year, but we recognise that more needs to be done. We need to fix the long-term problems; we need multi-year settlements. I know the transition will be difficult, but the devolution revolution—giving local areas more say and more powers over how they spend and raise their revenue—will, in time, lead to more secure and sustainable funding for local government. I will ensure the relevant Minister comes to this House with regular updates.

At the stroke of a pen, Tory-led Northumberland county council is about to wipe 9,000 people off the county’s housing waiting list. My office is beset by constituents in desperate need of secure and affordable accommodation, but even those in the highest priority bandings are often unable to get the housing they need. This is a simple, callous attempt to massage the huge housing list rather than deal with the issue. Can we have a debate in Government time on how to ensure that those in need of decent, affordable housing are not easily cast aside and thrown on to the scrap heap, as in the case of Northumberland county council?

I am really sorry to hear about what has happened with Northumberland county council and its housing waiting list. My hon. Friend is absolutely right to identify that waiting lists are far too high and that many people are in desperate need of affordable, social or council housing. That is why the Government are really committed to not just building 1.5 million new homes over the course of the Parliament, but ensuring that we have very many more council houses, affordable houses and social houses. We announced further plans on that this week, and I will ensure that Ministers are accountable on these matters.

I call the Chair of the Backbench Business Committee.

I remind the House that the Backbench Business Committee is taking applications for estimates day debates on 5 March, and that applications close a week tomorrow. We will then consider the applications for debates—we understand that there may be several—at our meeting on 25 February.

In addition to the business announced by the Leader of the House, on 6 March there will be a debate on International Women’s Day, followed by a debate on political finance rules. On Thursday 13 March, if we are given the time, there will be a debate on the future of farming, followed by a debate on knife crime among children and young people. On a rough calculation, with the queue of applications we have for the Chamber, we have enough business to allocate until the end of June, provided we are given every single available Thursday.

In Westminster Hall when we come back, on Tuesday 25 February there will be a debate on maternity services, followed on the Thursday by a debate on rural crime and a debate on women’s health. I will leave the other business for when we come back.

On Sunday 23 February, when we are due to come back after recess, the renowned hate preacher Mohamed Hoblos is due to speak in this country. He has been banned in Germany and Holland. The shadow Home Secretary has written to the Home Secretary asking that he be banned from this country. Given that antisemitism is at its highest peak ever and that anti-Muslim hatred is at a peak, it is clear that the last thing we want is someone coming along stirring up racial and religious hatred. Will the Leader of the House use her good offices to encourage the Home Secretary to issue a banning order to prevent this man from coming to this country?

I thank the hon. Gentleman for announcing the forthcoming Backbench Business in the Chamber and in Westminster Hall. I am sure he will understand that I cannot guarantee him every Thursday between now and the end of June, but we have been allocating Backbench Business debates regularly and often, and hopefully they will be filled in the usual way. I am really glad to hear about the debate on International Women’s Day, which he and I have discussed. I will let colleagues know about this more formally, but we are hoping to arrange to get all the women Members of the House together for a photo in the Chamber to mark International Women’s Day.

Which I have not approved, but I will do now!

Sorry, Mr Speaker. That is why I am not formally announcing it, but saying that we are hoping to. I am gently lobbying for it through your good offices, thank you very much indeed.

The hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) raises a serious matter, as he often does, about how we tackle antisemitism and hate speech, and how we take action to ensure that those who are spreading hate and antisemitism are prevented from doing so. I shall certainly raise the matter with the Home Secretary and make sure that he gets a full response.

This week I was visited by some constituents as part of the Board of Deputies of British Jews parliamentary advocacy day. We talked about how great our local multi-faith forum is, and it was suggested that we should have a British-Jewish culture month to celebrate all the multicultural elements and diversity in the Jewish community. One constituent said to me, “You could have two Jewish people in the room and three different opinions.” Would it not be wonderful if we could have that culture month, and could we perhaps spend some Government time discussing it?

I am very pleased that my hon. Friend had such a good meeting with the Board of Deputies, and I thank her for all the work that she does—along with other Members on both sides of the House—to organise multi-faith gatherings and bring people together. She is right to refer to the fantastic contribution that the Jewish community have long made, and continue to make, at the heart of our country, and I am sure that others will support her call for a British-Jewish culture month.